Canadian Apple store refuses to return woman's stolen iPhone

Here's an interesting – if cautionary – tale of how an Apple store in Canada apparently refused to hand back a stolen iPhone to a woman, despite police and Apple's database as confirming the hardware was registered to her.

According to the CTV British Columbia newswire, Nicky Olsen's iPhone was stolen at a party late last year and she reported the theft to the police. Recently, the newswire says, Olsen had an email from the Richmond Apple store saying her missing phone was in for repairs.

"I was ecstatic because I thought, wow, they found my phone. Someone turned it in, I could finally get it back. How often do you get to recover a stolen piece of property like that?" she told the newswire. “But when she went to the store to pick up the phone, Apple refused to hand it over to her, even though it was clearly registered to her”, says the newswire, adding that Olsen says she was told this was due to privacy issues, and that they had to contact the Apple legal department.