Of course it's in Seattle
 

Holy crap!! A stolen bike was returned to its owner! Now I've seen everything.

We will take him.
And bless him for his efforts.

That's better than some of the hobbies I've considered taking up.

At least he's not a cosplay comic book batman.
Like I said, Seattle will take him.

Since he's local = 'he ought to write an app for that'.
I don't know - type in your stolen bike and the app scans every known website to ever advertise a used bike for sale, for anything close to a match?

edit: wait-a-minute, all I need is a coder, a neat name, and it's the next Software Forest kickstarter sensation, with a million dollar valuation.

re-edit: sorta like google .... on steroids ..... for stolen bikes.

What's missing is the element of vigilante justice that we so enjoyed in Death Wish. Perhaps he could also punch the thieves in the kneecap?

IDK. Punching someone in the kneecap could mess up one's hand.

A buddy of mine had his Colnago C-40 stolen from community center. He had bought the bike from a LBS owned by a relative. Some two years later someone came into the shop with a C-40 trying to sell it. The owner thought he recognized the bike and persuaded the seller to leave it for a few days so he could check out the condition. The shop owner used to sign the inside of his hand-built wheels. He removed a tire and found his signature. He then calls his relative saying he thinks he has his stolen bike. The relative tells him to remove one of the bar caps and look for his business card inside the bar. Sure enough, it's in there. The seller was only asking for maybe $150 for the bike, so to avoid trouble (broken shop windows, arson or even worse), the shop owner paid the seller.

Another way of dealing with thieves.

"Don't steal bikes, bro."

Ah, old skool NYC justice. Brutal. And mor illegal than stealing bikes.

Yeah, but I wouldn't have called the cops, would you?

Nope. I'm an old skool noo yawkah, myself.

Me and some teenage friends did something similar around '76-'77. Slapped the kid around pretty good. Teenage slaps. No blood. Kid was a private school kid, too. Stealing a bike from a bunch of us hippies in Central Park. We ran him down on our bikes. Tuned him up when we caught him on 96th and 5th after he dumped the bike and tried to walk away all nonchalant. Lol. The good old days.