Joking aside, according to the police in San Francisco, such Internet cafés have increasingly drawn the attention of laptop thieves, thus the numbers of laptop theft cases has taken a visibly ascending path lately. Police reports mention of 48 devices stolen last year compared to 18 stolen in 2004 and another 18 have already been stolen this year till the end of March.
On the 16th of March there was one case of a 40-year-old finance manager in San Francisco who actually got stabbed and suffered a partially collapsed lung for which a 6-day hospitalisation was needed after attempting to resist when two thieves were trying to steal his $2,500 worth Apple PowerBook, as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.
"This poor guy, who got stabbed, all he did was kind of stand up... and almost instantaneously the guy stabbed him", stated Inspector Robert Lynch of the San Francisco police. "The whole thing was over in 15 seconds."
It seems that the sales of stolen laptops are thriving as well, as people are tempted to buy thousands of dollars-worth laptops at far more little prices, even if simply out of ignorance.
"It's a changing culture, and crime is following it", police Lt. John Loftus said. "To the criminal element, this is a valuable piece of equipment that they can quite easily cash in on - even otherwise law-abiding people are tempted to buy $3,000 laptops for $200 to $300 on the street."
As a response to these threats, more and more Internet cafés have or are in the process of installing special security leashes for the customers' laptops, as well as post employees to guard the doors.
While these precaution measures are indeed welcome and may prevent some of the robberies, the police also advises people not to resist if the thieves seem very determined, otherwise their lives may be in danger as well and, unlike a laptop, that's not replaceable.
