Photographer gets beaten and robbed on Dartmoor

Is a taser legal?
 
If only society could come up with something to stop scum like this, maybe a judicial system that actually punishes offenders and hasn't evolved into a compensatory system for greedy unethical lawyers and totally out of touch judges.
 
Doesn't dartmoor have a prison? I would start from there with enquiries
 
This is a worrying story and surprising it doesn't happen more considering the value of kit. People in these kind of areas are usually incredibly friendly thankfully but I guess any of us could meet a nutcase or dangerous group. It's a nice thought to clout an attacker with a tripod but sounds like this man didn't have a chance to react
 
cardiff_gareth said:
This is my main worry when going out alone for a sunrise / sunset shoot. You never know what lowlife is about. Everything I have is insured through Photoguard so if they want it then they can have it as it's not worth it in the end. Hope he's ok and on the mend. Hopefully they catch them. I think by the serial number in the EXIF, any images uploaded are traceable by the police?
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The police probably couldn't trace them if you gave them the address. There was a woman traced her I think Iphone and the police told her to get it back herself. My stepson had his laptop taken, traced it and phoned the police and they said there was nothing they could do, but he's a big lad with a lot of mates so he got his laptop back.
Seriously I wouldn't hold out any hopes of the police searching for a stolen camera by the EXIF data.
 
Mark twiglet said:
Is a taser legal?
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nope but some forms of knives are due to *work purpose* if you can get around that feeling more safe

martial arts be your best option though id love them to try take my stuff lol!!


anyone know how the person is doing ? or if they have anyone found etc ? is the guy on this forums ?!
 
As for hitting your attackers a court is going to have a job convicting a harmless photographer if he's attacked by four thieves and he decks a few defending himself, and the law says we have the right to use reasonable force anyway. Remember these days the attackers might be terrorists as far as we know so draw your own conclusions on reasnoable force.
 
Broken said:
nope but some forms of knives are due to *work purpose* if you can get around that feeling more
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If you are not at work that defence would not be accepted
 
I've been thinking about getting one of these to slip in to my camera bag (or glue it to my tripod) - it's a tracking device, I've read some of the case studies for lost/stolen wallets etc and on the surface it seems like a good idea. Does anyone have one of these?

https://www.thetileapp.com/en-gb/how-it-works
 
swanseamale47 said:
As for hitting your attackers a court is going to have a job convicting a harmless photographer if he's attacked by four thieves and he decks a few defending himself, and the law says we have the right to use reasonable force anyway. Remember these days the attackers might be terrorists as far as we know so draw your own conclusions on reasnoable force.
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Is this meant to be satire, the terrorist bit i mean?

Edit: apologies for multiple samepost, forum and VPN evidently don't get along....
 
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Not good at all, I hope the guy is recovering well. An experience like that is going put you off going out again on your own and enjoying your photography.

It does sound like it was an opportunist theft rather than planned. Hopefully they catch them and whoever buys the the stolen gear cheaply (they are just as bad as attackers as us photographers known if something is too cheap, and no charger, leads, manuals or box are good alarm bells).

Having worked nights on standby for several years visiting some lonely, dark places in both towns and the countryside, there are sadly some people around like this, thankfully only a small percentage of the population.
 
ronnus said:
Is this meant to be satire, the terrorist bit i mean?

Edit: apologies for multiple samepost, forum and VPN evidently don't get along....
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No it means we can't be sure the intent is just to rob us these days, that puts a different viewpoint on what may be considered reasonable force, reasonable force against someone wanting your property is one thing, protecting yourself against someone who intends to kill you is another thing.
We used to have a saying better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6.
 
Applemuncher said:
I've been thinking about getting one of these to slip in to my camera bag (or glue it to my tripod) - it's a tracking device, I've read some of the case studies for lost/stolen wallets etc and on the surface it seems like a good idea. Does anyone have one of these?

https://www.thetileapp.com/en-gb/how-it-works
Click to expand...

Did you see this

5. Battery Duration & Lifetime of Tile
The quality components in Tile will run for 1 year. You don't need to charge Tile or replace the battery. Simply after 1 year, we can help you recycle your old Tiles and replace them with the latest model.

Talk about built in obsolescence!

D
 
Willid1 said:
Did you see this

5. Battery Duration & Lifetime of Tile
The quality components in Tile will run for 1 year. You don't need to charge Tile or replace the battery. Simply after 1 year, we can help you recycle your old Tiles and replace them with the latest model.

Talk about built in obsolescence!

D
Click to expand...

Now that feels like I would be getting robbed twice! They're quite pricey for a yearly replacement, my camera equipment isn't worth that much!
 
swanseamale47 said:
The police probably couldn't trace them if you gave them the address. There was a woman traced her I think Iphone and the police told her to get it back herself. My stepson had his laptop taken, traced it and phoned the police and they said there was nothing they could do, but he's a big lad with a lot of mates so he got his laptop back.
Seriously I wouldn't hold out any hopes of the police searching for a stolen camera by the EXIF data.
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No, if it's traced via a tracking device / software the police will act (I've recovered a few iPhones, and other items as a result), the instance reported in the Daily Mail (which I think you're referring to) the civilian call taker messed up, didn't deploy officers and gave very poor advice, the force admitted that. Not sure why your force wouldn't follow up on a stolen laptop? Did they give a reason?

But this doesn't have anything you can track it with so I'm not sure how they'd trace it.
 
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odd jim said:
No, if it's traced via a tracking device / software the police will act (I've recovered a few iPhones, and other items as a result), the instance reported in the Daily Mail (which I think you're referring to) the civilian call taker messed up, didn't deploy officers and gave very poor advice, the force admitted that. Not sure why your force wouldn't follow up on a stolen laptop? Did they give a reason?

But this doesn't have anything you can track it with so I'm not sure how they'd trace it.
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That was the met police and they said they didn't have the man power.
 
cardiff_gareth said:
This is my main worry when going out alone for a sunrise / sunset shoot. You never know what lowlife is about. Everything I have is insured through Photoguard so if they want it then they can have it as it's not worth it in the end. Hope he's ok and on the mend. Hopefully they catch them. I think by the serial number in the EXIF, any images uploaded are traceable by the police?
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Seriously?

Why would thugs want to upload images of a countryside? They would rather upload images of street cars beefed up for late night street racing.

They would likely to do what Mark Twiglet say in his post below yours, sell it off for £20 in a pub.

The buyer would then most likely to delete all images on the memory card, and use the camera to take porn images of his girlfriend.

On the other hand, it is possible to hope that those guys are thick. They can file off the series number from the camera, but hopefully knows nothing about EXIF, and hopefully whoever is using the camera may still upload photos with the EXIF still using the series number, but will the police catch them? That depends on if the original owner did record the camera's series number.

Plus: Tracing down the person by checking the Internet for any uploaded images with the series number in the EXIF is not much of a point. Like the other member pointed out, the thugs will have sold it off. Police could catch whoever is using the camera, but the current owner of the camera would not have known it was a stolen camera. All he did was bought "hot" goods, but he had nothing to do with beating up the poor original owner.
 
Rather pointless post as we covered most of that already after that post you quoted.

Yes i appreciate these thugs are not going to be landscape photographers and if needed up cars or girlfriend porn is there thing AND they were stupid enough not to sell it on then hopefully it's traceable online via the serial number. I'm sure there was a company online for stolen equipment where you tell them the serial number and they go alooking.

Plus if they did sell it on and the police collared the 'new owner' then hopefully he could say where he bought it from. If they are silly enough to try and Gumtree it or Facebook bootsale it then they might sell it from a home somewhere.

As said, we can only hope.
 
Maybe given the high value of premium cameras, manufacturers could start putting GPS trackers in them. You can buy small units to attach to your bike, etc., nowadays which run for about a year on a watch battery, so the camera's battery could charge a capacitor in the camera to run the thing for a few days which is all you'd need.
 
Dave1 said:
Ftfy ;)



I'm sure you would get pulled for walking around with that, it's a club with a torch fitted, rather than a torch that just might work as a club...
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I don't doubt it, I still like the big old maglite 3 cell, just a torch... but I wouldn't want a clout off it...
 
Had this happen to me many years ago whilst doing a series on the old Liverpool Docks, was using a Nikon F2 with a motor drive at the time, solid as a brick. Two young punks just came straight up and demanded my gear. They got it alright, one right around the side of the head, he went down like a proverbial brick and the other one ran, leaving his mate semi conscious. Before the days of mobile phone so Police not called, I just left the scene. I would rather have thrown the gear in the Dock that let the bastards have it. Would not advise this today as they are likely to be armed and you could get arrested for taking them out. :mad:
 
kissfoto said:
Had this happen to me many years ago whilst doing a series on the old Liverpool Docks, was using a Nikon F2 with a motor drive at the time, solid as a brick. Two young punks just came straight up and demanded my gear. They got it alright, one right around the side of the head, he went down like a proverbial brick and the other one ran, leaving his mate semi conscious. Before the days of mobile phone so Police not called, I just left the scene. I would rather have thrown the gear in the Dock that let the bastards have it. Would not advise this today as they are likely to be armed and you could get arrested for taking them out. :mad:
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The old Nikon & Canon 'pro' grade bodies had a reputation for solidity, no doubt why they popular with war & conflict togs and being clouted by the pentaprism housing of one of those would likely leave a permanent dent that would not disappear in hurry ;)
 
6ft tall and the wrong side of 16 stone with xxl size gloves. Most of the time I'd think that I'd give these scum a good pummelling with the gear or any object at hand.
But in reality, as the sole breadwinner 2 young kids, I'm more likely to hand over the gear and just claim on insurance. After all, I pay a premium each year.....
Bravado on a keyboard, but come the situation in real life......
 
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