Pawn Unit reunites owners with goods

SUSAN SCHROCK
Ft. Worth Star-Telegram Staff Writer

November 18, 2004

ARLINGTON--Big-screen TVs and bicycles, laptops and lawn mowers -- these commonly stolen items often end up sold to pawnshops and secondhand stores. When they do, Detective Jim McRobbie works to find their rightful owners.

McRobbie, who has run the Arlington Police Department's Pawn Unit since 1999, visits pawnshops and secondhand stores almost daily in his search for stolen items. Each week, he and civilian assistant Carol Banks compare stolen-property reports against nearly 5,000 transaction records from the 25 stores in Arlington, which are required by city ordinance to turn over receipts to police.

When McRobbie and Banks find a possible match, the process to recover the item begins.

The first -- and often most difficult -- step is to prove whom the item belongs to, McRobbie said.

"It's hard to recover an item if people don't have a good description of the item or a serial number," he said. "If

we call you up and say, 'We believe this big-screen TV is yours,' we don't go seize it until we're 100 percent sure."  Once police are certain that they have located an item that was reported stolen, the rightful owner must go before a municipal judge to recover it. Or if an owner wants valuables back in a hurry, he or she can buy them from the store where the items were sold, McRobbie said.

The Pawn Unit has recovered more than $550,000 in stolen property this year. McRobbie and Banks recently helped a woman recover her $2,000 violin. They also helped a family recover their big-screen  television, which had been pawned hours after it was reported stolen.

Roy Saenz, assistant manager at Top Dollar Pawn on Center Street, said it's not always easy to tell when someone is trying to sell stolen goods. "If a 21-year-old kid brings in something like a Rolex, it don't look right. It could be something they inherited, you never know. We can't judge them," said Saenz, who said his store takes in one stolen item a month on average. Saenz said store employees try to ask customers about an item, especially computer equipment, if they suspect that it might be stolen. "If they don't know how many megahertz it has or what the password to log on is, that's when you know that doesn't belong to them," Saenz said. When people sell items to pawnshops and secondhand stores, they must provide proof of identification and residence. Sometimes, store employees who are suspicious will contact police, McRobbie said. Items that are sold to pawnshops or secondhand stores must be held for 20 days before they can be resold, according to city ordinance. Residents are more likely to have their golf clubs, lawn equipment or electronics returned if they've taken the steps to make them identifiable, police spokeswoman Christy Gilfour said. Police encourage residents to participate in Operation Identification, a crime-prevention program that educates people on how to keep records of their valuables. "When people know their serial numbers or have participated in Operation Identification, there's almost a 100 percent chance we'll be able to return that property if we find it," Gilfour said.

Susan Schrock, (817) 548-5475 sschrock@star-telegram.com

Copyright 2004 Star-Telegram, Inc.