As I made my rounds at one of my favorite auction houses this week, I didn’t find much to marvel at. The pickins’ were truly slim, many of us agreed. It’s been that way for the past month or so.
There were a few cameras, including a Voigtlander, a well-made German brand. The shutter didn’t seem to be working so I bypassed it.
As I meandered around the room – my hands in white surgical gloves because you never know where this stuff has been – I came across two beautiful lenses for a Voigtlander, along with their leather cases. The small lens was dusted with foam particles; the insides of its case had completely disintegrated. The glass lens itself was clean, though.
The other – which looked to be a 135 mm lens – was in pristine condition. I examined the glass to make sure there was no mold, but I recognized the brand and knew it was a good one. I’d come back later to examine both very carefully before bidding.
I moved on to the other tables in the room, and looked over the furniture in the back room and outside. About 30 minutes later I was back at the table with the lenses.
The 135 mm lens was gone. Gone! I did a double-take. Gone! How could it be gone? It was here 30 minutes ago, there in the open, not obstructed by other items. My mind could not fathom that someone had taken the lens – put it in their pocket and walked off with it.
That’s ridiculous, I thought. So I figured that someone had probably taken it over to the Voigtlander camera so they could buy them together – which would be a no-no because they were from different lots. The lens was not there. Nor was it near a Minolta XG-M camera I had seen on another table.
I was so astounded that I found my auction buddy Janet and ranted to her. I still couldn’t believe it.
People stealing items from tables seem to be business-as-usual at auction houses. We’ve been to several where the auctioneers have announced that items they knew were in a lot had been stolen. A month or so ago at this same auction house, one buyer kept shouting that people had taken his merchandise from a table. We just shook our heads, knowing that you can’t just leave your stuff unattended.
Some people assume that the items were your leftovers, that you’d taken what you wanted and left the rest for anyone who wanted it (which some buyers will do, although the auction staff reminds everyone not to take anything left on tables). Other bidders will just outright steal your stuff.
Auctioneers also repeatedly tell buyers to remove their items as soon as they are handed to them. Most of us head straight to our cars to lock away our purchases. Or we ask someone to keep an eye on them as we make trips to our cars.
This wasn’t the first time I’d felt something was missing from a box lot. A couple weeks ago, I had rifled through a box of small items. When I came back to re-examine, I felt something was missing but I wasn’t sure what. It’s very easy to slip a small item into a pocket and it not be missed.
As for the lens, I was not the only one who noticed that it had disappeared. Another bidder, who also buys cameras, called over one of the auctioneers to point out the theft. There wasn’t much the man could do. They have a hard time catching the thieves, who turn their backs to the surveillance cameras (I didn’t see any cameras in the auction house) as they are taking items, the auctioneer said. He’d look at the cameras to see if he could determine who stole the lens. He told a story of catching a thief once and calling him out on it. The man “surprisingly” found the item tucked inside another item, where he had surreptitiously placed it while he pretended to be searching for it. 
The missing lens and case were similar to the one in this photo on Ebay (it had a starting bid of $149.99).
This buyer kept saying that he just once wanted to catch someone stealing. He’d been buying and selling for more than 25 years, he said, and he’d never been able to catch anyone. I felt a little sorry for the person whom he caught; he was teed off and ready to hurt somebody. He announced that he had intended to bid on the lenses. Me, too, I told him.
Most of the items at auctions go for a pittance, so why steal something you can buy for 5 to 10 bucks (well, maybe not this pair of lens). I suppose that people without a conscience will do just about anything. At auction houses, people are always around when you are scoping out tables, so I still wonder how the thief was able to swipe the lens without being noticed. Maybe he or she does it so often that they are skilled at doing it.
I just don’t understand dishonesty. It’s not what I was taught. It just steals your humanity.
