bag snatch – Page 2 – Pickpocket Bob Arno

Purse stolen off lap at restaurant

Bags on laps should be safe, but not always.

Should Have Left it in the Hotel—Gisela and Ludvig Horst checked into their Barcelona hotel and immediately got into an argument. Gisela did not feel comfortable leaving their valuables in the room, though Ludvig was insistent that they should. They’d just arrived from Germany for an Herbalife convention. With 30,000 international participants in town, each sporting big I-heart-Herbalife buttons, every Barcelona hotel was fully booked. The Horsts ended up in the same small, semi-seedy inn Bob and I had chosen for our semi-seedy research. We met them at breakfast the morning after.

The Horsts went out for their evening exploration with everything in Gisela’s purse. They joined another Herbalife couple for drinks at an outdoor cafÃ© on La Rambla. The avenida was lively, the June weather delightful. Gisela was enthralled by the entertaining parade of strollers, yet she never forgot caution. Conscious of the value her purse contained, she held it on her lap. The foursome ordered sangriÃ¡ and let the Spanish nightlife swirl around them.

If the Horsts’ cash and passports had been stolen from their hotel room, one might fault them for leaving their things unsecured. Had Gisela hung her purse from the back of her cafÃ© chair, one could chastise her severely. Had she put it on the ground, out of sight, out of mind, she could be blamed. But Gisela’s handbag was securely cradled right under her nose.

Thinking back, Gisela remembered a middle-aged man seated alone at a table behind them. Was it him? She also sensed the bulk of a man moving behind her and had assumed it was a waiter. Without warning, her bag was snatched right off her lap.

The Horsts lost everything. Besides the tremendous paperwork hassle, the mood of their trip was ruined and Gisela was badly traumatized. She blamed herself and lost confidence in her judgment, though she was hardly at fault.

Personal security is an art, not a science. Information and awareness are everything. In the Horsts’ situation, I may have done exactly as Gisela did, had I been lacking a suitable suitcase to use as a safe. However, I’d try to split up my goodies, and put as much as possible on my body instead of in a grabbable bag.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Four (a part of): Hotels: Have a Nice Stay

Research crime before your trip

It was Cecily’s dream vacation: she and her family had rented an ancient stone farmhouse near St.-Paul-de-Vence on the French Riviera. Recently renovated to luxurious standards, it stood between an olive orchard and a lavender farm, strolling distance from the sea, and it came with a Renault.

For their first morning, coffee, baguette, and fresh farm butter had been delivered by the agent. Cecily feasted lightly on the terrace, then drove into Nice and shopped for groceries. So far, excellent. She loaded the Renault feeling spiffy, pleased with her success, and rather… je ne sais quois. Perhaps rather French.

Just as Cecily got into the car a nice-looking man approached and asked her something: where could he buy a newspaper? where was a petrol station? Cecily’s French had rusted since high school, but she struggled to understand.

“Don’t worry,” the man said in English. “I am not going to steal from you.”

What? Cecily swiveled in her seat just in time to see another man, a partner, dash off with her purse which, sadly, still contained her entire family’s passports and return air tickets. The nice-looking man at her window was gone.

Cecily had spent weeks researching French villa-rental companies and poring over their offerings. After deciding on the 400-year-old farmhouse, she read up on the nearby perfume factories, the MusÃ©e Picasso, and where to tour an olive oil processor. She compiled a list of every enticing restaurant she’d read about within a hundred-mile radius of the farmhouse, whether Michelin starred or a village secret. Crime reports were the furthest thing from Cecily’s mind. She’d focused on weather reports.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Two (part-a): Research Before You Go

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Rome train station

The ticket machines confuse a steady stream of travelers.

Rome, Italy—Termini Station serves up buses, trains, and the subway. Four long rows of ticket machines busily dispense tickets and confound travelers. Traffic is brisk. Meanwhile, thieves and con artists loiter, watching. Bob and I loitered, too.

An unkempt man pushed in close to a family trying to figure out the machine. The man kept offering advice, though he clearly hadn’t a clue about the machine. The family repeatedly waved him away. After a while he moved to another group at a machine halfway down the row, where he was equally unwelcome.

A pair of cops sauntered past and Bob had a conversation with them. Berlusconi’s drastic anti-immigrant program has not made a dent in crime, these and other cops told us. Bob strolled with the patrolling police while I took up a position next to the new plexiglass wall that protects ticket-buyers at agent windows from pickpockets and bag thieves. No longer do mobs press against passengers who must set down bags and fumble with wallets while buying tickets.

A new glass enclosure keeps the crowds away from travelers as they buy their tickets. Still, station police get about 50 reports of theft per day.

Unattended luggage caught my eye. A large suitcase topped with a sleeping bag stood several yards away from the ticket machines. Who could have turned his back on his belongings in such a place?

Bob returned with the police, who removed the troublesome wastrel from the midst of the ticket machine crowd. I could be wrong, but it appeared they photographed him first with a mobile phone camera.

Bob and I scrutinized the messy line of machine-users, trying to guess who the unwatched bag belonged to. Few by few, people left the machines and the bag remained. Eventually, only one young couple remained, the rest of the crowd being freshly arrived and unattached to the lonely luggage. But this couple never glanced toward the baggage at all. Either it wasn’t theirs, or they were part of a sting, as demonstratively ignoring their stuff as I had years before in a casino coin-pail operation.

The suitcase at left was unattended for at least 15 minutes.

As the minutes went by, Bob’s and my amazement grew. We discussed the possibilities: police baiting bag thieves; a daring drug deal in which the suitcase contained cash or contraband; a frazzled traveler who’d shortly return for the forgotten thing, panting and train long gone. We kept our eyes on the bag.

A man came up to us and began a long tale in Italian. He was 60 or so, and looked like a grizzled businessman dressed in city-casual: a button-down shirt tucked into belted gabardines. He might have worn a sport coat, I’m not sure. We glanced at him and let him ramble as we kept watch on the suitcase, wondering what his scam was. His tone was moderate, a little confidential, a little urgent. He asked a question and from his baggy pants pocket pulled out an enormous wad of euros, bound by a thick rubber band. He switched to mostly unintelligible English, something about a bank, and persevered.

The suitcase was gone.

How? We’d been determined to see its resolution and barely looked at the interloper who’d accosted us. Had he come just to distract us? He’d certainly succeeded by flashing his money roll. We left him and rushed to the ticket machines, not twenty feet away, hoping to catch a glimpse of the bag, but it was gone without a trace.

We were angry and disappointed in ourselves. But not to despair: this was a good excuse for a consolation dinner. By accident, we found Ristorante Pizzeria da Francesco, and they had fresh porcini! Porcini will always perk me up, and Francesco served them the ultimate way: on thin, crisp pizza with a bit of mozzarella. No wonder the place was jammed with locals—well, anyway, the waiters didn’t kiss me.

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Bag snatch at the outdoor café

What’s more charming than a leisurely break at an outdoor café? Coffee, a beer, a glass of wine, maybe lunch… You chat with friends and watch the people-parade, safe within the lush green walls separating you from the commotion and concerns of traffic and humanity. A cool oasis with a feeling of privacy and exclusivity—at least to some level.

This is where a great number of bag thefts occur, thanks to that false sense of security one naturally gets from the perimeter of potted plants. Thieves may use a special tool or a mangled wire hanger to snag a purse or backpack from between the planters. The use of a tool allows them to pierce your private sphere without setting off your personal alarm system. The most popular sites for this M.O. are right beside a subway entrance or other easy getaway—a gateway to disappear with the swag.

Thankfully, restaurants are beginning to counteract with simple preventative measures. This summer I’ve noticed many café perimeters reinforced with wooden lathing, chicken wire, or bigger planters close together.

bag snatch cafe purse steal Thieves

Shocking statistics

Every single summer day, one hundred tourists will be pickpocketed near the Coliseum in Rome; another hundred will be hit near the Spanish Steps, and another hundred in and around the Vatican. These three hundred individuals will report their thefts to the local police stations. Three hundred more victims will not file a report, for lack of time, late discovery, or other reasons. Florence reports similar numbers. So do London, Barcelona, Paris, Prague, and numerous other favorite tourist destinations. Multiplied by the number of days in the tourist season, dollars in currency lost, hours of vacation ruined, aggravation, humiliation, hassle, and havoc, you can see that pickpocketing is a small crime with huge repercussions.

Numbers are difficult to obtain, but as far as can be measured, they’re going up: “Among violent crimes, robbery showed the greatest increase, 3.9 percent … and larceny-theft increased 1.4 percent” says the FBI’s “Crime Trends, 2001 Preliminary Figures.” While that’s not a very impressive increase, anecdotal evidence indicates otherwise.

It’s estimated that at least half of all pickpocketing incidents are never reported at all. Of those reported, most, according to a New York cop on the pickpocket detail who wishes to remain unnamed, fall into the “lost property” category. “They don’t even realize they’ve been pickpocketed,” he said. “They think they just lost it.” Incidents reported as thefts are lumped under one of several legal descriptions. Larceny is the unlawful taking of property from the possession of a person, and includes pickpocketing, purse-snatching, shoplifting, bike theft, and theft from cars. Robbery is the same but involves the use or threat of force. The theft of a purse or wallet, therefore, may fall into either of these categories, and usually cannot be extracted for statistical purposes. Similarly, the figures collected under larceny or robbery include offenses this book does not specifically address; shoplifting, for example.

In Europe, where the theft of cell phones has skyrocketed, numbers help propel industry changes—the development of security devices in phones, for example. 11,000 cell phones were stolen in the Czech Republic in the first eight months of 2001. More than 20,000 cell phones were stolen in the city of Paris in 2000.

In September 2000, British Transport Police reported a 94.6 percent increase in pickpocketing on the London Tube, and pickpocketing on the streets rose by almost 30 percent in the same period. Spain experienced a 19.5 percent increase over the course of 2001, and street robbery was up 28 percent in England. In Paris, pickpocketing on the underground metro jumped 40 percent in 2001.

Frightening new trends are developing. What were simple snatches are lately turning into brutal grabs resulting in serious injury or death. Perhaps it’s the stiff competition from a glut of pickpockets that is turning some to violent methods. Strangulation from behind is one terrifying method. Another involves squirting flammable liquid on the back of a target’s jacket and igniting it. The victim throws down her bag and struggles to get the flaming jacket off while the thief grabs the bag and flees. Even ordinary bag snatches are becoming deadly, with victims being pulled to the ground, some cracking their heads on the pavement, or falling into traffic.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter One: High and Dry on the Streets of Elsewhere

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