Guys! Awesome story for you...

Around Thanksgiving (2 months ago) I just purchased my first bass boat. About 2 weeks later, someone broke into it and stole EVERYTHING except the motor and trolling motor. Thankfully I had a good insurance policy with high limits so I was able to get back about $5,000 of the $7500 worth of goods that were stolen, however as us fishermen know, it was a real pain to repurchase everything and organize all that gear that took me years to accumulate! So I thought it was a done deal and just moved on and now flipping ahead to yesterday... I get a phone call!

"Hi Brent this is the Manager over at #%& Storage Place, there's some guy out in front of his storage unit selling a TON of fishing gear, his unit is pretty close to where your boat was stored, do you want to come take a look and see if any of it is yours?!" I said heck yes!

I hightailed over to the unit and the guy was already gone but the manager got access into the unit and sure enough, 6 of my rod/reels, 4 of my Plano 3700 boxes full of crankbaits, topwater, jigs, spinnerbaits, swimbaits, etc. and an array of miscellaneous items that were stolen. My quick calculation was that about 3/5 of the stuff was gone but at least there were still some items remaining. I also saw well over 80-90 Plano Boxes stacked high of most likely other stolen goods! This guy must be a 'professional fisherman thief!'

So what did we do? Well if I was in Texas you know damn well it would've been on. But out here in California I took the more 'politically correct' route lol. The police were called immediately and we went through the run around with them and now today a detective was brought in and even better... I found a Craigslist post of this scumbag selling all my gear! "Freshwater Fishing Gear, Tons of Stuff, Too much to list, starting at $10, etc. CALL Only!" So I called and played dumb and he quickly identified a few of my items and even mentioned the Rod Sox that I have on the rods and I knew it was him.

Well right now the Detectives are 'setting up a buy' in hopes of luring this scumbag over to sell their undercover detective some of the stolen goods. So I'm ANXIOUSLY waiting right now. It feels like the 4'th quarter with 5 seconds on the clock, with a timeout, and I'm about to go kick a game winning field goal...

End the story for me... what do you think will happen? Thanks for reading and I will post a follow-up as soon as I hopefully get most of my gear back and see this guy goes to jail! Thank You Lord!

That is awesome. Way to handle it the correct way with out getting your hands dirty. I really hope they pin his azz to the wall with charges to the fullest. Can't wait to hear the outcome.

Keep us informed. I'm interested in what this guys story is.

well, hopefully this guy doesnt have a computer and follow this site.........

This guy will go to jail, and If you play your cards right you will come out ahead. since insurance already paid you, the equipment that will be consficated will be thiers, you can buy that equipment from the insurance company for .20 on the dollar normally.

This is not a Texas event. I'm way out in California. highly doubt it. haha. The ball is already in motion.

I hope u get the SOB, not as fun as Texas justice hopefully he does time

The first part of that sounds great, but the second part- not getting my gear back... hmmm... Should I have just taken the stuff yesterday then when I had it in my sites?!?! I will be pisssed if I have to 'buy' back my goods. I think this should just be a 'bonus' to all the garbage I endured. As well, I was short about $2500 because the limits only went up to $5,000 and there was about $7,500 in the loss. I hope I can get this all back?!

you may be able to get back your losses from him, but the insurance company wont pay you and give you the stuff too.

excellent. hope ya'll catch him

Hope all work out good for you and bad for him!!

And I also hope he isn't reading this...

Thanks, and as mentioned above this is a California thing, not anything to do with Texas. Highly unlikely.

Hope he ends up with some jail time.

Hope they bust his a** and throw him in jail.

Dude, there is people that frequent this site from all over the country. My advice to you is contact a mod, have them take this thread down, once the douche is nabbed, put it back up and tell "the rest of the story".

Great work gumshoe!!

treble hook, his nutsack, pully and some rope...

+1,000

TEXAS JUSTICE......NUTTIN LIKE IT

im pretty sure you will get your gear back, you may have to pay back some to the ins co but it will be worth it, glad you got him and I hope he pays dearly for it

I think I saw this guy on Storage Wars the other night. Congrads. on you find. Hope you get it all back.

Hope you get it all back. I would think you'd get to keep the insurance money plus whatever the police department turns back over to you after they're done using it as evidence. It's not like insurance covered all your losses or you got all your stuff back anyway. You got some of your stuff back and some money to cover the rest.

Oh well, good luck catching him!

Kick his @ss Seabass!

hope they nail him!!!!

After making a few calls, that appears to be accurate. It is MY Property that was stolen and as far as the original insurance claim, it is considered 'completed' and this new development after the fact, has nothing to do with it and my items should be returned to me after there is no longer use for the evidence.

Now after all this has taken place would you continue with the same coverage, or pay a larger premium to get a more complete coverage policy?

Delete.

Lose lips sink ships.....

Yea I will have same coverage and this all happened 2 months ago (the original theft) but it looks like my rate will go up about 12 dollars a year from 220 or so a year to about 232 for about 3 years which is not bad. But if another claim happens within 3 years I think they drop you.

I highly recommend SKI SAFE, somewhat affiliated with Geico. It was an easy and as stressless as possible experience.

Good for you! Think you should take down your picture and any references that could be used to locate you.

I would inform my insurance company of the situation, they probably have additional avenues to add to his problems (sounds like he owes them 5k) and they might insure the investigation continues as they now have an interest...

I'd welcome him to locate me. I'd love to 'meet him' ; )

Hopefully, the storage unit will take a poll on stolen items and get a few more victims. If you can pile on the victims, it is more likely he won't be able to plea down. More Victims, more crimes, MORE TIME!! Good Luck.

Hopefully justice will be served. I can't stand thiefs!!! The individual needs some prison time so his a$$ gets punished by several inmates!!!

Lol. Stay away. You never know what they're gonna do. You gotta Strike on him,though.

Good luck

Just over estimate the amount to the LEO..A crime over a certain amount is a felony. as long as you dont over estimate to insurance company. A lot of Thefts are just misdemeanor until they total a certain amount.

Hopefully you posting this thread before justice is served, won't bite you in the a$$. We are talking a "world wide" Internet forum. Lots of people visit TFF everyday from many different states. Just never know, who knows who. No different than myself visiting a few California hunting and fishing sites daily.

Hope you get all your gear back and the theif sees some jail time!

JUSTICE WAS SERVED:

* Suspect had priors.
* Suspect was on probation.
* 2/5 of my tackle was recovered.
* It's now in my possession.
* Suspect is en route to Jail.

ADIOS MOTHER ______ !

That's what i like to hear congrats

Great ending!

GOOD

Off with his head!

Glad you'll caught the sorry SOB! Was any of the other stollen tackle put back in the hands of it's owners?

There is about $3,500 (in my calculations) worth of OTHER Tackle that the Police believe they MAY be able to link to other reported thefts. I only took what was mine and there were a few giant tubs of plano boxes left. One had about $300 worth of Spro Frogs in them that looked brand new. Another, about 30 DD22s brand new!

Unreal!

glad you got your stuff back, the sad thing is that waste of flesh will probably be back on the street in no time.

street justice is sometimes the best kind.

So glad to hear you got some of your stuff back. The sad part is,If he's an illegel. He'll be free in a week with food stamps and a place to stay after his free doctors visit to make sure he's heathly enough to continue to steal from us citizens.

It's actually a white guy haha.

love the end to the story i just wish you could whip him with one of your rods and pepper spray his punk a$$

Just googled his name and it turns out this scumbag won a few local bass tourneys back in 2006! Man the guys on our local forum will sure want to know about this. What a piece of garbage! So he's not only a thief but a fellow fisherman.

Good to hear! Glad you got some of your stuff back, hope the guy gets significant jail time!

No one wnts to face it but I bet alot of the
Thefts at fork are fishermen. of course the methheads
get thier share......

Im not surprised he fished

How come you have the stuff? It is property of the insurance company if you made a claim.

No it's not. It is my property. The claim has nothing to due with the fact it is my property. This is new evidence AFTER the fact.

Also, I am still out some $3,000 that was NOT covered by the claim. I sort of low-balled the action number in the OP. The amount of loss was significantly more.

It all worked out well. I also will be going for more after the guy besides jail time, restitution and a few other local ordinances that I can pursue.

As a judge I would love to say it would be jail but I can tell you that jail is doughtful unless he has been convicted before of a serious crime. The DA's office will not be to concerned about hard time for this kind of case. Especially in Cal.. As mad as it makes me and I am only a JP these type crimes at best may get ten years probation and fines. The DA's office may not even accept the case but I hope they hang the turd.

LOL!

And he has been convicted before, he is actually ON Probation currently. So I think the guy is out of chances hopefully! People will continue to do these terrible crimes if no one punishes them, they'll think they can just get away with it and a slap on the wrist is nothing to them.

My friend said a crazy crazy statement today but in some ways it's true...

"I can deal with drunks, drug addicts and other lowlifes but when it comes to stealing from others, being a thief is the most deceitful, despicable scum on the earth... he should be cast out to the bottom of the lake!" (quote- my friend, not me lol).

I hope he gets it all but I bet he don't. I set in on courts all the time and yes he might be on probation but I see it alot where they just add time to his probation and reset them to supervision. Unless he it is violent crime it will be plead to probation extension. Obama's releasing non violent offenders across Texas everyday because of crowding in the jails.

Yup. I bet this guy don't do any more than 6 months if he does that. It's unfortunate but we got a lot of thieves among us. So many that we can't lock em all up.

what a dumba$$ for sellin the stuff where he stole it!!

The claim does have something to do with your property...they paid you for your lost property. You need to notify the insurance company ASAP. They might sell you some of their propery. They will also need the guys name for subrogation.