A pickpocket in Barcelona uses a newspaper to hide his steal. We videotaped with a hidden camera.
Message to Telsta executive pickpocket victim: don’t beat yourself up. It happens to lots of visitors to Barcelona. So many, that events are starting to flee Barcelona for safer cities.
A doctor told us he had just spent six days in Barcelona at a pathology conference. One of his colleagues had her passport stolen and when she went to the embassy, fourteen other conference attendees were there reporting thefts. That’s typical.
Almost a year ago, Yannick Laclau wrote that Barcelona was close to losing the Mobile World Congress, partly because of the high level of street crime in the city. The convention organizers gave Barcelona another shot, and this year’s Congress just ended there. Yeah, there were thefts. No surprise.
A pickpocket at work in Barcelona.
But among the many items stolen by pickpockets was something the entire Windows world was waiting for: the working demo of Windows Mobile 6.5. It was lifted right out of the pocket of the Australian telephone company executive who was testing it. But really, it could have happened to anyone.
Or could it? With its top secret, unreleased, mobile operating system, the one that’s supposed to crush the iPhone with its Windows Marketplace fake AppStore and copycat touch screen, the phone was a hot property. I personally know any number of thieves in Barcelona who would consider it a fun challenge, albeit an easy one, to target a specific item. Presented properly, one could probably hire the unwitting pickpocket to steal the thing, then hand it over over for little more than he guesses is its street price. I’d probably recruit Kharem, or Plaid (about whom I’ve not yet written), or the swift-swiper.
Pickpockets often work in pairs, like these two in Barcelona. The newspaper is a tool, under which they hide their moves, as in the photo above.
Stranger things have happened. Like the time Bob gave some tourist safety talks to police and security groups in an unmentionable Spanish-speaking country. Of course he also demonstrated his pickpocketing skills. At dinner afterward, the chief of presidential security whispered to Bob about a visiting Colombian drug lord known for ordering ruthless murders. He actually asked Bob to pickpocket the gangster! They wanted him to steal his passport. There were 19 at the dinner table that night. It was pretty easy for us to grab our driver and slip away quietly.
I wonder if Bob and I should have bodyguards, like Roberto Saviano does. We, like Saviano, write about and expose the Camorra, Naples’ infamous mafia. The Camorra is not a crime family to fool with. If they don’t like you, they just kill you. Even if they do like you, because you’re just a tourist with money to spend (or have stolen), you might step in front of a flying bullet. These things happen in Naples.
Robert Saviano wrote the book Gomorrah, about the Camorra, in 2007. It’s been made into a film, which opens in the U.S. this week. Since publishing his book, Saviano has been housebound, despite living with a security detail. “I have not been able to go for a walk, go to a bookstore, to the cinema, to the theatre. Or even just grocery shopping,” he told The Wall Street Journal.
Quartieri Spagnoli
As thiefhunters, Bob and I have been mixing with the criminal element in Naples since 1993. I don’t remember how much we knew about the Camorra in the beginning of our research there. We knew a little, for sure, but not how ruthless they are, not how deep their tentacles reach. We should have been more scared. I mean, on our very first visit we got mugged. That experience left a lasting legacy with me: I still get a chill every time I hear motor-scooter buzzing behind me.
My scientifically-unfounded assumption is that pickpockets in Naples are low-level Camorra members. They steal right in front of police officers, who are also in on the game. About young gang members, a local says “they steal for money,” and “they shoot like it’s a video game.” In Naples, everyone’s part of the system. If higher-ups get word that we’re in town, will they be intrigued and want to talk? Might they show up at our door and threaten us? Will our rooms be broken into and equipment stolen? Will we be mugged again? A bone or two broken, just so we get the message? Am I a hysteric with a rich imagination? The truth is, Naples is dangerous. Not too dangerous for the ordinary visitor, but what about one who goes snooping about in mafia business? One who wants to expose the city’s dirty little secrets?
Port and commercial district of Naples
The Camorra
In Naples, everything is connected to the syndicate. Even if you’re not part of it, you pay up. In Rome, we met the owner of a men’s clothing store who told us how her Naples shop was destroyed and how they were extorted and threatened there until they closed up shop and fled to Rome. She cried as she told us this.
Shopkeepers in Naples pay about €1,000 ($1,300) a month as “protection;” supermarket managers pay about €3,000 a month. A report by the Italian retailers’ association Confesercenti, published last week, said organized crime had become Italy’s biggest industry.
The Confesercenti report estimated that organised crime groups take in 30 billion [euros] a year from the protection racket alone, a phenomenon that affects 160,000 businesses or 20% of all shops in Italy.
The extortion plague is particularly prevalent in the south. In the Sicilian towns of Palermo and Catania 80% of shops pay protection money. The figure slips to 70% across the water in Reggio Calabria and to 50% in Naples, although in some of the rundown suburbs of that city absolutely everyone pays.
Quartieri Spagnoli would be one of those rundown suburbs.
Another form of thievery in Naples is Rolex theft. It happens to any non-mafia member who dares to flash the easily identifiable status symbol in the city. Bob and I have spoken to countless victims, including Napolitanos (but mostly visitors). We’ve been to the home of the Rolex thieves, quivering at the doorstep as their pit bulls growled, too scared to film even with hidden cameras. Greetings, Camorra. We’re the Arnos!
Two thieves on scooters corner Bob in Quartieri Spagnoli
Closely related to Rolex theft, and possibly everything else going on in Naples, is the drug business. I remember a police officer we often met with in Barcelona ten years ago. He was Italian, and specialized in recognizing mafia bosses who’d had plastic surgery to change their appearance. He was intrigued with our work, and facilitated one of our important interviews with gypsy pickpockets in Barcelona. At the time, Bob and I didn’t understand why an Italian police officer with his knowledge-base would be working in Spain.
Now we read that a Camorra godfather and his henchman were captured in Madrid two weeks ago. “Neapolitan organised crime has created logistical bases in several major Spanish cities,” a Naples military police official said. They’re partnering with Colombian cartels in the cocaine business, stationed in Spain, Europe’s main welcome mat for drugs. Saviano, the author, says that “Spain is considered by many mafiosi as the best place to hide without interrupting their activities.” Seems that they were doing more than just hiding. Spain is wisening up though, having arrested many suspected Camorra members in the past few months, including a Camorra boss in Barcelona.
When police searched the hideouts of three arrested Comorra members near Naples a few months ago, they “found Carabinieri outfits and other disguises.” This first makes me think of “pseudo cops,” those who commit crimes while pretending to be police; then I think real cops, members of both the mafia and the police; and then I think dead cops. Of course there are endless uses for a police uniform if you’re a criminal.
Funiculi, funiculaaaaah….
How is it all related? We’re not mafia experts; I’d hate for us to step on the wrong toes, ask the wrong question, or peek around the wrong corner. Frankly, research in Naples scares me. When it goes well, it’s extremely exciting. If it goes wrong, how wrong can it go?Â
Why is crime in Naples allowed to flourish? I used to wonder this. I used to be amazed that it went on and on. If Bob and I could see it, surely the police and politicians could see it, too. Now, of course, I realize that it’s an integral part of the economics and politics of the city. It’s not meant to go away. Hopefully the terrible violence of the past few years is a temporary symptom. But the theft, the graft, the drugs, extortion, money-laundering, palm-greasing, conning and scamming—they’re all art forms. They’re tradition. The way of life. It’s unique among modern countries. Something you might expect to find in the third world, or in the old days. An anachronism.
Naples has much to brag about. Just look at all the types of thievery: The pickpocket. The pacco man (bait-and-switch). The Rolex snatcher. The scippatori (thieves who snatch from the back of a speeding scooter). The borseggio (bag snatcher). All against a rich backdrop of warmth and welcome, including the thieves who invite us for lunch or coffee (and insist on paying) (after they try to steal our wallet). They all have heart, soul, pride, shamelessness, and bravado. Luciano, whom we’ve known since 1998, raised his kids on pickpocketing, and now has five or six grandchildren. Salvatore, the star of our Playboy shoot, is quick to show pictures of his babies.
Charming but dangerous
Danger is a big part of Naples. Worry. Concern. Fear. Contrasted with the pleasures: the ambiance of the place, the charm, the incredible food, the picturesque beauty of the old city, the gravel-voiced men in the coffee bars, not to mention the great coffee, lemon granita on the street, multiple weekend wedding couples out for photo sessions within sight of all the thieves I’ve mentioned.
Bob and I became intimately involved with the Camorra the moment we stepped among the pickpockets of Napoli. As I’ve hinted above, and as the linked articles state, the mob is everywhere and touches everything. The Camorra was aware of us from the moment we hit the streets, at some level or other. How high up our presence is known, who knows? How long it will be tolerated, who knows? But if the mob bosses don’t want us sniffing around anymore, we’ll find out. We plunge ahead, but we acknowledge that we’re in real mafia-country, investigating family business. We might pretend ignorance, but we can’t ignore the danger. When you work on mob turf, you cannot ignore the mob.
A few days ago, a foreigner arrived at Mexico City’s international airport and exchanged money there. What he didn’t know was that he was being observed by lookouts. When he left the airport, his car was followed by two others. He was forced off the road and approached by gunmen, who simply shot him in the head when he resisted their demand for the cash.
By now everyone knows that Mexico has become a risky destination, thanks to drug gangs and their brutal operations. Police officers have been steadily targeted by the gangs, and are being killed from the top ranks to the bottom in scary numbers I can’t quote.
Last year, the director of the federal police division monitoring trafficking and contraband was killed, along with his bodyguard. So were other top police officials, including the head of Mexico City’s anti-kidnapping unit, and the director of national police operations against drug traffickers.
Little girls in Mexico playing with bottle caps.
All of Mexico is dangerous now, from the capital city to the most popular resort towns. Acapulco (the city in which Bob and I met), is now called a “violent Mexican resort.”
Tourists to Mexico are in the middle of it all. They are perceived to have cash: either on them, accessible by ATM, or available as ransom.
Mexican police say that the drug gangs now post lookouts at the airport money-exchange booths. The lookouts phone their colleagues outside the airport, who rob the visitors as they leave.
If an ATM must be used, it should be accessed only during the business day at large protected facilities (preferably inside commercial establishments, rather than at glass-enclosed, highly visible ATMs on streets).
About Mexico City specifically, the State Department suggests:
Arriving travelers who need to obtain pesos at the airport should use the exchange counters or ATMs in the arrival/departure gate area, where access is restricted, rather than changing money after passing through Customs, where they can be observed by criminals.
It’s easy and common for criminal gangs to recruit low-level airport employees as conspirators. I wouldn’t feel much safer in the “secure” arrival/departure gate areas.
Mexican citizens have long been the targets of express kidnapping and carjacking, along with the usual burglaries and robberies. Tourists have had to be alert to pickpockets, drink-druggers, taxi-robberies, and psuedo-cops.
First spread of Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet's photo essay on Bob Arno.
Way back on July 7, 2008, I wrote that the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet interviewed Bob Arno, and I promised a link when available.
The interview was on June 30, 2008. The article was finally published in Aftonbladet on December 7, 2008. It hasn’t been uploaded to Aftonbladet’s website, so I’m posting a pdf file. The article has lots of photos, but is written in Swedish, of course.
Mondli and Hector purchase herbs from a witchdoctor at a South Africa muti market.
In Johannesburg for a string of corporate shows, we managed to find and talk to three pickpockets, one of whom claimed to be reformed. He is Mondli, seen here on the left, with Hector, 29 years old and still active. With a translator, we and the thieves went to the city’s enormous muti market, sprawled over many acres under a freeway overpass. Muti is traditional African medicine, made of plant and animal parts, and it is dispensed by a sangoma or inyanga, types of witchdoctor.
The witchdoctor gets a joke.
Mondli and Hector purchased herbs which, when boiled and drunk, and/or bathed in, will “make them invisible to police.” Mondli’s interest in this herb increased our skepticism of his reformed status.
The sangoma dissolved into laughter when the honest thief among us asked her if she had muti to make his penis smaller.
A sangoma\’s consultation house.
Elaborate consultation houses stand in the otherwise haphazard market. This one, on the right, was larger than most; others were precious dollhouses, barely wide enough to contain two adults.
We also interviewed a 24-year-old pickpocket named Sihle, who uses razor blades to slice the back pockets of men looking at magazines in bookshops. (Very specific M.O., no?) The wallet then drops into Sihle’s hand, he explained, while the razor blade is stored in a slit in his shirt cuff.
Another sangoma and consultation room.Medicinal plant and animal parts, plus human feet. Be glad this photo isn\’t larger!Bambi played, Bob wrestled, with a 14-week-old lion cub.
Off duty, we got VIP treatment at private game parks. At 14 weeks old, this lion cub enjoyed its last playdate with humans. Heavy and strong, it began to exercise its instinct to go for the neck, as Bob learned that day.
Pickpocket, left, pretends innocence after stealing a wallet from Diaz, right.
Bob and I looked at each other in disbelief. Only we knew the incredible odds we’d just beaten. To stroll into Rome’s Termini, the main train and subway station, pick a platform, peg a pair of old men as pickpockets, position a victim, and have it all work as if to a script, in under twenty minutes, on Take One… we were flabbergasted, giggly. The fact that the film crew’s hidden cameras captured it all was merely the cherry on top. This had been our hope and our plan, but we never dreamed we’d pull it off so quickly, if at all. Our prey were Italians; ordinary-looking, regular citizens. Not ethnic minorities, not immigrants, not identifiable outcasts. We’d begun this project for ABC 20/20 with this, the toughest challenge of them all.
Just last night, at dinner in a wonderfully touristy trattoria, investigative reporter Arnold Diaz and segment producer Glenn Ruppel had expressed their severe doubt. They wondered why ABC had allowed this frivolous endeavor, invested the time and significant expense in so improbable a venture. Hidden camera expert Jill Goldstein, serious videographer though she was, just seemed pleased to be along, on her first trip to Europe, her first trip abroad. The five of us ate an innumerable procession of courses any Italian would have pared by half, toasting luck first with Prosecco, then wine, grappa, and finally little glasses of thick, sweet limoncello.
Arnold Diaz interviews Bob Arno about pickpocketing techniques.
Bob and I had worried all the previous two weeks, fretting over myriad potential obstacles. How could we be certain to lead the crew to thieves, get Arnold Diaz pickpocketed, and get it all on film? How would we find the perps in all of Rome?
Our hopes slipped a little when we first met Arnold. With his refined Latin looks and flair for fashion, he blended right in with the local Italian crowd. He didn’t look like a typical American tourist, who may as well have the stars and stripes tattooed across the forehead. Arnold didn’t look like a tourist at all; rather, he looked like a European businessman. So we gave him a five-minute makeover. We slung a backpack on him, put a guidebook in his hand, a camera around his neck, and a “wife” by his side (me!) and, poof—there he was: a tasteful tourist, ready to be ripped off.
Let’s look at the anatomy of a pickpocket victim. I’m thinking of a couple I saw in Barcelona not too long ago. They had the word “gull” plastered all over them, a perfect lesson in what not to do. They were affluent-looking: the woman wore a slinky black dress, a big blonde wig, and garish diamonds from here to there, real or not. Her watch was thin, gold, and diamond encrusted. She carried a designer purse and a recognizably expensive shopping bag. The man wore a floppy black suit, trendy black t-shirt, and a gold Rolex. He carried a large camera bag with a Sony label on it. They stood utterly bewildered, map in hand, staring at street signs. I had an urge to educate them, but what could they change right then and there? I’d only manage to scare them. Bob and I want people to enjoy their travels. We mean to raise awareness, not paranoia.
If this couple were the ideal paradigm of oblivion, they’d plop down at a sidewalk café. She’d sling her purse (unzipped) over the back of the chair by its delicate strap and he’d put his camera bag on the ground beside or under his chair. He would not put his foot through the strap. He’d hang his jacket on the back of his chair. Is anything in its pockets? They’d both relax and watch the people parade, as they should. When the bill arrived, he’d leave his thick wallet on the table in front of him while he waited for change. Eventually he’d realize there would be no change, because he hadn’t counted on a cover charge, a charge for bread, a charge for moist, scented, plastic-wrapped napkins, a built-in tip, and water that cost more than wine.
How many mistakes did they make?
A purse at risk.
“Tourists are more vulnerable than anyone else on the streets,” Bob says. “And not only because they often carry more money than others. Their eyes are everywhere: on the fine architecture, the uneven pavement, shop windows, the map in their hands, unfamiliar traffic patterns, unpronounceable street signs. They don’t know the customs of the locals and don’t recognize the local troublemakers.
“Con artists and thieves are drawn to tourists for the same reasons. Tourists are unsuspecting and vulnerable.”
Lord and Lady Ball (yes, their real names), enjoyed a week in warm Palma de Mallorca, an annual retreat from the dreary London weather. They nimbly dodged the numerous pickpockets, flower sellers, and con artist that live in this paradise, supported by tourist dollars, pounds, euros, yen, etc. But their visit began with a fiasco.
On arrival at the Palma airport, they collected their luggage and piled it onto a cart. Then they pushed the cart out to their assigned rental car in the crowded lot. The way the cars were parked, they couldn’t get the cart close to the trunk of the car. So they left it in front of the car while they opened the doors and the trunk lid. When they turned back to the cart, it was gone. The whole thing was just gone.
Yes, I know. It sounds doubtful. You’d think they’d hear something, or at least see it being pushed off in the distance. But no.
Lady Ball gave a little shout and who should be nearby but a nice, friendly policeman! Just when you need him, right? Strangely, he didn’t have much of a reaction, but he directed the Balls to an airport police desk where they should report the stolen luggage.
So they did. And upon returning to their car, there was their stuff, next to a trash can in the parking lot. Everything of value was gone from inside. The Balls were left with a distinct feeling of fishiness.
They never discovered anything more about the incident. Neither did we.
Beach creature.
Palma de Mallorca has long been a favorite holiday destination for Germans, Brits, and Swedes, and for Europeans in general. Many British retire to Mallorca, or have second homes there. Ferries bring daytrippers from mainland Spain, and cruise ships regularly dump sightseers by the thousands to bask in this balmy Spanish paradise. Its beaches and nightclubs are a perennial draw, and have been long before the spotlight hit Ibiza.
Low-lying criminals, too, are attracted to Palma’s easy-going lifestyle and laid-back law enforcement.
Bob and I have spent many a blistering summer day chasing thieves in Palma, a well-stocked laboratory for our research. We’ve been threatened there, and physically assaulted by thieves. Stories of these to come in future posts.
So I wondered: did Mallorca’s prevalent pickpockets plague every tourist attraction? Even underground? With that weak theory to prove, I had excuse enough to join the daytrippers on a journey to the Cuevas del Drach, or Caves of the Dragon, at Mallorca’s eastern coast. Well? If thieves can be nocturnal, why not subterranean? Leaving Bob on downtown surveillance, I set off by coach across the desolate landscape beyond the city of Palma.
Cuevas del Drach, Caves of the Dragon, in Mallorca.
The caves contain the largest underground lake in Europe, a superlative that failed to inspire my need-to-see instinct. So I paid for my ticket with minor lethargy and ambled off in the direction vaguely indicated, drawn to the cool, the dark, and the quiet.
A rough path descended gently into a forest of unfamiliar forms. Organic shapes and amoebic ponds in utter darkness were exquisitely lit to dramatic effect by an absolute (probably Italian) master. Disney couldn’t have done as well, and certainly couldn’t have created something so unreal, so otherworldly.
I got quite wet during the twenty-minute stroll into the depths. The surroundings first seemed inspired by Antoni Gaudi—or perhaps vice versa. Around me rose huge, undulating floor to ceiling columns in complicated bundles. Vast expanses of icicles by the millions pointed to curvaceous, humanoid formations below. I felt as if I were inside a giant pin cushion of some undefined shape. Or in the mouth of some great beast chewing taffy. Now, instead of Gaudi, I felt the influence of Dr. Suess. Among looming trunk-like forms the ceiling dripped and spattered and ploinked into puddles and pools. Stalactites and stalagmites were forming as I watched.
The uneven path wound down and around, along crystal clear ponds containing underwater figures—or were they reflections from above?—and eventually to an enormous gallery surrounded on three sides by a lake of such stillness and clarity it could have been air. A number of visitors had already gathered on the peninsula, settling onto wet benches facing Lago Martel and the thick and thin columns growing out of it.
Lights went out one by one and the crowd became silent. We were allowed a few moments to savor the cool void, the faintly clammy air, the crisp smell of absolutely fresh water, the surround-sound of erratic drips, and the unfortunate absence of bats.
Then, far, far in the distance, a violin. Chopin. The music grew, as did a faint glow from the depths of the cave. Finally, still distant, a curved row of fairy lights appeared, doubled by its reflection. It was a small boat encircled by a string of white lights, gliding smoothly as if on a rail. Another Disney effect. The boat carried a small orchestra and a single rower who dipped and pulled his oar like a slow metronome. Chopin became Offenbach as the boat drew near; the music swelled then filled and overflowed what had been a void, an unnoticed nothingness. Ghostly and surreal, the boat slid past us to hover in a small grotto, its single string of bulbs still the only illumination.
The concert ended as it had begun, with the simultaneous dwindling of music and light as the vessel and its orchestra sailed slowly, serenely, out of sight. As the last note sounded, a thunderous applause exploded in the darkness.
Gradually, stalagmites were randomly lit and the audience came out of its collective trance.
“Where’s my purse?” A woman’s panicked voice echoed nearby. I snapped my head around to look for her.
“Here,” said another, lifting dripping, waterlogged leather from the cave floor. I fought an urge to lecture the woman.
A line of rowboats had magically appeared. Visitors rose reluctantly to be ferried across the lake to a path leading up and out of the cave.
I emerged damp, blinking like Gollum, and drunk on the multisensual subterranean experience. While not exactly relevant research on the underground subculture we study, the venture below had been well above my expectations, and a fine respite.
Bob Arno, the go-to guy on street scams, was on the NBC Weekend Today show on November 22.
He was on Fox & Friends on November 29. The video made Yahoo’s top ten of the day.
Both programs show some of our video of thieves-in-the-act, and both are examples of network news soundbite-style segments. They don’t want to know anything about why, just three minutes or so of your best stuff for ratings. Nothing to be proud of, really.
Stung by a Wasp: Scooter-Riding Bandits
Buzz Bob and Bambi
I didn’t think it could happen to me.
There was no forewarning. One moment Bambi and I were walking down a narrow, cobblestone alley in Naples’ Centro Storico, having just looked back at an empty street. The next moment I was grabbed from behind, like a Heimlich maneuver—except I wasn’t choking on chicken. I was being mugged and there were three of them.
There was nothing slick about it; they were just fast and singularly focused on my 30-year-old Rolex. Without finesse, it was merely a crude attempt to break the metal strap. What these amateurs didn’t know was that they had selected a mark who had himself lifted hundreds of thousands of watches in his career as an honest crook.
Until now, I had never been on the receiving end of my game, even though I’d strolled often through ultimate pocket-picking grounds in Cartegena, the souks in Cairo, and La Rambla in Barcelona. I’d been pushed and shoved using public transportation like the Star Ferry in Hong Kong and rush-hour subways in Tokyo, London, and New York; yet I’d never been a victim.
A typical street in Naples' Quartieri Spagnoli.
Finally my luck turned—I’m not sure for the good or bad—during a visit to Naples, Italy. Though I hadn’t been there in some fifteen years, I knew full well about its slick pickpockets, and particularly about the infamous scippatori. This latter is a unique style of rip-off which involves speeding scooters and short Italians with long arms. Little did I know that I would finally become a statistic in what must be one of the world’s highest concentrations of muggings and pickpocketings in an area of less than a square mile: Quartieri Spagnoli, a district even the police avoid.
Scippatori are marauding teams of pirates on motor scooters. The scooter of choice is the Vespa, a nimble machine with a plaintive buzz which, when carrying a pair of highway bandits, delivers a surprising sting. Scippatori ply their vicious bag snatching chicanery on unsuspecting tourists in Italy, and in Naples particularly. Handbags and gold chains are plucked as easily as ripe oranges by backseat riders in daring dash-and-grab capers.
It was therefore with extreme caution that Bambi and I walked these streets, popular with tourists primarily as a gateway city. It’s the starting point for ferry trips to Capri, bus tours to Pompeii, and drives along the spectacular Amalfi-Sorrento Coast. Let me emphasize starting point. Even Naples’ car rental companies urge tourists to drive directly out of town.
Though it hardly matches the beauty or historical magnitude of Rome, Venice, or Florence, Bambi wanted to photograph the colorful Quartieri Spagnoli. Its old section, the Centro Storico, has a seedy, rustic, old-world fascination, with its dismal balconied apartments stacked on minuscule dreary shops. As we walked, I reminded my wife that this was the birthplace of pickpocketing, and I scrutinized every scooter that buzzed by, making sure we were out of reach.
Shot from the back of a moving Vespa.
It was mid-afternoon, siesta time, as Bambi and I strolled the deserted lanes. Little light filtered down through the seven or eight stories of laundry hanging above the narrow alleys. Almost all the shops were shut, their steel shutters rolled down and padlocked, and it was quiet except for the snarl of traffic on Via Toledo, the perimeter street. A lone shellfish monger remained, amid shallow dishes of live cockles, clams, snails, and cigalo glittering in water. Though we were practically alone in the area, we frequently glanced behind us.
Still, they caught us completely off-guard. With silence their foil, they rolled down a hill: three young thugs on a Vespa scooter, its engine off. One guy remained on the scooter, ready to bolt; another held me with my arms pinned to my sides, and the third tried to tear the watch off my wrist. It was sudden, quick, and silent. No shouts or vulgar threats.
It‘s a joke, I thought that first crucial instant, expecting a friend or fan to say “Gottcha!” I’m quite often grabbed by people who’ve seen me perform; they like to make me faux-victim as a sort of role-reversing prank. Although this vice-grip felt deadly serious, my thought process, instant and automatic, cost me several seconds. I didn’t fight back with a sharp elbow or kick. And because my reflexes never got into gear, I didn’t have a chance to coil my muscles into a protective stance.
Decorative street marking in Quartieri Spagnoli.
Fortunately, pickpockets are generally petty criminals who can easily be scared off. They prefer stealth, diversion, and speed to violence as their modus operandi. Bambi reacted a moment before I did, bravely smashing my captor on the head with her umbrella. Other than breaking the umbrella, this had no effect at all.
As soon as my adrenaline kicked in, I yelled at the top of my voice “Polizia, polizia.” Years of stage speaking enabled me to project my voice throughout the neighborhood. Instant reaction! They scrambled away as fast as they had appeared.
We walked away, lucky but shaken. My steel watchband didn’t give despite considerable force applied in attempting to snap its pin. All I had lost was my own track record. I could no longer claim that pickpockets had never tried to steal from me.
Bambi still tenses at the buzz of a motorcycle behind her—not a bad legacy, perhaps. And both of us now strip down to skin and cloth when visiting this most colorful district. The proof of my own stupidity, namely, wearing a Rolex in Naples, was a scratched up wrist. I should have known better.
Scippatori in training?
First rule for avoiding pickpockets: don’t attract them. Don’t signal you’re worth their while. Second rule: acknowledge that it can happen to anyone. Whether you’re strong, confident, aware, or careful, you are not immune. Even a veteran pickpocket can become a victim.
