Stolen Garmin GPS-400W and G5

[29-0363]

16 hours ago, Cody Stallings said:

ears ago I had a Propeller that was delivered by mistake to a customer who is well know for not paying his bills in my area. The type of guy you have to almost beat a check out of.

Anyway, said Propeller was gone for almost 4 months an I found the plane in Iowa (AirTractor 602) that had gone north at the end of the Arkansas spray season, to spray fungicide on Corn.

In Australia to use the propeller knowing it was somebody else's property would be dishonest dealing or misappropriation.  Banks have sent people to jail (gaol) for using funds from ATM's that were paid out in error.

[Browncbr1]

I believe I will put a small sticker on my window noting the federal statute.   Might be a worthwhile deterrent.  

[yvesg]

On 2/1/2019 at 1:42 AM, Cody Stallings said:

You are absolutely Right.

Years ago I had a Propeller that was delivered by mistake to a customer who is well know for not paying his bills in my area. The type of guy you have to almost beat a check out of.

Anyway, said Propeller was gone for almost 4 months an I found the plane in Iowa (AirTractor 602) that had gone north at the end of the Arkansas spray season, to spray fungicide on Corn.

My plan was to have one of my guys roll the flatbed truck up to Iowa through the night , then I would jump in my backward tail cream puff an meet the driver at the airport(2Y4)where the plane was spotted, remove the prop an 30min later be on my way back to Arkansas.

Well, little lady I live with(my wife) asked me to run that by the Attorney.

so I did.

He guaranteed me that there would be a Federal Minimum sentence, Man I got excited when he said that.

He said the beautiful thing about it was wouldn’t even have to track the guy down, he knows exactly where to find him. 

Thought that was a little strange, then he said I would be the one going to jail cause knowingly disabling any aircraft in any way  is a Federal Crime. No two ways about it.

So I was stuck with putting a fairly large labor lean on the N# of which I finally got paid for last year.

 

I always listen to my wife!  Good you did too!

Yves

[Cody Stallings]

16 hours ago, 29-0363 said:

In Australia to use the propeller knowing it was somebody else's property would be dishonest dealing or misappropriation.  Banks have sent people to jail (gaol) for using funds from ATM's that were paid out in error.

I really wasn’t planning to go get a guys Propeller to be dishonest.

I work on Propellers for a living an the bill was not paid on the prop.

Be more like Repo a Propeller.

[thinwing]

Interesting..so how do the aircraft repo guys break into aircraft assuming they don’t have keys...start the thing up and fly away and not run afoul or federal prosecution?

[ArtVandelay]

Interesting..so how do the aircraft repo guys break into aircraft assuming they don’t have keys...start the thing up and fly away and not run afoul or federal prosecution?

A. Airplane locks are easy to break into
B. I’m betting a knowledgeable person can hot wire the ignition switch in less than 60 seconds.
C. They have paperwork from the bank or shop that in effect gives them permission. I assume a judges signature is all you need.


Tom

[Davidv]

On 1/30/2019 at 8:33 PM, jaylw314 said:

That's pretty awesome.  Not that it got stolen, but that the state troopers and FBI followed up on it to the degree they did.  I would have figured there response was "yeah, we'll look into it someday," so it's heartening to hear about that outcome (and that your insurance replaced it).

It does unfortunately remind me of a stolen avionics scheme I read about where a thief steals avionics from one aircraft, and breaks into a second aircraft with an identical unit and replaces it with the first stolen unit.  The first owner has tagged the serial number of his unit as stolen, but the second owner hasn't realized it yet (or ever).  This gives the thief time to sell the second unit and the serial number is clean.  So if your aircraft is ever broken into but it seems like they didn't steal anything, you'll want to check that your avionics are actually yours.

Surely if this thief is that good at installing it in the second aircraft and making it work properly with other systems (AP, ect...), all presumably fairly quickly, he could probably do better as a mechanic

[FloridaMan]

On 2/1/2019 at 1:42 AM, Cody Stallings said:

You are absolutely Right.

Years ago I had a Propeller that was delivered by mistake to a customer who is well know for not paying his bills in my area. The type of guy you have to almost beat a check out of.

Anyway, said Propeller was gone for almost 4 months an I found the plane in Iowa (AirTractor 602) that had gone north at the end of the Arkansas spray season, to spray fungicide on Corn.

My plan was to have one of my guys roll the flatbed truck up to Iowa through the night , then I would jump in my backward tail cream puff an meet the driver at the airport(2Y4)where the plane was spotted, remove the prop an 30min later be on my way back to Arkansas.

Well, little lady I live with(my wife) asked me to run that by the Attorney.

so I did.

He guaranteed me that there would be a Federal Minimum sentence, Man I got excited when he said that.

He said the beautiful thing about it was wouldn’t even have to track the guy down, he knows exactly where to find him. 

Thought that was a little strange, then he said I would be the one going to jail cause knowingly disabling any aircraft in any way  is a Federal Crime. No two ways about it.

So I was stuck with putting a fairly large labor lean on the N# of which I finally got paid for last year.

 

I have to ask, what constitutes disabling an aircraft? I know of a guy who runs a small FBO who had a guy place his plane on the ramp for a month and run up a sizeable fuel bill. Local LEOs from neighboring counties contacted the FBO and alerted them to the pilot running engaging in months of parking his plane at different FBOs for a month, running up fuel bills, and then moving to another county. The FBO owner had the wheels booted, which immobilized the aircraft. 

I've also heard of mechanics removing props and holding them until the customer pays their bill as some form of mechanic's lien. I'm sure this came up in discussion with your attorney and I'm curious as to how the two things I mentioned seemed acceptable, but recovering your property was not. 

[Cody Stallings]

9 minutes ago, FloridaMan said:

I have to ask, what constitutes disabling an aircraft? I know of a guy who runs a small FBO who had a guy place his plane on the ramp for a month and run up a sizeable fuel bill. Local LEOs from neighboring counties contacted the FBO and alerted them to the pilot running engaging in months of parking his plane at different FBOs for a month, running up fuel bills, and then moving to another county. The FBO owner had the wheels booted, which immobilized the aircraft. 

I've also heard of mechanics removing props and holding them until the customer pays their bill as some form of mechanic's lien. I'm sure this came up in discussion with your attorney and I'm curious as to how the two things I mentioned seemed acceptable, but recovering your property was not. 

Can’t really say about the fuel deal an the boot.

But the prop removel is a Felony in the Eye’s of the Feds.

Lawyer didn’t say much about me getting paid for the work I had done.

He was more into telling me how I was fixing to go to jail if I set my plan in motion.

 

[jaylw314]

7 hours ago, Davidv said:

Surely if this thief is that good at installing it in the second aircraft and making it work properly with other systems (AP, ect...), all presumably fairly quickly, he could probably do better as a mechanic

Unfortunately, I think the scam was targeting 430Ws and 530Ws when they were the most common types of GPS.  It wouldn't have taken much searching to find two planes with 530W's, and the extraction/installation just takes a hex wrench.

[Jerry 5TJ]

20 minutes ago, jaylw314 said:

Unfortunately, I think the scam was targeting 430Ws and 530Ws when they were the most common types of GPS.  It wouldn't have taken much searching to find two planes with 530W's, and the extraction/installation just takes a hex wrench.

It only takes a minute to physically swap two GNS530s but to hide the swap you’ll have to configure the unit to the same settings.  That probably would take a practiced Avionics tech at least an hour.  More if she carefully copied all the user data and recent history to really clone a swapped out 530.  

If this oft-told aviation tale about “the double swap scam” was ever a common issue it would have been easier to do with radios like a KX155.  Those really are “plug and play.”  

[Davidv]

18 minutes ago, Jerry 5TJ said:

It only takes a minute to physically swap two GNS530s but to hide the swap you’ll have to configure the unit to the same settings.  That probably would take a practiced Avionics tech at least an hour.  More if she carefully copied all the user data and recent history to really clone a swapped out 530.  

If this oft-told aviation tale about “the double swap scam” was ever a common issue it would have been easier to do with radios like a KX155.  Those really are “plug and play.”  

Yes Jerry that sounds about right.  However, with how tight everything sits in our panels it took my mechanic more than 30 minutes just to remove the DME which seemed pretty straightforward (and yes, I was right there next to him and saw the issue he was having getting all of the screws).

[jaylw314]

1 hour ago, Jerry 5TJ said:

It only takes a minute to physically swap two GNS530s but to hide the swap you’ll have to configure the unit to the same settings.  That probably would take a practiced Avionics tech at least an hour.  More if she carefully copied all the user data and recent history to really clone a swapped out 530.  

If this oft-told aviation tale about “the double swap scam” was ever a common issue it would have been easier to do with radios like a KX155.  Those really are “plug and play.”  

All they would have needed would be sufficient time to sell the second unit before it was reported stolen, they wouldn't need to have the second unit work.  If they saw the plane sat around for a few weeks at a time that'd be a target.  I figure most unsuspecting owners would have figured something was broken and they would call their mechanic, and eventually get it into the shop which might take a couple more weeks.

[Marcopolo]

20 hours ago, thinwing said:

Interesting..so how do the aircraft repo guys break into aircraft assuming they don’t have keys...start the thing up and fly away and not run afoul or federal prosecution?

Other than on T.V. I'm guessing they don't!  The Bank's paper work my cover their possession rights but they are bound by the FAA to make sure the airplane is airworthy or to request the appropriate ferry permit if not.  This would take log book inspections and/or physical inspections in order to file properly for the ferry permit.  I'm guessing Airplane Repossessions don't happen exactly as portrayed on T.V. 

 

Ron

[jaylw314]

8 minutes ago, Marcopolo said:

Other than on T.V. I'm guessing they don't!  The Bank's paper work my cover their possession rights but they are bound by the FAA to make sure the airplane is airworthy or to request the appropriate ferry permit if not.  This would take log book inspections and/or physical inspections in order to file properly for the ferry permit.  I'm guessing Airplane Repossessions don't happen exactly as portrayed on T.V. 

 

Ron

For that matter, how do they resell the aircraft without the logbooks?  

[Marcopolo]

3 minutes ago, jaylw314 said:

For that matter, how do they resell the aircraft without the logbooks?

Cheaply,  once the Bank has the asset, as I understand it, they can then auction it off and claim any loss taken.  

 

Ron