Are you prepared to answer the questions the police

[steelheadfever]

and your insurance company (hopefully you have homeowners insurance) are going to ask you after your home (God forbid) has been burglarized? After the police have finished with their preliminary investigation they are going to ask you about what was taken. To save time here lets just say that only your detectors and accessories were taken. Can you identify each and every item? Do you have serial numbers, if not what markings are on them that you can identify? Do you have an inventory list of all the items and do you have photos of all of your gear? What was the value of the gear and what would the replacement costs be? Do you have receipts These are just a few of the question that will be ask of you. After 20 yrs of law enforcement I thought I could answer all these questions that is until I began asking myself these questions. What started me off with this post was I read a story about a poor sole in California who had lost all his detectors and could not answer the important questions that I just pointed out. For the newbies to this hobby it should be easy to gather the required information and keep it up as their hobby grows and for those of us who have been in the hobby for many years it takes quite a bit longer to gather the information and have it put in a safe place like a fire proof safe. Just food for thought. HH Dennis in Idaho

 

[Hoosier]

Thanks Dennis. Great point that can be easily overlooked. I just went and wrote down all my serial #'s and values. Not only my MD's but all my other "toys" in the house as well.

 

[JW]

n/t

 

[steelheadfever]

I have heard that and thats good because most thieves will remove the S/N as soon as possible anyway, so they can get them sold. Most detectors have serial numbers but sadly they are easy to remove. If I was in the market for a used detector I would be alittle leary of ones that have had the S/N removed. HH Dennis in Idaho

 

[sonny60]

I took pictures of all my "toys, collections, etc" along with a sheet of paper laying beside each one with a description and serial nos. and model nos. Then my wife put all the pictures on a DVD. One I kept here and 2 others were given to family and my TH partner for security reasons. You might want to try this.

 

[steelheadfever]

I did about the same thing. Makes you have that warm fuzzy feeling when its all done and secured. HH Dennis in Idaho

 

[MikeMXT]

Without a serial number, or an Owner Applied Number (OAN), the police cannot enter your metal detector into NCIC (National Crime Information Center). Once a stolen item is entered into NCIC, your chances of getting your stuff back is a whole lot greater. For example, your metal detector gets stolen. The police come out and you give them the serial number. The officer goes back to the station and has that serial number entered into NCIC. A month later, bad guy goes and pawns your metal detector. If a detective comes across that pawn ticket and runs the serial number it will show that it is stolen, what city it was stolen out of and the case number that goes with it. Just about every department has a way to check their city's pawn tickets. Some have detectives that are assigned to go through each and every pawn ticket and run serial numbers through NCIC. Others, like the department I work for, use websites such as leadsonline.com. With this program I can enter a serial number and it will come back with results showing if it's in any pawn shop in the entire state of Texas. If it's not, then the program remembers that serial number and if its pawned in Texas at a later date I will be alerted. If your serial number can easily be removed then use and engraver or permanent marker and write the serial number or your driver's license in a hidden area.

 

[steelheadfever]

Great info Mike!!!! I hope as this topic goes on we get more input as helpful as yours. HH Dennis in Idaho