My laptop's been hijacked. Help...

ryan brown

ryan brown

lOwEr CaSe Member
Some douchebag's got my laptop and is now not answering my calls or emails (it's been almost two weeks). I have his name, cell phone number, email address, and the county he live's in.

I'm calling the county sherriff's department tomorrow to see if they can help, but I'm not expecting much.

Can't find anything in the phone book or any other *free* online sites.

I was looking online at the various "reverse cell phone lookup" websites, and I'm wondering if it's worth it. $70 for the one I'm looking at, and they say they "guarantee correct results".

Anyone tried these?

What can I do here? can the police look up his address?

-brown
 
Long story, but I'll sum it up:

A friend gave me the laptop cause the LCD wasn't working anymore. I found a guy to fix it on craigslist, and he said he'd drive to me. He came out to my house, worked on it for awhile, and said it was the video cable and he'd have to order a new one (exactly what I thought). He said he'd order it and come back when it arrived.

He seemed like a really nice, although a bit dorky, guy about my age (25-30), so I just told him to take it with him and I'll come pick it up when he finished.

He calls me the next day, said he stripped the plastic on the video cable and found a cut wire. Said he was going to fix it, and it should be working in the next 20 minutes.

I call him back an hour later, he answers, and says he got the cable back together, but it was still not working. I told him to go ahead and just order a new cable.

He kept me updated all that day and the next, saying he ordered the cable and it was $30. I told him I'd call him in a few days.

4 days later I call his cell, it rings and rings and goes to voicemail. He never called back, and I haven't heard from him. The strange thing is, is that for 3 days his cell would ring and ring, then go to voicemail. Then on the fourth day, it went straight to voicemail without ringing.

This is making me think something happened, and his cell phone lasted the 3 days, then the battery died.

It's been almost two weeks, and I haven't heard anything.

This kid seemed like a really nice guy, and I can read people well. The absolute LAST thing he seemed like was a thief. He was placing ads in craigslist up till the day I last talked to him, then just disappeared. No more craigslist ads, cell phone dead, and not returning emails.

I still don't think this is about trying to steal my crappy $300 broken laptop. I mean, he could've done a lot better than an out of date, broken laptop.

Anyway... yeah, yeah, yeah... I shouldn't have let him take it without more info on him, etc. Don't wanna hear it:zombie_smiley:

Just want to get it back so I can trade it for a guitar I found worth 3 times as much.
 
maybe he accidentally electrocuted himself to death while working on your laptop.
 
ugafan said:
maybe he accidentally electrocuted himself to death while working on your laptop.
Click to expand...


sounds crazy but I was thinking the same thing. this does'nt sound like a theft situation......... In any case I hope you get your laptop back.
 
maybe his mom caught him surfing nasty websites and grounded him without cell phone privileges?

I'd give the Sheriff a call and see if he's on their radar. at least they can check up and see what's cookin. I mean, if my cell acted like that for three days my friends would be starting a search party. for all you know something might actually have happened. or not. who knows.

the reverse lookup sites on the web are scams btw. the info they get is readily available - they just sell it to suckers.

mor10
 
Maybe he had a bad car accident and it laid up in a hospital somewhere... anything can happen. I would call the sheriff though. They can most likely track down an address for the guy.
 
Well, at least you don't have any info on there.

If you call the phone company and have a police report, I think they'll do a reverse phone lookup for free.

Or you can hire me to take care of things the old-fashioned way.
 
sounds like the guy's a flake - he probably discovered that he can't fix it, so he's ignoring you, and he's off doing something else, maybe out of town, and just doesn't have the deceny to own up. next time, make a scan of his drivers license. good luck.
 
When I was working on my HeroFest entry last summer I had a similar thing happen.

I had been in steady contact with my lead actor by cell then one day he didn't answer. And again the next. Then his voicemail was filled up. Finally after a couple days it would just go straight to voicemail (of course, ying it was full) but presumably the battery died.

Anyway, I finally heard from him after a week or so. It turns out he had been in a bad car accident and was in the hospital for several days. The cellphone had been left in the car when it got towed away.

So, all that to say...maybe something did happen.
 
It hasn't been hijacked... He got it running, found lots of things that shouldn't be there, and it was seized by Homeland Security. He is currently in the custody of the FBI with your laptop, and the guys in black suits and sunglasses are on their way to your home as we speak.
 
Capt Quirk said:
It hasn't been hijacked... He got it running, found lots of things that shouldn't be there, and it was seized by Homeland Security. He is currently in the custody of the FBI with your laptop, and the guys in black suits and sunglasses are on their way to your home as we speak.
Click to expand...

Now there's a theory... tainted with paranoia. I'm glad my drug days are over, otherwise I'd be hiding at my neighbours right now ;)

The car accident thing is what's been running through my mind as well. I'm calling the county's sherriff department to see what they have to say.

Thanks gents

-brown
 
rcbrown23 said:
The car accident thing is what's been running through my mind as well.

-brown
Click to expand...
Wouldn't it be a real bummer, if as he was driving over to deliver the fixed laptop, you called him. As he is trying to answer the call, he got in a wreck because of it?
 
Capt Quirk said:
It hasn't been hijacked... He got it running, found lots of things that shouldn't be there, and it was seized by Homeland Security. He is currently in the custody of the FBI with your laptop, and the guys in black suits and sunglasses are on their way to your home as we speak.
Click to expand...

Precisely. And why exactly do they want the laptop? Because it's actually a Transformer.
 
I see everyone's having fun with this:thumbsup:

Ah, just kidding. An officer just came over to my house and I filed a police report.

I think this is the first time in my life I've had a police officer at my house, and they weren't trying to take me to jail:thumbup:

I'm getting old.
 
LOL

Working in the hotel industry I've spoken to cops, marshalls on the trail of a fugitive, F.B.I. on the trail of a fugitive, and my favorite story, the Secret Service. These two very slick, hair perfectly in place, white starched shirts, tie, yeah, they looked the part.

So the Secret Service needed access to a room of one of our employees, not a good sign by the way, I could have played hardball, get a warrant kind of thing, but I had little favor with this 'new' employee. They walked around the room after I let them in, they could of course, touched nothing, has to be in plain sight.

They asked if they could come back and talk to said employee, sure, no problem. These two Secret Service gents came back, gave a nice long conversation to this employee, took a box with them, left.

They came took me over to the kitchen near the lobby, thanked me for my cooperation in the matter which they said they could, "not discuss" to me. I looked at them, saw the box under their arm and said, "look, the Secret Service does two things, guard the President and fight against conterfeit, and guess what, the President ain't here."

Oh my God we all busted out laughing. I think they liked me - lol.
 
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