A modern Grinch story

[Cagliostro]

So as those that are friends with my wife on Facebook already know, our house was broke into on Wednesday when my wife went to the grocery store. They stole a PlayStation 3, our TV, my bass guitar, all my PlayStation games, our Blu-Ray disks, our camera and my wife's jewelry. The jewelry was not replaceable and included family heirlooms, so that was probably the worst part of the loss, and could have been considerably worse if they took a few items, such as the video camera that we got at the birth of my first born that included video of both kids as babies that we have stupidly never backed up. The camera that did get stolen was recently backed up, and I don't think we're missing any photos, but it still sucks, especially trying to report things to insurance.
My personal sadness is that Desmond is REALLY excited about getting Little Big Planet 3 more than anything (he even dreamed about it last night is how excited he is), and I just thought how sad it would be to not be able to deliver on Christmas morning.
The police did fingerprinting and were unsuccessful as they said they found fibers suggesting that they were wearing gloves.
After talking with the home owners insurance and them dropping the bomb that they have $1000 deductible, it definitely crapped up life for us. However, after telling work and my wife telling people on Facebook, I have been amazed at the number of especially sweet people either offering replacements for us either to borrow or have, or just simply passing the hat (which we don't really need, but is very sweet). I've been especially moved at the generosity of people (including Aliantha...thank you very much for the offer, you sweet sweet lady), and makes my sour old heart toward humanity grow 3 times it's original size (or whatever it is from the Grinch story).
So something interesting happened today. Because Rock Band 3 has been my most used game probably of all time because of teaching me a few instruments (and not just the 5-button faux guitar), I have been working on it since I got it and nearly every week since. They no longer sell it on Amazon, and the price has been jumping up, so I figured I needed to find a copy ASAP before the price goes up even more and it gets harder and harder to find. I went to the GameStop site to find where they supposedly had it, and the first place I went, they did have a copy, but it was in the generic case. Because they were wanting the same price for it than if it did have the original case and booklet, I decided to pass.
Today, we had an errand nearby another store that had a copy of Rock Band 3, so we stopped by and they had the original case. I bought it, and mentioned that I was robbed to ask if they have info on the last several years of what I bought to prove proof of purchase for the insurance company who is asking for that info. He said we'd need to speak with corporate and was very sweet. I got back in the car, and as we were heading off to our errand, I looked at the booklet for Rock Band 3, and found an old business card of mine with my name on it. I used the back of it to track the progress throughout the game (see my insanity in the Rock Band 3 thread in video games). Also in the booklet was a list of songs I intended to download with the ones marked off that I did download, and my original receipt from buying the game.
We went back to the store, and I asked the guy I just spoke with if when they buy from people if they take any information from them. He said they do, and I explained why I asked. He said to speak with the store manager who would be in any minute. She showed up almost immediately after and after he explained to her what happened, she asked me when it happened, and I told her, and then she asked what other games were stolen, and I named what I could remember, and she said that it looks like they have a drivers license and address on record. They did not buy a PlayStation though because they don't buy systems unless they were complete, and that might have been what happened.
When we got home, we called for the person who is handling our case, and of course she isn't in on the weekends, and no other detectives are either, so we'd have to wait until Monday. We called the store manager back to just let her know where it stands, and she said that she has printed off the information and would let everyone know at the store what that is for.
I'm not really counting on getting anything back, but it would be nice. What I am interested in doing is busting the crap out of these bastards and hope they never do this to anybody else. That would be my Christmas wish this year.

[Sorus]

I hope they get carried off by pterodactyls.

Sorry. That really sucks. I have less faith in humanity with each passing day, and KW is one of the few places that restores it.

[michaelm]

Sorry to hear that. At the very least I hope those assholes get caught through the details they left at the store.

[lorin]

Getting robbed sucks. It happened to me two years ago when I was relocating after hurricane Sandy. I unloaded I my stuff, went back to get the rest and returned to my new rental to find everything gone. I had no rental insurance.

But lemons into lemonade, I learned a huge lesson about not needing so much stuff. Of course it is different with you because you have kids and are at a different stage in your life.

Remember the deductible, everything that is not covered by insurance and the difference in value and what you received is a tax write-off. If you would like I will look around NYC to see if any of those things are for sale.

[peter]

Wow Cag! Truly sorry about that; a bad thing. Hope you get a result on nailing the perpetrators.

[wayfriend]

That's a tough turn, Cags. I really feel for you when you describe the loss of those videos - stuff more precious than money. (Okay, yeah, that's not helping....) I look forward to hearing about how you got them all back! Let us know if there's anything we can help with.

[Ananda]

Sorry, that does stink.

[Cagliostro]

Yeah, I mainly hope it is not a fake ID they have on record. If so, then I'm pretty much screwed.

[Savor Dam]

One more thing, Cag. Even if the ID is fake, check with the store and see if their surveillance system recordings might have an image of this lump of offal from when (s)he brought in your stuff and sold it to the store. Pretty compelling evidence, if so.

[aliantha]

Cag, I just wish I could've done more. I hope the cops catch those bastidges and roast them slowly over some hot appliance or other. Although I don't hold out much hope of it.

Y'know what? Call the Denver Post and tell them what happened, particularly about when you went to Game Stop and *purchased your own game from them*. If *they* call the cops, it might make your case a higher priority. Just sayin'.

[peter]

Yeah, I mainly hope it is not a fake ID they have on record. If so, then I'm pretty much screwed.

In my experience people are creatures of habit; they will have been to this store in the past and they will go again in the future. The store will have the ability to identify them if not immediately, then when they surface again. They're screwed!

[Cagliostro]

Cag, I just wish I could've done more. I hope the cops catch those bastidges and roast them slowly over some hot appliance or other. Although I don't hold out much hope of it.

Y'know what? Call the Denver Post and tell them what happened, particularly about when you went to Game Stop and *purchased your own game from them*. If *they* call the cops, it might make your case a higher priority. Just sayin'.

Well, I wrote up a past that was lost to the ether, but to quickly summarize what I said before is that the police detective assigned to our case still hasn't been in to get this update in our case, and I feel like I should leave a box of donuts at the store so that he will go down and pick up the info from them.

The insurance company has been a pain with requiring us to show documentation of what we owned through photo or receipt or whatnot, and sadly we do not take photos of our stuff very much, and rarely hold onto receipts. And they send discouragement along with the paperwork that they want us to fill out with date purchased and how much and what it is worth now and so forth. The discouragement is that if we don't think it even comes to $1000 to not even bother and call them to close the case. So I've been making a lot of phone calls and going to businesses at this time of year to request our info on what we've purchased from them. Some of have been nice and compliant (Costco, Best Buy), and some suck (Gamestop in particular, who I waited for an hour to talk with someone only to be told that only the police would be able to access my own information, with being told several times that it should appear on the website but doesn't).
But after doing this, it's hard to tell if the insurance will even pay a dime to us. It's one thing being robbed only to discover that we're being robbed a lot slower and subtler already.

I do really like the idea of writing to the Denver Post or calling them about my story. I kind of want to write out the story once it is all done and maybe the Denver Post can publish it or write their version as a human interest type of thing.

[michaelm]

I almost hate to say this, but in my experience with some insurance companies the only way to deal with them is to be the biggest asshole on the planet, as it's the only thing that gets you anywhere. For some things it's been really easy and straightforward, but for some things insurance companies will do anything they can to wriggle out of making payments.

The worst one was my nephew dealing with my mom's home owners insurance when the wall at the front of her house blew down during a storm. She had no deductible to pay, but they tried every trick in the book to get out of paying. They started by trying to convince her that she needed to deal with the insurance company that covered the contents of her home, then tried to say that the policy did not cover walls and fences around the property, then they tried to say that they would only pay out a fixed amount that would not cover getting the wall rebuilt.

My nephew did two things - he started refusing to talk to whoever answered the phone and insist on talking to their manager, he told them right off the bat that he was taking dates, names and job titles and was collecting the information should he need to hand it over to his attorney; the second thing he did was called the local newspaper and gave them the story and the contact details for the local office, along with the names he had collected.

They paid up pretty quickly after that.

With me it's mostly been dealing with idiots working for auto insurance companies when I've been trying to make a claim against other drivers and they've always tried to offer less than the repairs.

[Vraith]

Insurance, as intended, is/was a great idea.
Insurance, as it exists, is a legal protection racket.

Bad things happen...then the thing you thought was there to make them hurt less makes them worse.

Sorry for both levels of your misfortune.

[michaelm]

Insurance, as intended, is/was a great idea.
Insurance, as it exists, is a legal protection racket.

^^This

So true. You have to fight the bastards to get every penny sometimes.

[I'm Murrin]

Dunno how different the insurance markets are between UK and US; I'm lucky in having only a £100 excess on my contents insurance. Sucks to have this kind of thing happen, hopefully you can get somewhere with the insurance and with the store they sold to.

[aliantha]

Insurance, as intended, is/was a great idea.
Insurance, as it exists, is a legal protection racket.

^^This

So true. You have to fight the bastards to get every penny sometimes.

Agreed.

And the cops won't make it a priority -- to them, it's a run-of-the-mill break-in. They'll get interested only if these guys are stupid enough to break into a bunch of homes in your neighborhood. That's why I suggested calling the paper. Or whichever local radio/TV station has a consumer protection unit -- somebody who will make some noise on your behalf.

[michaelm]

Dunno how different the insurance markets are between UK and US; I'm lucky in having only a £100 excess on my contents insurance. Sucks to have this kind of thing happen, hopefully you can get somewhere with the insurance and with the store they sold to.

When I lived in the UK I remember having a lower excess/deductible for most insurance, and sometimes none. Also that insurance didn't have a limit on how much could be paid out.

In the US it's difficult to get insurance with no deductible unless you pay a higher premium, and things that are variable like car insurance may have a cap that can be paid out. I just don't remember that for auto insurance in the UK.

Other than that, pretty much the same.

[wayfriend]

Hey Cagliostro, did GameStop ever give you whatever stuff you had stolen that they still had on hand? Because if you know property is stolen, it becomes a crime to keep it I think.

[Cagliostro]

Hey Cagliostro, did GameStop ever give you whatever stuff you had stolen that they still had on hand? Because if you know property is stolen, it becomes a crime to keep it I think.

Apparently they did put aside what I did not already buy. I'm hoping that I can get reimbursed for the games I did already buy that helped me realized all this.

As for the police, it looks like the detective has gotten moving on this, and found that a pawn shop bought a bass guitar and some jewelry from someone, and they have pictures to show us late this week or early next week of what has been recovered. Apparently pawn shops are required to keep stuff purchased off the shelf for 30 days for this very reason. Unfortunately, Game Stop doesn't, but they pulled what they could right away, and I appreciate them doing this. We'll see what I get to recover.

The other thing is, the police officer gave us the name of a 24 year old I've never heard of before. A bit relieved that it was nobody I knew. But I'm a little surprised they give out the name of the bastard who done it. My wife apparently looked up his address and found where he lives, and he lives pretty close. I just hope they bust the guy, and it didn't occur to me to ask until after what they will do with him from here. I really hope the name is not handed to us because they do not intend on doing anything, so that we can sue the bastard. I'd just rather he be arrested.