April 4, 2008
50,000 Pairs of Fake Sneakers in Queens
The police raided a Flushing warehouse and found $4.5 million worth of counterfeit goods. NY1 reported there were 50,000 pairs of sneakers, about 40,000 fake purses, and thousands of articles of clothing.
The items' street value was $4.5 million, but if they were the authentic Nike sneakers or Chanel bags, the retail price would be closer to $16 million. The items, made in China, were apparently just about to head out to streets. It's believed it's one of the biggest counterfeit good busts ever, and it took eight tractor-trailers to haul everything away.
Last month, the city raided 32 stores in Chinatown's Counterfeit Triangle. Mayor Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Kelly emphasized that counterfeit goods cheat not only legitimate business owners, but also encourage atrocious black market practices.
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I'm so grateful that the NYPD is protecting Nike's interest with my tax money. It feels great to know that someone is looking out for the big guy.
I actively seek out counterfeit (read: no frills) items in the supermarket, and I think most people actively seek counterfeit merchandise when they go to that section of Chinatown.
The ONLY victim here that I can see is big business.
seriously, why are they wasting the pd's time and our money with this shit given all the problems nyc has that they haven't fixed. this is really a priority? how does this help the people that live in this city in any way?
I saw this on the news this morning; in addition to recovering the counterfeit merchandise, police found thousands of dollars in cash and an alligator.
I recind my last comment--I think the crawl on Fox5 was wrong--the alligator was found in connection with a Jersey gang sweep.
Damn, I wanted a counterfeit alligator.....
with everything being so expensive esp. in nyc, bootleggs should be legal. who the fck cares if its fake? as long as it feels & looks good.
its good to know our tax $$ is being wasted on stuff like this. meanwhile nyc takes 856599568 years to fix a pothole. ridiculous.
Aren't "authentic" Nike sneakers also made in China?
There's no money in it for the city to fix a pothole. The cops are always happy to write tickets for petty things like no seat belt violations because it's an easy way to add $100 to the city coffers.
Most of the time, it seems like cops are there to write tickets for petty things where a warning would suffice/ bully people, not protecting and serving anyone.
what do they do with these sneakers? do they give them to homeless people or poor kids in the projects?
what a ratchet this is. from using the cops, to the asshole private investigators hired by big business.
if there were no more counterfeit goods these guys would be out of business. but then they'll go after the P2P music people.
I guess they sell them to the Chinese vendors on Canal Street.
And what about the fact that there's no WAY these people are paying anywhere close to what they should be in tax money? Everyone loves to complain when the city wants to raise more money (congestion pricing, say) but here's the city going after people who are BREAKING THE LAW and not paying their fair share and people complain about that too.
bloomberg, tough on counterfeit goods.
if you're Poor, Eff you.
they want to get some pr for their easy handling of bootleggers. they don't want to go after the rapist,murders,drug dealers, gangsters.
seriously, does this mean i can get some faux jordans for a dollar at a police auction? does anyone know what happens to seized counterfit goods?
Where do people find or make these counterfeit goods in order to sell?
Re Steven: Red China.
In a non-kafkaesque world, the headlines would read:
"Brazen Bandits Make Off with $4.5m Worth of Goods, Kidnap and Take Hostages into Involuntarily Confinement".
The government is the only agency which should be prosecuted for counterfeiting; the crime of defrauding [and coercing] customers into exchanging one good for another good of inferior quality.
For a transaction in which both parties are fully aware of the nature of those items which they exchange, it cannot be justly said that there is a victimized party, i.e. when Ms. Tourist purchases a 'Gucci' purse in Chinatown neither party is harmed by the consensual exchange, and in fact both parties profit in the ex-ante sense.
I know that some of you think that perhaps there are other victims here that should be taken into consideration, perhaps the Gucci corporation, or the NYC Department of Finance which didn't steal, umm, 'collect' a sales tax on the transaction.
For one, the Gucci Co. can only be a victim if they were actively deprived of a physical good, or the use of that which they already own. In this case, fictitious rights to so-called "IP" is exactly that, a scam fostered upon the backs of society to prop up the sales revenue of pattern monopolists.
JMH
Actually no-frills products claim, right on the packaging, that their product is EQUAL to the original, but you are somewhat correct, it isn't exactly the same thing as saying you ARE the original.
And while your argument regarding taxes looks good on a web page, the reality is the people who buy counterfeit goods aren't going to start buying the original now that the counterfeit isn't available.
Johnny isn't going to go out and buy a real Rolex because he can't get a fake one.. so exactly what revenue is being generated by this sting? None. But our tax dollars still paid for the NYPD to set up the bloody thing.
It's wasteful and stupid
The police either destroy the counterfeit stuff, or they give it to charity that will send it to third-world countries. (Like the New England Patriots Super Bowl Champ t-shirts)
Just a drop in the bucket you can get anything you
want on Broadway & 28th street. This is getting to
be a joke . If we wanted too we could get this crime stopped completely in 2 months.
It has become a big business to do these raids.
No wonder the above mentioned area is a hellhole
for many years equal to Canal street.