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Robbed!


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Crud :) It fianlly happened. Friday night some cockroach smashed my truck window and took a backpack and travel bag containing gps, pda, clothes, small tools, camera, and worst of all, several Travel Bugs. So where was I parked? Deserted road miles from civilization? "Bad" part of town chasing a lame micro? Nope. In the parking lot of the hospital where I'm working. I was going to leave right after work to spend the night in a State Park and get up at dawn to find some caches and leave a few bugs. The worst part for me is going to be emailing the TB owners to tell them their bugs have been stolen. I'm gonna hate that!

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Crud :laughing: It fianlly happened. Friday night some cockroach smashed my truck window and took a backpack and travel bag containing gps, pda, clothes, small tools, camera, and worst of all, several Travel Bugs. So where was I parked? Deserted road miles from civilization? "Bad" part of town chasing a lame micro? Nope. In the parking lot of the hospital where I'm working. I was going to leave right after work to spend the night in a State Park and get up at dawn to find some caches and leave a few bugs. The worst part for me is going to be emailing the TB owners to tell them their bugs have been stolen. I'm gonna hate that!

 

I'm sorry to hear of your misfortune. Actually you're vehicle was Burglarized, you weren't robbed. It seems that hiking trails have been big targets for vehicle burglars. They know people will be gone for extended periods of time, so the cars make easy targets.

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It seems that hiking trails have been big targets for vehicle burglars. They know people will be gone for extended periods of time, so the cars make easy targets.

 

Yeah, and for everyone else, if you lock stuff in your trunk think about that 'pop' button in your glovebox. You have to lock the glovebox too. Otherwise a busted window makes it easy access.

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Sorry to hear about what happened. My dad works at AT&T in a very nice area in Sillicon Valley and a lady's car was parked right in front of the office the window was smashed the dashboard was ripped to shreds in broad daylight security drives by there too and no one saw a thing.Our house has been broken into 4 times now the first time they couldn't get into the front door so they kicked in the garage door and used a sledge hammer to knock a hole from the garage to my bedroom wall and crawled through it and robbed us blind. We were at a family reunion in Oregon at the time and recieved a phone call from the police from our house phone. They had also managed to destroy my dads gun safe and took all the guns out and left them sitting in the living room. Which the police knew that they would come back for them but they didn't. I know the pain and the feeling I hope it gets better for you. For us it was a learning experience.

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Our first apartment was in a rather bad part of Fresno...people were home all day, with traffic coming and going all hours of day and night. We lived there 2 years, and the only thing that happened to us was some nidiot tried to steal hubby's Mitsu PU, which was stock - no radio, air, fnacy anything. It was a stick too, and I understand those aren't really an easy thing to steal.

We moved to a better neighborhood, where people had to work for a living, 9-5. We weren't there 2 months and someone broke in, stealing the typical tools, microwave, stereo, VCR...but they also took a typewriter (?) and my jewelry box - which was the worst thing, I had nothing of value in there except for my engagement ring, but a lot of costume jewelry given to me by long-gone great grandparents.

Bummer!

I have some really vindicitve punishment ideas for folks who steal memories from others. Nasty Rat-stards!

 

Sorry to hear of your situation. Good Luck! Maybe someone will find the items of "non-value" left behind...

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Ok so I started this thread a while back because my GPS had been stolen and I was curious how many units people end up going through.

 

Thought I'd give an update now that my SECOND unit was stolen. Call me a slow learner but this theft was a little more brutal. The first one was because I was dumb by leaving the car unlocked, at school, at night in a jeep (the #1 broken into car around here). This time around it was in my frikkin driveway, locked and really poorly jimmied into (my driver's door doesn't lock anymore). With the unit locked in the glove compartment. And they actually took more than just the GPS. Not much more, they weren't the smartest in the world I guess, they took the faceplate off my stereo but left the stereo, took the GPS from the glovebox but left my checkbook..

 

A lot of work for an old explorist 210 and a useless stereo part...

 

But again, an excuse to upgrade. Used the forums' garage sale to trade an old laptop for a used 60cs, bought the nav kit and am lovin it, and it never leaves my side. I don't even leave it at home much, I take it to work with me (I work in a pharmacy) and keep it in the safe :P

 

So now my Jeep is empty. I even keep the reg and ins in my wallet and leave the jeep unlocked so they don't have to break in to see that it was a waste of time. If they decide to just take the jeep itself they won't get far, I don't even keep gas in it!

 

So in short I'm up to unit number 3, how bout you?

 

I feel ya, man!

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My car was broken into while I was at work one day. Sure, it was near Johns Hopkins (East Baltimore, not the greatest area of town) but it was a full-time monitored lot (attendent in booth with cameras and everything).

 

Back window on a 2-door...unlocked the door...rifled through everything...popped the trunk....broke out the 6-disc changer hard-mounted into the trunk bed....and left.

 

Funniest part was that I had purchased the used car only about a week before and the changer was broken when I got it so the broken remote and disc cartridge were in my house at the time. All of the other pockets in the car were completely empty except for the manual and I hadn't even had time to put in the after-market radio yet. Other than the headache of getting the window fixed, I was fortunate enough to get a nice chunk of insurance money for the changer (because it was hard-mounted, it counted as part of the car and covered under my policy)...and the crook got away with probably $20 in plastic that won't work without the stuff that wasn't in the car.

 

I've always made it a habit to remove anything valuable from my car no matter where I leave it for more than 5 minutes. All of my CDs are duplicates or mixes. The most change they would probably find is less than a dollar on the console. If they were a sports fan, they might have some fun with the ratty old glove and dog-chewed baseballs in the trunk.

 

Car burglars are pretty crude fellows. Just yesterday I saw a nice Rav4 with a busted out back window that hadn't been found by the owner yet. The stereo faceplate was tossed on the driver seat and the rest of the unit was still in the dash (evidently the thief was in a hurry and didn't come prepared with the right tools). Everything else looked in place...pretty sad since now that person has to get their window replaced for no good reason and hopefully their stereo faceplate isn't mangled in any way.

 

Best advice I can give is to act as if whatever you've left behind could be taken and how rough it might be for you if it were gone. Since I don't have the cash to replace my GPSr, I won't be leaving it in my vehicle any time soon. Sorry for your troubles.

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I feel your pain.

 

My Jeep and my wife's SUV were broken into last summer. They were parked behind our house in our nice safe little subdivision in our relatively crime-free town. We lost thousands of dollars worth of stuff (including my GPS V). The stuff wasn't a big deal, but the thought that some creep (probably kids) had the nerve to break into our cars while we were home still makes me angry, and rather paranoid.

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Car burglars are pretty crude fellows. Just yesterday I saw a nice Rav4 with a busted out back window...

 

A buddy of mine had a Mustang that was broken into. Instead of busting the window, they took a crowbar and tore out the lock! A new door skin is a hell of lot more expensive than a window!

 

I used to have my car broken into on a regular basis while I lived in Spain. I figured the weather is nice, the car is junk, I'll just get wet if it rains; I stopped replacing the window and didn't keep anything in it.

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:ph34r: Ever so sorry to hear about your loss!

 

I just had my jeep rifled through about a week ago- the only thing taken was pocket change [most likely one of the neighborhood idiot kids] but it was only consequential enough to remind me to lock the doors at night

 

Still this; in an incredibly rural part of town in a dead-end culdesac subdivision of $300,000+ houses... Just goes to show a person that it doesn't matter where you work, live or thrive to survive, there's always someone who sees you as having more than they do- and are more than willing to take it away from you if given an opportunity.

 

My condolensces- I hope you're able to get the majority of your stolen items back- and more importantly, I hope you're able to recover your serenity- the hardest of all things to replace when such an event occurs!

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That is the pits! :wub:

Let's hope the thieves get themselves electrocuted when they try charging one of those electrical devices.

 

Do you think that the burglary was carried out by someone who knew of your habits and perhaps knew that you were the proud owner of all those goodies?

Many times burgalries like this target individuals whose habits and customs are quite well known to the immediate community.

 

Anyway, I hope you get back on your feet soon and put that behind you. :wub:

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Well, your loss isn't that bad in the grand scheme of things. A few months from now it won't bother you nearly as much as it does right now. But I definitely hope your story has taught everyone to NEVER leave valuables in your car!!

 

My GPS and camera gear stays with me at all times.

 

GeoBC

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Well, your loss isn't that bad in the grand scheme of things. A few months from now it won't bother you nearly as much as it does right now. But I definitely hope your story has taught everyone to NEVER leave valuables in your car!!

 

My GPS and camera gear stays with me at all times.

I am still scarred by my loss after nearly a year. The stuff is quickly replaced, but the violation sticks with you.

 

Ironically, just prior to my Jeep being broken into, I had gotten into the habit of leaving my 35mm camera and lenses in the vehicle. By chance, I had removed them about a week before the WJ was desecrated.

Edited by sbell111
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It is most definitely the violation that will linger. While at GW4 we had bikes stolen that were chained and locked to the truck. We were parked in front of the office of the hotel. To add to the frustration, there was a guy who claimed to be a witness but he wouldn't talk unless we gave him money, which didn't happen. A 100 deductible for $1,200 in new bikes with no wear / tear or necessary repairs is more appealing than 50 bucks to a hustler.

 

Another incident of theft I had was a week following my mother's passing. Some young fellows broke into the house and trashed the inside of it. There was no structural damage but everything in drawers was in the floor and everything in closets was pulled out and gone thru. They took what they thought were some drugs with street value but was really only stool softners and aspirin. They also found a jewelry box that we hadn't found ourselves which had items that were my mothers and great-grandmothers. The cops even stopped the guy who had broken in and inventoried everything he had, but did nothing. Upon discovering the mess in the house we called and an investigation occured. Nothing happened to the morons who stopped the suspicious guy walking down the street at 4 am with a backpack filled with jewelry and prescription bottles with my mom's name on them. **Shoot, even Rush Limbaugh was detained recently for something similar** Fortunately the guy cut himself while breaking thru a window and DNA testing placed him at the scene, but we never recovered anything from the burgulary. One of the two guys went to prison because it was hit 8th conviction for breaking and entering and the driver of the get away car got 6 months probation.

 

They guys admitted they would read the obits every day and target homes of the recently deceased. It was bad enough a family is dealing with the loss of a loved one but when losers such as that add to the hurt, it is often overpowering.

 

Should you lose a loved one, I hope what happened to my family can at least be a learning experience for others. Don't leave the home empty and go thru everything to be sure all valuables and medications are removed.

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That is a tragic but very common thing! When my grandmother passed, my mom asked my hubby to stay at the house while we were all at the funeral. This worked out well, because at the time I didn't want my curious and intelligent 5 year old asking me some innocent but personal questions (more for my sanity) during the whole service, so I had him stay there with her.

Same with my dad's services. We had other family stay at the house. Obits are fine and all, but sometimes they let out too much info, especially in smaller towns.

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Crud :unsure: It fianlly happened. Friday night some cockroach smashed my truck window and took a backpack and travel bag containing gps, pda, clothes, small tools, camera, and worst of all, several Travel Bugs. So where was I parked? Deserted road miles from civilization? "Bad" part of town chasing a lame micro? Nope. In the parking lot of the hospital where I'm working. I was going to leave right after work to spend the night in a State Park and get up at dawn to find some caches and leave a few bugs. The worst part for me is going to be emailing the TB owners to tell them their bugs have been stolen. I'm gonna hate that!

 

 

Awwwww. I'm so sorry ;_; Was your stuff visible? When me,mom and my sister are out for a while, we cover up the goodies we leave in our car. Just hope that helps any of the other chachers out there. ^^

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Sorry to here that hukilaulau. I know how you feel. When my Jeep got broken into they didn't get a whole lot, some tapes (yeah it has been a while), a jacket, etc. My Jeep was parked right outside my bedroom window and I didn't hear a thing. The worst part was the violation and not feeling safe anymore. I have traveled to a lot of 3rd world countries and never had a problem. Been robbed twice, once here in the US in a very conservative small city and once in Australia by an American.

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we feel your pain. At least they did not take your doors, we own a jeep wrangler and we were awoken by the local police asking if we owned a jeep and were we missing our doors. Sure enough they took the doors and the "OH S**T" handles off our jeep, but the cops managed to recover everything. The funny thing is that they left all the electronics in the car. So now we have hinge locks on our jeep so people won't steal the doors again.

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What a good reality check for all of us to read these stories. I myself am guilty of leaving a little more in the car than I should. I think I'll go clean out my car today.

 

As a personal life-rule, I like to follow the minor buddhist thought of having few "worldy posessions." Whatever I own I have with the assumption it can be replaced. If I dont need it I donate it with reckless abandon. Sentimentality is great but do you really need X, Y, and Z? Having an open and spacey house helps you live a little bit easier and helps buffer against the pain of being violated.

 

Thanks everyone for your stories, I really appreciate it.

 

~Versius

Chris

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My wife has to park in a lot out of sight of her building, and after a few break ins we tried something I read about a long time ago.

first don't leave anyting in your car,and leave a door unlocked {to save a broken window}

then you leave a large neatly wrapped package on the back seat containing nothing but garbage.

Wedding present type most of the year.

Christmas type around the hollidays.

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Sorry for your misfortune, same thing happened to me last year at the same time , hear on LI also....in my driveway. Chances are it was kids at the end of the school year, doesn't make it any better though. Between your bag and mine, some kids have some nice stuff!! Hope you have better luck in the future.

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