Ontario bike shop loses $15k Cipollini in daytime theft, turns to social networking to find thieves

In one of the more brazen daylight bike thefts ever to be caught on video — in-store surveillance video, no less — the inventory at Evolution Cycles in Richmond Hill, Ont. is lighter by one $15,000 Cipollini road bike, and the shop’s owners want to get to the bottom of it.

However, “It’s not about getting the bike back at this point,” said store owner Mike Horlick in conversation with the CBC. “Just catching the people responsible.”

On June 19, a man and woman entered the store at around 2:19 p.m., seemingly to browse. The woman idly wandered around the store, checking out inventory. The man, meanwhile, turned his attention to the high-end Italian Cipollini near the front door. The road bike — white with red and green striping on the frame, and equipped with Campagnolo wheels — was resting on a rack, from which the man then lifted the bike and placed it on the floor. Two minutes later, he opened the front door and pulled the bike out of the shop.

The entire incident was caught on high definition surveillance video, and judging from the time-stamped footage, it took about three minutes.

The Cipollini, of course, isn’t your average bike. Hand-crafted with a lightweight carbon frame and top of the line components, it’s a rare, professional-quality Italian speed machine, and expensive enough that selling it, if that’s the theft’s intent, will be difficult to do. Nonetheless, York Regional Police in the Toronto-area city are investigating the daytime theft, considering it to be a high-profile shoplifting

Evolution’s owners, in their efforts to identify the culprits, have turned to Facebook. By this morning, a post detailing the theft, splashed with stills from the surveillance video, has already been shared nearly 9,700 times.