wearyourtruth

so my buddy mike and i are riding downtown the other night when we are waiting at an intersection and this guy rolls up on a nice Trek T1. after staring for a couple seconds mike says "hey, where'd you get that bike?" the guy says in a thick british accent "a pawn shop" to which mike replies "that's my bike."

mike then proceeds to list off all sorts of things about the bike indicating he knows it well, the dura ace tubeless front wheel, the dent in the top tube by the seat clamp, etc. he apparently had the bike stolen over a year ago from outside penn station. after realizing that it really was mike's bike, the guy says "look, you're being really nice about this. i know that if i saw someone riding my bike i wouldn't be so kind, so here's what i'll do. i bought it for $200. i put on the brake and new pedals and had the hub fixed" (repacked, i assume) "so if you want it, because i put these on it i'll sell it to you for $300 and i'll just go buy another bike, it doesn't matter to me."

so they exchange phone numbers and mike calls the guy up the next day. long story short the guy is really nice about the whole thing and mike pays him $250 to get his long lost T1 back. it was freakin surreal and gave me all sorts of warm fuzzies about humanity

Cy Trivialities

that's unbelievable.

chadbrochill17

sweet, i wonder if the brit was the one that stole it in the first place.

cc700

or he could have called the police and gotten it back for free...

cord13

+1

darksiderising

Assuming he had proof of ownership (or had it registered), filed a police report when it was stolen, and the police give a ****.

cc700

okay, pretty big assumptions. but is the trouble worth 300 dollars on a 900 dollar+ investment? in this case, yes.

PedallingATX

i would have smashed my U-lock over the guy's head and taken it back. And, no, I'm not just saying that cause I'm on the internet. Anyone who buys a bike that nice at a pawn shop is basically a thief b/c they know it's stolen.

operator

Assuming he wasn't the guy that stole it, good job though.

Meepers

buying it back or not. just finding the bike after it being stolen a year ago is awesome!

Sina

If you (1) purchase something from a business that sells the given property in its regular course of business (i.e. a bike from a bike shop) and (2) have a good faith belief that the property is not stolen (very hard to prove someone didn't have a good faith belief) then you (as the victim of the theft) would have no legal recourse. However, I haven't studied property law in a while so I'm not sure if a pawn shop selling bikes would satisfy requirement (1).

The rationale behind this law is that consumers should feel confident when purchasing property that someone else does not have a superior property right/claim to the given property.

cc700

Sina-

the buyer from the pawn shop would get his money back from the pawn shop and the pawn shop would have to take the hit for buying stolen property. this is, of course, assuming- again- that the bike could be traced(serial numbers weren't ground off), proof of ownership (original receipt as a new bike) could be provided, and the police did their job.

if you can prove good faith then you get your money back. if you can't or it's questionable then you may not, and if it's proved that you knew it was stolen then you get penalized.

passerby

My theory is that the British guy stole it, lied about buying it in a pawn shop, rode it for a year and then when your buddy identified the bike, the British guy did not want to get into any legal trouble and played along with the situation making $250 off of it haha just my theory but I'm glad you found it!

Sina

Thanks cc...I remember this similar topic was brought up in my property class when a student described how his 1 week old bike was stolen and later found for sale at the same store where he bought it from (allegedly, a common practice by the local bike store around campus). As mentioned though, this of course was not a pawn shop.

DIRT BOY

If I really bought it form the pawn shop and you tired that, I would give your ass and then get the cops after you for assault with a deadly weapon.

Again, in real life you would just keep your mouth shut and keep missing your bike.

DIRT BOY

Your are correct. If the owner could actually prove through registered serial numbers, the pawn shop would be screwed and the buyer would get his money back.

cc700

yeah. if my bike gets stolen and i see someone riding it i will be contacting police and tracking the person. i won't be doing any assault.

the property law stuff is tricky. i know this because my friend bought a bunch of car parts from a gutted car in new jersey. this alone should have tipped him off, but he bid on ebay and lost about 6-9 large, never hearing from the seller again.

luckily, the cops busted the thief maybe a month later and discovered his ferrari chop shop. how this guy thought he'd get away stealing things like ferrari's, i have no clue. long story short- my friend got his money back but it took a year or so.

so if your friend hadn't bought your stolen bike back, and had a paper trail through reputable businesses and companies, he could have gotten the bike back after the investigation, the ill-dealing pawn shop would be on the grill and under a close eye, and the ****head who bought the bike would be out of his money temporarily, but would get back what he paid if not what he put into it.

DIRT BOY

If the British guys was being honest, then it a great story and shows there are still good people in the world.

If we was the thief, it s still nice that he offered the bike back regardless if he made money. Unless the serial numbers were registered, the other guys as ZERO proof that it his his bike.

DIRT BOY

Thats the smart thing to do. who knows if he has a gun!

blickblocks

If the pawn shop sold it to the guy for $200

then the pawn shop probably paid $100 or less to the likely thief

The pawn shop made $100 too

Guy who bought it from the shop didn't make anything (he paid for the pedals, brakes and service).

Considering the OP could have never seen that bike again I don't think it's worth overthinking or regretting not going to the police.

palu

I would gladly pay $250 for my old 1998 Gary Fisher Big Sur that was stolen from me.

noglider 

Amazing how people are so eager to rewrite a story that has a happy ending and change it to a gruesome one where everyone is in the wrong.

na975

that guy stole yur bike and then stole yur $ too.

time bandit

agreed

Sikbug

For real, f-that. I'm I agree with the ulock bash. If I saw a bike that I knew for sure was mine that was stolen, it would be hard to be so level headed about it. If the guy wasn't the one who stole I'm sure he figured it was when he bought it.