Stolen Festival Tickets Show Up Online - Central Coast News KION/KCBA

GILROY, Calif. -- Stolen Festival Tickets Show Up Online. One major setback before the Gilroy Garlic Festival starts, more than $12,500 worth of tickets were stolen during an inventory check earlier this month. Event staff explain how you can avoid buying one of the stolen tickets plus the consequences if you try to walk through the door with one of them.

Festival Director Brian Bowe said he couldn't even show us what the real ones looked like. After the thousand tickets were stolen, the rest are under lock and key. Now, the stolen ones are showing up on Facebook and Craigslist. "We know they're stolen tickets because of the serial number and also because of the color, they're lilac in color," said Bowe. Those lilac tickets are only sold at the gate entrance. "Anybody holding a lilac ticket right now would be a stolen ticket," said Bowe.

It's important for people to know if they came to the Garlic Festival with a ticket that has been stolen they may still not be let in the doors even if they did not know they purchased a stolen ticket. "We will confiscate stolen tickets at the gate and those attendees will have to purchase a valid ticket at the booth before they come in," said Bowe.

Police are planning to track down how you got your hands on one of the tickets. To be safe even staff suggest to purchase your tickets online at the official Garlic Festival website, sponsor stores or even safer at the door. "Any social media site of eBay or Facebook or anything like that could very well be one of the stolen tickets that's being sold," said Bowe.

To purchase Garlic Festival tickets from the official website, go here: http://gilroygarlicfestival.com/