How I used the internet to find my stolen bicycle

‘The only difference between tragedy and comedy is time’. I’ve always felt this expression should be expanded to: ‘the only difference between tragedy (T) and comedy is time (t), to the power of proximity (P)’. Therefore:

 C = (T x t)^P

I hope you find this tragedy amusing. I should warn you that as with any cautionary tale, this bag of tricks only works under a specific set of circumstances: when the offending party is not so clever/potential shardhead, and you as a victim have a thirst for justice.

The crime

Picture a university student, working ‘till 10:50 PM on a Thursday night; not common, but not unheard of. Thinking he’s done enough reading for the night, he decides to head home. Stepping out the door into the cool summer night, he notices two items in lieu of his $1,600 mountain bicycle: his helmet, discarded on the ground indicating the villain’s disdain for safety as well as for the law, and his bicycle chain, lying dismantled and broken. ‘By golly! What a reward for working late!’ he thought sulking as he walked home in the dark, mulling over thoughts of sadness and revenge. He hoped they hadn’t ridden it home without their helmet because that is illegal in Victoria. One thought repeated over and over in his mind as he slept that night (Figure 1).

Figure 1: “He will be fined, oh yes, he will be fined”

Analysis of the scene

The first thing I did was call Campus security and fill out an incident report about what happened. The crime occurred between the hours of 8 PM (which was when security confirmed that they had seen it last) and 11 PM, when I found my bicycle gone. This was most likely the work of an amateur considering they had tried to cut through the reinforced chain, given up half way through and instead physically broke the weakest part of the chain. Ironically enough, this was the combination lock itself (Figure 2). 

2A: Picture of broken bicycle lock. The attempt the thief made cutting through the steel lock.

2B: How the thief got through the chain by breaking through instead of breaking the combination.

2C:  Close up of the combination section, which was sawed and snapped through.

Next I called the police and filled out a report. I knew statistically most stolen bikes never resurface, but I thought that I would give it a crack anyway. 

Searching for clues

Next, I went to Gumtree and Ebay, and set up search notifications both for my bicycle model, (including misspellings of my bicycle model) as well as the generic term ‘mountain bike’. This meant that I received email notifications every time a new listing appeared. Within a day the emails started piling up. I received maybe 30 emails within the week, each containing anywhere from 2 to 5,200 new bicycle listings. I scrolled through every single picture until a week later, there it was (Figure 3): elegantly resting against a corrugated iron wall on Gumtree. It was 100% my bicycle; it had the same stickers, modifications, and even still had my lights attached. Gumtree provided a first name and mobile number of the seller. The bicycle was being sold from the next suburb over from where it was stolen. Checkmate. 

Figure 3: Ad of my stolen bicycle on Gumtree, along with the potential name and number of the seller. Bullet hole stickers are cool OKAY!

My $1,600 bicycle up for sale for the sweet price of $250. The low price meant that I had to act quickly otherwise it would be sold and I would lose track of it forever. The next thing I did was call my local police station (Police Station A) and tell them that I had found the person who was selling my stolen bike. I provided the police with the website, the link and the seller’s details. I was thanked for the information and was told that police would chase it up through Gumtree, and that I should not meet with the seller. Online commerce is a time-sensitive issue, so I sent work a message that I was taking tomorrow morning off and the seller a message saying I was interested in buying the bicycle (Figure 4).

Figure 4: My thought process after being told by the police to not meet with the seller.

The meeting

We arranged to meet the next morning at 10 AM. Due to a sleep in on the seller’s part (which had me worried they were somehow telepathically onto me), we ended up meeting at 11 AM. As soon as they texted me the address (Figure 5), I called Police Station A to tell them I had the location of the stolen bicycle. I was told that because it was technically one suburb over, I should contact the nearest local station (Police Station B). Once again, I was advised against meeting the seller, and that I should not escalate, confront, or ride off on the bicycle. I called Police Station B and told them the story. They didn’t really seem interested in helping me (didn’t even ask about the street address), but advised me similarly as Police Station A had. 

Figure 5: Screenshot of text message. The seller had now given me their address and we had arranged a meetup under the guise of me buying the bicycle.

I arranged for a friend to drive me to the seller’s house, with the plan as follows: I would pretend to be interested in purchasing the bicycle but suggest that I need to take it for a ‘test ride’ to be sure. While the seller would be bamboozled by my acting skills, I would then make a majestic and triumphant escape on said bicycle, and have my friend record the entire thing on her phone.

We arrived half an hour early and saw the seller wheeling the bicycle into their side-accessible garage. We circled round the block, working out where we were going to film from. We start talking like directors of photography, storyboarding our ‘gotcha’ money-shot. I took photos of the seller’s car, number plates, house, and other car parked in the driveway. My friend parked her car facing the garage and started recording. I walked up to the door of the house. At this point, I was a little scared. My knees were shaking; I don’t normally do things like this. I took a breath and calmed myself, then knocked on the door. The seller opened the door.

The night before I went onto Facebook and searched the seller’s name and all neighbouring suburbs. Then I whittled down likely contenders, and this person was my number one pick. We started chatting and I asked them why they were selling the bicycle. They said they didn’t ride it anymore. They took me to the side of the house and opened the gate. A huge dog came running up the driveway from the backyard and my mouth went dry. I was now out of sight of my friend, in a stranger’s backyard with a large dog of questionable temperament present. I hoped the guy hadn’t picked-up on my nerves; I kept up the chatter and tried to distract them with a flurry of bike related questions. The seller opened the garage door and walked in. Evolution had given me alarm bells, legs of jelly and gut instincts that I was about to ignore. I was of my own volition walking into a dark, unfamiliar, enclosed space with two potentially threatening entities. Mind racing, I turned my head to check the dog behind me and stepped in. My eyes were instantly drawn to the bicycle. There was no doubt. This was my bicycle. It was leaning succulently against a workbench, its pedals calling out to me, its seat waiting to be reunited under the weight of my body. All the lights and the bumblebee bell I had installed were stripped off. Needless casualties in an unwanted war. My bicycle will ride in style once more I thought. Luckily the modifications were still attached, along with my sweet bullet hole stickers. 

I asked the seller if I could test ride it, as I didn’t want to buy a piece of junk that didn’t work. They accepted and opened the garage door. Score! We were now in plain view of my friend, who was recording everything from the car. I hopped on my bicycle, intent on riding off into the distance.   This dream of victory quickly faded.  The bike must have been banged around as the chain wasn’t working, and I couldn’t pedal properly. With great disappointment, I dismounted and told the seller I wasn’t interested in buying a damaged bicycle. I handed it back to him. They offered to drop the price to $100 but I declined. They then thanked me and wheeled it back into the garage. Money-shot I thought, as I smugly walked to my friend’s car, giving them a thumbs up (Figure 6). Everything had been recorded, and it clearly showed the seller taking possession of the bicycle. 

Figure 6: Screenshot of the video showing the vantage point from within my friend's car. The seller is wheeling the bicycle back into the garage after the test ride. I’m seen here giving a cheeky thumbs up to the camera. Smug as.

The chase

We drove 15 minutes directly to Police Station B to explain and show them everything including: the address of the seller’s house, the photos of the cars, the video, the seller’s Facebook account, the seller’s number and screenshots of the original Gumtree ad. The officer behind the counter is looking at us wide-eyed. We were projectile vomiting evidence at them and we could see them slowing absorbing everything. The officer then asked for the video, and they began watching it on my friend’s phone. They looked up, squinting behind us. They looked back down to the video, then back up, squinting. They did this a few more times, then asked: “Is that him?” nodding behind us. I turned around, and sure enough, the seller was peering with a bewildered look on their face, through the glass wall of the station, hands cupped around their face, blocking the glare. “Yes! That’s him!” I said, pointing like Phoenix Wright (Figure 7). “That’s him!”.

Figure 7: How I envision I looked when visually identifying the seller. In reality, I was wearing running shorts and a t-shirt. https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/aceattorney/images/b/b7/Trilogy_Phoenix_Point.png/revision/latest?cb=20140524203723 

The seller jumped back with a look of shock on their face. They then bolted down the road. The officer behind the counter starts bouncing up and down with excitement (Figure 8) and disappeared in the back for about 30 seconds. They reappeared in the station lobby scrambling into their fluorescent vest.

Tippy taps of excitement

Figure 8: The police officer looked like this. It was equally as adorable. https://i.imgur.com/DodyOgE.mp4

We ran outside en masse and were joined by another officer. The seller had started to speed off down the road in their car, only to get stuck at a red light. The officer in uniform said: “Leave him. They’re gone”. I can’t stress how much they were not “gone”. They were literally down the road, about 400 meters, stuck behind ~15 cars at a red light, going towards the traffic-packed town centre. “They’re gone, mate”.

“But we know where they’re going; back to the house to dump my bicycle!” I squeaked with no sense of conviction. Both officers returned to the station building, and my friend and I stood there, staring down the street at the seller’s car, waiting patiently for the traffic light.

As I later discovered, the seller had not been following us (as we had gathered) but was actually reporting into the police station. They were on bail and had to report in every week; it was just incredibly bad timing on their part that they ran into us at the station. However, we didn’t know that at the time, and we were feeling a little spooked at the thought of being followed.

I then asked the officer what was going to happen next. The officer told me “We’ll handle it”, then told us to head home. I believed them. Now, I know next to nothing about police procedure, but we obviously knew where they were headed; back home to destroy/get rid of my bicycle. My thinking was that a search warrant wouldn’t be required, because the seller would be moving the bicycle off the property within 10 – 15 minutes. My friend dropped me back at university (the bicycle being my primary mode of transportation, now lost to the ether) and I spent the rest of the day sitting in the lab, wondering where I’d find a spare couple of grand for a new bicycle. Would I have to start watching Breaking Bad for chemistry lessons? Did sugarbaby.com consider dudes?

The debrief

Two days later I received a phone call from the police officer I originally logged the stolen bicycle with from Police Station A, and I filled them in on what had happened. They told me I could come in and give a statement. They asked for all the data that I had collected (because the video and other information we had given to Police Station B had not been transferred). They informed me a search of the seller’s house had not happened. If the bicycle wasn’t ditched before, it surely was now. I was told that Police Station B saw it as Police Station A’s problem, so Police Station B didn’t follow up on it. The officer then told me they would go pick up the seller, interview and most likely charge them. This was the last I heard of this at this time. 

The stats

Data analysis based on the Crime Statistics Reports released annually shows some interesting trends regarding bicycle theft. Figure 9 shows a weak trend of bicycle theft rising, fluctuating between ~4,000 and ~6,000. Bicycles were stolen from two major places in 2017: residential areas (2,774), which consists of houses, apartments, back and front yards, driveways, garages and sheds, and community areas (2,502), which includes streets, schools, hospitals, train stations, carparks. 609 bicycles were stolen from shopping centres and outside retail stores.  

Figure 9: Bicycle theft over the past 9 years, represented in total stolen and rate per 100,000 population. 

Bicycle theft is a crime a thief will statistically get away with based on the downward trending formal charge rate (Figure 10). This shows that bicycle thievery is one of the least risky crimes committed each year, and it’s a strategy that thieves rely upon. Most people that get a bicycle stolen will never see it again.

Figure 10: Graph showing the clearance rate, where bicycle thieves are charged. The red line shows the clearance rate percentage. The black line shows the trend going down over time. A moderately declining trend in charge rate is occurring.

When looking at the annual Victoria Police Crime Statistics, expensive bicycles (>$1000) represent the largest proportion of the total value of stolen bicycles (Figure 11), and this trend is on the rise (after adjusting for inflation). As of the last recorded data (2013/2014), bicycles >$1000 represent 67.7% of the total value of bicycles stolen. Considering the 2013/2014 total was almost $4 million, it’s pretty astonishing. However, it’s also possible that there is reporting bias going on here, and less valuable bicycles aren’t being reported stolen.

Figure 11: Graph showing proportion of expensive bicycles stolen (>$1000) of the total value of stolen bicycles. The data shows a strong trend over time, indicating that more expensive bicycles are being stolen at a proportionately higher rate.

Combining the proportionately higher theft of more expensive bicycles with the dropping clearance rate and increasing theft rate, this is an ominous sign for cyclists. With cycling becoming more and more prevalent (29,837 trips into Melbourne in 2011/2012), cycling representing >2.3% of total transportation to work/study in 2012, and that 6.2% of Australians cycled recreationally in 2013/2014, more needs to be done to prevent/deter bicycle theft.

Bicycles are more than money though. There is overwhelming evidence that commuting via cycling has massive benefits such as reduction in traffic congestion, reduced carbon emissions, more efficient public transport, fewer traffic accidents, greater fitness (and therefore less strain on the public health system). We should be actively encouraging as much cycling and bicycle infrastructure as we can, because people will use it. We also need assurances the bicycles will be there when we get back.

I understand the police have a priority list, and scrolling through crime statistics, it seems trivial to ignore the 7,683 serious assaults and 3,162 rape cases in 2017 in Victoria alone. However, there are several low-cost strategies which could be implemented to reduce bicycle theft.

Implementable, realistic strategies

There are a number of strategies that could be employed to reduce growing bicycle theft, in order of cheapest to most expensive:

1. In residential areas, bicycles should be kept locked indoors, and not left in backyards, front yard or open garages.
2. All cyclists should become familiar with good locking practice technique including double-locking. Information stickers and sheets should be placed at bicycle racks.
3. A study in 2012 demonstrated by using a poster (Figure 11) around bicycle racks significantly reduced the number of bicycle thefts.
4. Increasing undercover bicycle racks with security cameras to reduce fly-parking (attaching to poles, and other unsuitable structures). Data collected from Camden local police indicate that 72% of bicycles stolen in 2004 – 2005 were flyparked.
5. In community spaces, indoor bicycle racks or account-based bicycle parking systems with security cameras should be invested in.  

Figure 12: Picture of the bicycle theft deterrent material placed near bicycle racks

The resolution

Just over a year later, I contacted the police and asked them if there had been any progress. I am not allowed to disseminate the contents of the email, but I was satisfied with the outcome. I was thankful for this officer’s time and effort, but I lost the thing I set out to find and that which I had in my grasp. No one but this one officer seemed like they would lift a finger to help me, even though I’d investigated and solved the crime. Reflecting on the incident, I don’t think I could have collected any more evidence or given a more compelling reason for the police to do something. Instead, their inactivity cost me something which I worked very hard to recover. I understand the police have a priority list, but given all the data I provided them, I feel it was unreasonable that nothing was done at the time.

I am still annoyed about this two years later (hence the article), because I feel let down. I was told “We’ll handle it”, and I naively believed it. As someone who has had little to no interaction with law enforcement, my natural inclination was to trust in that reassurance. I feel the work I put into tracking down my bicycle was validated by the outcome of the investigation, but I still had to buy a new bicycle.






This post wouldn't have been possible nor published at the quality it is if it weren't for a few people: Jacqui, Steph, Tom and Rhys. Cheers guys.