A few minutes was all it took: a New Jersey student set his belongings down outside of a study hall while he left to answer a call, returning to find a missing laptop. Luckily, the student had installed Computrace LoJack for Laptops to expedite laptop recovery.

The student reported the theft to police and the Absolute Software Theft Recovery Team, who deployed the forensic tools necessary to trace the computer. It quickly became clear that the laptop was still on campus, and being used by a female user. It was also determined that the user was a classmate of the victim … perhaps making for an awkward semester ....

Less than one week later, campus police approached the identified user, who alleged to have “found” the laptop outside of the study hall. She claimed to be unaware that the computer belonged to her classmate and said she had tirelessly attempted to find the owner. She soon gave up on locating the owner, however, and figured “finders keepers.” Police explained that she figured wrong  — and that “keepers” must face theft charges.  

A happy student has since been reunited with his laptop.