[Cyclelicious] New comment on Receiving stolen property.

cezar has left a new comment on your post "Receiving stolen property":

Pulled it from google
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Here's what happened to me. I bought a bicycle and went to jail for 4 days. Last week I bought a bicycle from a guy at a garage sale at 16th AND VALENCIA, the bike was a hundred dollars. I thought the bike was a great deal, the bike was nice, but didn't look very expensive. The guy looked like the original owner, his clothing matched the stickers on the bike (yes it sounds silly but he gave me the impression he was the owner). I bought the bike and figured i could make a few bucks on the bike, so I posted it on Craigslist. The original owner saw the bike on Craigslist, 2 days after it was stolen (the day I bought it), and called the SF police department. The original owner saw the bike and told the police he saw the bike posted on Craigslist, he said to meet at his job and I did. When I arrived the police arrested me, without listening to my story, and threw me in jail. The police ignored what I was saying and said yah sure we hear it all the time. I was thrown into 850 bryant the local jail here in San Francisco. Jail is awful, it's a terrible place. The food is a smear of peanut butter on wax paper, with a couple of slices of bread, 2 packets of jelly, and a few small cookies. And a kindergardener size milk. I was starving the whole 4 days. I lost 10 pounds, and was severely depressed and was suicidal. My cell mates was a person with 7 counts of terrorism, and 1 count of stalking, a dude who was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon, a crack cocaine dealer, and a dude who took assaulted 7 black guys with a baseball bat, because he didn't like the color of their skin. These are not quality people, this experience was hell. My bail was $15, 000 dollars and my friend were not allowed to visit me.

Jail is a hard place especially if you have never been there, imagining staring at 4 walls 24 hours a day, no books, no music, no television, nothing, only a cellmate who farts all day, and stinks up the cell you are in. My cell smelt like cat piss, and butt.

You have no rights when in jail, I was thinking how could this happen to me. It happens to people all the time! People get locked up because owners see people riding their bicycles and call the police. This is the 2nd highest rated city in the USA for bicycle theft. If you are thinking your bicycle is not stolen, you are probably wrong. Sellers lie, why tell the truth?- people will believe anything you tell them, they have to, most buyers in SF really need a bicycle and can't afford to buy a a new one, so they buy used.

Especially if you see a bicycle that is looking brand new, or close to it, it's probably stolen. The street rate for a bicycle is $40 to $200, when it's super hot (just stolen). Why risk it, don't buy these bikes, jail is a horrible place where you can easily get stabbed with a toothbrush shank, or any item a prisoner can use, do you want to die? I don't, and I will never buy a bike used again.

Here is where you can find the stolen bicycles:

Craigslist, you'll see these people do postings everyday, same background in their picture, same type of ad, these people, some of whom, may have no idea the bicycles they have are stolen. Some guys "fix up" bikes, i did, I bought bicycles form Craigslisters and from flea markets, and thought the bikes had a clean title, I repaired and re-sold them.

"Oakland Coliseum swap meet", has only stolen bicycles, so if you are looking here is where they are. Thieves in oakland mostly illegal mexican immigrants steal the bikes and run them here early in the morning, you'' see these short people, with brand new mountain bikes, and $1000 road bicycle, and you can buy the bikes from these guys super cheap. I heard stories from random people saying that they scour San Francisco, Berkeley, and San Jose for bicycles and go around in trucks with bolt clippers and hacksaws in the middle of the night and get to work, some of whom strip the paint off bicycles, re paint quickly and re-sell the bikes by morning.

"Laney College Flea Market" the place where there are usually about 50 bicycles on any given Sunday, ranging from $40 to $800, most are super cheap, for a quick sell.

I am done with this, I learned my lesson, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.



Posted by cezar to Cyclelicious at 10/22/2008 10:25:00 PM