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NEED HELP - Found Phone with Lookout...what next??

N

naveeds786

Newbie
Hey everyone,

My girlfriend lost her phone at the mall. She has lookout installed on it. We've located the phone to within 80 meters (its in a residential area not too far from the mall). Any suggestions on what should we do next?

I'm trying to crowd source a solution :D Thanks for the help!\


EDIT: The phone is a Samsung Epic...so you can see why I want it back.
 
Can't Lookout make the phone trigger some sort of audible alert or siren?
 
It can....but the location is narrowed to about 8-10 homes in a residential area. If I sound the alarm, I dont think I'll hear it if its inside someones house.
 
Trigger the alarm, often. Day and night. It will drive the person nuts. However, if you have already deactivated the phone by notifying your carrier, that may not work anymore.
 
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I haven't deactivated the phone yet. We lost it this afternoon. Lookout did not locate it until just now. We are trying to figure out the best course of action...
 
Call or text the phone and tell the person that you know where they are. Park avenue and valentine, and that you will be there soon. Then trigger the siren.
 
I was thinking along those lines, but my goal is to get the phone back. Should I write something like I know where you are, contact me otherwise I'm calling the police? and then sound the alarm?

If I don't give them an option to return the phone, they'll probably just freak out, turn it off and then try to sell it, no?
 
naveeds786 said:
I was thinking along those lines, but my goal is to get the phone back. Should I write something like I know where you are, contact me otherwise I'm calling the police? and then sound the alarm?

If I don't give them an option to return the phone, they'll probably just freak out, turn it off and then try to sell it, no?
Click to expand...

You can try that. But I doubt you will ever see that phone again anyway. They know the cops aren't going to chase down a phone. You need to deactivate that phone as soon as possible. They could be having fun racking up international calls for all you know, which will show up on her bill. If you dont report it stolen, it's her bill until she does.
 
I can't find the thread here, but someone (with a Droid?) had their phone stolen, and the ownder decided to send his missing phone a text saying something like "I saw your ad on Craigslist and I'll buy your Droid". The thief texted back saying no, and the owner "doubled the offer". The thief accepted, and they setup a meeting. The owner brought along one or two friends, and got his phone back. You could try something clever, though it might be risky.
 
thats clever. Although I checked our local craigslist and there is no recent listings for a samsung epic. Also, we did text/call the phone earlier today. The texts said that we lost the phone and were offering a reward for its return.

Argh, its frustrating to know where it is and not be able to do anything concrete about it.

Anyone know any police officers in the Nassau County Police who want to get some justice done?
 
Lookout sends a SMS message each time you track it via GPS, the person with the phone would have seen it, not likely they'll want to give it back. Should report it to your carrier.
 
we've disabled outgoing calls on the device, but left on the txt msging for now. If the phone starts to move, I am going to go wait at their 'home' location until they get back and figure out which house its inside.
 
Be careful. The person who has the phone may not be someone you want to mess with, or likes it when someone is sitting outside their house. If they were smart, they probably will reset the phone soon anyway, which will remove Lookout from the phone, making it no longer easy to trace.
 
Had a case here locally and the police were called in. They ended up finding the phone in a restaurant. One cop watched the map and the other went to the locale.

Just a thought.
 
naveeds786 said:
well i sent a txt asking them to return the phone to mall security otherwise i'll contact the authorities. Hope it works.
Click to expand...
Hopefully they are not sending international text messages while you decide what to do. At $0.25 a pop a few hundred will add up.
 
We deactivated the phone after sending the texts. We also checked with sprint and no outgoing texts or calls were made from the account so we dont have to worry about extra charges.

Although its highly unlikely, we're gonna go check the mall out tomorrow to see if anybody turned it in. Thanks for all the advice.
 
This is part of why I have the opinion that a lot of these phone tracking apps really aren't worth it. In this case, you've found your phone, but you can't get it back because you really don't know what house it's in. The cops aren't going to go door to door in the area looking for your phone. If you wait and try to catch the person who has it, you could end up killed. (I once saw a guy get shot because he went out to find the guy who stole a license plate off his car and that's a lot less than $200. That guy probably wishes he had his right eye and part of his brain back right now.) Calling/texting the person and asking them to bring back your phone is your best option and it sounds like you already did that. Sorry it didn't work out for you.
 
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