Jail time for man who listed stolen bikes on online classified ads

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As you all know, Going Going Bike is the one place where you can be certain that any second hand bike listed for sale by a private seller is legitimately owned by that person. Our Prove It system has resulted in not a single stolen bike being sold on the site since our launch in 2010.

Unfortunately many people do see their stolen bikes being sold on online classified sites as there are no strict security controls in place at the listing level.

Yesterday saw the conviction of a criminal who advertised at least 123 stolen bikes for sale on the Gumtree platform. (The real number of stolen bikes he actually listed or received by him is probably higher).

The criminal, Alam Miah of Kilburn, London, was jailed for six months after pleading guilty to conspiring to convert criminal property.

Southwark Crown Court heard that Mr Miah was caught by Metropolitan Police after they were alerted by a victim to an advert for his stolen bike on Gumtree. The victim’s £550 bike had only been stolen 12 hours earlier from his workplace in central London.

Arrest

Once satisfied the bike had been stolen, undercover officers from the Met responded to the Gumtree advert and arranged to meet the seller. At that meeting, Mr Miah tried to sell them the bike and was arrested.

The Metropolitan Police told the court that Mr Miah had placed at least 123 adverts with Gumtree (between December 2009 and November 2010) with supporting evidence of almost 100 text messages on a number of phones that linked him to those bike sales on the site.

The police couldn’t verify if Mr Miah had actually taken part in the bike thefts himself but he had benefited from the proceeds of the sales of the stolen bikes (£4,000).

Most of the bikes listed were high value branded models. The Met has since been able to reunite some of the stolen bikes with their rightful owners.


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See also

Second hand bike shop idea catches thieves out

Cycle co-op uses phone app to spread bike theft details

from Going Going Bike – Auctions, Bike News, Cycle Stuff

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