All my new baby pics lost in a SCAM in St. Louis, MO

[happytxchick]

Our hard drive crashed and (super long story short...yes, we know every single thing we did wrong) we mistakenly hired a company called Fields Data Recovery to retrieve our files. Turns out it was all a scam and now that they have our non-refundable fee, the guy won't call us back!!! How am I supposed to get my hard drive back now!? I don't even care about the money, and just want my media!!!

Our youngest child was born in May and all of her baby pics were on there. Their is a very small chance that someone may be able to retrieve them off of my camera's memory stick, but I have also lost all of my photos of holidays and school event, etc from the last two years! The last time I backed up was the Summer of 2009.

I wish I was in St. Louis so I could check out the address and see who gets the mail there, and where they may possibly send it off to from there. Only God in heaven (and scam artist Todd Taylor) knows where my hard drive is now!

I am sad beyond measure...

The only time I remember being more distraught is when my dad died just before my 17th birthday many years ago!

 

[PotterWatch]

I'm sorry! I know how you feel. Last year our house was broken into and our computers stolen. I lost all the pictures I had taken over the previous 1.5yrs. I didn't care about the other stuff so much as the lost memories.

 

[OHhappychicks]

How very distressing!! I'm so sorry for you. Hope you can find a way to retrieve what you can. It's always amazing to me what links people will go to cheat others.

 

[TriciaHowe]

Oh my gosh I can only imagine what you must be going through.... I am so sorry

I had a bad experience once too with a crashed hard drive so I save all of my pictures now on webshots. We have used them for about 5 years now and it's worked out great.
I don't have any other advice for you but I sure hope you are successful in getting your HD and pictures back!

 

[anderson8505]

I supposed you've already tried this, but it's the best I could find for any help, the Better Business Bureau has had some success. http://www.bbb.org/stlouis/business-reviews/computers-service-and-repair/fields-data-recovery-in-saint-louis-mo-310322677/complaints

It appears this fellow "took" people from all over the globe. It is unfathomable that a human could go through so much effort to deceive people for money. Many other words come to mind, but this is a family site so I'll stop right here.

I know nothing about hard drive crashes and recovery, though I wonder if taking the computer to a real computer repair place might work? Or they might give you a definitive answer as to what can be done?

Otherwise, be thankful that your actual child/children are happy and healthy, and try to move on. I think about what would happen if the house burned down and my actual photos were gone. I remind myself that my feelings may be crushed, but I'd still have the memories of those moments.

Ask family/friends that you sent those pictures to if they can send you a copy back through email or on disk/thumb drive.

Sorry! People can really suck!!!

 

[happytxchick]

Yes, I've already asked friends to post to Facebook and tag any photos of me and my family from the last two years. Thankfully, I do have a few baby photos that I posted to FB when she was born, but not nearly enough to comprise a whole album like I did for my other children. I also lost a very special pregnancy journal for her like I had written for the other kids. I think with a lot of effort I may be able to redo the journal, but not with nearly as much detail or fresh recounts of events since it's all past time events now.

I also posted quite a bit to the Expectant Parent Club thread here on BYC, so I am going to use that to try to reprise the journal. Wish me luck as I really don't have time to be redoing detailed things like this while caring for four children, a husband, and working full-time.

anderson8505 - The hard drive IS the computer...it's the part where all of the memory/documents/etc is held. That's the part that broke, and I had to physically send off that part. There is absolutely nothing that can be done...no hope unless I can get that part back, which is looking grim.

My whole take on the situation is, in the big scheme of things, that the poor hard-hearted person who has done this must be so far away from God that he cannot fathom the love that we are supposed to give to one another as "neighbors" in this old world. I pray that God softens his heart, and that he'll attempt to make amends by returning hard drives to their rightful owners.

 

[happytxchick]

Oh, and I have filed a complaint with the MO Att Gen Ofc. I see they've favorably resolved the sitn for some other ppl; I hope that means those folks got their hard drives back!

 

[Acre of Blessings]

Had the same thing happen here, but just with the crash. My best advice to you is to purchase an External Hard Drive. I bought one from www.Tiger.com for less than 50 bucks. Hope you eventually get your media though. I bought the Hitachi Life Studio and the bad boy holds over 100,000 pics......

 

[Acre of Blessings]

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[Dar]

did you by chance e-mail them to anyone? can you go through your sent folder and find them... or can they email them back to you