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Robbery    

This is old news...

Jan 4, 2017, my wife Carla and I were traveling
from a nature reserve through Pereira. We stopped at the Victoria
'Centro Commercial', a shopping mall downtown, for some lunch. Our
car had an alarm and was locked. The mall had a
parking garage with paid admission, security and cameras. When
we returned our car been broken into, and four large bags, one
very large, removed. Later we learned that the security footage
showed two men breaking into the car with a 'master key', perhaps
a screw driver, and then carrying the bags by foot to the other side
of the mall where they walked out.

Unfortunately one bag had my tripod, and another a backup lens. These
two items alone cost over $7,000 dollars, and would still cost that much
to repurchase in Colombia. In fact the tripod valued at arond $1000, cost
me $1,400 to ship from the United States with customs and shipping fees.
Four bags of clothes and personal items also had a significant value.

The next morning we filed a 'denuncia', or incident report, with the local
police. One man was in a small office handling all of the reports. On
the desk next to his another man worked with a typewriter.

Eight months have passed and the 'Fiscalia', the department of the police
who investigate crimes, have not assigned a investigator to the case. We
filed a legal document with the shopping mall asking them to take responsibility
and not to destroy the videos. They responded they would not destroy the
videos, but told us they would not pay for anything, even the damage to the car.
Now we have filed a complaint against the Fiscalia itself.

Since I have been coming to Colombia, between my wife and I, we've been robbed
or had robbery attempted eight times, once by firearm. Crime and robberies are
out of control in Colombia, and the reason is obvious.
The police and 'Fiscalia' don't do anything about it. No one has yet looked
at the video of two men breaking into my car. Probably if we weren't for our
pursing this case, they never will. Or maybe even with our efforts, they never will.

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