Has anyone heard of this happening? A college-student age acquaintance of ours rode her bike somewhere the other day, parked and locked it. When she came back, another (heftier) lock had been put on her bike so that she could not remove it from the bike rack. Luckily she did not leave her bike, but called for help. Friends showed up, a large bolt-cutter cut the lock, and her bike was rescued.
What the heck was that? Was someone planning on coming back and stealing her bike? Was it just a bizarre prank? Or what?
Your acquaintance stole the bike. The owner saw it and put the big lock on to hold until returning with bolt cutters for the small lock. But your acquaintance got there first. You should keep an eye on your stuff when your acquaintance is around.
Why would the owner take their lock off in the mean time? If that happened to my bike I would guess it was a prank or some kind of odd accident and assume the owner of the lock would remove it at some point leaving my bike unlocked.
I think the idea is to put the additional lock in an unobtrusive place so it’s not noticed until the owner removes his/her lock. And hope that the owner is confused/upset enough not to bother putting his/her lock back on.
Anyway don’t ask me, that’s how I’ve heard it on some online forum and I have no confirmation it’s actually true.
I misunderstood. You are saying that there are now TWO locks - the owner’s, and a strangers? I thought you meant that the owner’s was gone, and a new lock REPLACED it, which is more pranky. Yeah, then I don’t know what’s going on…
This was kind of my thought too, but it seems like a weird way to go around stealing bikes. However I’m inclined to think that everything is a scam si I figured I’d better ask.
I was thinking along the lines of, “Hey, let’s fuck with Theresa by switching the lock on her bike! It’ll freak her out!”
But two locks - it seems complicated, but the attempted theft thing makes sense. But why not just, under cover of night, scout around for bikes and just bolt-cutter-off the locks?
That would look awfully suspicious. This way they can come back later and cut off the owner’s lock. If anyone challenges them, they say “somebody was trying to steal my bike by putting a second lock on it.” That’s what the OP’s friend would have said if anyone challenged her. Then they cut off the owner’s lock, undo their own lock, and ride away.
Sometimes people will leave the lock on their bike unlocked. These pranksters go around and pick up locks with no keys. Then they apply the locks to other bikes, dumpsters, gates or whatever. I guess their thrill is in the act rather than seeing the person’s discomfort. It’s a similar principle to breaking glass on the street. It’s fun for them even though they don’t see the person with the flat tire.
I’ve actually heard of this scam working a different way:
Thief spots a locked-up bike.
Thief puts his own lock on the bike.
Thief finds a cop/helpful person and says, “hey, some jerk put a second lock on my bike!”
Helpful Person says, “how do I know this is your bike?”
Thief says, “look, I have the key to my lock which I put on it,” and removes his own lock.
Helpful Person, convinced by this display, uses a tool of some sort to remove the other lock. Bystanders are not alarmed by the bolt-cutting because they have seen the whole conversation take place.
