Robbery

[Mike McKnight]

Folks I hate to say this but I am now another statistic. Some or should I say several A-Holes broke into and ransacked my office late Saturday night or early Sunday morning. Among the items that actually were taken were several computers. One of which was the heart of all my printing and cutting operation. And yes there are some 100+ sets of scale graphics that are now gone. I have about 2/3 of them backed up but others I will need to recreate. I have several sets waiting to go out that were only missing a single piece or so. I have a friend neaby with a sign shop that is going to help me finish those sets. Otherwise I will be down for at the very least a week to two weeks while I replace the computer and the vinyl cutting software that was on it. I will be calling everyone I have orders for individually to let them know.

 

[Russell Bear]

That Sucks!! Hope they catch and fry the bastards!!

 

[Mike McKnight]

The good news is that I still have most of the source files on another computer. I will have to redraw a few. I have another computer being delivered tomorrow and most of my software will be in later this coming week. Nice to have friends in the computer business.

Even still, this is the fourth time in for years. I had my race trailer stolen, luckily not a lot was in it at the time. Then my truck was broken into. Then my house was broken into while my wife was home....now this. This used to be a nice town but now I'm not so sure.

Thanks to everyone that has sent PMs. I'm busting my fanny to get beck up and running this week.

 

[DON MAHER]

Mike,

I sure hope that nasty cloud of bad luck has gone by now! :angry: Hang in there. All things good & bad go round and round.

Don

 

[t_hedlund]

Sorry to hear about that Mike

I worked in a body shop and it seemed like every week some moron was trying to break in, We had one dufus ram one of the bay door several times, Its amazing how hard people will work just to steal somebody's stuff.Hope they catch them.

 

[Mike McKnight]

Well a small breakthrough of sorts. The police came by yesterday and said they have someone in custody that might be one of the perps. They pulled this guy over on something unrelated but when they searched his car they found some items that were in my desk that had my name on it. He didn't have any ID and refuses to give his name but they are trying to ID him so they can get an address to get a warrant for his house. Police are surprisingly really on top of this.

Between the police, the glass guy that came out to do the broken window and a few customers.....all are telling me there is apparently a trend lately to rip computers and part them out on Ebay. One of my customers yesterday said that they just had someone smash the glass in their front door and grab the computer out of their reception area and split.

Also on the good news front....I have a new main computer in place and as soon as my software arrive later this week I should be back to cranking out graphics by early next week at the outside.

 

[legendscar24]

Sounds like someone that you know or that you know, you would not believe how many times people that rip you off are folks that you know...believe it.

Mike

 

[Mike McKnight]

I thought that originally too. The detective came by yesterday with some evidence that they recovered from a car they stopped and searched. They had one of the occupants in custody already but after I ID'd the evidence and stuff that came from one of my desk drawers they went back and arrested the girl that was driving the car. He showed me pictures of both of them and they aren't anyone I know. I told the cop they may have been working for someone else that had cased the place as I had a couple of different people selling office equipment come by and want to sell me a new copier. Well in order to see my old copier they have to walk though a good part of my office and they would have been able to tell if I had an alarm and what was in there. The property owner had alarms in the building but my office and one other are not covered. I had my own alarm installed yesterday.

I received a good chunk of replacement software yesterday and my new computer will be here today so I should be back up and running Monday. Plus I have recovered a bunch of files from other computers in my system. I have about 95% of my graphics back to where they were before. There are still a few that I may need to re-draw by hand so I may be a little longer on some sets.

 

[Don Ferrette]

Great to see things are getting back to normal Mike. Let's hope they give the thieves some nice lengthy jail time!