Chronicle of a porch thief
This Atlantic article describes how home surveillance cameras have helped catch thieves who steal packages – predominantly Amazon packages – from porches. The attitude of the author is somewhat ambiguous, but as best I can determine she seems to lean slightly more towards sympathy with the thieves (in particular one thief who is described at great length) than with the victims of the crimes.
For example:
While porch cams have been used to investigate cases as serious as homicides, the surveillance and neighborhood social networking typically make a particular type of crime especially visible: those lower-level ones happening out in public, committed by the poorest. Despite the much higher cost of white-collar crime, it seems to cause less societal hand-wringing than what might be caught on a Ring camera, said W. David Ball, a professor at Santa Clara University School of Law. “Did people really feel that crime was ‘out of control’ after Theranos?” he said. “People lost hundreds of millions of dollars. You would have to break into every single car in San Francisco for the next ten years to amount to the amount stolen under Theranos.”
That perspective was little comfort to San Franciscans in late 2017, when the city was the nation’s leader in property crime. In Potrero, Fairley had been captured on camera enough times, snatching packages or walking down the street with bundles of mail, that many in the neighborhood had a face and a name to attach to their generalized anger about ongoing nuisances. Fairley was correct in thinking that, in many cases, Amazon will replace pilfered packages. Her major miscalculation was in thinking that her neighbors would, therefore, just shrug and move on.
It’s hard to convey the flavor of the article without quoting at great length from it, but the general feeling I got was that stealing Amazon stuff from rich people’s (or middle class people’s) porches is upsetting but no biggee, but poor drug addicts (particularly if from minority groups) can be forgiven because it’s poverty that drives them.
The other sense the article conveys is how well Fairley (the porch thief featured in the article) plays the game of self-justification. She minimizes her offenses and plays the race card with great frequency. Here’s a little sample:
Arnold began combining the neighbors’ Fairley-related posts in a single document. They started with the first dispatch, from May 2017, with Margett photographing Fairley and her daughter. In October of that year, a friend of Arnold’s, then a VP at Flipboard, followed Fairley in his Prius, watching her go door to door collecting packages—a mail carrier in reverse. In November, a cam caught a lithe woman who looked like Fairley crawling up a home’s steps to seize a fat Amazon pouch of lug nuts, a rosary dangling from her neck. Two weeks later, neighbors were gardening on a shared strip of land when Fairley passed by balancing a long lamp box on her shoulder. (Fairley claimed that the box contained her own headboard and lampshade.) Seeing an address written in big letters for a home in the opposite direction, one of them grabbed the box and demanded to see an ID to prove Fairley lived there. A second man called 911 as a woman videoed Fairley’s ensuing tirade: “That’s why people get shot. You don’t pull somebody’s package off their fucking arm,” Fairley snapped, then stalked off.
And then there’s the failure of the legal system as well as the system to treat addiction:
Two incidents—the Googler and the bus; the Prius calling in Fairley—resulted in charges (petty theft, mail theft, receiving stolen property, and possession of heroin—all misdemeanors), and tickets for court dates. But Fairley regularly skipped her hearings—she’d lose track of the dates, she later told me, and just had “a lot going on”—which slowed the process of resolving the cases. Again and again, in her absence, the judge would issue bench warrants, and Fairley would eventually be arrested and booked into jail, from which the judge would release her to await her next hearing, with demands that she report to diversion programs or Narcotics Anonymous meetings—all while neighbors continued to report on Nextdoor that they were watching her steal mail.
Fairley is given many chances in many rehab programs, all of which she manages to flunk. Then, as her life spirals down from an already-low point, she loses more and more: her possessions, her public housing, her daughter. At no point does she show any inclination to take responsibility for her situation.
It’s hard to imagine any good ending to Fairley’s story; her problems seem deep-seated and intractable, her way of life ingrained and habitual. And what percentage of petty criminals resembles Fairley? How many are capable of change and how many strongly resistant to it?
Would more prison time have made a difference in Fairley’s trajectory? At the very least, it would have sent her a different message, and would have given the residents of the Portrero neighborhood a break from her thievery.
Or would it have? As this depressing article also makes clear, even when Fairley was unable to make her rounds because she was in rehab programs, other thieves took up the slack and kept stealing the low-hanging fruit – the Amazon packages – from the porches of Portrero.
Ganave Fairley, being female and black and gay, cannot possibly be held accountable for her actions. Only the powerful, evil victimizers possess agency, while she (and all the other victims) are simply reacting to the forces oppressing them. Some materialists (often biologists) deny agency to all humans, who are nothing more than “meat puppets” in a mechanistic universe, but most leftists deny personal responsibility only to members of certain favored groups.
I know two people that were addicted to drugs who claim time in jail (county jail for one, state prison for the other) enabled them to beat their addiction. So in some cases, time served is more merciful in the long run than letting someone “get out of jail free”.
The late Cathy Seipp once asked one of her daughters elementary teachers why a particularly inane pedagogic practice was being followed there (the teacher was due to retire ‘ere long). The reply, “That’s where we are in the cycle right now…I’ve been doing this so long I can see the same wheel just keep turning round and round.”
Today I received a notification that my package had been delivered. They included a photograph of the package on my porch. This is something new.
Potrero Hill was one of my favorite neighborhoods in San Francisco — a bit of the old city, still somewhat intact after the Great Tech Gentrification. It also had my favorite cafe, named (coincidentally) Farley’s.
https://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/farleys-san-francisco?select=-dSb_oDGSWwxtAT2S0NFSw
I’ve seen people struggle with substance abuse. It takes every ounce of honesty, faith and courage one can muster. I don’t think it can be done while telling oneself stories about how it’s someone else’s fault.
According to the article, the porch thief started on painkillers at age 19, and then went on to heroin and meth. Here’s some of the damage caused by meth:
https://americanaddictioncenters.org/meth-treatment/effects-on-the-brain-and-cns
Mail theft is a felony. Why is it being described as a misdemeanor? The federal postal inspectors should have been involved. They take mail theft very seriously. Unless this is not USPS, but it is described as mail theft. Something fishy.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steal_This_Book
Presbypoet:
I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that Amazon does not use the USPS. It uses UPS and other carriers.
huxley:
Telling oneself stories about how it is someone else’s fault is part of the addiction syndrome, which is centered on selfishness and self-centeredness, plus the first cousin when a selfish goal is not achieved, self-pity. “Not my fault, but someone else’s. Poor me. I feel so sorry for me”.
Feeling sorry for one’s self makes the addiction-prone seek comfort in booze, one or more drugs, or both. Essential features of the addictive persona!
Around here, Amazon is using its own vans and drivers for delivery. USPS is long gone for Amazon deliveries.
Possibly this is also a side effect of California’s new criminal code “reform.” Thefts under $950, which would include the vast majority of Amazon deliveries, are misdemeanors, no matter how often the offense is repeated.
There is one thing to be said for jail time. Fairley wouldn’t be stealing things while in jail.
Jewel, that is fairly new. Somebody has also already spread a doorbell video of the delivery driver putting the package down by the door, taking a picture, then picking up the package and returning to their vehicle with it.
I like how this guy took the porch pirate problem and turned it into a source of mirth:
Glitter Bomb: https://youtu.be/xoxhDk-hwuo
Amazon does not use the USPS
neo: Here in ABQ Amazon uses USPS for smaller items. I wish they wouldn’t. Occasionally things get screwed up and I have to go to the main Post Office and wait in line.
I chatted briefly with an affable black gentleman doing deliveries from an Amazon van. He told me they don’t print “Amazon” on the side of the van so that miscreants don’t follow it around stealing packages as soon as delivered. And this is in a low-theft area.
Even here, it’s so bad that when it started raining one day, I was reluctant to push a large package left on my neighbor’s front steps into his enclosed porch lest I be nabbed and charged as a would-be footpad. It’s ridiculous how we’re allowing petty thieves to destroy even the simplest manifestations of community spirit. But, if the law enforcement system will do nothing useful, there’s not much the rest of us can do. I’m not quite ready to resort to Vigilance Committees; I’d hate to shoot someone dead over a box of, say, saxophone reeds, no matter how much he may deserve it.
Someone is going to get tired of the constant thefts and do something about it themselves. Not going to be pretty. There are videos from other countries that have descended into lawlessness that show people taking action. Seems like CA is headed that way. Not good at all.
I think it’s great Kanye West has had a powerful conversion experience and is now using his cultural position to testify. Christianity, whatever its ultimate truth, is a way people can change their lives if they are ready to.
A couple years ago I googled my old neighborhood gang. I don’t know why Daytona Beach was such a tough place to grow up but it was and a sad number of the old gang ended up involved with drugs, in prison or dead.
Anyway, one kid I knew, Steve, was into downers and heroin in his teens. I figured him for a casualty, easy. But no, he came close, but he formed a relationship with a Christian pastor who went to bat for Steve when he was up for a 5-10 stretch. Steve got a very special sentence. He only served time on weekends. The rest of the week he worked for his church.
It was enough to get Steve back on track. I spoke with him on the phone. Now Steve is the B&G guy for his church, he is a solid citizen, and he is married with children and grandchildren. God bless him.
I’ll bet by example Kanye saves people he never even hears about.
Very disappointed in the SCU law prof. Once we lose the rule of law in this country, we’re finished. How would he like it if HIS stuff was stolen.
Black female “studies” professor at Princeton was on Book TV last Sunday. She was doing 67 mph in a 45 zone. Because she had unpaid parking tickets there was a bench warrant for her arrest. The cops took her to the station and cuffed her; all SOP. She alleged racism. I was surprised to learn she has a JD from Harvard and LLM from Georgetown.
The good news is that some new houses have second story package landing zones for drone deliveries.
According to the article, the porch thief started on painkillers at age 19, and then went on to heroin and meth. Here’s some of the damage caused by meth:
Relevance?
Rot begins at the head of the fish. DC, the district of criminals, is lawless. Until we see real justice occur in the head of the fish with convictions and hard time in a federal maximum security prison, the lawlessness will continue to grow.
I suggest it should start with that paradigm of smugness James Comey. Out here in flyover country most of us are tired of what goes on in the coasts. That is why Trump sits in the Oval Office.
Kate,
Where I live, in the Adirondack mountains, Amazon is delivered by the USPS. Sometimes UPS, but only the bigger packages.
A friend of mine who works for the USPS curses Amazon and their package volume at Christmas time. Apparently, the USPS was desperate to make a deal with Amazon, reasoning that while Snail Mail volume was shrinking, the volume of packages by mail was going through the roof. But he says the USPS was desperate when they negotiated the deal and Amazon got the better end of the deal. The Postal Service is still hurting pretty bad.
Mentus,
You beat me to it! I was going to link to that video. It always brings a smile to my face.
huxley says, “Christianity, whatever its ultimate truth, is a way people can change their lives if they are ready to.”
Exactly the same is true for Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous and all the other 12-step spinoffs. They are all spiritually based, but are not Christian, and people can indeed change in those programs if they really want to, with veterans to guide and help. One cannot do it by oneself no matter how ready/desperate one is! Or so I am told.
The ultimate Truth of Christianity is, I believe, real. I recommend a reading of Pope John Paul’s encyclical “Fides et Ratio”, aka Faith and Reason, to get a leg up on the matter. The Catholicism thereof is marginally relevant. John Paul was a great philosopher.
“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.” Proverbs 29:2 KJV I have thought that for some time we are headed towards anarchy-tyranny in this country. Where the political left sides with the Antifa types and general career criminals while piling on more regulations and taxes on the law abiding.
Cornhead
Exactly so. Zealous attorneys should consider this point before they speak out in defense of criminals.
Antifa-linked man, 24, is sentenced to nearly six years in prison for brutal baton attack in Portland that left his victim needing 25 staples to the head Consider what his attorney said:
How would attorney Kroll feel if HE suffered the blows on the head that his client’s victim suffered?
Both Antifa and package thieves are examples of criminals acting with nearly complete impunity. Impunity brings vigilantes or, at least, many recordings.
(I would prefer twenty Antifa sentences of six months to one of six years.)
I’ve noticed how the MSM has tried to “reframe” these thieves and their thefts by minimizing and poo pooing this crime, and by labeling them using the lighthearted term of “Porch pirates,” and not identifying them for the thieves that they are.
Their thefts are only a lighthearted “prank” if its not your child’s long awaited Christmas present, the item you’ve saved up a year to buy, or your absolutely essential shipment of Insulin or some other life saving drug that’s been stolen by one of these “porch pirates.”
I choose to pick up items at the store as in Walmart.com and not support Mr. Bezos. Now if I have to worry about safety in the parking lot, well that’s evidence that Seattle values have moved east across the mountains.
You would think that it wouldn’t be that hard a concept to understand–that if the supposed “justice” and “legal” systems don’t do the job of protecting citizens from assault, theft, and other forms of criminality well, then, eventually citizens will do the job themselves, and it won’t be pretty.
Here in this country, it seems as if we’re inching towards that state of self help a little more each day.
The problem is that–given the current state of many of our police and judicial systems–it won’t be the criminal who ends up in jail, it will be the citizen who has tried to defend himself, his family, his property, and his right to peaceful enjoyment of his life who will end up being charged and put into jail.
For an extreme example of this situation see today’s UK.
Exactly the same is true for Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous and all the other 12-step spinoffs. They are all spiritually based, but are not Christian…
Cicero: Perhaps you already know, but the story of AA is stranger than most realize.
AA came out of Bill W.’s desperation for a cure to his alcoholism, a classic “white light” spiritual experience he had apparently based on Belladonna alkaloids, which allowed him to stop drinking, and the advice of a friend to ground his experience in an evangelical Christianity called the Oxford Group.
Bill W’s conviction was that alcoholism could only be turned around by a spiritual experience. However, the fellowship of other alcoholics was useful, even necessary, to maintain sobriety.
Nonetheless, Bill W. never lost sight of the spiritual experience which changed him. Years later he took part in LSD experiments with Aldous Huxley no less and felt LSD provided access to his first experience. He was ready to promote LSD under the AA banner but other members opposed him strenuously.
Far out, man!
The people of California are learning how important it is not to let the deadwood accumulate in their forests They have yet to apply what they’ve learned to the cities.
My point in all this is that people can change, though what people can do versus what they will do is all the difference in the world.
But I want to hold that possibility aloft for all, even for the Fairley’s.
My sister was crushed by her life and her addictions to alcoholism and cocaine. She had as much reason, maybe more, as Fairley to give up. In the 80s she hit bottom, gave it up to God, went to an AA meeting, picked up her white chip and never used again.
My other sister has a plenty tragic story as well, and not so clear-cut. She’s in her mid-fifties and all the rehab and AA finally seemed to have taken hold. She’s stable, sober and living with a decent man. I almost can’t believe it, but I know how hard she worked.
I hate that message I see everywhere how everyone is a victim. It’s poison. I don’t believe in fairy tale happy endings, but people can do better.
Huxley, Cicero,
I remember a much younger me being mildly shocked when a ne’er do well acquaintance told me he had conquered his alcoholism – and he couldn’t have done it without Jesus.
Since then I have noticed no one ever says; ‘I saved my soul – all by myself.’
As far as the ‘ultimate truth’ of Christianity, I’d wager Jesus has brought more souls back from the brink than anyone – or thing – going.
‘By their fruits ye shall know them.’
Thanks to the miracle of American greatness, nonlethal home defense systems are available to thwart porch thieves and other domestic threats. Most porch thievery can be easily deterred by use of an easily installed dual use HFT Fire Buster Home Protection system* with water cannon aimed at the delivery area. Once triggered, the system’s motion-detection feature literally chases miscreants off your property. If they attempt to make off with their loot, a drop net system** (originally designed for large game animals) may be deployed to impede their escape. With the fire hose still blasting them, use your speaker to encourage dropping packages and moving on.
“Well and good enough for porch thieves,” you say, “but what if Antifa comes calling, à la the harassment of Tucker Carlson and Andy Ngo?”
Glad you asked! The same user-friendly remote for your camera, speaker, water cannon, and drop net has an additional feature. Just flip the water cannon switch to “sewer” to give Antifites an experience they won’t soon forget. After all, you pay for that sewer line, and you might as well get full use of it. When the assailants have been dosed for an appropriate interval, netting retracts into an enzyme cleaning solution, which also shoots through the cannons for rapid crime scene cleanup.
Having vanquished such threats, one last challenge remains. As President Trump knows all too well, this one’s the toughest: modesty.
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vE-swnR8W5Y
** https://www.memphisnet.net/category/cannon-rocket-nets
As far as the ‘ultimate truth’ of Christianity, I’d wager Jesus has brought more souls back from the brink than anyone – or thing – going.
Molly Brown: I give Jesus credit for that! At least so far as I know. Christian churches are a bit more complicated, but you can always call on Jesus.
In the sixties there was a Hindu teacher/saint called Maharaji, who developed a large following among Westerners who came to India. Along with Hindu teachings, Maharaji made sure to tell his Western disciples about Jesus, though the Westerners, mostly hippie types, really didn’t want to hear it.
One of Maharaji’s Western disciples, Krishna Das, now tours giving concerts of Hindu devotional music. At some point in the concert he tells a long shaggy-dog story about going deep, deep into Indian mountains and forests to meditate until he finds an ancient, spiritual village. There he discovers the holy teacher always has a telephone to his ear. Krishna Das doesn’t get that at all. But he explains to the audience he is going to teach them the chant he learned in that village:
Jesus on the mainline — tell him what you want
Jesus on the mainline — tell him what you want
Jesus on the mainline — tell him what you want
You can call him up and tell him what you want
“Jesus On The Mainline – Krishna Das Live!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl-o7O222FA
I couldn’t believe the length of the original article. It just kept going and going and saying the same thing over and over. Inadvertently replicating the institutional and personal cycle of ineptitude and failure and disregard that is the subject of the article. Nothing good happens, then nothing good happens some more. Wrong hands, rinse, repeat.
There is nothing the average suburban Joe can do about white collar crime.
We think we have crime problems here, how about our next door neighbor Mexico?
You see these ads for vacations in Mexico at this or that great looking beachfront resort, and if you look at TV shows like “International House Hunters,” they often have episodes featuring couples who have decided to buy a vacation home in Mexico, or even to pick up stakes, make a permanent move, and to resettle in some part of Mexico.
On these shows about moving to Mexico, the common thread is the people who are resettling in Mexico gushing about what a “great place to live” the area they have chosen is, how they enjoy the local “culture” (as far as I can see, from the pictures they usually use to illustrate this idea, outside of major cities this Mexican “culture” is quite often represented by beat up looking towns with dirt roads, and stalls full of brightly colored, trashy tourist crap) and, always, about how “friendly the locals are.”
Meanwhile—back in the real world—you have almost weekly reports of authorities finding mass graves of cartel victims, recent reports of corpses, killed execution style, hung along bridges, or dumped all over the place, actual bags full of heads turning up, gang wars so intense that Mexican government troops have recently been defeated and, now, this new incident in which nine U.S. citizens—three women and what I assume were their six young children—visiting Mexico, got caught in a gun battle between two cartels, and were killed. *
Why in the world would anybody want to visit, much less settle in Mexico?
P.S. —I see that President Trump has offered Mexico U.S. military assistance to help the Mexican government battle against these cartels.
I’m assuming that this is merely rhetorical, and not a genuine offer to get the U.S. militarily involved in Mexico.
* See https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/11/developing-president-trump-offers-mexico-military-assistance-to-clean-out-cartel-armies-after-9-americans-including-6-children-slaughtered-in-gun-battle/
The little “credit” at the end tells you all you need to know about the inside slant the article is going to take from its funding moment:
“This article is part of our project “The Presence of Justice,” which is supported by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge.”
SAFETY AND JUSTICE tells you all you need to know about the writer and her inner ideology.
P.S. Re my post above–
According to the information in this story about the attack, those killed were not visiting Mexico, they lived in Mexico, and were members of some type of long established Mormon community there—where people often had dual U.S.-Mexican citizenship—who were traveling in a convoy of SUVs, which cartel members mistook for cartel vehicles. (A relative of those killed is quoted saying that after cartel gunmen shot up a SUV, they set it on fire for good measure.)
This article says that a half dozen other children involved in this incident were taken across the border into the U.S., to Phoenix—one of them with a bullet wound—and that one other child is still missing. *
This truly was a massacre of U.S. citizens, and I’d expect that our government will have some kind of response that will not just be words.
* https://www.richmond.com/news/national-world/at-least-us-citizens-die-in-cartel-attack-in-northern/article_45058173-19d3-5766-955e-c8a76cf1edd6.html
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
and earlier:
Seems to me that Delta might need to make a little visit, “South of the border, down Mexico Way.”
The chances of the President of Mexico making that call are slim to none at present. Can’t predict the future, but I am sure that the US military 1) has long had plans for the invasion of Mexico and 2) orders for new killer drones went up yesterday.
“This article is part of our project “The Presence of Justice,” which is supported by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge.” — G. Vanderleun
Nearly all of these foundations become left wing over time. Henry Ford was a hard core conservative (and probably racist) but the Ford foundation went left rather quickly. Realizing this, Mr. Olin set up the Olin foundation with a young conservative at the top and required him to spend down the foundation and terminate it over some set time period, roughly half a lifetime.
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Yes, Amazon does deliver some packages via USPS. I’ve even seen USPS deliveries on Sunday though I don’t know if those are Amazon.
If someone is stealing actual mail, the Postal Inspector is the way to go. Those folks don’t screw around.
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I try to do my window shopping on Amazon, then purchase on Walmart when possible. Vote with your wallet. Though I do subscribe to Amazon Prime on occasion for the streaming video content.
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A caution on wireless home cameras: If they are continuously transmitting wireless video, even encrypted transmissions are rather easily hacked.
Sounds like it’s part of the progressive effort to delegitimize and dismantle the “broken windows “ method of crime prevention.
That could have an unintended consequence as studies suggest fear pushes people to be right wing conservatives. Of course, then there are studies that say fear is a right wing conservative brain pathology.
If someone is stealing actual mail, the Postal Inspector is the way to go. Those folks don’t screw around.
TommyJay: I heard that during the Jussy Smollett hoax.
In the week before his “attack” he received a racist death threat letter containing an ominous white powder (turned out to be crushed aspirin), which he reported. Since Smollett almost certainly sent that letter to himself, it qualified as a “terroristic hoax” under federal law and the “don’t screw around” Post Office was on the case.
It sounded like the Post Office would manage what the Chicago authorities couldn’t — nail Smollett to the wall. But I’ve heard nothing on that score since last April.
At this point I don’t have much faith when it comes to the law and those with Deep State connections. I’d like to believe there are just a few bad apples here and there but the rot seems to go considerably deeper.
AMLO responds:
}}} Mail theft is a felony. Why is it being described as a misdemeanor? The federal postal inspectors should have been involved. They take mail theft very seriously. Unless this is not USPS, but it is described as mail theft. Something fishy.
and Neo:
It depends on the package and the area. Amazon often uses the USPS for the “last mile” part, since they are headed past your house every day, anyway, so they drop stuff off at the local mail facility and the USPS delivers it same day. I have never figured out what precisely triggers them to use UPS vs. USPS. It may be that all the doorstep deliveries are UPS, if they (all the USPS deliveries) are small enough to fit in one of the USPS main postal boxes (i.e., the “package box” often found next to a gang of individual boxes, which handles parcels up to ca. 40″x40″x40″, or thereabouts, usually a stacked pair of two).
I’m tired of our citizens being attacked, all over the world.
From what I’ve read, in ancient times, when Rome was the predominant power, to be a “Citizen of Rome” conferred all sorts of benefits and really meant something, and anyone who attacked a “Citizen of Rome” could expect swift, brutal, and bloody retaliation from Roman military forces.
Time, it seems to me, to revive that policy, to protect our citizens when they are abroad, so that anyone who attacks a “Citizen of the United States” can also expect our swift, brutal, and bloody military retaliation.
TommyJay and Huxley–
I, too, had picked up the impression, from somewhere or the other, about how hard-nosed, on the hunt, and effective the U.S. Postal Inspector’s Service was.
But, here is my personal experience with the U.S. Postal Inspector’s Service, and their total lack of interest in doing anything to identify and prosecute scammers who violate Federal law–
To my surprise, around 15 years ago, I received one of those large, expensive overnight letters and, when I opened it up, out fluttered what appeared to be a postal money order, made out to me, as I recall, for $750.00 dollars.
Included in this packet was a letter telling me that, because of my sterling reputation in the business community (me not having any business at all) I had been chosen to be a “secret shopper,” and I was to take this U.S. postal money order to my bank, cash it, take 10% of the money as my fee for performing this secret shopper service, and take the remaining $650.00 dollars in cash to the local Walmart, wire this money to the person and address they supplied, and I was then to write up my “secret shopper evaluation” of how the transaction went, mail it back to the person who had sent me this “opportunity,” and I would then be given a new secret shopper assignment at the same rate of pay.
Suspicious ol’ me looked around on the Internet, and immediately discovered that this “secret shopper scam” was a common one.
Th legit looking “postal money order”—silver security line and all—was a fake.
The bank would cash it alright, but it could take up to a couple of months for processing at the bank to identify this postal money order as fake and, when they did, I would be looking at bank fraud charges, and owe the bank the entire $750.00 dollars plus various other penalty charges, $650.00 dollars of which I had long since wired to the scammers.
After I read this, I handled the paperwork and “U.S. postal money order” with gloves to preserve any fingerprints, and called the U.S. Postal Inspectors Office listed in the Phone Book.
I explained what had happened, told them that I had this envelope, letter, and fake postal money order—which they might be able to use to identify the scammers—and was told by the Postal Inspector employee on the phone that they had no interest at all in investigating this matter, and that I could just throw away the scammer’s envelope, paperwork, and fake postal money order.
P.S.—I kept that paperwork for some time, hoping that there had been some mistake, that the Postal Inspectors would have a change of heart, call me up and want it all, but a year or two later, as I was throwing the envelope and its contents out, another postal money order, again made out to me for for $750.00, fluttered out.
So–if I took the bait–I wasn’t just supposed to be scammed out of $675.00 dollars, I was supposed to be scammed out of $1,350.00 dollars.
Snow on Pine, there’s been an expatriate Mormon community in Mexico for a long time. Mitt Romney’s father was born in Mexico in such a community.
Make that $675.00 not $650.00, and so on.
Snow on Pine: Thanks for your Post Office story.
I too miss the good ole days when foreigners could snatch or kill American citizens at their profound risk.
When did that end? Or was it ever really true?
re Ann’s comment: The relevance is obvious. The accuracy or source isn’t..
i’d say, it’s input: FWIW.
huxley on November 5, 2019 at 4:10 pm said:
I too miss the good ole days when foreigners could snatch or kill American citizens at their profound risk.
When did that end? Or was it ever really true?
* * *
“Pedecaris alive or Raisuli dead!” sort of thing, you mean?
The movie “The Wind and the Lion” is one of my all time favorites, but it *ahem* adapts the real story for dramatic and romantic affect.
It’s still a great line.
Meanwhile, back at the main topic – we are awaiting our new purchase of the Benchsentry package protection box, which we bought from the inventor himself during a special event at our local ACE hardware store.
We had to take our place in line, as they are getting orders faster than they can build the box, but should have it before Thanksgiving. The display prototype was quite impressive. $499 online price; we got it cheaper at the time, of course.
Since we get packages nearly everyday, it seemed like a good idea.
Haven’t lost one yet, but I suspect it’s only a matter of time before the pirates hit our neighborhood. They are rampant in the rest of Denver metro.
https://benchsentry.com/
Never have a package stolen. Ever.
• Smart electric lock
• Can be bolted to your patio
• Accessed by all delivery services (USPS, FedEx, UPS)
• HOA approved bench design
• Weatherproof and UV resistant
• 7 cubic feet of capacity
• Android and Apple mobile app control
The poor, who are thieves instead of beggars by choice, should be at some kind of job. Either a volunteer National Service job, or an involuntary out-of-city infrastructure support job.
Or in jail. Where such a jail is not to rehabilitate the thieves, but to protect the innocent from their “free” thieving. Yes, after the third of “3 strikes you’re out”. At a minimum security prison at first.
It’s mental / cultural illness and needs to be actively and consistently fought against with both legal and cultural punishments, like shame and ostracization.
But too many rich elite prefer blaming “society” rather than the individuals.