A friend of mine had some of his equipment stolen out of a van after a gig a few years ago. He put up posters asking for their return. A fine young criminal called him and offered to return his equipment for a reward. This was scary enough that my friend called the cops, and an undercover cop accompanied him for the meeting, posing as a band member. At the first meeting, the thief had a sawed off shotgun in his coat. So the undercover officer postponed the meeting for later, when he showed up without the real musician.

When the cop identified himself, the criminal tried to get the sawed-off shotgun out. Bad-guy got shot several times for his trouble, and then he got a trip to the hospital, and later, the calaboose.

Few stories end so happily.

By now, pj's drum is in a pawn shop, and twenty dollars worth of heroin has long since filtered through some junkie's veins.

In our town, some second-hand stores specialize in musical instruments. I suggest making a police report, complete with those photos, and then going to the second hand stores. Visualize finding your drum on a shelf in the pawn shop. Then, with the report and the photos, you can prove it's your drum. Don't give them any money for it. The pawn shop owner will be sh*t out of luck. Then the pawn shop owner can visualize telling the cops who sold him the drum.