Keep on eye on your bikes in Shockoe
Keep an eye out and call the police if you see something suspicious.
Tori Valentine (@oh_hey_tori) yesterday posted the picture you see above which apparently is the scene of a bike robbery. I reached out to Tori via email and got the full story of what happened.
Yesterday, October 9th, Tori was walking through the parking deck of the apartments at Old Stone Row (2005 E. Franklin Street). She saw two young, boys messing with one of the bikes in an apparent attempt to remove a wheel. Trying not to assume anything but wanting to get word out she Tweeted at 4:01 PM “I want to hope that the kids I just saw dismantling bikes on the racks in the parking deck of this apartment bldg weren’t stealing them…”.
About an hour later when she came back, Tori found 3-4 bikes gone and many of those left were missing seats and/or wheels. She wasn’t alone in noticing the crime as another person in the parking deck said, “What happened to all the bikes? There used to be a lot of them right there.” The picture above was taken at this time.
Tori informed the leasing office and one of the property managers and was informed that this wasn’t the first time.
The boys spotted around the bikes were short, black, age range 11-12, with short hair and were wearing light colored tank tops.
That same day Tori also tried to file a report with the Richmond Police. After talking with a couple different representatives from RPD including having to call back the next day she was informed that since it wasn’t her bike that was stolen the police couldn’t file a formal report. However, she is in communication with the RPD social media folks and they are working with Tori to see if a report can be filed.
Richmond no longer requires bike registration but if you register your bike with the National Bike Registry it could aid police in recovery of your two wheeled transport.
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Richard Hayes
When Richard isn’t rounding up neighborhood news, he’s likely watching soccer or chasing down the latest and greatest craft beer.
Notice: Comments that are not conducive to an interesting and thoughtful conversation may be removed at the editor’s discretion.
If you’re going to take out your phone to tweet about the theft in progress, at least take a couple photos too. Come on!
Part of the reason bike theft is so common here is the police don’t give a damn or treat it like a real crime. Had my bike stolen off my back porch and when I called the police they refused to make a report because I didn’t have the serial number. Obviously I was never going to get my bike back, but if no report is made it’s not going into the crime statistics, which determine where police focus their efforts.
My experience has been that if children are involved, the police usually won’t do anything anyway. Extremely frustrating. (And when it’s eleven and twelve year olds, hard to decide whether you’d prefer to beat the kids or beat the parents)