Granted this isn't the first time someone has stolen a nex-gen game system but...

@http://news.filefront.com/man-arrested-for-stealing-a-13-yr-olds-xbox-360/

 "

I’ve heard a lot of stories about people robbing someone for a console, but this one really is a despicable story.

According to reports, Richard Maldonado was in a Laundromat with his girlfriend and her daughter. In the Laundromat was a boy who was playing on an Xbox 360 while helping his mother watch the Laundromat. The boy left his Xbox 360 unattended for a couple of minutes, but upon returning noticed it was missing. He noticed Maldonado leaving the Laundromat with a blue laundry bag with wires hanging out of it. The boy chased Maldonado and confronted him at a local bank parking lot.

The boy pleaded with Maldonado to give him back his game and told him that it was a gift from his mother after his father died. The boy later explained to officers that the game was a gift from his mother on his first Christmas after his father passed away. It was meant to make him feel better even though she could not afford such an expensive gift.

And what did Maldonado, or as I like to refer to him “Model citizen of the year” do upon hearing that tragic story? He picked up a brick and continually told the boy to “Back Off”. Maldonado got away with the Xbox 360, but police officers learned his whereabouts from the woman he was with in the laundromat and apprehended him and returned the Xbox 360 to the boy."

Awww....

what a moron.

that sad that a grown man would do something like that to a kid

Ironically, I used to work at a police department in my small town (13k people).

The most stolen game system? Xbox 360. This was months after the Wii/PS3 launches. I was a dispatcher, so I got all the incoming calls, and whenever there was a home invasion/robbery, one of the first things any suspect would get would be the video game system. Smaller than a TV, more expensive than a DVD player, and harder to track too (atleast from a criminal's perspective). I always found it was odd, because the victim(s) would always mention "oh, they stole my son/family member's Xbox 360" and could specify alot of stuff about it.

Likewise, Playstation 2's were #2 (ironically). It's like they knew the 360s were costlier, and went for them first. I never had any other systems reported stolen, ever. Just X360s and PS2s. Sometimes TVs and DVD players were stolen, along with other typical household goods, but mostly video game systems and games were stolen since their cost is so much more immense for the size. Not only that, EB/GS rarely care about serial # checking for games.

Of course, there were always tons of things like that happening in the media during PS3 and X360 launches. I did hear a story over on NeoGAF about a mother offering sexual favors for a Nintendo Wii a few months back :-p (sadly enough, it seemed legit too)

How and why is he playing a 360 in a laundromat?

Would be easier and cheaper to have a DS?? Put it in your pocket.

And according to the mothers apparent financial problems a DS would of been perfect,

Either way that's sick and sad, poor kid.

That's pretty horrible...though I wasn't aware the laundromat was a 360 gaming center.