Tag Archives: crime

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’24 A To Z Challenge – S

Shiver me timbers!  Scupper and scuttle me, mateys.  It’s time for a post about the letter S.

I thought that I would tell you about the first young couple to get caught

SCRUMPING

It was Adam and Eve – and not doing what you might have thought, at all.  “Scrumping” means to

Steal fruit

Scrumping is an old-fashioned informal term in England that means to steal fruit such as apples from trees. It is a dialectal term that can also refer to something that is shriveled or cooked to a crisp.

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About what you thought it might mean:  If God created Adam and Eve immortal – no sin, no death, no painful childbirth, no human race – did He also create them with sexual equipment and orgasms, or was Eve just there to make apple butter??  Discuss among yourselves, and with any available tight-assed Buy-Bull thumper.

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Bi-Cycling Fibbing Friday

Pensitivity101 was recycling questions from August 2019 last week, so my apologies if these seem familiar:

1. What are Porkies, Chorkies and Morkies?

Pulled pork, pulled chicken, and pulled tofu sandwiches, in that order

2. Why did the Wicked Witch of the West melt?

Because she moved from Kansas to Phoenix, Arizona, in August, where it was 112 degrees F three days in a row.  Natives say, ‘It’s a dry heat’, but so is arson.

3. Will Smith said ‘I’ve got to get me one of these’. What was he referring to?

A wife with hair

4. Why aren’t dumb blondes quiet?

You can remain silent, and be thought a fool, or you can open your mouth, and remove all doubt.

5. Why do they call it ‘High Tea?’

Because describing it as a cup of gin, is too much on point.

6. What makes a banana split?

When it discovers that the ice-cream treat has lost its cherry.  😳

7. What happened when the Princess kissed the frog for a second time?

She found out how and why Princess Fiona became an ogress.

8. What goes best on rhubarb?

I spread manure on mine, but my neighbour insists on adding cream – strange fellow.

9. How is the best way to serve coffee?

Bow deeply when you approach the samovar.  Keep your eyes lowered, hold the salver level, and intone, O great caffeine God, you are our savior.

10. Why are rock buns so called?

Because food-service caterers found that bands like The Pretenders, Jefferson Starship, and AC/DC loved these chewy, crusty bread rolls, while performers like John Tesh, Justin Timberlake, and Brittney Spears prefer Fluffernutter™ sandwiches on white Wonder Bread.

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Stop That

I regard the preservation of my constitutional rights to be far more important than someone else’s vague, undefined “upset.”

I occasionally watch YouTube videos posted by Civil Rights Auditors.  These are people who try to ensure honesty and transparency in interactions between civilians and all levels of Government, by recording and posting videos of politicians, civil servants, and police.

There is something about the presence of a video camera that drives some people crazy.  You can wander up to, or into, city halls, DMV offices, even police stations, wander around, staring at stuff, and no-one questions your presence.  Bring along a camcorder, or set your cell phone to record, and all Hell breaks loose.

In a recent video, a young man with a camera walked behind a police station, and wandered around the parking area.  Almost immediately, three young, white, male officers coalesced out of the ether – and the harassment, intimidation, and lies began.

What are you doing here?

Performing a Constitutionally-protected activity.

You can’t be here. You can’t record our vehicles!

The First Amendment says I can.

You’re trespassing!

I can’t be trespassed from public property unless I’ve committed a crime.

You’re acting suspicious!

The US Supreme Court has ruled that “suspicion” is not a crime.

This is private property!

This is County property, and obviously public.

This is a secure facility!

No fence, no gate, no signs.

Finally, it came – Give us your ID!

I don’t have to provide identification unless I’ve been lawfully detained.  Please give a reasonable, articulable suspicion of a specific crime.

The debate raged for about ten minutes, until an older Captain was called out, and reluctantly admitted that all the claims and demands were false.  As the cammer was exiting the parking lot, he was passed by another officer in a cruiser.  He yelled at the officer, “You’re not wearing a seatbelt.  Obey the law!  Put on your seatbelt.”

I know what he was doing, and why, and I commend him for it.  He was trying to ensure that Police Officers obey the same laws that the rest of us have to obey.

Here is where I insert my usual –HOWEVER!

Almost every jurisdiction I am aware of – US States, Canadian Provinces – have ‘exception clauses’ in their seatbelt legislation, to cover certain class(es) of vehicles.  “Any vehicle where there is a requirement for rapid and/or repetitive exits.  The list shall include, but not be limited to: garbage trucks, fire trucks, police, ambulances, taxis, delivery vehicles, and public transit.

No subway riders, or bus riders, wear seatbelts, although the bus drivers usually, wisely, do.  For no obvious reason, about a year ago, there was a local, public kerfuffle.  If we have to wear seatbelts in our cars, shouldn’t children wear seatbelts in their school buses? Shouldn’t our kids be safe??  It finally died away, after an automotive engineer published an article.

School buses are designed and built with what engineers call “Egg Crating.”  The backs of the seats are high enough, strong enough, and flexible enough, to control and dissipate forward momentum.  They also slope backward, to further absorb and deflect the energy of ejected students, downward.  In the event of a real emergency, like a fire after a collision, there is not enough time or space to unlatch or cut off seatbelts from 30 panicked youngsters.

I’m gonna stop here for now, and go have a belt.  See you in a couple of days.

 

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Setup Fibbing Friday

Last week was another set of question offered to Pensitivity101 by fellow blogger Archon’s Den.  (Ta-Da!)
What do you make of these?

1. Betrump

That is the woe that will betide the United States, if there are enough desperate, gullible voters to re-elect a multiply-convicted felon.

2. Cony-catch

That’s a form of juggling, using special, Fall-Fair hotdogs.

3. Crapulous

Living in a small town, we don’t have a sewage system.  Houses just have septic tanks.  Some of the older houses still just have cesspools – or British cesspits – although, ours are covered over.  There’s a local firm that comes around occasionally, to pump them out.  It’s called Poker Pumping, and the motto on the honey-wagon says, “A straight flush beats a full house.”

4. Dowsabel

It’s the signal for the end of the stock trading day on the NYSE.

5. Ear-rent

This is the up-front, per-minute charge that I demand, to listen to duct-cleaners, campaigning politicians, and rabid religious missionaries.  I have kinda, sorta learned to listen to the wife, or I will pay.

6. Flexanimous

This is the exact opposite of what I was at the beginning of my life.  Nowadays, my thoughts and opinions are as rigid as my protesting muscles and joints.

7. Gazophylacium

This is a new medication developed to relieve acid reflux, caused by a hiatus hernia.

8. Grum

Cheer up, they said.  Things could be worse.  So I cheered up.  Sure as shit, things got worse.  Things always seem to go from bad to worse.  Yesterday, they were grim.  Today they are grum.

9. Hugger–mugger

This WOKE shit is getting Waaayyyy out of hand.  Apparently, there are no more armed robbers.  There are just financially-disadvantaged street residents.  I’m of the, “That’s not a knife.  That’s a knife Beretta 9-mil, opinion.”  It cuts recidivism 100%.

10. Lucubrate

This is a system to assign values to the untruths we spread.  It ranges from tact, – (No, dear, those yoga pants don’t make your butt look big.  It’s your addiction to Godiva chocolates that does that.) to white lies, fibs, euphemisms, misdirection, real lies, damned lies, statistics, and Vote for me.  I’m not really a rich, condescending asshole, I just married into the money.

How many British Prime Ministers does it take to change a light bulb?
No-one knows.  They don’t stay in office long enough to do it.

Fancy a cuppa?

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Reasons To Live In Canada

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

  1. Vancouver: 2.5 million people and two bridges. You do the math.
  2. Your $1.400,000.00 Vancouver home is just 5 hours from downtown.
  3. You can throw a rock and hit three Starbucks locations.
  4. There’s always some sort of deforestation protest going on.
  5. “Weed”.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN ALBERTA

  1. Big rock between you and B.C.
  2. Ottawa who?
  3. Tax is 5% instead of the approximately 200% as it is for the rest of the country.
  4. You can exploit almost any natural resource you can think of.
  5. You live in the only province that could actually afford to be its own country.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN SASKATCHEWAN

  1. You never run out of wheat.
  2. Your province is really easy to draw.
  3. You can watch the dog run away from home for hours.
  4. People will assume you live on a farm.
  5. Daylight saving time? Who the hell needs that!

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN MANITOBA

  1. You wake up one morning to find that you suddenly have a beachfront property.
  2. Hundreds of huge, horribly frigid lakes.
  3. Nothing compares to a wicked Winnipeg winter.
  4. You can be an Easterner or a Westerner depending on your mood.
  5. You can pass the time watching trucks and barns float by.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN ONTARIO

  1. You live in the center of the universe.
  2. Your $800,000 Toronto home is actually a dump.
  3. You and you alone decide who will win the federal election.
  4. The only province with hard-core American-style crime.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN QUEBEC

Ahhhh….Give me a minute here to think…….Gosh, this is hard…….OK, here are some:

  1. Racism is socially acceptable.
  2. You can take bets with your friends on which English neighbour will move out next.
  3. Other provinces basically bribe you to stay in Canada …
  4. You can blame all your problems on the “Anglo A*#!%!”?

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN NEW BRUNSWICK

  1. One way or another, the government gets 98% of your income.
  2. You’re poor, but not as poor as the Newfies.
  3. No one ever blames anything on New Brunswick …
  4. Everybody has a grandfather who runs a lighthouse.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN NOVA SCOTIA

  1. Everyone can play the fiddle.. The ones who can’t, think they can.
  2. You can pretend to have Scottish heritage as an excuse to get drunk and wear a kilt.
  3. You are the only reason Anne Murray makes money.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND

  1. Even though more people live on Vancouver Island, you still got the big new bridge.
  2. You can walk across the province in half an hour.
  3. You can drive across the province in two minutes.
  4. Everyone has been an extra on “Road to Avonlea.”
  5. This is where all those tiny, red potatoes come from..
  6. You can confuse ships by turning your porch lights on and off at night.

TOP REASONS TO LIVE IN NEWFOUNDLAND

  1. If Quebec separates, you will float off to sea.
  2. If you do something stupid, you have a built-in excuse.
  3. The workday is about two hours long.
  4. It is socially acceptable to wear your hip waders to your wedding.

 😳

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Anti-Anti-Gun Post

It felt like a very bad time to be firing a gun.

Not long after the horrific mass shooting in Buffalo, and an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, a local gun store invited the media to drop by on Saturday, June 4th, to shoot at some targets, as a part of National Range Day.

A newspaper reporter accepted the offer.  After getting a safety talk, he entered the range and fired nine rounds from a 9mm handgun.  His hands were shaky, and his aim was poor.  The manager made it perfectly clear that the gun culture and laws in the United States are completely different in Canada.  He told a personal story to illustrate the point.

Years ago, when he wasn’t in the gun business, he and some of his clients went to a Florida restaurant with a no-gun rule.  “So, just like your coat-checks up here, they had a gun-check at the restaurant.  My clients opened up their jackets, got their guns out, got their little chit for the gun-check, and the lady said to me, “Sir, you need to check your gun in.”

I said, “I’m not carrying” and she looked at me and said, “Come on sir, you need to check your gun.”  I said, “Honestly, I’m not carrying.”  She looked around and said, “You’re not carrying?”  I opened my jacket and said, “I’m from Canada.  We don’t do this up there”  And she couldn’t believe it!

Friends in Michigan have told him they can’t understand why he doesn’t carry a gun.  I said, ‘Here’s the difference.  Where I come from, we had six homicides last year.  They were all targeted, either gang-related, or domestic.”  They said, “That happened in Detroit yesterday.”  That’s the big difference.

In some states, almost everyone can buy a gun immediately.  This is not the case in Canada.  You’ll have to wait six to eight months.  You must take a 16 hour safety course, provide references, and be vetted by the RCMP.  It involves answering some intrusive and serious questions.  Have you been on medication in the last five years for depression?  Have you had a job loss, or a divorce?

Any red flag means No Gun!  If you do get one, it can only be used for hunting or target shooting.  Automated background checks are run on gun owners once a day.  We have to recognize that we are a different country than the United States.  We have a different gun culture and different processes.

He said, “Mass shootings in the US have nothing to do with Canada.  I refuse to be blamed for the actions of a madman.  It’s that simple.  There is no connection.

The Saturday event celebrated the lawful ownership of guns in Canada.  About 2.3 million Canadians are licensed to own a gun.  At the start of the COVID pandemic, the store was stampeded by people looking for guns.  “They felt like things were going to go bad – lockdowns were going to cause people to go crazy.”

Many were surprised they needed a licence and had to take a safety course, and pass a background check.  They said that they needed a gun immediately.  He told them, “If you are panicking, and the only thing that is driving you to buy a gun is panic – we need to have a longer conversation.  You don’t buy a gun out of panic, and you don’t buy a gun for self-defense.”

Many Canadian gun-control laws miss the mark.  Most guns used in crimes are smuggled across the border.  There is a serious problem at the border that needs to be solved.  Targeting businesses like his and their livelihood, and law-abiding customers, is not going to solve the problem of violent crime.

It was pleasant to see such a well-researched and thought-out article for a change, instead of the typical Chicken Little, The Sky Is Falling, Big Brother Save Us rants.

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Through A Theist Glass, Darkly

How fear of Atheism gets some Christian Apologists all turned around, mirror-image.

If Atheism are true, and there is no God

  1. Humans were moist robots
  2. Humans had no mind
  3. Humans had no emotion
  4. Humans had no free will
  5. If universe is at it is, and yet we know that universe will end one day, then the universe will be in doom
  6. There is no good and no evil if atheism is true

If there is no final Judgement, it’s like somebody murdered someone else, deep in the forest and nobody saw it happen, then they wouldn’t get arrested or charged or put in prison.

# !  That’s a very emotion-driven, sensationalistic claim but, SO WHAT.  We are what we appear to be – sentient beings, constantly striving, constantly learning, constantly improving, always trending upward, for the betterment of ourselves as individuals, and as a race – and all of it without an absentee-landlord puppet-master, so, we are hardly robots.

# 2  Oh, these poor Christian Apologists – they are nothing without their God-crutch.  I don’t know how to rebut this assertion, except to say that it is silly and untrue.  I did not ask the writer to explain and justify his claim.  Previous similar attempts have just produced bewildered responses like, Of course it’s true!  That’s obvious! when it is definitely not obvious.

#3  First we had no thought.  Now we have no feelings, without God the orchestra leader.  Such a bleak, morbid, and dismal outlook!  😯  While the belief in the existence of God can’t be proven, for writers like this, perhaps it is better that he continue to do so.  He seems to need some solid emotional and psychological support to keep from slipping into the abyss of clinical depression.

#4  Another unsupported, mirror-image claim.  😕  If God exists, as writers like this claim, and He ‘knows all,’ past, present and future, then His perfect and unchanging plan means that everything we do is predestined, and there is no such thing as free will.  Only the nonexistence of God in any way makes us free – but that’s only another thing that worries such writers.  We should only be free (?) to agree to worship their God.

I don’t know how he equates free will, with a deity which has a Top Ten and 603 following commandments about what you can eat, drink, wear, and who you can do it with.

#5  English is not his first language.  Perhaps this cavil makes more sense in Korean.  He’s right.  Whether God exists or not, the Universe will, one day, die the heat-death of entropy – a very natural occurrence.  It’s just that we won’t be around to experience it, so he’ll have to explain to his mental-health counsellor, why he attaches the word ‘doom’ to it.

#6  “Good” and “Evil” do not exist as tangible entities.  “Evil” tends to be a term used by religious/Christians, indicating intent.  Atheists usually substitute ‘good and bad,’ natural descriptors which can exist without a God.  Good is that which increases my well-being and/or happiness.  ‘The greatest good, for the greatest number.’  Bad is that which decreases my well-being – and those around me, and the entire human race.

Being convinced to drink disinfectant to, ‘cure COVID’ might even make me happy, but it does not increase the well-being of my widow, or my children, who are now without a father and provider.

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While he does not use the word in his final complaint, he implies the Hell out of the concept of ‘Fair.’  Fair is where you take your pig, to have it judged.  The Universe is supremely disinterested in the human concept of justice.  Things like his example occur all the time.  Again, SO WHAT??!  !sneppah tihS

Even the existence of his hypothetical God does not guarantee justice, or ‘fair.’   Someone like failed-Catholic, Adolf Hitler, might repent at the end, confess his sins, plead for forgiveness, and go to Heaven, while Anne Frank is sent to Hell.  👿

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ROM

A blog-friend has asked me to read a book.
Okay.  I’ve got lots of experience; in fact, I’m reading three of them, right now.

Read Our Manuscript

She wants me to read Her book, Kevin: Murder Beneath The Pines.  Our fellow-blogger, the lovely KayJai, has published her third book, and wants me to read and review it.  I am honored and willing, if somewhat under-qualified.

This will be the sixth such book that I have read.  The first was for an author in Washington.  I did a terrible job, because I thought I knew what I was doing – but didn’t.  I have read four for BrainRants, who made it a lot easier, and more logical.  You can’t put colored pencil marks on a digital copy, so he sent all of his in a Word file with numbered lines.

Don’t ever attempt to do your own proof-reading.  Get someone else – preferably three other people.  When you read your own work, you will see what your mind expects to see, and errors that might irk readers can sneak through.

This book is not yet Great Literature.  She is still on a learning curve.  For what it is, the third attempt by a busy lady, it is a delightful little murder mystery, suitable to be discussed at a book club meeting, or a knitting circle.  It begins with a Dilbert-like glimpse at office politics, but soon devolves into a look at darkness, not only in the deep, piney woods, but in the hearts and souls of men.  Small-town characters have to learn to deal with big-city-type crime, and its after-effects on the survivors.

If you are writing, or thinking of writing a book, and need/want a Beta-reader, I am usually available.  My forte is the words, and usage, and construction, and punctuation.  I am not so insightful or helpful with plot, story arc or character development, although I often have some opinions.

Well, enough about me.  Now it’s your turn – to provide emotional support by returning soon to read my next post.

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Bungling Burglars

Phone a Bungling Burglar!

A bungling burglar in the USA has been arrested after he left his mobile phone on charge at the house of one of his victims. The man was disturbed while rifling through rooms in the house in Washington DC and jumped out of a window to escape. Police searched the house later and were surprised to find a cell phone that didn’t belong to anyone at the house, charging in a socket. Officers called one of the numbers in his contacts, told them the phone owner had been involved in an accident and asked for his name. That led to the 25 year old man being arrested and later charged with ten burglaries.

Dutch Bungling Burglar

A stupid criminal was caught after he fell down a chimney while escaping over the roof of a house he had just broken into. Police in Maastricht, Holland, arrested the 33-year-old after being called out by the house owners who heard his calls for help. The man had tried to flee out of a roof window with his booty of cash and jewellery, but tumbled in the dark and got stuck inside the chimney.

Another Bungled Chimney Burglar Story

A burglar who got stuck in a chimney while trying to break in to a Los Angeles home has been jailed for two years. Bungling burglar Marco Antonio Espinoza was also ordered to pay the owners of the house more than $10,000 to repair the damage done when fire fighters freed him. When he was caught, he told the police that he was doing building work on the house.

Bagging A Burglar

A ‘would be’ robber had to drop his bank looting plans after he forgot to take with him a bag into which the stolen money could be put. Apparently, the young man in his 20’s, entered a local Chase Bank branch early on Monday morning and passed the cashier a piece of cardboard on which was written ‘Give me your money,’ reported the Detroit News. He told the bank teller to ‘hurry up,’ but when she asked him if he had a bag to put the money into he became flustered and confused and ran off without the cash.

The Bungled Get Away

The two criminal masterminds planned their heist carefully. They knew the courier would have a suitcase full of cash.  They waited for his car to pass, then pursued him at high speed, shooting at the vehicle until the courier was forced to pull over. Armed robbers made off with what they thought was a suitcase full of cash – they were in for a surprise. Back at their secret hideout, the bandits prepared to force the locks and spring the cash.  That’s when they noticed their plan had gone horribly wrong; instead of taking the money, they made off with a first aid kit. Police spokesman Johann Steinlitz said, ‘If there was an award for the dumbest crooks, they would certainly be in the running. ‘

Car Thief – Loser of the Week

A car thief who ran out of gas in rush hour traffic was arrested after police helped him push the stolen vehicle to the side of the road reports The Moscow Times.  Helpful officers in Moscow, Russia, were about to leave the scene and let Alexei Ashurin wait for breakdown services when they noticed the red 15 year old Volkswagen’s lock was broken and a screwdriver was sticking out of the ignition. After checking the number plate, they discovered the vehicle had been stolen and that Ashurin was wanted for a string of other motoring thefts.  He admitted to stealing the car and this stupid criminal is now facing up to two years in prison.

A Funny Magistrates Court Story

This hilarious story may make you laugh at the stupidity of some crooks.  We cannot, however, vouch for its veracity. A man arrived the magistrate’s court, he was charged with impersonating a policeman. On arrival he was wearing a blue baseball cap with the word ‘police’ on it; a fluorescent yellow jacket, with ‘police’ on it, he was carrying a truncheon, a can of CS spray, and he had blue flashing lights in his car. You will, no doubt wish to know how he came to be arrested. It apparently happened like this: he flagged down a car with two men in it, pulled them over and said ‘Police. You’re nicked.’ They answered, ‘No mate. You’re not police – we are.’ Funnily, he had stopped two off-duty detectives in an unmarked police car and so ended up in court. You could not invent a story like it.

Bungling Burglar From Mexico

Robbers broke into the Telefonica Movistar cell-phone store in Morelia, Mexico recently with the aim of stealing some mobile phones. In their haste to get away they grabbed the first phones that came to hand – hollow replicas, used normally for display purposes only. Employees explained that the bungling burglars overlooked real cell phones and cash in another part of the shop.

Surely One of The Dumbest Criminals:

A man who had spent 20 years in prison for bank robbery back in 1963 thought he would try again in 2003 in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, USA. He demanded and received several thousand dollars from two surprised bank cashiers and as he fled he spilled $100 notes in his wake as he attempted to stuff the cash into his pockets and get away. When he reached his hired getaway car this stupid criminal realized that he had locked his keys inside. This bungling burglar promptly took to his heels and fled the scene on foot followed by two passersby who grabbed him. The fleeing felon attempted to pull out his gun but failed, and shot himself in his leg but kept fighting his would be arresters; one of whom shot the suspect. The local police have charged the robber with 8 felonies, including robbery and 2 counts of attempted murder. The suspect was attended to in hospital and recovered. No, you couldn’t make it up

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There Was A Crooked Man

Who walked a crooked mile
And when I tell his tale
We get a crooked smile.

Facepalm

The Back-to-Jail Special

Two men decided a back-to-school event at an office supply store would be the perfect time to do some shoplifting. After all, store clerks would be busy helping an influx of shoppers. The sale happened to coincide with the annual ‘Shop with a Cop’ day, when about 60 police officers show up to help children pick out school supplies.

Burrito Patrol

Adan Juarez Ramirez had it all figured out—he could be a cop without having to take the boring test. But he was arrested in Grapevine, Texas, after pulling over a driver in his pickup truck, outfitted with flashing lights. He even had an ID badge, which he’d made by blacking out a restaurant gift card and etching in the word ‘POLICE.’ However, he’d kept the restaurant’s logo, a jalapeño pepper surrounded by the words ‘Chipotle Mexican Grill.’

The Case of the Returned Merchandise

A Target store in Augusta, Georgia, agreed to take back a printer from a dissatisfied customer. Then the clerk noticed some work the customer forgot to remove from the machine: Counterfeit bills.

You Mean It’s Not Scout Night?

Two machete-wielding men barged into a Sydney, Australia, bar demanding money. They didn’t know the club was hosting a bikers’ meeting at the time. One of the robbers ended up in the hospital, the other hog-tied with electrical wire.

Hampered by Stupidity

In Mesa, Arizona, a home break-in was foiled when the burglar jumped through the bedroom window—and got trapped in a clothes hamper. Cops took it from there. (That definitely wasn’t the kind of clean getaway he had planned.)

Worst Customer Service Ever!

Joseph Goetz’s alleged attempt to rob a York, Pennsylvania, bank met with some snags. Cops say the first teller he tried to rob fainted and the next two had no more cash in their drawers. Fed up, Goetz stormed out, threatening to write an angry letter to the bank.

To: idiot@jail.com

A German bank robber sent mocking emails to local police, ridiculing their efforts to arrest him. First he let them know they had his age, build, and accent wrong. Then he corrected their announcement that he’d escaped on foot; no, he had a getaway car! The cops got the last word in, though, when they arrested the guy a few hours later. They used his email to trace him.

The Case of the Clean Intruder

After a man kicked in the front door of a Texas home at 3:30 a.m., the resident fled and called police. When cops arrived, they were surprised to find that the intruder hadn’t stolen a thing. Police found the man in the bathroom, enjoying a warm bath.

Fish Tales

Robby Rose lost his first-place medal and was charged with a felony after it was discovered that he’d cheated in a Texas fishing tournament by stuffing a one-pound weight down the throat of a bass he’d caught. Officials became suspicious when they placed Rose’s fish in a tank and it sank to the bottom.

Banana attack

According to the bus driver, it was a brutal, unprovoked attack. A woman got on his bus and assaulted him with a half-eaten banana. ‘I had banana all over me,’ he insisted. ‘On my tie, my shirt, and my eye.’ The woman explained that the driver had almost hit her car and that when she entered the bus to rationally discuss the matter, the banana slipped … right into his tie, his shirt, his eye … The court may not have believed that, but it did believe her when she argued that it was ‘unreasonable that a banana could cause this much damage.’ They slapped her with a fine of only about $100.

You are gonna regret that tattoo

Police in Pico Rivera, California, had an easy time pinning a four-year-old murder on Anthony Garcia. That’s because he pinned it on himself—with an elaborate tattoo on his chest, depicting the killing. Cops noticed the incriminating ink when taking Garcia’s mug shot for a petty crime. The tattoo revealed all the details of the night, from the Christmas lights and bent streetlamp near the liquor store where the body was found to the image of an angry helicopter—Garcia’s nickname was Chopper—machine-gunning the victim.

Lincoln on the money

James Rhyne of Memphis was charged with forgery after he handed a waitress a $100 bill. The waitress knew something was funny with the money: Instead of the portly visage of Ben Franklin, it was the star of the $5 bill, Abe Lincoln, who was staring back at her.