On a beautiful, sunny day, I was sitting outside a café reading. My rucksack is right next to me where I can see it. Suddenly, an older woman comes by and gives her dog some of the water that is also next to me. A man in a white shirt and white headphones comes over and pets the dog and talks to the woman. That was the trick. I don’t know if the dog was in on it as a diversion or if his mistress was part of it. All I know is that there was suddenly a different backpack next to me. The thief was already out of sight.

Hoping to find him after all, I set off in search of him. In vain. New rucksack, my freshly washed laundry and my tablet are gone. I have no idea in which direction he made off. Both the lady who came back to the bowl with her dog and the barista saw the man and were able to give a rough description.

In a hurry, I remembered that you can track your devices. Unfortunately, my tablet in my backpack is not constantly connected to the internet. So I only get signals from other Samsung devices that are near it. Unfortunately very inaccurate. I look around the last place. Nobody seems to have seen it.

There was a long queue at the police station. I didn’t feel like waiting for them. Depressed, I walk back to the hostel. Later that evening, I meet Sebastian, a local student, who encourages me to file a complaint with the police. The policeman explains how such crimes take place, that there are more and more of them and where the electronics are taken. Exactly where my tablet last reported itself two hours after the theft. I couldn’t persuade him to go there, nor did he advise me to do it on my own. The police themselves regularly go there with a whole battalion to raid the stores. It would be too dangerous without them.

Resignation

Disappointed that nothing more would happen, I looked for second-hand tablets that I could buy cheaply. After all, I would love to have a typewriter again. Facebook Marketplace has an annoying habit of constantly notifying me of new listings. I notice one of the tablets in particular. English keyboard, very rare here in Chile, but common in New Zealand, where I bought mine, a broken display, just like mine. No doubt about it.

I contact the seller and ask if it’s still available. It is available. We arrange a time and a place where I can look at it. A metro station near my hostel. I had already taken the police completely out of the picture. I had no hope of support from my colleagues in green. Even though I claim it’s my tablet. I don’t have proof of purchase.

In the cab on the way to the drop-off point, I get talking to the driver. He has great faith in the police (called carabineros here) and says I should give it a try. I had nothing to lose. If in doubt, I could always buy it. He dropped me off right in front of the police station and wished me good luck.

Special operation

Apparently the police officers had nothing to do at the moment, no case to deal with. The policewoman at the table on the right contacted two policemen on bicycles by radio and assured me that they would be waiting for me at the handover point.

I thought it was a bit strange that they were positioning themselves so obviously. I approached them about it, but they seemed to disagree. After some back and forth with the seller, he insisted that we meet downstairs in the metro. Unfortunately, the policemen were not in a position to leave the bikes alone. So I had to persuade the seller to come upstairs with me. He seemed like a really nice guy, not what you’d imagine a criminal to be like. But maybe that’s the trick. In any case, he wasn’t the guy who stole my tablet. Apparently there’s a division of labor here.

I pretended I was trying out the tablet for the first time. I didn’t want to give the wrong impression. After everything was okay, I negotiated. It’s all about the story. In the end, I lured him by telling him that I had to withdraw money. A ruse that he didn’t want to bite on at first. After all, there was a cash machine in the metro. My excuse was that I was going to a machine where I didn’t have to pay any fees. Which was true.

On the way up, we were met by two police officers. They called for reinforcements and there must have been four or five of them. Quite a lot of effort, just because they couldn’t take their eyes off their bikes.

The seller, Rodolfo, was not particularly surprised to be picked up by the police. While my heart beat a little faster, he remained calm. It was exciting to work with the police as an undercover agent.

Paperwork

When we arrived at the station together, the first time I was allowed to ride in a patrol car, everything was very bureaucratic. Rodolfo’s and my details were taken by at least three or four different police officers. In the end, they had a whole list of documents with all our details recorded twice and three times.

When my responsible police officer turned away another “customer” and said it would probably take another two hours, I knew what I was in for. It turned out to be four hours. My sandals, which had taken on a very unpleasant odor during my hikes, were running at full speed. I was certainly not the only one who had smelled them. Poor woman.

After all the waiting, I was able to just walk away with my tablet. A photo of me and the tablet sufficed as proof of possession. Rudolfo himself filed a complaint that he had fallen for the same scam on Facebook. I don’t believe him, because he has many other tablets on offer. But that’s not my problem.

This was the third time on this trip that I had to deal with the authorities. I was pleasantly surprised both times.

Did something similar happen to you? How did you solve the problem?