Crime doesn’t pay !

It’s not necessary to act like a genius to be a criminal.

Police say Milt Sims ran into the woods near Saucier,
Mississippi, trying to avoid being arrested for burglary.
Deputies searched for about an hour with no results. That’s
when Milt’s cell phone started ringing. Hello, Milt.

Geniuses don’t need to be criminals. Middletown,

Connecticut, police arrested Michael Maslar for [attempted]
bank robbery-not for bank robbery itself. Mr. Maslar went to
Citizen’s Bank wearing a mask and carrying a hold-up note.
There he stood tugging at the door. It was 3:08. The bank
had closed at 3:00.

Chris Newsome knew some places to go. Deputies in

Muncie, Indiana, were chasing him after burglary. The chase
had a happy ending for the police-at the courthouse front
door. That’s where Mr. Newsome ran. “We love it when the
run to jail for us,” said one deputy.

May I remind you that criminals don’t have to be

geniuses? Police in York, Pennsylvania, arrested Robert
Haley for armed robbery. They wanted his partner, David
Ruppert, also. It didn’t take long. Mr. Ruppert went to visit
Mr. Haley at the York County Prison. The police invited him
to stay.

Dwight Oliver was wearing one of those fashionable

jeans baggy enough to fit entire math class. Not a good
choice for a fast-running fugitive. Dwight slipped away from
deputies at the Sanford, Florida, courthouse. A block later,
his jeans slipped away from him. Police nabbed a not so
fashionable Dwight two blocks farther.

Auburn, Georgia, police arrested Michael LaRock.

Ticonderoga, New York, police had wanted him for burglary.
They say he had called their station to brag that they would
never catch him. They read his number on caller ID, and
notified Auburn Police. Michael was still on the phone when
they arrived.

Harvey Taylor threatened to sue Penobscot County

Sheriff’s Department in Maine. He blames a detective for
the loss of some toes. The Detective was pursuing Mr.
Taylor, who hid three nights in the woods. Mr. Taylor said
that he would not have suffered frostbite if the detective had
found him sooner.

Police say Brittany Bell, 16, gets an ‘F’ for bank robbery.
They say she handed a Rochester, New York, teller a hold up
note. The handwriting was so bad that the teller couldn’t
read it, and went to ask another teller. Meanwhile, closing
time arrived, and Brittany got locked in the bank.

With a little help from our friends. Police in Oakland

Ca., spent 2 hours trying to subdue a gunman that
barricaded himself inside his home. After firing ten tear gas
canisters, officers discovered that the man was standing
beside them in the police line shouting “Please come out and
give yourself up.”
What was Plan B?? An Illinois man, pretending to have
a gun, kidnapped a motorist and forced him to drive to two
different automated teller machines, where the kidnapper
preceded to withdraw money from his own bank accounts.

The Getaway! A man walked into a Topeka, Kansas

Kwik Stop and asked for all the money in the cash drawer.
Apparently, the take was to small so he tied up the store
clerk and worked the counter himself for 3 hours until the
police showed up and grabbed him.

Did I say that? Police in Los Angeles had good luck with
a robbery suspect who just couldn’t control himself during a
lineup. When detectives asked each man to repeat the
words, “Give over all your money or I’ll shoot!” The man
shouted, “That’s not what I said!”
 Not the sharpest tool in the shed. In Modesto,
California Steven Richard King was arrested for trying to hold
up a Bank of America branch without a weapon. King used a
thumb and a finger to simulate a gun, but unfortunately, he
failed to keep his hand in his pocket.

He wasn’t the brightest thief. Arnsberg, Germany,

police spokesman Udo Heppe on a robber who broke into a
local doctor’s office through a skylight, and found that he
wasn’t tall enough to get back out, and then called the police
for help.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. A bank robber in

Fort Worth, Texas, gave a Wells Fargo Bank teller a holdup
note and then made off with big money. Police arrested him
the next day. He had written his holdup note on the back of
his own resume-a summary of his personal information and
job history.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. The Bureau of

Concern in Fostoria, Ohio, is a charity. Someone would have
to be pretty low to rob a charity. Someone was. Pretty
helpful too. The Bureau of Concern folks had been wanting
to get rid of the worthless old empty safe in its office. But
the thing was to big and heavy to haul to the dump. That’s
when a thief broke in and stole the thing.
 Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Burglars broke
into a home in Fargo, North Dakota, and stole a water cooler
jug filled with $1800 in coins. It had to be burglars, plural.
The thing weighed more than a hippo on steroids. Later that
very day, three young men brought a water cooler jug filled
with coins to a local bank for deposit. “I don’t know how
they got it out of the car trunk” said the bank manager –
after the three had been arrested.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in Clark

County, Nevada, say Alejandro Martinez, 23, pulled off an
armed robbery in a pizza parlor and made off with $200. He
should have made off with the job application he was filling
out just before pulling the gun. But he didn’t. He left the
form on the pizza parlor counter with his full name and
address filled in. He didn’t get the job, but did get a free
room at the Clark County jail.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Twenty-four-year-

old Randy Washington pleaded guilty to robbing a Chicago
bank with five of his friends. They had split $81,000 they
took from the South Chicago Heights TCF Bank. They had
also gotten away scot-free for over a year. Then Randy
thought it would be fun to call a “confessions” radio show
and brag about his successful heist. Police easily traced the
call. Randy has free board and room for the next four years.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in

Columbus, Mississippi, say 26-year-old Terrel Green robbed
the Trustmark Bank. He walked into the bank wearing a
white T-shirt, blue jeans, and sunglasses. He pulled out his
wallet, removed a hold-up note, and handed it to a teller. He
then fled with a pillow case full of cash. Police soon arrested
him at his mom’s house. He had left his wallet with all of his
identification on the bank teller’s counter.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Ask Clay County

Sheriff Andy Howe in Yankton, South Dakota. He says drunk
driver Jada Coover hit another vehicle with his truck and
skedaddled. A deputy chased him until he stopped in the
street to turn around. Instead he reversed his truck into a
retaining wall, jumped out, ran into a building, scampered
upstairs, slipped through a door, and barricaded himself
inside a large room. It was the courtroom of the Clay County
Courthouse – complete with judge.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Pensacola,

Florida, police say two men stole a blue Ford Escort from a
gas station. The car, one hubcap missing, belonged to a
station employee. It was running on empty. Apparently the
thieves were too. Less than an hour later, a blue Ford Escort
missing one hubcap appeared at the pumps. The two men
apparently saw they needed gas. They didn’t. The police
car that took them to jail had a full tank.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Australian

teenagers Luke Carroll and Anthony Prince worked at a Vail,
Colorado, ski shop. They also robbed Vail’s WestStar Bank.
Arrested two days later, they weren’t hard to track. Their
faces were covered during the holdup – but not their
accents. And they used the BB guns they had shot some
windows with two months earlier. Police from that arrest
remembered the guns and the accents. They also took
pictures of each other with the loot and bought expensive
jewelry after robbery – with cash.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in

Redlands, California, say Albert Engelsman and Matthew
Montanez stole a 2001 Mustang and later abandoned it.
They also abandoned plenty of fingerprints and a disposable
camera filled with pictures of the two proud thieves posing
with a car. “These are not the brightest people,” says police
spokesman Carl Baker. When arrested, Mr. Engelsman was
wearing the same shirt he wore for the cool pictures.
 Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in Santa
Cruz, California, say a 20-year-old man got so drunk that he
jumped into a police car thinking it was a taxi cab. The
“taxi” driver drove him straight to the police station where
he was booked for both alcohol and drug abuse.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in Fargo,

North Dakota, say 23-year-old Richard Roquet stole some
diamond earrings from a fundraising auction at North Dakota
State University. He took them to a jewelry store to ask their
value. The jeweler said appraisal would take one day, and
took the man’s name and number. Oops. It was the same
store that had donated the earrings. By the way, their
$4600 price was on them when Mr. Roquet brought them in
for appraisal.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Police in

Lawrence, Massachusettes, have arrested the bag bomb
bandit. They say George Melendez robbed banks by
claiming to have a bomb in his zipper bag. After taking the
moola, he’d leave the bag behind to keep police busy
checking the “bomb” while he got away. Well, the bombs
were always just books in a bag. Trouble (for George) is, his
latest “bomb bag” included his own phone book with his own
mailing label on it.
 Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. The sheriff’s
department in Orange County, Florida, arrested 34-year-old
Michael Gariby of Orlando for selling illegal drugs. Deputies
say he approached a car at a gas station and asked the
driver, “want to buy some cocaine?” They say the driver
said yes, and the suspect handed him a bag of cocaine and
asked for cash. The driver was Sheriff’s Deputy Ed Johnson –
in uniform. The car was a marked patrol car.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Christopher Harris

spent about a year in jail for robbing the same gas station
three times in less than a week. He released to serve four
more years probation, by the apparently hadn’t learned his
lesson. Police in Green Bay, Wisconsin, arrested him for
robbing the Astor Park Mini Mart. Twice. And in the same
day.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Ralph Gomez of

St. Augustine, Florida, was showing off the Onstar system to
his girl friend in his Cadillac Escalade. On star is a satellite
communication device that helps drivers with directions and
also automatically calls the police in a possible emergency.
Mr. Gomez turned OnStar on but turned the volume down, so
did not hear the OnStar operator asking if everything was
okay. When showed up, everything wasn’t. They found
cocaine sitting on his center console.
 Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Phillip Williams of
Tampa, Florida, bought some crack cocaine – an illegal drug.
But he suspected he’d been ripped off. Maybe the stuff was
fake. So he walked up to two men and asked them to check
it out for him. Sure enough, it was the real stuff. Good news
for druggie. The two men were police officers in uniform.
Bad news for druggie.

Criminals don’t have to be geniuses. Two burglars,

ages 18 and 20. broke into a summer cabin near the Danish
town of Kaldred. A passing neighbor caught them hailing
loot to their getaway car and told them to put it back. To
make sure the confronted burglars didn’t skedaddle, the
passerby yanked the keys from their car and refused to give
them back. So the burglars called the police.