Sometimes you can get your stolen bike back

Sometimes the police will take bike theft seriously. Eventually. Spacing reports an interesting story of Heather's stolen bike, how her friend found her stolen bike on Kijiji, and how their persistance got the police to eventually arrest and return her bike. With the cops initially being uninterested in helping to get it back, Heather collaborated with her friends to confront the thief while pretending to buy it. A last minute change of heart brought the weight of the police force to bear and they did an undercover takedown of the thief.

Understandably frustrated at the cop’s apparent disinterest, she consulted with some friends and decided to just try confronting the potential thief on Tuesday with an offer of $100 along with several friends and photos to prove that it was indeed her bike.
Tuesday afternoon rolled around and sure enough, she got a call from her bike thief confirming their meeting that evening at six o’clock outside Castle Frank Station. She quickly texted several friends to meet at Castle Frank and went on Facebook to print off some photos of her riding her bike.
....

After several minutes of waiting, her phone rang again. It was the same cop, this time asking her to cross Bloor and go and sit on the very bench where her sunglasses-wearing friends were pretending to be making out. Sitting down next to them as if they were strangers, the cop then told her to hop into another tinted SUV parked on the street. The next thing she knew, the SUV took off around the corner, as her friends looked on in shock.

The SUV, it turns out, was full of more undercover cops who told her they were going to park the car and go to meet the bike thief who was already chatting to the first group of cops. They left Heather in the parked SUV and disappeared around the corner.

A paddy-wagon drove by soon after and the next thing Heather knew, the cops had re-emerged from around the corner and were walking by towards her. Casually rolling alongside on of them was her bike. The thief had been arrested, she was told, and that - other than her still missing helmet - her bike was in perfect condition. As Heather returned to Castle Frank reunited with her lost bike, her friends threw off their acts and came to congratulate her.

A friend also retrieved his bike by seeing it locked up at a post and ring. He did some quick thinking of putting his own lock on it and then reported it to the cops who confirmed the ownership and got it back. So it still does make some difference to register your bike with the police. There's always a chance it will show up.