Member Article

Crimefighting through Facebook

A disgruntled homeowner has fallen victim to possibly the cheekiest burglar in the world, and has now turned to social networking website Facebook to track him down. Jackie McGeown said a man turned up at her address in north London, conned his way past builders working there and burgled all three flats in the building, right under their noses.

Jackie said: “The builders described him as ‘the nicest man you could meet’. He spent half an hour with them, made them all a cup of tea and even offered to make them a sandwich.”

While they were drinking their tea, he managed to break into one of the flats, steal the keys to the others, and robbed them all. According to Sky News, he filled Jackie’s two suitcases with laptops, jewellery, iPods and even a flat-screen TV. Having loaded up, he said goodbye to the builders saying he was off on holiday. That’s when the builders became suspicious and took a photo of him on a mobile phone.

Jackie thought she could catch him with the help of Facebook, so she has started up a new group on the site called DO YOU RECOGNISE MY BURGLAR?.

Jackie said: “I use Facebook quite a lot, and I thought it would be a modern way to catch a burglar. Maybe he’s burgled you. Or maybe you’ve poked him on Facebook. If you know who he is, let me know!”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .