Stolen Bike Market Locations (With photos of some suspected thefts)

Hi guys,

I recently had my beloved Felt TK2 burgled from my friend's house and I've started the depressing process of trying to recover it. The classic advice is to head down to Brick Lane Market to find it so off I went at 0630 this morning to try my luck. I arrived at the market at around 0700 and there wasn't much around. I stayed until 0915 (mainly on Sclater and Cheshire Street) and didn't see anyone selling stolen bikes out of the back of vans.

One extremely shady looking guy offered me a bike (Cross frame pictured, just in case it belongs to anyone) that was leant up against the fence and I noticed an almost mint 58cm CaadX with Tiagra kit (also pictured) being advertised for £200 for sale from the regular bike sales and servicing stall which I assume is also stolen as it looked almost new.

My question is then, has anywhere else sprung up as a marketplace for stolen bikes? Mine was pinched from SW9 and is probably never going to show up again but I'm going to keep looking as it's a nice bike and it's worth someone's time to try and sell it.

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I've heard of suspicious bikes for sale at markets in Holloway and nine elms. And also at the entrance to London fields opposite Broadway market. No concrete proof that they were stolen though.

Deptford Market weds & fridays (& Sat maybe not sure) def some dodginess. Heard about a carbon road wheel set on sale there recently, made by wheelsmith, retail £1.5k I think ... shocking that this trade is just tolerated.

I've heard nine elms too. Also you should really be at 'car boot sales' if you want to find your nicked bike.

Good luck to you trying to retrieve your bike.

Recovered my girlfriends specialised yesterday it was stolen from our hallway in tooting a month ago. The Met closed the case a week or so later , I kept swinging by the main bike racks & shops in balham/tooting with the hope that it may turn up . Most the shops were happy to take my details and keep an eye out for it (printed out a pic of the serials and bike). There is a shop opposite tooting bec station that sells alot of fixed gear bikes and some second hand ones someone might attempt to sell it to them so might be worth asking them to keep a look out.
My girlfriend spotted hers yesterday in the tooting Market , a cafe had afew second hand bikes out front and hers was one of them ... the owners were pretty good about it and gave it back after I showed them my photos , think they may have been a bit too trusting of the seller.
I was so suprised it turned up so locally , literally 3kms from our house .
Yours might still be closeby too ..... Good luck in your search hope it turns up soon

Thanks for your responses guys, I'm going to keep my eyes peeled in the area and check out those markets.

And yeah it is sad that this stuff is tolerated but I think the problem lies with people who are all too happy to buy without any proof of ownership. Neither of the sellers of the above bikes knew anything about them and it got quite tense when I asked for a recipt and where they'd bought the bikes!

Keep an eye on eBay and gumtree. Massive amount of suspicious bikes on gumtree

And here http://www.bikeshd.co.uk/

Thanks again for suggestions, I've got alerts up everywhere so if it appears on the internet I should hear about it! I'm going to stick some flyers out as well on the off chance that someone sees it kicking about in South London. Half expecting it to turn up on a Monday night at HHV at some point which might be a bit awkward...

Just bumping this with an update. Finally found time to head down to Nine Elms Market this morning and I don't really know how to describe it other than the most brazenly criminal setup I've ever seen...

Lots of nice looking kit being sold at a few different stalls. One thing that particularly caught my eye was a guy in a tracksuit selling a pair of pro branded deep section wheels along with an old Cervelo P3 frame and a new-ish white S-Works tarmac frame. Said the wheels were up for £800 so clearly knows a thing or two about what he's stealing/selling. If anyone's missing said items could be worth checking out and it's a good spot to know if your bike gets pinched.

The Saturday and Sunday car boot sales at Wimbledon dog stadium always have the occasional hot bike in the back of some of the larger traders' vans. Worth a punt if your pride and joy gets lifted in SW.

I saw a Klein attitude for sale at Vauxhall market a couple weeks back, they guy wanted £150 quid for it so definitely stolen. Maybe check there.

With full 9sp DA group I might add

Bet some one bought it too.

Put a high enough price on it so it seems legit is his plan.

The wheels to my Pinarello were bought from someone at Herne Hill Velodrome market (according to the buyer)

You would have thought that herne hill sellers were a bit more savvy.

Good luck with recovering your bike, mine was stolen March this year, and I've all but given up hope on recovering it. Checked the usual spots around town but to no avail.

It only takes one person to turn a blind eye... and there's something to be said about hiding things in plain sight too.

View post on imgur.com

View post on imgur.com

2 bikes stolen from our communal garden in brixton just off Acre Lane yesterday. They were taken from a garden shared with the 5 flats in the building which is gated so i'm not sure how they got in, unless the gate was left open? I'm also unsure of if we've got any rights insurance wise? the allez is prety common unfortunately but the langster not so much (The langster had been changed to flat bars with wrapped tape as well, which is pretty uncommon).
specialized allez (i think 2015) black white red all stock parts. size 58
specialized langster black/grey (not sure of the year? 2014? it's got the shaped tubing so i think it's one of the slightly newer ones but please correct me) Size 56
both bought second hand

(having some trouble embedding photos sorry)
Please keep an eye out; brixton, clapham etc. my housemates are gutted! @Kieran_Ferguson_PC_2224T

Hi Theoazb,

Have you reported this to your local Police station (either online, in person or by phoning 101)?

I can't seem to see the photos for some reason, probably my settings here at Belgravia. Once you've reported it and have a crime reference number, send this number along with the photographs of your bikes to me at

Kieran.d.ferguson@met.police.u_k (remove the underscore in the UK - it stops some of the webtrawling spam merchants).

Once I have that, I'll put the photos on a report which is linked to the crime report.

Do you have the frame numbers? If so, register your bike as stolen on http://www.bikeregister.com/report

Ta, Kieran.

hi Kieran, thanks for replyign so quickly. my housemate has reported it and has a crime ref, so i'll get him to email you over all that info. Don't think we have frame numbers unfortunately.

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