These geniuses thought they pulled off the perfect score.
A British Columbia man arranged a Facebook Marketplace meetup in Coquitlam to sell his prized Pokémon card collection. The “buyers” showed up, took a look at the goods… and bolted with the whole stash.
Fast-forward just one day.
The same collection pops back up on Marketplace, using the exact same photos from the victim’s original listing. Not cropped. Not filtered. Not even a new angle. Straight-up copy-paste criminality.
Enter the Pokémon community, which apparently has better detective skills than these boneheads.
A stranger spotted the stolen goods in a Facebook group, tipped off the owner, and helped set up a second meetup at Metrotown mall. This time, the real buyer was waiting with the police.
The suspects showed up ready to flip their hot cards. Instead, they got an unscheduled meet-and-greet with the law.
Photos from the scene show one of the alleged thieves smiling ear-to-ear near a white car moments before the cuffs came out, plus the high-end graded cards at the center of it all, including PSA 10 Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise ex from the 2023 set.
Lesson of the day for aspiring crooks: If you’re going to steal someone’s Pokémon collection, maybe don’t use the victim’s own listing photos 24 hours later in the same metro area.
Gotta catch ’em all? These guys got caught all right, by their own spectacular lack of imagination.
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