IPad Bandit Terrorizes Gotham!

Holy gadget lust, Batman!

Here’s one way to respond to a hardware shortage: A Manhattan Apple store lost two boxes of iPads in two different robberies last week.

Police reports suggest that the same guy (perhaps with the aid of an accomplice) was behind both thefts. In both cases, the robberies occurred outside Apple’s Upper West Side store, when UPS (UPS) was dropping off new shipments of the gadgets.

The store’s employees, understandably, tell the New York Post they now have “a heightened security presence.”

Modest proposal: Why not leverage the legions of crazed Apple (AAPL) fans who are already willing to spend their free time standing outside the company’s stores? I bet you wouldn’t even have to pay them to help police the property–don’t you think Robert Scoble, et al would clamor for a chance to become deputized Apple loss-prevention experts?