Earlier this week, CHS reported on some bike thievery in the neighborhood including the rip-off of one woman’s bike as she attended class at Seattle Central on Tuesday night. It’s a tale of a great web site (not CHS!), bad drugs and a good guy named Cruz. Here are the details (via boyfriend Michael) of how Naomi got her bike back:
Awesome people DO exist and go out of their way to help strangers. Today, we celebrate a dude named Cruz. Yesterday, Cruz was walking downtown when he overheard a few tweakers selling a black Surly Long Haul Trucker for $40 ($40!!!). Being the righteous dude that he is, Cruz realized that the bike was probably stolen, bought the bike from the tweakers, went home and searched for the stolen bike registry (where Naomi had posted her stolen bike) and reached out to Naomi last night to arrange a meeting at Counterbalance Bikes in the U District to hand off the bike. While it was stripped of its fenders and racks, the bike was the same condition she left it.
Hurray, nice people rule! Cruz rules! Bike thefts suck!
The lessons here are 1) make sure to add a stolen bike to http://stolenbicycleregistry.com/ immediately and 2) be savvy like Cruz. Is 3) have a really expensive bike that will be obvious to any good samaritans? That helps, too. Though it apparently hasn’t helped the other victim from our coverage this week. Last we heard, his $10k in stolen bikes were still missing.
Well done Cruz, that’s an awesome story.
What kind of lock was used?
Also, I will raise a glass for Cruz tonight!
Way to go Cruz! I hope he got a good look at the tweakers and reported them to the police.
Hey Cruz, if you’re reading this drop me an email, I’d like to send you some free ‘death to bike thieves’ stickers for being awesome :)
And let’s not forget the real message here either – #$## tweakers. Seriously.
-bhance
-stolenbicycleregistry.com
Sorry, reading this from Australia. Would love to know what a tweaker is, would help the story make sense.
There’s been some serious bike thievery lately. If you see people doing suspicious shit to bikes don’t be afraid to call them out. If it’s the person’s bike they’ll be happy you’re concerned at least.
Can’t remember what brand/type of lock Naomi had. Will ask and post later.
Again, thanks to CHS blog for the coverage and to rad people like Cruz. Send that man some good vibes!
A tweaker is a drug addict, specifically someone who does meth.
Ummmm…. How do Naomi and Michael know (and by extension, how do we know) that Cruz isn’t the one who stole the bike in the first place? I’m just a country bumpkin, not sophisticated like some city folk, but Cruz’s story sounds cartoonish and unlikely… I need more facts to believe this story– and so should CHS.
You are kidding right? It is ok to be optimistic and feel good about stories once in a very great while. You, are a buzz kill. In your free time google Debbie Downer and Happy Friday to you. I’ll choose to believe in Cruz and hope.
That’s a fair point. Initially, I was hopeful, but skeptical. After all, how do you react to a person who calls and tells you they have your stolen bike? But when we met Cruz, there was something that appeared he was a genuinely righteous dude just trying to be to best part of someone else’s day. Obviously, there’s no evidence to prove this, but then again, I find it hard to believe that someone would resell a stolen bike to their owner at such a ridiculously low cost.
The way I see this is the tweakers got what they wanted with no bad consequences for their crime. So this one lady is happy to have her bike back, and they’re encouraged to go steal more. Did Cruz give a description of the tweakers and where they were selling to the police?
You’ve got to be kidding if you think the cops would do anything other than file a report. And that’s assuming you find a cop that cares enough to even do that…
I’ve wasted a fair amount of time on bikeforums.net, and this scenario does happen. People who know bikes or have some common sense know that some shady dude selling a good bike for dirt cheap is up to no good. I don’t want to say it is “standard practice” to buy the bike and get it back to its owner, but it is, at least, a known practice. Surly’s are nice bikes.
This happens all the time. Tweakers are common. They like their drugs more than anything else and are not willing or able to put in the time to research the actual value of the things they steal. So they make up a number that will get them their next hit. In this case $40 for a $1150 retail bicycle. Totally stupid, yes, but neither you or I are addicted to meth and are stealing to support our habit, so we still have a grip on our higher mental faculties.
Also, people buying stolen bikes to return them to owners is pretty common. Well, I’ve read about it enough to know it happens pretty frequently.
At least you admit not knowing anything about big city bike theft.
In a perfect world the cops have the resources to go after small time tweakers. In our world they have more important things to do, like standing around watching people gathering in a public park.
I have to agree with Call Me Cynical. I wouldnt be surprised at all if this guy stole the bike or was involved. I dealt with a similar situation where someone “bought” a bike from a someone else and then tried to return the bike to its owner on CL. However, he had a similar ad trying to sell my bike under a different name and asked for a reward we I inquired about the bike as its rightful owner. Turns our he was selling several stolen bikes on CL. After a prolonged investigation, I never got my bike back. Unfortunately, real life has made me a pessimist.