[kaushik_s]

Originally Posted by hellstar

I chose to differ on this , statistics available with the National Crime Records Bureau, show that a house once burgled is 75% more probable to be hit again ,as not other miscreants know that the house has weaknesses, which might be covered up but nevertheless still existent.

I would probably agree with that cause there was a second attempt to break-in into my friend's house after a few months but this time they were unsuccessful as my friend got the doors properly strengthened with steel bars and put iron grills on the back side also.So better not to leave the house unguarded and in case you have to be out for more then a day then arrange for a security guard.
Regards,

[Surprise]

Originally Posted by hellstar

I chose to differ on this , statistics available with the National Crime Records Bureau, show that a house once burgled is 75% more probable to be hit again ,as not other miscreants know that the house has weaknesses, which might be covered up but nevertheless still existent.

Is it possible for you to share that link?

I stand corrected.

I say from my observation of following such news. I could think off atleast 20 places where the theft/burglary took place 1st time in comparison with only one incident where it happened twice.

[setuniket]

This part is indeed frustating to read.I am a forensic student and know how each and every type of fingerprint can be lifted.Working in this field since last three years.They surely had no intention to work seriously to find out clues,more shocking is read that they were drunk!!
The worst part is that this aspect(fingerperint lifting) is one man job.. It never needs a bunch of people.
These were looking for quick bucks for the job, for which the government is already paying..
regards
Setu Niket

Originally Posted by jassi

Anurag911 finally walks into my place at 11pm with some munch from KFC and we sit and eat in one corner without touching anything, still waiting for the fingerprint specialists. Finally I call the cops and they say the fingerprint guy is on his way. At 1230 two cops on a luna along with a jeep full of "fingerprint specialists" walk in. They now ask me things like where I work and how much do I earn. I say where I work and ask how does my pay matter. Fake a small number and then answer that the stuff is worth 1.5 lacs. They look at me and say think twice before you say the estimated value, electronics depreciate and crap, to which I answer I have paid for it all through my nose and still repaying credit cards.

The experts then open their "investigation bag" and take out silver dust and start dusting the cupboard, a black cellphone box full of fingerprints, which was opened is dusted and discarded (reason unknown). Now they use their own ungloved hands to open cupboard and say paint is not right for fingerprints and also too much dust boss. I tell em to come to the hall where major stuff has been stolen, to which they quip, whatever has been touched has been stolen!! One guy seems to be strumming the guitar in my cupboard with his bare hands, another possible source of fingerprints ruined.

Finally I tell em to analyse the silver amp, to which they say no boss our powder is silver color so we can take finger prints off the amp. I point to the black screen of amp which has 2 fingerprints on it, but no they say its too oily oily . The black tv trolley where the electronics were picked from - no too dusty the other cupboard, a laptop bag, no boss all useless and dusty!! The bathroom grill - no boss that is where we came in from so all fingerprints mixed.

According to anurag911, these "experts" were also kinda drunk!! 9-10 mins later, they say we have no fingerprints, but dont worry we will catch them and get all your stuff back and walk out. They disappear so soon in their jeep and luna (waving away), that I dont even get a chance to ask em what are the next steps. We lock the doors of bathroom and lock the house and drive off to airport for some coffee. Fifth gear at a speed of 30kmph, I was really driving like a guy who lost all the gadgets he had assembled over 2 years of international trips. Cursing myself for not getting the zicon and theft insurance in time. We have coffee, come back home and anurag911 pushes off.

[Nitin]

Sorry about the loss,Jassi. I can understand how you feel at this point.
Brings back memories of what happened to my neighbor in 1995.
We had just moved to Indiranagar,and we met this family who lived right across the street. We were on the road parallel to Double Rd,Indiranagar.

We moved to the house in 1994,and that year everything was ok.In 1995,both mother & son were in Kerala during the Diwali season. Turns out,on Diwali, the house was broken into. Not one person heard a sound from the house,since there were crackers going off all around. A few things were lost,but nothing very precious as a lot of things were in the bank locker.

Anyways,the cops turn up and begin their work. They were the most unprofessional & incompetent individuals I had ever seen. Clumsy & clueless on where to start. The questions were vague,and the work by the fingerprinting experts was lousy. The investigation went nowhere.

3 months later the cops show up,and say that they have recovered a few items. None of them are in the original condition,and it seemed more like some 'maal' from Chor bazaar. The items didn't even come close to the stuff that was lost.

Ever since that day, my folks stay home during Diwali,and make sure there's a crowd for the most part of the night.

[jassi]

not surprised to know that most fingerprints can be lifted - the cops were just doing TP and that too I don't think they had intentions of coming but ACP had promised and also they came cos I called em 3 times, as it was getting frustrating sitting not touching anything.

Statistics or not - I can't trust this house anymore. My time is bad and I have learnt my lesson!! - its time to move out to a safer place and secure it further and then get insurance.

[jassi]

i collected all the inputs from my end like 3 bills totaling to 1lac that I found after searching a lot in a house turned upside down by thieves. Most bills were in a box with the ext harddisk which seems to have been stolen
Also printed pics of all devices and put in hints like they didn't take remote or power cord etc on 6 pages color print out so that they can identify these stolen goods.
Anyway I goto the police station and meet sub-inspector shivanna who is handling my case and it seems he was sleeping at 5pm. After explaining all the clues I had, the hawaldar or admin guy gave sub-insptr a missed call to wake him up. The sub-inspctr finally woke up and then i took him through entire set of clues. He said go get a photocopy and I promptly got one set in 5 mins.
He now seemed awake and said, this value is above 50k and I cant handle your case. This will now be handled by SHO (stationed house officer??) G. Guruswamy and with all your hints we will make a new FIR I was like what is the investigation so far and do you have any intelligence on where to look. He said no sir now we will make new FIR and then start investigation cos we don't know how a ps3 looks or what is a dvd player!! I said ok where is SHO - Sir he is on special duty please come tomorrow.
This was day before yesterday, so I went yesterday morning and SHO was not there. Then I called his cell and he said I am on special duty at vidhan soudha or something, so please come in evening. I made sure he commits to a time and he said 5pm. I left early from office with my set of clues' printouts and bills and on reaching there in evening was told SHO has left for special duty due to government falling problems. I was now kinda angry and asked him who is handling my case in meanwhile and was told SHO when he is off special duty!! I did notice that SHO's cabin lights were on, so no idea if he had just left or what.

FInally frustrated I walked out and tried ringing smsing SHO on his cell but got no response. All I wanted was to give all the info and hints I had to help in investigation and then leave it on police, but it seems there is no investigation and right now despite initially telling that value of stolen stuff is 1.5 lacs, they want to now do new FIR cos value is more than 50k.
I am sure by now all stuff has been sold twice (from thief to shop and shop to enduser) and its impossible to trace the goods from final end users!!

I always new it was time to move on and bangy police sucks at investigation, but just wanted to be sure from my end I have done all I can. But i never knew police was so bad that they wont even be able to take in all the inputs a victim had.

Everyone if you have valuable goods get an insurance and preferably anti-theft device installed. Dont trust the security provided by your society, dont trust your maid or anyone who comes to work at your place and especially dont trust the police to help you out. DTA!!

[himanshugoswami]

Jassi, I suggest you talk to a local lawyer.

there is no provision in law for a second FIR for the same offence. what the SI is telling you is complete crap and just an excuse for not working.

See if you can get in touch with some higher ups in the police....that is the only way that this will ever work.

[BUSA]

Sorry to hear about the incident Jassi. Its sad to know some people want to make money on some else's hardwork/money.

[jassi]

Guys - I have an update!!
The original case was with Mahadevpura police station but last week I gotta call from airport police station asking me to come down immediately as they had caught the thieves.

I walk in to the police station and they take me down the backside where they open a cupboard and show me the PS3 (no hdmi, optical, power, etc, cables) and they have my archos portable video player (screen seemed a bit outta shape or maybe just dirty) as well as the philips dvd player. They also had recovered 1 speaker out of the 6 onkyo speakers stolen from my onkyo 7.1 HT.

Then they asked me if I wanted to meet the thieves. I said not really, but they insisted and took me to the backyard. There were 4 local goons (1 more who had fled). They were just sitting in blankets, eating merrily ready to sleep infact. And they had all the details, what all stuff they stole, down to the exact split of country wise dollars (sing, aud, US) which they had stolen

Well then the cops said we have spent lotsa money, around 10k in catching em, and i said oh is it. They then asked me value of recovered stuff, which I confirmed was around 45k (ps3 + archos + philips dvd) but the other stuff like onkyo (60k) and watches (4-5) and dollars (300 odd) etc was missing. They said don't worry we will try and get remaining speakers, and will call you in 2 days and explain how to get the recovered stuff released.

Its been 1 week now and they haven't called. Now I am sure they expect some dough for releasing the stuff, but I am bad at this stuff and have no clue how to proceed.
Should I rush up and call them (and show my eagerness) or wait for their call i.e. maybe they are trying to recover speakers.
Given that they have hinted 10k spent in recovering, how much should I ideally pay for the recovered stuff to be released.

Also given that these are gadgets (may have been dropped, opened or internal storage stripped), I think I will be need to take a chance to figure out if they really still work or not. Only way to test is try and get the power and connector cables from somewhere and test if the gadgets are still in working condition.

Any ideas

[Nitin]

Thats some bit of good news,jassi.
The problem is this. Most thieves get the gadgets torn apart to pull out important stuff,and whats remaining is nothing but the casing with few electronic components. I've seen this happen in 3 cases,where my friends have had their electronic goods returned with almost nothing left in them.
You will definitely want to get every single thing checked in anything thats returned to you.
As for the thieves,a couple of days and they'll probably go scott-free.

[Xehaust]

In my opinion, it's not worth it.
If possible, check what is working as the electronic items must probably have been handled very roughly even if they are not torn apart. So check if anything is perfect and anyways you have mentioned that the cables and so on are missing.

So instead of having the hassle of procuring cables, getting back damaged goods and also having to pay the police and also the hassle of handling them, id say just buy new electronic items, be happy and enjoy them and get on with life. It will be much easier.

Why pay the police for releasing the damaged goods? Just buy new ones and tell them that you dont want to release the goods as they are not working and spoilt. Tip them for their efforts (which i guess was not much anyways).

Also, i would suggest to anyone in any situation, do not call the cops as long as you yourself are not in any danger. If your house has been robbed, live with it and write off your losses. This is India where the cops dont give a dam, all they will do is make you run around all day and try to extract more money from your already emptied wallet. (Thats why they were asking how much you earn and stuff in the beginning). So it's better to just buy new stuff when you can afford it and shed a tear for a few days. Time will heal all. So its better to never get cops involved. They will only creat more of a nuisance and waste your time.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by jassi

Its been 1 week now and they haven't called. Now I am sure they expect some dough for releasing the stuff, but I am bad at this stuff and have no clue how to proceed.
Should I rush up and call them (and show my eagerness) or wait for their call i.e. maybe they are trying to recover speakers.

One question, do you want it back, in that abused shape? Proceed only if you want it. You won't get it unless you pay bribe, that much is very clear.

Originally Posted by jassi

Given that they have hinted 10k spent in recovering, how much should I ideally pay for the recovered stuff to be released.

You mean they spent from their pocket? They spent the tax payers money to recover it. If you don't want the stuff back, you have no liability, they are not running a business to give you recovery bills.

[jassi]

well I have already bought a new ps3 and speakers and for all i know the recovered stuff maybe damaged. But the prospect of having another PS3 (maybe install linux on it) and another dvd player and 6 more speakers and my 30gb video player (for my car now use a viewty) back did seem enticing

I was thinking maybe I could cut a deal with em to allow me test the stuff and then pay em. I can test the ps3 with my new ps3's cables and I have the archos cables on me (I guess!!) These 2 gadgets if i can test and are working are worth 25+15=40k. philips dvd player is 5k so no big deal there and speakers they have just recovered 1 of 6 so nothing there.

Is this a doable proposition or am i just wasting my time

[Xehaust]

Like mentioned earlier,

Step by step:
1) Test them.

2) If they are working then figure out how much are they expecting you to pay them.

3) Then weigh if its worth the dough.

4) Finally, & above all else, even the dough, consider whether it's worth your time, effort and all the hassles.

Thats the best advice i can give

[khanak]

Is there any way you can get a lawyer to go to the police station with you. Its ridiculous to have them ask you to pay to get their stuff back. After all you have probably paid for than 10k in taxes just on the things that got stolen