Editor’s note: This is part one of a two-part story detailing both a personal experience and the broader problem of bicycle theft in the Twin Cities — what police could do about it, but often aren’t, and how cyclists could better protect their property.
Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about bicycle theft. Not the one 30-plus years ago when my first really decent bike — a purple aluminum Trek 8000 mountain bike, serial number 870854 — was swiped, quite literally, from right under my nose. original steering wheel lock
No, I’ve been thinking instead about the break-in and theft of an e-bike from my neighbor and friend Kristin last summer. Through a combination of good luck, foolish bravado and assistance from a Facebook group that helps reunite stolen bikes and their owners, I recovered Kristin’s bike a few days later and someone was eventually arrested. His next court appearance is approaching, and for a long time I’ve been chewing over what happened — and what didn’t — that night and in the days and weeks that followed.
“One especially important aspect of the theft of Kristin’s bike is the troubling evidence that she was targeted by a criminal enterprise, and was not simply the victim of an opportunistic grab-and-go.”
I’m a longtime cyclist with a low tolerance of risk for losing my own bikes to theft. And that has dramatically changed how and where I ride, store and secure my bikes. Until moving back to Minneapolis a few years ago I had rarely missed a day of commuting to work by bike, and I frequently made car-free errands. But, at least for now, it’s likely I won’t soon leave even a well-locked bike unattended outside a retail store, the library or most of my other destinations.
I know how meaningful bikes are to many people, but I’ve also discovered how bikes are perceived as merely “toys” by others, including some police and prosecutors. Some bikes are just toys, of course, but for many people, bicycles are so much more: They may be a family’s only transportation, enabling them to get to and from school and work when other options simply don’t exist. A bicycle may be the most valuable possession a person owns. Bikes enable exploration and discovery, health and fitness. They are an undeniably critical part of strategies for reducing the impact of transportation on climate change. Bike owners often spend countless hours (and many dollars) personalizing, maintaining and upgrading them. Bicycles can be at least as prized as a car, a piece of fine art or almost any other thing of value — or any other thing that gives us joy.
Bicycles themselves, and the physical infrastructure and economies their use supports, contribute much — sometimes remarkably much — to a community’s quality of life.
But it’s clear why the theft of bicycles is a thriving business: It’s easy to do, and easy to get away with. And because law enforcement and criminal justice systems have other priorities for allocating limited resources, stealing bicycles is a pretty low-risk/high-return proposition.
So, yes, I’ve been thinking a lot about the theft and recovery of my friend’s bike, and the broader impact of bicycle theft on communities and why there doesn’t seem to be much of an organized effort to curtail it. I’ve also been thinking about what it might take to change that.
I have a lot of questions, and few answers.
Frankly, I think the copper wire inside streetlights gets more love than bicycles when it comes to reducing and prosecuting theft. And while it’s true that copper wire theft costs cities millions of dollars and can affect public safety, the impacts of bike theft on victims deserve more than just a yawn in comparison. (As we’ll see in part two, however, they share one important attribute that explains their appeal to thieves: Both can easily be converted to cash. And that may be something to leverage in keeping them both better protected from theft.)
At 1:44 a.m. one morning early last summer, three people in a silver SUV parked at the end of the alley behind our detached garage and that of our neighbor, Kristin. A passenger got out of the SUV and walked confidently and deliberately toward Kristin’s garage mid-block. In seconds he pried open the locked service door, then ran back up the alley to the SUV, returning moments later with the vehicle and at least two other people. The first guy re-entered the garage, emerged with Kristin’s bike and they fled.
Kristin was vacationing out of town when I discovered the theft hours later; she forwarded details to me about her bike, including the serial number. The Minneapolis police officer who took a report said it was one of several nearby break-ins and thefts overnight that appeared to be the work of the same people. I mentioned I had video from a security camera. “Send us a copy,” he instructed, providing a download link. “An investigator will get back to you.”
But none did, and that would be the first of several broken promises to “get back” to me from officers in Minneapolis (where the theft occurred) and St. Paul (where the bike was subsequently recovered). Even after I later discovered evidence in Kristin’s garage from what was probably one of the other nearby break-ins that night, and filed a supplemental report, no investigator followed up to ask about or retrieve it.
I was aware of a Facebook page, Twin Cities Stolen Bikes 2.0, where victims of bike theft can post specific, curated information about their stolen bikes, and I submitted the details of Kristin’s bike; a few days later a site administrator notified me that the bike apparently was being advertised for sale in St. Paul. So I contacted the seller — let’s call him “Josh” — and pretended to be someone interested in buying it. We met — no surprise, he was driving a silver SUV like the one in the video of the theft — and he was quite skittish.
In fact, in one of the multiple calls and text messages between us, Josh explained he’d once had “a bad experience” selling a bike, and he wanted to be sure I was “legitimate.” I took that to mean “not a cop,” when he asked me to text a photo of myself before he would meet me.
I knew — but he didn’t know I knew — that the “bad experience” he’d previously had when selling a bike was this: When the potential buyer arrived at their meet-up, that person, shall we say, vigorously claimed ownership of the bike Josh was selling. “The cops got involved,” Josh explained vaguely, and he didn’t “want to go through that again.”
“I was a 69-year-old man with a bike I could hardly ride and a nearly dead cell phone, trying to hide from Josh in an unfamiliar neighborhood. Josh was half my age, very angry, and hunting for me from a big vehicle in nearly his own backyard.”
That’s understandable: Josh was selling a stolen bike, and the rightful owner was determined to get it back. Josh’s subsequent arrest and conviction was just one part of a lengthy criminal history that led a St. Paul detective to later describe him to me as “not one of our finer citizens.” Unfortunately for Josh, that second “bad experience” he wanted to avoid was about to be reprised: After he arrived with Kristin’s bike and reluctantly accommodated my insistence on test-riding it, I pedaled it away. Some weeks later he was arrested — at least his second arrest involving bike theft in just a few months.
The full story of my escape with the bike is lengthy, with parts both entertaining and harrowing: I was a 69-year-old man with a bike I could hardly ride and a nearly dead cell phone, trying to hide from Josh in an unfamiliar neighborhood. Josh was half my age, very angry, and hunting for me from a big vehicle in nearly his own backyard. Every few minutes over the next six hours he threatened by phone and text message to “[eff]” me up if I didn’t return with “his” bike. It definitely felt Josh had the advantage.
And I was flying solo: I’d tried to enlist the St. Paul police to help me in advance, but they declined — just too busy, sorry. When I called them again, hours later, for an escort to my car from a hiding place some distance from where I’d made the recovery, they promised to be there as quickly as they could. But I waited another hour, and with darkness falling and Josh still fuming and issuing threats, I set out on my own. Perhaps because it was now dark, I was able to evade Josh and eventually find my car. I met the police at their nearest station where I received the expected scolding for acting on my own. “Yes,” I acknowledged somberly, “I do know what could have happened. But you guys had bigger fish to fry…”
“All fish are big fish to us,” an officer gamely countered. It was a nice sentiment, but the reality is that it just isn’t true.
One especially important aspect of the theft of Kristin’s bike is the troubling evidence that she was targeted by a criminal enterprise, and was not simply the victim of an opportunistic grab-and-go. The security camera video I provided to police demonstrated this clearly: The three people involved did not just wander down the alley, randomly testing door knobs until they found one unlocked. Instead, the theft was planned and choreographed to take place at one very specific place. Somehow, these guys knew in advance there was an e-bike available to be stolen inside.
That’s particularly creepy when you consider how bike thieves might acquire such knowledge, and what kind of privacy violations they employ to get it.
I’m no conspiracy theorist, and I’ve talked to other victims of bike theft who feel strongly they, too, were targeted — there could not otherwise be a reasonable explanation for how someone knew their locked garage would be worth cracking open for the treasure inside.
What do the police say? Investigators are aware of such targeting: I know that because I told them, and so have other victims. Have they looked seriously into it?
What about the link between Kristin’s theft and the other thefts that night that police said the same people could have done? After recovering her bike, I gave St. Paul police the name and address of the suspect, and, later, other information I thought could be useful in gathering additional evidence or obtaining a search warrant. Did SPPD share any of that with MPD for their joint use investigating the possibly related crimes? Did the arrest in Kristin’s case lead to any resolution or relief for the other victims, as it potentially could have?
A St. Paul detective, by the way, asked in our first conversation if I would participate in a line-up to confirm our suspect’s identity. “Absolutely,” I replied — but I never heard back. And he never responded when I left messages sharing tidbits that I and another of Josh’s victims uncovered with just a little sniffing around online, including:
I wondered if any of the information I passed along was ultimately useful. My calls requesting follow-up were never returned.
And so, still, I have questions:
This is some of what I’ve been thinking about bike theft. In Part 2, I’ll share some ideas about how bicyclists can better protect themselves from thieves.
Photo at top by max im on Unsplash
steering wheel to pedal security lock Streets.mn is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit produced primarily by volunteers. Our members and donors help us highlight Minnesota's conversations about land use, planning and people-centered communities. Please consider a one-time or monthly donation to Streets.mn, and check out our podcast, which appears twice a month.