A couple was arrested for baiting, and beating, bicycle thieves outside their home. From the LA Times:

For months, police said, a Visalia, Calif., couple left a bicycle unattended outside their home in order to bait passersby into stealing it. Once someone took the bike, the couple would run from their home and, on at least four occasions, police said, beat the person with a baseball bat. Visalia police arrested the couple Wednesday. They face charges of assault with a deadly weapon and conspiracy. Police say Corey Curnutt, 25, and Savannah Grillot, 29, posted videos of the assaults to YouTube from July through November. Video shows the unattended bike in the front of the house. In two instances, a person takes the bicycle off the property. Once that person reaches the sidewalk, two people identified by police as Curnett and Grillot run from their home with a baseball bat in hand… A GoFundMe page shared on Curnutt’s Facebook page said that after the couple’s car window was busted and money was stolen, followed later by the theft of their son’s bicycle and other items, law enforcement was contacted but no arrests were made. “They decided to use a scare tactic in effort to convince people to stop stealing from them,” the page reads.

This couple should be applauded, not prosecuted. Presumably, they paid taxes. They PAID their local police department to uphold the law, and to serve them. Instead, local police took their money, and did NOTHING.

This is to be expected. From National Review:

California’s Proposition 47 downgraded a variety of “non-serious, nonviolent crimes” that had previously been considered felonies to misdemeanors. These include shoplifting, grand theft, receiving stolen property, forgery, fraud, and writing bad checks. As long as the total value of the stolen property is under $950, only a ghost of an offense has occurred. A thief may now steal something under that limit on a daily basis and it will never rise to felony status. In the event that a perpetrator is pursued and apprehended, the consequence can be a small fine or a brief stay in jail, In reality, these repercussions are rare. In addition, DNA samples aren’t collected from misdemeanor offenders. Thus the DNA database has shrunk, making it more difficult for law-enforcement agencies to solve cold cases, including those involving rape and murder.

There are times when some sort of vigilante justice is justified, and this is one such case. If your property is being stolen, and the government will not help you, then you have a right to take matters into your own hands.

This is yet one more example of California’s dysfunction. I hope Corey and Savannah are spared any serious consequences for their actions. Maybe next time, they should be more careful, and discrete, about how they protect their own property.