YES: Truckloads of stolen items are being pawned here

This letter is in response to the amendments proposed to the Pawnbrokers Ordinance.

I am an Albuquerque native and have been in business for almost 31 years as co-owner of AP-T Camera Repair.

“A pawnshop is a business where a consumer may pledge personal property as collateral for a loan. The personal property is then held by the pawnshop, and may be bought back by the consumer for a set price within a set period of time.”

Property crimes have risen drastically along with other major crimes in Albuquerque. Unless we make some drastic changes, crime will continue to spiral out of control.

Business owners like myself have been forced to use social media, like Facebook, to help track down thieves. Twice this year we have been hit — once in May when a fake Texas driver’s license and stolen credit card were used to make a purchase, and most recently in August when a customer wrote us a check on a closed account with a valid N.M. driver’s license. In both instances, I had recorded the serial numbers and reported them to the Albuquerque Police Department. We posted a surveillance picture of the woman who wrote the check on Facebook. Another business owner called me a few weeks later and told me of a similar occurrence with the same woman and that her favorite place to pawn items was Valley Pawn.

I called Valley Pawn and gave them the serial numbers and sure enough, they had the camera and three lenses. Just for grins I asked about the items that were “stolen” in May, and yes, they verified, they had them and sold both items, even after I had reported the theft to the police.

I am doing my diligence as a citizen, and either (the pawnshops) are not reporting purchases to the police, or the pawnshop detail at APD is so overwhelmed that it cannot even keep up with the property crimes reports.

The people who are pawning aren’t “young moms with radios to pawn for diapers.” Seriously, did someone actually say that?

Detectives from APD spent most of the day executing a search warrant on the “worthless check writer’s” residence last month. They told me there were so many items, including items at five pawnshop locations, he had to get two trucks to retrieve them all.

I don’t buy that 85 to 90 percent of pawned items are being redeemed either, another statistic quoted in the Journal article.

We are all regulated. We pay mortgages or rents and taxes. Pawnshops are no different.

When a thief steals and takes the items to them to pawn, the thief is rewarded instead of punished. As a victim and business owner (I believe) the pawnshops should be working diligently with APD to ensure the items being pawned are not indeed stolen.

1) Are the pawned items being reported daily?

2) Does APD take these reports and cross-reference them with property crimes police reports? How long does that take?

3) How is it that stolen items that have been reported are still being displayed and sold at the pawnshops?

4) Who is the online company that is supposed to alert the police and pawnshops? In both of my experiences, having serial numbers and a police report did nothing to keep my merchandise from being pawned.

APD supports this ordinance, and so should we. They need all of the help we can give them. Let’s work together as a community with APD and agree on a solution. A fingerprint is not unreasonable, along with a valid driver’s license. Even a 24-hour waiting period is not unreasonable. It will at least allow the buyer to ensure the items are indeed “not stolen.”