»When you come to a fork in the road ...

Reports of larceny in the 'hood abound: this morning we walked in to Coopers and greeted Peter, only to hear the startling story of how his bicycle was parted in five minutes. He arrived to open the shop at 6h10, and locked his 26" BMX -style cruiser to a street sign immediately outside the shop. Eight minutes later he looked up from his preparations and saw that the front wheel, fork, and sundry parts had been stripped off the chromed bike.
Bicycle thieves in this neighbourhood congregate, ironically, in the Duboce Bikeway, between the U.S. Mint and the urban strip mall. Shopping carts full of bike parts litter the narrow path.
Peter said that he accosted a raggamuffin who was loitering nearby; the kid said that yeah, he saw someone around ten minutes ago, he could maybe find out something.
Why a fork? Taking the fork has destroyed the use value of the bicycle -- Peter's transportation -- and will have very low resale value. Goddam junkys.