San Francisco Bike Blog

UCSF Today reports that the police are getting hearing of bike thefts around UCSF, and the police did a surveillance operation to catch and interview at least one suspected bike thief:

The UCSF Police Department Investigations Unit, in an attempt to address the problem of bicycle thefts, conducted a surveillance operation at the Parnassus campus on Aug. 28. Detectives observed a suspect using bolt cutters to cut a cable-style lock. The suspect was subsequently arrested by the detectives. The suspect was interviewed and provided insight into how he stole bicycles from the campuses. The suspect claimed stealing bicycles was his “job.”

In this case, the suspect stated that he watched a bicycle owner park and secure the bicycle. After watching the owner enter a nearby business, he cut the cable-style lock with bolt cutters. The suspect told detectives he had taken bicycles from the bicycle cage on the Parnassus campus on numerous occasions. The suspect stated that he would wait until someone entered the locked cage and walk in behind them. He would then act as if he were looking for a key to unlock a bicycle while waiting for the person to leave.

The suspect had a source for selling the stolen bicycles, and told detectives the bicycles were being sold at an Oakland flea market. Because the bicycle theft victims were unable to provide a serial number, any attempt to recover the stolen bicycles wil be difficult.

It’s a pretty solid, if obvious, lesson - don’t let people into bicycle cages; everyone needs to be able to gain access by themselves. I know it must be a bit awkward to not let someone in, but if you let someone in, then at least stick around to make sure they don’t steal someone else’s bike. That’s fair, right?

I thought it was a bit odd that we didn’t get a description of the person they caught:

In previous reports, the suspects have been described as white male methamphetamine users, 25 to 50 years old, with an unkempt, “homeless” appearance.

I emailed the Detective mentioned in the article, but didn’t hear back. I’m curious for practical purposes; for instance, was it another suit-wearing guy going around taking bikes? If so, us bikers need to start looking out more for guys dressed in suits rather than ‘homeless’ folks.

From that same ’suit’ post, we have an quick note about a typical operator error situation:

I have used those racks many times, and I have to say they are a bit awkward to use. They are some sort of jaw-type system that requires you to pull your bike in, then line up the rack so that it clenches your frame. Lining it up can be a hassle and I’m guessing that the person in this most recent theft didn’t mean to leave their bike unlocked — they might have just not used the rack properly.

With this anecdote, reading through the ‘Crime Prevention Tips‘ at the end of the UCSF Today article (definitely worth a serious read-through), and talking to a bike mechanic recently who suggested ‘99% of thefts are operator error’ - I’m starting to think that there may be some truth to that statement. Maybe 99% is a bit high, but what if it was 50%? Wouldn’t that save us bikers a lot of misery if we were able to reduce bicycle thefts by that amount?

I’ve done the ‘operator error’ thing recently myself - I somehow failed to actually lock my bike to anything, so now I always double-check. I feel like maybe solid, easy-to-understand bicycle theft advice like that provided in this article has somehow not yet made it into the consciousness of most bikers. For instance, how many of us still use U-locks with a round barrel key? (me!) And should bicycle shops even be selling cable locks like this in San Francisco?

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