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Forwarded Message on RBMS Thefts



This was forwarded to me, and I thought it would be of interest to
archivists as well as librarians.  I gather from the posting trail that it
was forwarded to the AUTOCAT list from MAPS-L.  In any event, I didn't see
anything on it on ARCHIVES (but I didn't look all that closely).  If this
duplicates prior postings, please excuse.

> Forwarded from MAPS-L with permission.
>
>
> This is not another depressing announcement about thefts at Michigan State
> University.  I'm instead going to drag a lot of other people into the
> situation.  The FBI agent I have been working with approved my sending
this
> message to warn others.
>
> The FBI contacted me earlier this week about a suspect they now have in
> custody who they think stole items from about 37 universities in the
midwest
> last summer.  From the suspect's girlfriend, they have reconstructed a
list
> of places they visited, which included universities in Michigan, Ohio,
> Indiana, and Kentucky.  I saw the list of Michigan universities, and it
> included WMU, MSU, EMU, UofM (not sure which campus), and Wayne State.
The
> FBI plans to contact these places, and may have already, but who knows who
> they called.  When they initially called MSU last winter they talked to
> campus police who at that point didn't know anything about my thefts.
>
> The suspect's focus was on items relating to American Indians and the
> American West (in his photograph he was even wearing a T-shirt with lots
of
> arrowheads on it!).  The girlfriend would sit in the car while he would go
> into the library and locate and steal materials.  Sometimes he would pose
as
> a desperate grad student who forgot his ID, and get a coed to check
> something out for him.  Since my materials don't circulate, he snuck into
my
> back room and hid the books in a large bag.  He visited our campus 3-4
> times.
>
> I encourage everyone, especially libraries in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, and
> Kentucky to look over your valuable items relating to Native Americans and
> the American West.  The suspect is a 6'5" white male, skinny, has long
hair
> in a ponytail, and perhaps discolored hands.  Anyone remember dealing with
> such a person?  Last June a student worker here stopped just such a person
> from walking out with a bag full of 19th century county atlases.  He said
he
> wanted to take them down to the 2nd floor to the color photocopier, but
she
> was really suspicous and wouldn't let them go.  She saved those items, but
> obviously that wasn't his only visit.
>
> Kathleen Weessies
> Maps/GIS Librarian
> Michigan State University
> weessie2@mail.lib.msu.edu

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