We want to thank Bret Dallas for the very interesting and informative talk at our February meeting. As you may recall, Bret discovered that he had been burglarized and a lot of very valuable musical equipment, as well as other items, had been stolen. He immediately called the police, his insurance company, and his girlfriend. Insurance company said, “Oh, oh. Too bad. We don’t cover that.” The police said, “We’ll keep an eye out.” So Bret got online and boo-hoo’d to Reddit and Facebook. Within a few minutes, someone let him know that his guitars had just been listed for sale at a couple of local music gear stores! So he called them up, said those are my guitars, and I’ve filed a report with the police. Bret pointed out that the music stores were also victims as they paid for the guitars but gave them back to Bret at no charge so they were out their money.
Bret also called the nearest pawn shops to his house. However, the thieves didn’t quite get away with everything. Apparently they didn’t have room to take his ladder. So they came back for it. But by this time, Bret had installed cameras! He watched the online sales groups and, sure enough, the ladder went up for sale. Bret called the number and made arrangements to meet the “salesperson” at a near-by “No-tell Motel.” He wore a body camera, got a good pic of the seller – as well as a motel-room full of stolen stuff. Bret – and the police – would not recommend that you do this. But the video was enough to convince the police to raid. And they got the guy on all kinds of charges. Also, one of the guys involved used his real ID to sell one of the guitars so he was nabbed, too.
So Bret’s advice was to
a) Make sure you have the serial numbers recorded for all your gear;
b) Take photos of every item, and photos of you with it to prove that it was yours;
c) Call the police FIRST, then call the pawn shops and music stores to alert them to the theft;
d) Count on your “community” to help you out. Let the social media people know what happened and the items that you are missing. He wouldn’t have gotten the guitars back had it not been for his “online friends.”