Bike Batman
April 29, 2016 8:33 PM   Subscribe

Meet “Bike Batman,” Seattle’s vigilante reuniting stolen bikes with their owners.
When he sees suspicious bike ads on Craigslist and sites like OfferUp.com – posts where the seller appears to know very little about the bike or has a photo in an odd, unidentifiable location – he cross references the image with bikes reported on Bike Index.

Once he has verified it with the owner, he arranges a meet-up with the thief and will call the Seattle police department so that officers can participate in the sting. He said that, in more than half of the 22 cases in which he has retrieved and returned bikes, the culprit has been arrested.
posted by mbrubeck (10 comments total) 9 users marked this as a favorite
 
I could have used him in Berkeley a few times...
posted by jadepearl at 9:39 PM on April 29, 2016


There are few crimes that deserve punishment as much as bike thieving. Good on this brave fellow for doing his part to level the playing field without resorting to violence. He's a better man than most.
posted by a lungful of dragon at 11:10 PM on April 29, 2016 [5 favorites]


Oh I love this. In my little town we have a Facebook page dedicated to reuniting bikes and owners. It's a tourist town and almost everyone here has a bike to get around in the summer. People tend not to lock up because it's such a small town with little to no crime. Hell, I leave the keys to my car in my car, half the time in the ignition, but after having my bike stolen four times one summer I always lock that up. No one is ever caught, but we try to get bikes back to owners.
posted by Belle O'Cosity at 11:56 PM on April 29, 2016


Regarding that "violence" link - holy fuck don't mess with bike messengers; they know the city better than anyone you've ever met, they have radios, and they will SWARM to protect each other (even if they don't like each other).

This has been a public service announcement.
posted by el io at 1:09 AM on April 30, 2016 [1 favorite]


We've reached the stage where instead of society being relatively united with the police representing their collective security, it's devolved into a situation where we need to reinvent essential services. As a cyclist I can applaud this super hero, but instead I wonder how we got here. I don't know if bike thieves are just a low level version of how the financial sector works or if they are the result of an economy which no longer provides a living wage for many individuals. More research is needed, perhaps by a superhero researcher.
posted by Obscure Reference at 6:07 AM on April 30, 2016 [1 favorite]


“I’m not out fighting crime and punching people,” he said, although he said it is probably advantageous that he is 6ft 4in tall. “I’m telling people: this is not yours.”

I recovered my stolen bike recently, very similarly to how Bike Batman operates. Luckily the person who posted the Craigslist ad and responded to my text messages was a woman, so I didn't need to flex my white male privilege very much. If her boyfriend the bike thief had shown to the meet it probably wouldn't have gone as smoothly as it did.

Why didn't I call the police to accompany me or handle the confrontation? Get this: The ad was posted last Sunday morning (my bike was lifted off my car the Tuesday prior) probably because Los Angeles Police Department doesn't offer Detective services on Sundays. I DID call my precinct as soon as I saw the ad, but Officer Gil at the front desk told me to "stall" and try to set up the meet for Monday. This was as helpful as LAPD got, and their detectives STILL haven't called me about the case. At all. Two weeks later.

But I got my bike back and so a little more is right with the world.

Anyway, BIKE INDEX.

Register your bike on the BIKE INDEX.
MeFi's own! Paging bhance!
posted by carsonb at 7:57 AM on April 30, 2016 [4 favorites]


This should totally be like a pet thread too, post a picture of your bike: Pretty & Strong
posted by carsonb at 8:17 AM on April 30, 2016


This was as helpful as LAPD got, and their detectives STILL haven't called me about the case. At all. Two weeks later.

The police around here won't even investigate a stolen car, asking for help with a stolen bike would get you laughed at if you're lucky and yelled at if they're feeling cranky.
posted by octothorpe at 9:01 AM on April 30, 2016 [1 favorite]


A friend of mine got her husband's stolen bike back because they're Burners and he'd put fur all over it, which apparently was glued on so well the thief couldn't remove it. She told her coworkers what happened and one of them spotted the bike and escorted her over there to take it back.

(This guy would have booming business in my town, incidentally.)

So, note to folks: distinctive bikes are easier to track down!
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:40 AM on April 30, 2016 [1 favorite]


Cops are useless with bikes. I couldn't even get them to help me get my bike back in a locked apartment building. They thought knocking on doors and asking questions would be too much effort.

(It was First Floor Tenant. I recovered it myself.)
posted by corb at 4:15 PM on April 30, 2016


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