my apartment was robbed, looking for advice

[trap15]

Woah, that's crazy Nice find

[gabe]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkcGm-pWwsQ

[Zerst]

If it does turn out that it was inside your complex then it's possible he has a key to your apartment. Please keep that in mind for your own safety.

[Jonst]

Man,I hope this works out for you,get the fucker and your stuff back! Fingers crossed...

[CMoon]

Excellent, good luck nailing 'em and hopefully retrieving your stuff.

No shit. Turning into an awesome story.

Don't forget about what Zerst said regarding your safety though.

[Deca]

I've definitely been on my toes. My roommate is back now and his girlfriend is around as well. I still haven't even been sleeping in the apartment, staying in my friends place downstairs. I want nothing more than to be moved out of that building right now, we're waiting for a call back on the house this Sunday.

[brentsg]

That's amazing cooperation from the police. I wish my experience had been so good.

My home was robbed of $1000+ by a dude who worked for the flooring company that I'd hired. They were in the house for 2+ weeks so it was difficult to keep an eye on him all the time, and of course you shouldn't need to. Once the theft was detected, he fled and some left over bits and pieces from his capers were found stuffed under the seat of his work vehicle.

So basically we knew his name and he was quite obviously guilty. The police initially issued a warrant but wouldn't go to his house, basically if he got picked up for something else this was there. But then they brought us a handful of tiny driver's license size photos of guys and told us to identify him. We couldn't b/c all the photos were of skinny people and the guilty had allegedly gained a bunch of weight over the past several years. At that, they dropped the warrant.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

We happen to have a friend that works as a sysadmin at Netflix, so we called him up immediately and he sent us back the logs straight away. They confirm that it was coming from my PS3, and list ISP and IP addresses along with timestamps for every individual show they were watching. My friend ran a traceroute on the IP and it only bounced off of 2 routers, so there's a fair chance that it's coming from inside the apartment complex.

Either they happened to sell it to someone who you can track down and find who sold it to them, or they were seriously dumb enough to use your PS3 on a network and not think it'd get traced. If it's the latter, thank goodness for idiots.

And if the thief is in your building, that's a bonus; you can push the fucker off his/her balcony.

[Mortificator]

I hope you get these assholes.

You were technically burglarized and not robbed. We all know what you mean, of course, but it could be significant for paperwork you have to fill out.

[DEL]

jonny5 wrote;

So pretty much everything they took was games/consoles? Was there nothing else to take, like did they walk past other easily stolen things and go straight for your games?

Have you had any roommates move out? Anybody with keys?

Seems a bit odd that they just took your games and nothing else. If it were me, and the door wasn't busted, I'd be looking at people that you know, as bad as that sounds.

Yes the majority of crime is an inside job. Why? Because the majority of crime is opportunistic. Who has the opportunity? -> Insiders. I can give dozens of examples, but here's just one: A pregnant woman in our office had a £170 baby present fund locked away in an office drawer, behind security guards etc, and it was stolen. Only an indsider could have done it.

The fact that they took your games & consoles only is VERY suspicious. I had a burglary that I know was perpetrated by our workers fixing our bathroom, and they didn't touch any games or consoles. They targeted what they wanted, what they KNEW was there.

My comiserations. Hope you get'em.
Always install an alarm. I recommend the Visonic PowerMax.

[xbl0x180]

First off, I agree that it's only stuff and that no harm came to you, so that's the bright side. However, I also realise it really, really sucks when someone fucks your shit up on principle. Second, this story is intriguing. It... it may just get me to start doing on-line gaming just to get the console(s) registered.

Oddly enough, I came back to the new place I'm renting to find my stereo had been switched off (I leave it on 24-hours). I thought it was a power outage, but everything else was working normally. I have bare minimum renter's insurance, so all they may cover would be part of the cost of a few of my watches.

[Deca]

No big developments from the police yet, but I knew the officer was going to be gone over the weekend.

I did, however, have a shitty development regarding what was stolen. As I was working on finding the receipt of my PS3 to put the FINAL touch on my claim list I discovered that another box was missing from my closet. I hadn't noticed immediately because I was under the assumption that it was further into the closet under another box.

That one had my DS, a white Japanese PSP1000, and my Sega Nomad in it. DS had Super Robot Taisen Original Generation 2 in the GBA port, not sure if anything was in the DS port. I need to dig through my library again I guess...PSP had Ys: Oath in Felghana. Realizing that shit was gone almost felt like I'd been robbed a second time, I was just coming to terms with shit too.

I guess there's slightly good news. Local gaming store downtown finally got a NES toploader, I'm going to pick it up on my lunch break because I need something to feel good about right now. The guys working there were actually really cool and sympathetic when I dropped off my list, I picked up some NES games and they actually gave me a couple free as well as nice clamshell cases for them.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

I hope the police get the fucker. Sorry about you finding even more stuff missing.

If someone else does have a key it might be an idea to remove what you can of value and store them at close friends or relatives if you haven't already done so that. And make a point of making sure the suspect sees you carrying the boxes so he/she know there's nothing worth for making a 2nd visit.

[Ed Oscuro]

Eh I wouldn't go through the trouble of trying to scare them off. If they try to return they might as well walk into a trap. You don't know how dangerous these people are, though, so it seems best not to push your luck.

[XoPachi]

Oh geez. I never would have thought to see a thread like this anywhere. That's despicable.

[Deca]

So at some point, somewhere, I was reading through forum posts regarding thefts and all that and someone mentioned looking through checkbooks thoroughly to see if anything was missing. I'm really glad I saw that because I would have never thought to. Last night while I was writing a rent check for my roommate (hopefully my last one in this apartment) I remembered reading that and decided to flip through. There were only a couple checks left in this book so it wasn't hard to notice that the last check and sheet under it had been removed from my checkbook.

Now it's entirely possible that I pulled them out at some point in the past for whatever reason, but my checkbook was right at the top of my desk drawer and would have been immediately obvious to anyone that opened it. There's a very good chance that whoever robbed me pulled it out of there. I've already contacted my bank and am working on getting paperwork back and forth to issue a permanent stop payment. I may end up going in to close the account and open a new one sometime soon, just to be safe...

I'm worried about how much more shit like this I'm going to find as time goes on. Yesterday at lunch MGS Ghost Babel came up in discussion and I immediately realized that I couldn't remember whether on not my stash of GB games my copy was in was still in my room. Spent the entire day stressed out and anxious until I could get home to check...Turns out they were all there and fine, but I'm just tired of going through shit like that.

In slightly better news, I spoke with my specific insurance agent from the local branch back home today. He was very friendly and easy to talk to, said he had received and looked over my claim information that was submitted. Specifically mentioned my more unique items, such as the custom PS2, that I'd been concerned about being dismissed or overlooked. He also told me that I've done a really good job so far with the amount of documentation and proof of ownership materials I've provided so far, said that I was above average in that regard so I'm a bit more optimistic on that front.

Ah well, one step at a time I guess. Anxiety/anger/other negative emotions come and go. This evening I'm heading out to visit some friends in Ohio and have a little sports car outing. I haven't had a proper day with my SVT Focus since I got the Pilot Super Sports put on, so it should be fun.

[XoPachi]

Ooooh my fucking hopscotching Christ. There is so much involved with having to worry about a burglary. This is stressing me out just reading it. Please let your next post be good news and keep us all posted in case you can get help again.

I'm glad you checked back and took action quickly regarding the bank. I hope he/she did NOT grab your social security number by chance.

[system11]

You should also have any cards which were in the house, cancelled and reissued in case the details were recorded but the cards left in place. Really annoying thieves will take mail left around to use for identity theft so it's best to have minimal amounts on display and always shred everything as soon as possible.

Unfortunately you're going to feel uneasy about leaving the house unattended for years. I still haven't totally gotten over it. I did a damn good job of documenting what was missing but still months down the line I'd remember something else.

[Skykid]

Whoa, some Columbo shiz. If you go to the apartment with the cops, make sure you open the conversation with "Y'know, my wife likes to play video games..."

Keep us updated on the developments!

[Deca]

Just heard back from the claims team today, everything seems to be continuing along smoothly. They quoted replacements for my newer items like my monitors, mixer, and a few consoles and accepted the replacement costs I provided on other items. I'm relieved that they accepted my costs for the Nomad and jPS2, I was worried I'd have to try and explain their value/why a japanese ps2 is different from an american one and all that to someone with no idea what I was saying, but I was actually put in touch with reasonably knowledgeable people that were willing to hear me out.

I may allow them to replace and ship me the monitors and mixer, but I'm thinking I'll go ahead and replace the consoles myself. I know I can do it quickly in town, and I might still be able to find a new PS3 Slim somewhere.

I suppose shopping will be kind of fun, at the very least.

[BPzeBanshee]

Sounds like an outcome that could've been a lot worse, but fortunately wasn't the case. Glad to hear things are getting better for you.