5 people split 150 bucks

TonyR

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Great videos.

But since it only took 15 minutes these little cockroaches calculate it x4 or $120 per hour per cockroach, not $30 each.

And they got their smartphones, don't they! Too bad it's not worth LEO's effort here to pull cell records and see which phones pinged the closest tower at 0324 in that first video...he's the scout cockroach, pants on the ground...."yeah, c'mon man, bring everybody, lets do dis".

It appears the female drives the mini-van... I would not be surprised if management watches past inside videos that they'll see them in there days ahead as patrons, casing the place. Someone on staff may actually recognize the little cockroaches.

Did I mention.......I absolutely, unequivocally DESPISE thieves?
 
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Sorry to see that, but lets hope with good video you will have a better outcome than those that have crappy or none at all. Not a car guy but looks like an older Honda Odyssey (late 90's, early 2000's) based on a quick minivan image search.

I guess I'm a thief noob, whats the plan for the hydraulic jack? Also I'm with TonyR, how many cellphones active in that general area at that wee-time in the AM? And you can bet one of them is on the phone with the getaway driver, she pulls up and then does another loop before pickup, like he was telling her "we aint done yet!".

Also notice the somewhat specific damage on the rear quarter panel of that van, someone has probably seen this because its probably her daily driver, grocery-getter. Not to mention it seems like you got reasonably clear face shots a number of time. Here's hoping the 'roaches get whats coming to them!
 
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looney2ns

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At least they had decent cams.
Too bad one wasn't mounted at 5ft to get straight on face shots at a choke point.
Probably find that one of the scum is a former or current employee.
 

J Sigmo

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Everyone else has said what I'd say except:

They may have only gotten $150, but I'll bet they did hundreds or even thousands in damage to the doors. That should make it worth effort to prosecute. And I agree: The damage to the mini-van is like a fingerprint, fairly compelling ID evidence if shown to a jury.
 

bababouy

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We monitor quite a few shopping plazas for just this reason. We are monitoring a plaza now because guys like this keep breaking into a Family Dollar. Why put yourself at risk for pennies, or snacks, or whatever they are stealing. Sooner or later, they will get caught, then it will be even tougher to get a real job. Go find a job with a burglary charge on your record.
 

J Sigmo

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We always joked that you were earning about a buck a year when robbing the Mini Mart because that $20 might well get you a 20 year sentence. Picking up bottles and cans along the highway is something most people can easily do, and will earn you quite a reasonable amount. People work awfully hard stealing when that same level of effort could make you a comfortable living doing something honest.
 

TonyR

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We always joked that you were earning about a buck a year when robbing the Mini Mart because that $20 might well get you a 20 year sentence. Picking up bottles and cans along the highway is something most people can easily do, and will earn you quite a reasonable amount. People work awfully hard stealing when that same level of effort could make you a comfortable living doing something honest.
That's very true...sad, but true.

These meth heads next to my mother-in-law's house took a flat file and in the wee hours of the night filed the tie wires that hold the galvanized chain-link fence fabric to the horizontal runners about 75% of the way through, almost but not quite cutting the tie. This way they could come back, just barely hit the ties with a hacksaw and in no time pull all the chain link, roll it up and take to a scrap dealer, get some cash and buy some dope.

There were likely 60 to 80 of these ties; they must have spent several hours over as many nights. Like you said...they could have spent probably less time, doing some honest work and made more money. There's people needing their yard mowed, garage cleaned out, etc. all the time in that neighborhood...I know this to be fact.

But there's something about the actual stealing, the challenge, the being criminal, the "getting something for nothing" that many of them relish. Also, many of them have lost that part of their gray matter, after years of frying their brains on meth, heroin, crack, etc. , that helps with rational decision making.

The proof: galvanized metal of any kind cannot easily be reclaimed by conventional means, thereby making it useless for scrap recycling; heated zinc-plating and/or electro-galvanized metal gives off toxic gases and can cause 'metal fume fever'.

Maybe that's mother nature's way of taking some of these little turds out of the gene pool. :rolleyes:

Did I say I don't like thieves?
 

J Sigmo

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That's typical! Working really hard for little gain!

I sometimes do the same kinds of things. I won't take the time to go get the right tool for something, or I try to take a short-cut, and then it makes the task harder in the long run. I call that: "Being too lazy to do it the easy way!" And I'm guilty of it quite often. ;)

On the other hand, I don't mind spending hours tweaking control system programs to make things run very well without operator intervention to save myself labor in the future. Ain't automation wonderful? I guess I'm trading doing something I enjoy for doing things I don't enjoy. So as you said, there's probably the thrill and pleasure of "getting something for nothing" for the thieves, even though they may work really hard at it!

And as @bababouy pointed out above, once someone has a conviction on their record, getting a job will be all that much more difficult. So that may help keep people trapped in a cycle of crime.

And, of course, there's drug addiction. That will affect the way folks think and also affect their life in such a way that it may be difficult to hold down a "regular" job. I have always been a night-owl, but I've been lucky enough to find jobs that allow me to more or less keep my own hours, and I prefer to work alone most of the time if the task requires something like programming, circuit design, or PC board layout, etc. And ironically, that's probably because I really like being with people and am too easily distracted. Whatever.

I read once that when tested, some large percentage of repeat inmates of some prison system showed that they made the same few logical thinking errors over and over. I'm not sure if that's something that can be learned or taught, or it it ends up being something that's just hard-wired in from the beginning. As I understand it, one of the "thinking errors" the inmates often make is that they actually fail to see anything wrong with stealing or doing harm to someone else. They're sociopathic. They really truly don't see that what they're doing is wrong. They lack empathy. And this can often be seen in people even when they're very very young.

Still, I've always felt that kids growing up should be forced to take at least three logic classes during their public education.

One in grade school, to get them familiar with the basics of symbolic logic and logical thinking. Then another in middle school. And finally a more advanced one in high school.

If people were taught to think logically from an early age, they'd recognize common tricks used to fool them in advertising, politics, etc. And they'd make better decisions all through life.

But I'm also sure that there would be a lot of variation in the ways people think due to genetics and various environmental effects. And that's actually a good thing. So while the logic training would be good, it obviously wouldn't solve all problems, or prevent all crime, etc.

I hate thieves, too, but thinking about everything logically, I'd say that I cannot actually judge anyone. To me, to be able to judge someone, you must be able to put yourself completely in their shoes, so to speak. And to truly do that, you'd have to share their exact brain makeup as well as their exact upbringing and life experience. And thus, you'd end up being the exact same person, so by definition, you'd do the same things given the same circumstances.

That doesn't mean that I don't want to stop thieves, or better yet, catch them. But I'm not sure where the glee for me comes from in any of that because it seems inconsistent when I examine it carefully.

So logically, catching them rather than just deterring them really comes down to hopefully preventing them from hurting anyone else in the future if possible rather than punishing them.

But again, emotionally, I really like the idea of punishment! But I don't know why that is. I guess that's just something I can't rationalize - but there it is! I'd like to electrify that fence between the time when they filed the ties and when they came back to steal it, if only to see the effect. I know that's not right, but that's the way it is! :)
 

TonyR

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I hate thieves, too, but thinking about everything logically, I'd say that I cannot actually judge anyone. To me, to be able to judge someone, you must be able to put yourself completely in their shoes, so to speak. And to truly do that, you'd have to share their exact brain makeup as well as their exact upbringing and life experience. And thus, you'd end up being the exact same person, so by definition, you'd do the same things given the same circumstances.
I agree with most of what you said until the last sentence, above....I totally disagree. IMO, being a thief is learned behavior, not genetic or due to struggles of under-privileged, day-to-day existence. I am far from perfect but because of how I was raised, I doubt very much I would resort to the same behavior under the same circumstances. Granted, I might steal food to survive under extreme circumstances but you can bet I would have at that point explored all alternatives and exhausted every option.....maybe because of my disdain for thieves.
 

J Sigmo

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I agree with most of what you said until the last sentence, above....I totally disagree. IMO, being a thief is learned behavior, not genetic or due to struggles of under-privileged, day-to-day existence. I am far from perfect but because of how I was raised, I doubt very much I would resort to the same behavior under the same circumstances. Granted, I might steal food to survive under extreme circumstances but you can bet I would have at that point explored all alternatives and exhausted every option.....maybe because of my disdain for thieves.
I understand what you're saying, and I, too, hate thievery! And I admit I love seeing thieves apprehended and convicted, or scared crapless, or, otherwise given a dose of instant Karma!

But I'm just saying that while I admit that I enjoy that, I'm not sure why I like it. I think that's somewhat irrational on my part. It's there in me, but I can't think of any good reason why it's logical or constructive.
 

TonyR

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It could be that innately you're a decent person, one who doesn't think that the sun rises and sets just for himself everyday, is aware of how his actions affects others and has a well-founded sense of right and wrong. :cool:
 

J Sigmo

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I guess, but I also catch myself being a selfish a-hole quite frequently, too. :)
 

fenderman

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Its interesting that they dvr/nvr with a monitor displaying the video is right there in plain sight, they see it and dont even bother disabling/taking it.
 
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