If you read nothing else, read this: don’t ever resist street thieves. Your phone or wallet are not worth your life.
Matthew Gibbard is dead. The British man was robbed outside his luxury hotel in Buenos Aires. When he resisted, he and his stepson were sho by thieves on motorcycles.
While his nephew escaped with only a thigh injury, Gibbard sustained a chess wound and died after being transported to an area hospital. The attacks happened last Saturday. Four suspects have been arrested.
Interestingly for our purposes as a travel blog, authorities suspect Gibbard was followed from the airport to the hotel and carefully watched: this was not a random attack.
An Airline Insider?
Could it be that an airline employee tipped off the gang? That’s what police are suggesting and what Sky News analyst Lloyd Figgins described as a growing trend.
“[W]hat we’re seeing is that criminals are actually targeting specific things, particularly passports, money and documents that are going to be of value to them.”
“It is concerning because criminals are becoming a lot more organized. And we’re starting to see they are having insiders working for airlines, where they are actually getting the manifest of a particular flight in order they can see who the business class travellers are, where they might be staying, and then targeting their vehicle from the moment they leave the airport, and knowing exactly which hotel they are going to. That in itself creates a choke point that makes it very easy for the criminals to target people.”
Kind of scary isn’t it? Especially because there’s really nothing we can do about it.
CONCLUSION
The human instinctual reaction, it seems to me, to fight back. Last week, a man lifted my wife’s iPhone directly from her purse in a department store. As someone who often misplaces her phone, she has an external alarm embedded into the phone in addition to the “Find My” app. The alarm is controlled by a small button on her keychain.
When she could not find her phone, she engaged the alarm, thinking she had just misplaced it. Instead, she followed her ears until she came to an old man who had it in his pocket. He claimed he was taking it to the front desk…right.
My wife yelled at him and then when she threatened to call the police he quickly bolted the store.
My point is that it could have gotten ugly and she could have been shot in the land of the free and the home of the handgun. I told her not to risk it next time; I don’t think that is being timid: rather I think it is being smart.
Sadly, Gibbard will not return from his holiday in Argentina. Whatever the extent of the conspiracy, it should give us pause. Sometimes, despite our best efforts, we simply cannot prepare for what comes our way.
what’s this keychain activated alarm?
my question exactly! please share!
I’ll ask her a for a link when I get back from my trip. It’s pretty handy and was also cheap.
Merry Christmas and happy new year. Did you get the info
Of course, never resist. Fairly recently an Aussie grandma was hacked to death in Thailand when she resisted a motorcycle bag snatcher.
BA, Argentina: I was locked in the lobby of a hotel ( Sheraton, IIRC), along with all guests, while there was a bank robbery/shoot out just outside. Elements of the Wild West still ,in what is otherwise a charming city.
Never look rich, don’t walk down the street consulting a map, don’t sling a bag over the shoulder, don’t wear jewellery.
I never feel entirely relaxed there; consequently I don’t bother going these days. Life’s too short…
My Father told me of what once occurred on the elevator of his office building, in NYC. A tenant who rented office space several floor below, was either coming into work, or going home. All of a sudden, some fine responsible citizen got on the elevator, and threatened the tenant with weapon, and demanded money. The tenant stated “Just a minute, Sir, I’ll get my wallet out of my pocket”. However, the robber did not realize that the tenant was legally licensed to carry a concealed hand gun. Fortunately, the tenant was able to get the drop on the robber, and shot him dead, right in the elevator. The authorities declared it to be justifiable homicide.
I’m not necessarily advocating reacting in that manner; however, the problem is that even if you comply with a robber’s demands, and turn over your valuables, there is no guarantee that a robber won’t shoot anyway, as may of them are sadistic. Unfortunately, the law of the jungle exists in our cities today; it is either kill or be killed.
Several years ago there was a spike in criminals that would target tourists in rental cars after arriving in the Miami area. Seems like this went away after a while but at the time there was talk about not putting rental car company stickers on the cars, etc. Today it is obvious to spot tourist or at least travelers in rental cars or coming from the airport so I don’t know why you would need an airline insider to tip off a criminal gang unless you are looking for someone specific like a person with a Rolex or a Macbook, etc.
As a Miami native, I observed that it would be a bit easier to avoid having tourists targeted if the license plates for car rentals weren’t all so easily identified by the listing of no county and the tags all starting with the letter Z.
Or the “fleet” tags on all rental cars in Arizona.
The only reason it doesn’t happen the USA more often is because there are easier ways to steal here.
Agreed – just become Commander in Chief!
Community organizer in chief has been out of office since 2016…
See if your fingers can google Emoluments Clause. 44 didn’t abuse that.
Something doesn’t add up. If criminals get a copy of the manifest to see who was sitting in business class or had a valuable passport/document how would they recognize them? How would having an airline insider help them target specific people?
Not sure, but say you have a manifest and you have someone “tailing” a specific flight. With LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram it’s generally pretty easy to match faces to names.
The story about him being targeted is very suspicious. Unfortunately most countries in Latin America are not safe at all and many tourists are extremely naive when traveling there. Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, etc…. are dangerous places and anyone traveling there should be very careful. Showing your iPhones, cameras, etc… on streets is a big risk. Argentina is going through a huge crisis, people are starving so any chance to get some money will be taken.
Did your wife get her phone back?
It’s possible that this airline manifest thing is complete BS in relation to this tragic story. I talked to a few friends down in B.A. and it’s huge news there. Apparently the driver (not sure if Taxi, Uber, Hotel car) was involved and has now been arrested. Makes much more sense that airport drivers are in on this as the initial contact to the gang members as to who to target. Expensive bags, purses, etc will be an easy identifier for a driver to go on. As well the destination. The Faena Hotel is one of the best.
When I was younger and had traveled to Peru with a small group, we heard pickpocketing stories every day…even from the locals. Yet, that did not help one in our group who was pickpocketed when she was the ONLY customer in a small shop. They are that good!
Years later I went to Argentina and Rio de Janeiro and felt lucky only to be scammed for about $20 from a BA taxi driver and not stabbed or shot in Rio. And this was back a few years when their economies were doing better than they are now.
I sensed a pattern. Lots of poor people….and me standing out as a tourist. While there are a lot of honest and good people everywhere, I decided not to press my luck anymore. I don’t travel where there are a lot of people living in poor economic conditions that would make them resort to preying on tourists for a living. In my mind, that happens to be in places that speak a lot of Spanish such as Central and South America as well as touristy places in Europe.
I find that going to what I consider to be safer countries like Japan, Taiwan, Canada, Singapore, Iceland, etc. have still have a lot to offer without the me worrying about someone going to attack or scam me for money. I might have taken more risk when I was younger but the older me rather just avoid being in bad situations now.
Title is misleading and irresponsible reporting. The police have arrested a taxi driver, which is and old scam not new one. Economic hardship has increased recently in Buenos Aires, but I still feel safer there than in Chicago or Dallas.
Quote from police chief suggest airport/airline insider, even if no arrests have been made yet.
How does it not happen in the US?
https://amp.scmp.com/news/world/us/article/1931226/san-francisco-police-release-tragic-video-tourist-paul-tam-being
One reason is maybe things are not publicized in the US. It could be because they do not want bad press, or because things like this are ordinary and do not make national news
Don’t be ridiculous. Yes, there are bad guys in the US but there is a huge difference between what happens in third world countries and in the US: a legal and a judicial system that is corrupted vs one that works. I was born and raised in a third world country from Latin America. Bad guys may go to jail but soon are back to the streets because of a corrupted system where police, judges, etc… are easily bribed or part of the criminal organizations. Here is the US the system is not perfect but you know if you break the law the chances you will rot in jail or fry on an electric chair are pretty high. Thus, the number of incidents is way lower than what you see in places like Argentina.
Welcome to Peronist Argentina, leased by the new President and Mrs Kirchner. Where criminals are applauded and rewarded while policemen are touted as “ the bad guys, inhuman and too aggressive”.