Stealing Legos for fun and profit?

Mad_Rain writes "Every nerd I know had (or still has) a fairly extensive Lego collection. But I don't think most would go so far as to steal $200,000 worth of Legos. When police arrived to carry away the evidence from his home, they needed a 20-foot-long truck. They found in the car of the accused a laptop computer that had a list of Target stores that he was planning to defraud along with the mapping software on how to get there."

hehe.

[carlmenezes]

So I guess the charges STUCK? :)

Re:hehe.

[Pichu0102]

Dunno, but I'm sure all the pieces will come together at the end.

Re:hehe.

[mav[LAG]]

It's because a +1 Funny doesn't give you karma. Some mods use a +1 Insightful to say "yes I thought that was funny and I think you deserve karma as well."

Re:hehe.

[Scarblac]

Actually, anybody who just posts now and then and behaves a bit on /. will have their karma maxed pretty easily. Who cares.

The thing is though that sometimes the "+1, Informative" mods rather add to the joke, or are a joke in themselves.

Re:hehe.

[kpwoodr]

But wouldn't the irony have truely been in modding the parent "+1, funny"

Re:hehe.

[Scarblac]

But then, I can't really think of any articles here where a comment like "I think all American chicks have huger asses than the global norm" would be on-topic and a decent contribution to the discussion, can you?

Re:hehe.

[Anonymous Coward]

obligatory post...

1. Steal Legos
2. ???
3. Profit!

Re:hehe.

[trentblase]

If you RTFA, it would be clear that step 2 is "sell legos online". I would be inclined to be more lenient if he was stealing the legos for a more creative purpose. Like a 3x scale lego model goatse.

his feedback page.

[weierstrass]

http://www.bricklink.com/feedback.asp?u=swanberg [bricklink.com]

Re:his feedback page.

[BigDogCH]

MOD the parent up.

This is the guys online store that he uses to sell these legos.

Actually, just yesterday I was just considering buying some xmas presents from this store!

http://www.bricklink.com/feedback.asp?u=swanberg [bricklink.com]

Re:hehe.

[DigitalHammer]

Yes, they won't LEGO of this criminal with that much evidence STACKED against him. :)

Re:hehe.

[chenjeru]

Somebody throw the brick^H^H^H^H^H book at him!!

Ruh-Row

[binaryspiral]

A Target security guard stopped Swanberg at a Portland-area store on Nov. 17

And he would have gotten away with it too... if it weren't for those meddling kids and their dog!

tsk tsk

[nemik]

and the evidence will just keep stacking up against him.

$200,000 worth of LEGOs

[dirtsurfer]

So that's like, what, four starwars sets?

Re:$200,000 worth of LEGOs

[CriminalNerd]

A nerd's dream...His own battalion of Death Stars!!! (scale 1:76547499)

Re:$200,000 worth of LEGOs

[TWooster]

Well, the summary was wrong.

It's twelve star-wars sets at $600,000, from some stores other than Target. "Only" $200,000 was from Target stores. Who knows the rest? ("Records of the Lego collector's Web site, Bricklink.Com, show that Swanberg has sold nearly $600,000 worth of Legos since 2002, said Dolyniuk.")

By the way. Portland represent!

Re:$200,000 worth of LEGOs

[Don_dumb]

Or two tickets to LEGOLAND

well....

[TheMeeks]

I hope he at least got one of those foot tall yoda's http://www.fbtb.net/sets/index.asp?page=set&set=71 94 [fbtb.net]

What happened to slashdot?

[SirDaShadow]

There were no stories and now all of the sudden there are like 5 in a row!

Re:What happened to slashdot?

[NanoGator]

"There were no stories and now all of the sudden there are like 5 in a row!"

I think they set the story to post at 7:32 pm instead of am. As a result, we had to wait for the clock to roll around before the stories behind it would show up. Of course, I could be wrong, but I did 'back' a few times and noticed the time hasn't changed on it.

Lego guy stole the articles

[sqeaky]

I think this lego guy stole all the articles for today, and they found them stuck in a lego brick jail.

Why the truck?

[syousef]

But I don't think most would go so far as to steal $200,000 worth of Legos. When police arrived to carry away the evidence from his home, they needed a 20-foot-long truck.

Why do you need a truck to move 10 lego sets?

Re:Why the truck?

[vrt3]

The truck was made of lego bricks itself.

Re:Why the Insightful?

[ArsenneLupin]

This is intentional. Funny doesn't give karma, whereas Insightful does. So if you want to reward a really funny joke (debatable...), you give it an Insightful.

Or maybe the slashdot coders could again give karma for Funny mods... The number of jokes modded Insightful should tell them something...

Re:Why the Insightful?

[roman_mir]

This is a STUPID argument. There is a reason that there is a Funny selection. Whoever mods funny posts as insightful is a fool.

Re:Why the Insightful?

[OverlordQ]

And you're the reason why the Slashdot moderation system is such a mess. Stop worrying about if it gives Karma or not and worry about the content and what the moderation means. Funny is Funny, Insightful isn't Funny. Get over the fact that it doesn't give Karma, whoop-de-fricken-do.

Re:Why the Insightful?

[Hognoxious]

The problem is, you make a joke that is funny, get 5 "+1 funny" mods, but that's outweighed by the one cretin who doesn't get the joke and mods it offtopic. A few of those and you're blocked from posting. I don't see why people who give us a much needed laugh should be prevented from doing so again. So in that sense yes, karma does matter.

Re:Why the truck?

[roman_mir]

A Troll? The parent is +5 Insightful or +5 Informative. In reality it is +5 Right.

low traffic story

[nizo]

I just realized why there are so few replies to this story so far: everyone here is out trying to figure out how they can get their hands on $200,000 worth of legos. I could build my own home addition with all those; that would be awesome.

Re:low traffic story

[jZnat]

I think it's because there were no new articles for a few hours today, so they all went to digg [digg.com] up some news.

Re:low traffic story

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

fark [fark.com] you.

Re:low traffic story

[king-manic]

I just realized why there are so few replies to this story so far: everyone here is out trying to figure out how they can get their hands on $200,000 worth of legos. I could build my own home addition with all those; that would be awesome.

It'd be drafty though. I think you might need some insulation between those legos blocks.

The only way that would be awesome

[SuperKendall]

I could build my own home addition with all those; that would be awesome.

Given the stabillity of lego constructions, the only way that would be "awesome" is that you could do a great "Kool-Aid Man Oh Yeah" imitation.

Ok, I guess that is pretty awesome.

Target: The S&M in "Service Mark"

[Arryck]

"...a list of Target stores that he was planning to defraud..."

Can you really blame him? The store's name is Target. Their logo is that of a target. Their mascot is a dog with a bull's-eye encircling one eye, looking as though it's in an abusive relationship. Oh, and those damn commercials. Clearly, this company is just asking for abuse.

RFID....

[Joe Random]

The guy didn't exactly steal the legos (or LEGO bricks, for the anal-retentative). He pulled the ol' UPC-swap trick on the store. What do you want to bet the retail market will use cases like this to try to push for RFID tagging of products? "If we only had RFID tags in all of the products we sell this never would have happened, and we would have saved our shareholders tons of money."

Re:RFID....

[fishbowl]

"The guy didn't exactly steal the legos (or LEGO bricks, for the anal-retentative). He pulled the ol' UPC-swap trick on the store."

It's shoplifting, which is theft, so he did *exactly* steal them. The point when the crime is committed is when you switch the price tag concealed from the merchant. (It would be legal to switch the tags with the merchant's consent -- it's the point of concealment where it becomes shoplifting.)

Actually RFID in legos could be helpful

[SuperKendall]

Need that one elusive piece? Just whip out the home RFID reader and point at your cases! Now you know right where it is, and can even do quick binary searches on piles of legos.

I wonder how many RFID tags a reader can pick out? Does a mass of different ones swamp a reader? Kind of an interesting question all by itself.

Re:RFID....

[catstack]

The guy didn't exactly steal the legos (or LEGO bricks, for the anal-retentative). He pulled the ol' UPC-swap trick on the store.

And how exactly is this not stealing?

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:RFID....

[Anonymous Coward]

He PAID for them. Stealing usually involved NOT paying, but this guy DID pay.

Just not the right amount.

Re:RFID....

[Joe Random]

YEAH, No one could swap out an RFID...

You should probably read up on RFID. Since RFID tags don't need to be visible to scan them (unlike optical barcodes) they could be:

1. embedded in the packaging, so that the only way to get rid of it is to either get rid of the packaging, or mutilate it trying to find the tag, bvoth of which would make store employees pay greater attention to you, which is exactly what you don't want.
2. embedded in one of the bricks inside the package. The only way to get rid of it t

Conjecture

[BMIComp]

No, but you could probably add another RFID tag, with a larger antenna and stronger signal....

Re:Conjecture

[Joe Random]

No, but you could probably add another RFID tag, with a larger antenna and stronger signal....

The problem is, there's an actual underlying protocol that keeps RFID tags from interfering with each other. You could have 2, 20, or 200 tags all in the same LEGO box, and the scanner would read them all.

You could use some sort of jamming device to block all RFID tags in a small area, but if the store can't read the RFID tag they'll have to do the equivalent of "Price check on aisle 5!", which will reveal the actual price of the item, thus nullifying all of your efforts.

Re:Conjecture

[AGMW]

The problem is, there's an actual underlying protocol that keeps RFID tags from interfering with each other. You could have 2, 20, or 200 tags all in the same LEGO box, and the scanner would read them all.

Oh great, so every LEGO brick will have it's own RFID tag ... and roll on IPv6 and every LEGO brick can then have it's own IP address, and a website with a picture of itself.

Re:Conjecture

[wcbarksdale]

In general, protocols assume cooperation. RFID tags for inventory tracking and individual consumer goods are probably not cryptographically strong and could likely be forged, but IANAEE.

Re:Conjecture

[vertinox]

You could use some sort of jamming device to block all RFID tags in a small area, but if the store can't read the RFID tag they'll have to do the equivalent of "Price check on aisle 5!", which will reveal the actual price of the item, thus nullifying all of your efforts.

Unless of course the cashier is in cahoots with you.

When I worked retail I was told by a manager that most store theft is commonly thought to be employees rather than customers, but harder to catch because they will ring up items for their f

Re:RFID....

[E8086]

So RFID tags are not easy to change, but I don't think bar codes are going to be replaced as the primary thing to scan at the checkout counters for at least the next couple years. If you're going to try some swap the barcode scam make sure the store has an small appliance section with working floor model microwaves. Just to make it look more convincing give the box a couple kicks and small tears while you're walking around looking for the microwaves. That way if a store employee asks you can try something l

Lego Mindstorms

[kiddailey]

So THIS is really what went wrong with Lego Mindstorms [slashdot.org]... this guy has been stealing all the sets! ;)

In other news....

[shri]

Federal and state authorities will move aggressively to ban mapping software.

Sheriff Clancy Wiggum noted a sharp increase in teenagers and middle management types who have been recently arrested with print outs of maps taken from online sources like Google.Com and Yahoo.Com. "Easy access to information like this has to stop!" said Sheriff Wiggum, noting that from now on only donut stores and brothels should be shown on maps.

LEGO

[BMIComp]

I wonder if this is what he looks like now...

Should have hit the preview button

[BMIComp]

I wonder if this is what he looks like now... [bricklink.com]

He sells them?!

[Sloppy]

The story says he has sold $600k worth of legos. Damn, he's just a run-of-the-mill crook, in it merely for the profit. I was hoping the story would explain what kind of totally insane thing he wanted to build that needed $200k worth of legos. Like he was building a whole house or something. Drat.

How much did he *really* steal

[egarland]

If a Lego set costs $99 at the store but $1 to make, how much did this guy really steal... was it $200,000 worth of product or $2,000. And if he paid more than $2,000 for it (which it sounds like he did) is it really stealing at all?

Let's just call him the Robin Hood of Lego Land and move on with our lives.

I am sure it cost target more than $1

[brunes69]

They had to pre-order it, ship it cross-country, warehouse it, distribute it, and shelf it for god knows how long.

It cost them *at least* $2.

At least he took it from the stores...

[CowsAnonymous]

I actually worked in Lego's packaging plant in Enfield, Conn. USA for awhile. Apparently, the summer I was working there someone was stealing a bunch of new Star Wars sets off of the line and selling them on ebay. They found out soon after, of course, because he was using an ebay account with his home phone number.

Mapping software?

[jiawen]

"...along with the mapping software on how to get there."

Is use of Mapquest now prima facie evidence of intent to commit a crime?

Re:Mapping software?

[mdecarle]

It is at least "suspicious" if you stole something from a few Target stores, and the maps all point to other Target stores.

But of course, it shows "intend", not evidence.

Re:Mapping software?

[crankyspice]

Well, to be relevant, a piece of evidence has to have (at least) the slighest tendency to make something more or less likely to be true. I'd say the maps pin-pointing the Target stores makes it at least slightly more likely that this guy was pulling off this scam that affected Target stores...

Also, it doesn't show "intend" [sic]. If anything, it would show a "common plan or scheme," but since that's only applicable to character evidence, it's immaterial here.

Awesome PR stunt.

[thegalacticcadet]

Half of the story reads like a police blotter, the other half reads like ad copy for LEGO. Anyone wanna go holiday shopping?

Why did they need a truck?

[ThatsNotFunny]

With all those lego bricks, they surely could've just built one. ;)

bricklink.com NOT _his_ website

[Ezza]

The article falsely states:

"Records of the Lego collector's Web site, Bricklink.Com, show that Swanberg has sold nearly $600,000 worth of Legos since 2002, said Dolyniuk"

Some people sell stolen goods on ebay, but ebay is not THEIR website.

Bricklink is a marketplace to buy/sell new/used lego kits, parts etc, but having an account on bricklink doesn't make it YOUR website.

Grr.

Re:bricklink.com NOT _his_ website

[Rhys]

Ah, parsing English.

"Records of (the (Lego collector's Web site), Bricklink.Com) ..."

not

"Records of ((the Lego collector's) Web site, Bricklink.Com) ..."

Re:bricklink.com NOT _his_ website

[bill_mcgonigle]

This is what happens when we don't teach punctuation in school.

    collector's -> collectors'

and suddenly it all makes sense.

Re:bricklink.com NOT _his_ website

[geminidomino]

Well, there is that apostophe abuse. While I don't doubt that you're correct, strictly speaking it should be "Lego Collectors' website." :)

Re:bricklink.com NOT _his_ website

[meringuoid]

When you nitpik, at least make sure you are reading correctly

He was reading correctly. Hardly anyone seems to know how to use apostrophes these days, though.

The Lego collector's web site - the web site of or belonging to the Lego collector. In the context of the article, this would be taken to mean the Lego collector who has been arrested.

The Lego collectors' web site - the web site of or belonging to the Lego collectors. In the context of the article, this would be taken to mean the community of Le

Eh?

[bnjf]

What's a Legos? [adrants.com]

Re:Eh?

[rodoke3]

I'm sorry, I couldn't quite read the link, could you xerox me a copy from your end?

Lego now so expensive it's worth stealing

[evilandi]

The missed point here is: Lego is now so expensive that it is worth stealing. When child's toy bricks get into the same crime bracket as alcohol and tobacco, something is wrong.

This isn't a case for RFID. This is a case for making Lego less expensive.

Re:Lego now so expensive it's worth stealing

[theguyfromsaturn]

Hence megablocks.

Re:Lego now so expensive it's worth stealing

[bill_mcgonigle]

Does anybody here know what it would cost to injection-mold your own Legos vs. buying a decent quanity of Legos such that a kid could build something reasonable (for locally defined values of reasonable).

If you're not selling them it should be perfectly legal.

Re:Lego now so expensive it's worth stealing

[petermgreen]

i can't see it being feasible to mould your own lego, building the moulds well isn't going to be cheap (lego relies on VERY tight tollerances to fit together well) and anyway there are commercial clones out there (though i don't think any compete with technic).

if you just wan't boxes of mixed lego to play with then your best bet is probablly to buy it by the kilo on ebay. you will get some crap so expect a level of shrinkage caused by removal of broken lego and non lego items from lego bought this way. but

Re:Lego now so expensive it's worth stealing

[petermgreen]

i'd like to clarify that as far cheaper than any other method thats availible anywhere and at any time. local car boot sales/house clearance auctions etc can be even cheaper if you can find them.

In other news...

[evilviper]

In other news, thousands of nerds listed their boxes of old legos on ebay today, now knowing their collections are worth thousands each.

Re:What

[binaryspiral]

I'm completely and utterly confused as to its worth and merit. And for me, that's a first here.

You're obviously new here.

Re:What

[antispam_ben]

And you've obviously spent entirely too much time here.

Yes, thousands of us have done just that. And we're not afraid to use our real names (okay, our "real slashdot ID's") to admit it.

Think we're just a bunch of nerds here? You ain't seen nothin yet. Wait till you see the "Mindstorms" story.

Re:LEGO

[Joe Random]

If you look on the bricks themself you will see LEGO printed on each dot. And the box says LEGO.

Hey, the Mountain Dew on my desk in front of me says "Mountain Dew" right on the can. I guess I can't talk about drinking two Mountain Dews, can I?

The website refers to the product as LEGO.

That's because the website uses the word more as an adjective than as a noun. It's always "LEGO building sets" or "LEGO bricks". But the word "LEGO" has become sort of a generic term to refer to the style of building

Re: LEGO

[Omniscient Ferret]

And the word "ninja" comes from Japanese, which lacks plurals (sort of). The correct way to talk about multiple of the assassins would be "lots of ninja attacked me". Doesn't stop me from saying "ninjas", though.

(shudder) You'd better watch out for the Grammar Ninja.

Re: LEGO

[roman_mir]

Grammar Ninja? So does it mean that Grammar Ninja's Gram-fu is stronger?

Re: LEGO

[narcc]

(shudder) You'd better watch out for the Grammar Ninja.

Is that one Grammar Ninja or multiple Grammar Ninja?

Re: LEGO

[v1]

would that maybe be "grammar ninjai"?

Re: LEGO

[StupidKatz]

would that maybe be "grammar ninjai"?

Iie.

Re: LEGO

[v1]

Doshta no?

Re: LEGO

[Omniscient Ferret]

(shudder) You'd better watch out for the Grammar Ninja.

Is that one Grammar Ninja or multiple Grammar Ninja?

Yes.

Re: LEGO

[dzfoo]

>> Grammar Ninja

I heard that there was this Grammar Ninja who was eating at a diner. And when some dude misspelled a word the Grammar Ninja killed the whole town. My friend Mark said that he saw a Grammar Ninja totally uppercut some kid just because the kid used a comma wrong.

And that's what I call REAL Ultimate Power!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

          -dZ.

Re: LEGO

[Rob the Bold]

(shudder) You'd better watch out for the Grammar Ninja.

And remember, Grammar Ninja never give up. Adjust your lifestyle accordingly.

Re:LEGO

[Kiffer]

Hey, the Mountain Dew on my desk in front of me says "Mountain Dew" right on the can. I guess I can't talk about drinking two Mountain Dews, can I?

But you can't say Mountains Dew... um... any way.
Look I have a two plastic boxes and a plastic bag ... I don't have three plastics.
I have three plastic objects. or a pile of plastic crap.

I have 1500 Lego Bricks, 100 Lego men and 20 lego horses.
What have I? I have a lot of lego.

One lego brick.
Two lego bricks.

  "a lego" makes no sense. like a red, or a round.

"Pass me that red bit of lego."
"I need two more of those 2X3 bricks to finish my ninja maze."
"Chuck me half that pile of lego"

At this point I think that people are just using Legos to troll people, and dispite the fact that the word brings me almost physical pain*, I'm never going to bother correcting any persons about this online from now on.
It's just a huge waste of time. From now on I'm only going to correct people about this in person... I almost winch every time I read or hear legos.

  *(unlike when people say Sheeps, Fishs or Euros)

Re:LEGO

[Sockatume]

With that in mind I'd say that both usages are valid, depending on whether you prefer to describe them as items or a sort of mass. I'm definitely in the "a lot of Lego attacked me" camp.

Re:LEGO

[91degrees]

*(unlike when people say Sheeps, Fishs or Euros)

Eh? Is the plural of Euro Euro then? Or do you just really hate single the european currency?

Re:LEGO

[meringuoid]

Eh? Is the plural of Euro Euro then?

Yep. It comes of having a single currency across twelve countries with far too many languages, each with its own way of forming the plural. Should two be called 'euros', 'euraux', 'euronen'? The easiest way around this problem is to just declare that 'euro' does not change in the plural.

Re:LEGO

[Hognoxious]

They seem to be using their own words for the cents though - centime, centesimi.

Re:LEGO

[Neillparatzo]

You mean you have 100 Minifigs [baseplate.com].

If you're going to be anal about Legos, at least do it right.

Re:LEGO

[elgatozorbas]

Hey, the Mountain Dew on my desk in front of me says "Mountain Dew" right on the can. I guess I can't talk about drinking two Mountain Dews, can I?

Of course you can. It's a free country. You could even say 'cat' to a dog. But a difference between Mountain Dew and Lego is that the latter explicitely request not to refer to their product as 'legos'.

From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
Please always refer to our bricks as 'LEGO Bricks or Toys' and not 'LEGOS.' By doing so, you will be helping to protect and preserve a brand of

Re:LEGO

[Old Wolf]

Hey, the Mountain Dew on my desk in front of me says "Mountain Dew" right on the can. I guess I can't talk about drinking two Mountain Dews, can I?

Sorry. My baaaaaaaaad.

Re:LEGO

[TX297]

Legos, plural useage of the word... fuckin doornob

I think this official website [legos.com] disagrees with you there.

If I remember correctly, the site used to say something along the lines of "please use our trademark properly. The plural of Lego is Lego." or something like that.

Re:LEGO

[ip_fired]

I think this official website [legos.com] disagrees with you there.

Uhh, I think the URL of the website disagrees with your argument.

Re:LEGO

[Mahou]

no the url is there so when people type it they will get the message that they don't want to be called legos, but LEGO. http://legonotlegos.ytmnd.com/ [ytmnd.com]

Re:LEGO

[Saven Marek]

bastardizing plurals just because it sounds cute gets tired after you're 14 years old. calling sheep "sheeps", calling you "youse" or calling lego "legos" is a teenybopper creation that just makes people look like morons after they should have grown up.

If you want to stay in the mid teens and call them "legos" then go for it. It just reveals to the world a lack of common sense & maturity.

Re:LEGO

[Greventls]

What does that have to do with people being 14? It isn't like they are calling them 13g05 or something. It seems more akin to local slang than anything else.

Re:LEGO

[lxs]

You're SO right. Now you'll have to exuse me while I install Linux on all my boxen. I mean, I don't want to get virii.