CLEVELAND (WJW) – Video released to the FOX 8 I-Team shows how a man got justice by tracking a thief with his phone and leading Cleveland police to the suspect.

Officers recovered some valuable stolen goods.

It began with a business trip into Cleveland, when Gerry Schor found himself a victim of crime as soon as he went through Hopkins Airport.

Someone stole his backpack and he couldn’t lose what was inside.

“In my backpack, I had my work laptop and my iPad. Of course, panic starts to set in,” he said.

Police body camera video shows Schor outside the Hopkins terminal, and an officer asked,
“Sir, are you OK? What’s wrong?”

He walked up and responded with, “I had a backpack and I had some important stuff in it.”

But, Schor and Cleveland police teamed up to find the thief and the computers far from the airport. Schor tracked his iPad with his phone. Tracked it to a west side fast food spot.

The police video shows Schor waiting for officers.

“It’s showing my iPad, right in here. I don’t know if you want to buzz it. You could play sound,” he said.

“Well, here, come on in with us,” an officer said.

Police looked around. Then, an officer checked a bathroom.

 “Ping it again,” an officer told Schor.

Then, police said to a man in the bathroom, “you coming out?”

Right there, you see the suspect and the stolen backpack both found. The police video shows Schor approaching an officer with the stolen backpack still beeping from the tracking.

“I knew I heard it,” the officer said.

“I love you guys,” Schor responded.

“Came out with a guy in cuffs and and the backpack fully intact,” he told us later. “The Cleveland Police Department was able to defend property. And, you know you don’t see that a lot anymore. And, I was very grateful.”

Court records show the suspect now indicted on a felony theft charge. He got released from jail on bond after his arrest, and records show, he didn’t go to court for his first hearing on the indictment.

So, the court rescheduled the hearing to give him another chance before putting out an arrest warrant.

Gerry Schor flew in from California. Despite everything he went through, he just might come back.

“Two and a half hours of my life I wouldn’t mind taking back, but the officers, because they were so cool and so great, I’d go back.”