Is your stolen bike here or tucked away in a back room?

It’s such a helpless feeling: you know there is a crime going on and you are powerless to stop it. That’s exactly how I felt when I overheard two unkempt young men talking on the pay phone as I was getting money out of an ATM at our city’s downtown library square. The men were negotiating the sale of “a really nice Specialized bike” for the low, low price of $50, and pleading with the guy on the other end to “get down here now” to pick up the bike. I quickly called security who watched the guys leave the building, had me fill out a report, and then told me there was nothing they could do about it. Why? Simply because there would be no proof the bike was not theirs to sell. Are you kidding, me?!

Stealing bikes is sadly so easy to do that many petty criminals do it and get away with it. As reported in the San Francisco Guardian, thieves steal nearly $50 million worth of bikes each year in the United States, far outstripping the take of bank robbers, according to the FBI.

Once the bike is stolen, where does it go? Well, there is one business that is used to taking used property and making a profit on it. If you guessed “pawn shops,” you are correct! Pawn shops even have their little jokes: “It’s only been stolen once.”

When a person (substitute the word thief here, if desired) takes a bike into the pawn shop, he has to state that he is the rightful owner of the bike and wishes to sell it. He shows his ID (real or not) and gives a fingerprint and then walks off with his cash. Honest pawnbrokers will enter the data on the bike with a good description and the serial number of the bike where it will be checked out through the criminal database NCIC (National Crime Information Computer) which police across the country use. The bike should according to many state laws, be held 30 days before it can be sold. If it is reported stolen and matches the description and serial number, it will be flagged. Presumably the thief will then be tracked down and charged with “possession of stolen property” and also “theft by deception.” And the stolen bike will be returned to the rightful owner. Ah, the happy ending!

Don't we all wish this guy would come to the rescue?

The Pawn Brokers from the Dark Side

“Unfortunately, there are a lot of shady places. If they can fudge things a bit without being discovered, they will.” says Detective Doug Lambert of Salt Lake County Sheriff’s office.

Here’s a sampling from the naughty pawn broker’s bag of tricks. As the brokers enter the data into the NCIC database, they might give a very vague description of the bike and hope the owner never knew his serial number. If the bike is clear, it is then theirs to legally sell. When really valuable bikes are brought in by thieves and sold for a mere pittance of their worth to the pawn shop, they are put into a back room where only select buyers may see them, not the poor girl looking for her stolen bike at every pawnbroker in town. Such a bike will probably make its way quickly out of the area.

Okay, how should I have caught those thieves? As the saying goes, hindsight is 20/20 vision. Instead of calling security, I should have got on the library’s PA system and announced, “Will the real owner of a nice Specialized bike get down here quick before 2 guys sell it on the street for a mere 50 bucks!”

Do You Want to Keep Your Bike Out of the Hands of Petty Criminals?

Eight Tips To Keep Your Bike Safe **

1. Get a good, strong lock—expect to spend about 10% of the bike’s value. Some suggest a U-Lock and a strong cable lock used together.

2. Choose a safe location to lock up your bike in the first place (If someone is taking cable cutters or hacksaws to bike locks, they are more likely to do it out of the public eye.)

3. Don’t leave your bike (or your children’s bikes) out unprotected in the yard

4. Don’t leave your garage open for long periods of time to give a thief a quick opportunity to grab a bike and go.

5. Register your bike’s serial number and description with the National Bike Registry (at the very least, keep good records with serial number & photo of bike.)

6. License your bike in the city/county you live in.

7. If you commute into town regularly and have to lock your bike outside in a public place, don’t spend a lot on it. Many commuters keep a “beater bike” for this purpose.

8. Lock and booby-trap your bike (Loosen seat and turn it around backwards and re-tighten, put in lowest gear, etc. See more ideas here.)

**Sorry, nothing is 100% guaranteed, but these tips will increase your odds of keeping your bike safe!

Would love to hear more tips from our readers–or share your sad story of your beloved bike forever lost with us in the comments section!

Thanks to Detective Doug Lambert of the Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Office and Jonathan Morrison         of the Bicycle Collective, who I interviewed for this article.