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Strange Crimes

A man wanted in New Zealand has handed himself in to police after hiring a helicopter and stopping off for champagne and oysters with his lawyer.

"A man who had been on the run in rural New Zealand hired a helicopter to fly to a police station and surrender.

James Bryant, who faces assault charges, spent five weeks apparently hiding in a small town in North Otago.

He told local media his time there had been "great", but he was ready to leave "the middle of nowhere".

Prisoners' advocate Arthur Taylor, who brokered the peaceful arrest, said he had taken Mr Bryant for champagne and oysters on their way to the station."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-57276336
 
£15,000 isn't much considering what she went through. These clowns should be in prison but the victim didn't want that.

Two men who badly injured a woman after dropping a sofa from a roof have been ordered to pay a total of £15,000 in compensation to their victim.

Edita Butkeviciute, now 31, was treated for injuries to her spine, legs and lungs after the incident in Aberdeen in December 2019.
She said she was "lucky to be alive" but did not want the men to be jailed.

Barrie Law, 27, and Lee Morrison, 33, had been moving the sofa. They admitted acting culpably and recklessly. At Aberdeen Sheriff Court, Sheriff William Summers said that as a direct alternative to custody, Law must pay compensation of £12,000 and Morrison must pay £3,000.

Both were also told to carry out 150 hours of unpaid work, and will be supervised for 18 months.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-57231441
 
This could go equally well in Compulsive Liars.

Samantha Azzopardi: Australia's notorious con artist sentenced for child theft

Notorious Australian con artist Samantha Azzopardi has been sentenced to prison in Melbourne for child stealing. Having created a trail of false identities around the world, she has a history that runs deep.

Emily Peet, Lindsay Coughlin, Dakota Johnson, Georgia McAuliffe, Harper Hernandez, Harper Hart. Behind all these names - and many more - was just one woman: serial fraudster Azzopardi, 32, from Sydney. Over the past decade, she has been caught under assumed names in Ireland, Canada and various states within her home nation.

Previously she has

posed as a victim of sex trafficking.

claimed to be Swedish royalty and a Russian gymnast whose whole family died in a murder-suicide incident.

Throughout her 20s and early 30s, she repeatedly pretended to be a young teenager. And with her slight figure, soft voice and a tendency to nervously chew her fingers, she often got away with it.

For years she has been running into trouble with authorities. She has been deported from foreign countries, she has been jailed for short periods. Yet, the saga seemed never-ending.

Irish police detective David Gallagher also had a strange encounter with Azzopardi, when she turned up in Dublin in October 2013.

He did not know her name then. No-one did. In the local media, she later became known as GPO girl, because she had been found outside Dublin's General Post Office, which is often referred to by its initials. The Garda Síochána (Irish police force) found her pacing back and forth, looking distressed, but refusing to speak.

Two officers took her to hospital and for weeks she did not say a word, leading authorities to fear she was a victim of human trafficking.

Though she never told them her age, she indicated through hand signals that she was 14.

Nonetheless, someone recognised her: a family contact she had been staying with at the start of her trip to Ireland. Azzopardi was identified and put back on a flight to Australia, escorted by police. She never spoke on the journey.

The following year, Azzopardi turned up in Calgary, Canada. A similar story played out but this time she vocalised it. She claimed she was Aurora Hepburn, 14-year-old victim of abuse, who had escaped a kidnapper. She was 26 at the time.

Again, investigators and health care workers spent weeks on the case, until someone discovered the Dublin story and made a connection.

This time she was convicted on a mischief charge for misleading Calgary police.

Det Supt Gallagher said he had been following her case from afar for the past eight years. People sent him clips every so often, whenever she turned up somewhere new.

"The problem," he said, "is whether prison is a suitable place for her. Is a mental health institute? Is she a danger to herself, or is she a danger to others? In Ireland, she wasn't a danger to herself or others, albeit she was a considerable nuisance."
 
Lamb scam

Some idiot in Northumbria is taking new-born lambs & leaving them in people's gardens. Three incidents so far.
 
I'll extend the benefit of the doubt and put this story here rather than the Dumbest Criminals thread ...

Two carnival owners stole a carnival game trailer from an entertainment service business. I'm still uncertain how or why they thought they were going to get away with possessing and using such a large specialized item.
Carnival owners stole amusement trailer worth $192K from N.J. party shop, cops say

Two carnival owners from New York were arrested Wednesday and charged with stealing an enclosed trailer and amusement game worth more than $192,000 from a party shop in Essex County ...

The theft occurred about 8:30 p.m. on April 12 when the trailer was driven off the lot of Funtime Services on Kulick Road in Fairfield.

Inside the trailer was a 14-gun water pistol carnival game and “a number of inflatable amusements” ...

Investigators spoke to witnesses, obtained security camera video and reviewed the databases of automated license plates readers to determine that the trailer had been towed to a parking lot in Oceanside, New York. The trailer was recovered on April 30 and returned to the owner ...
FULL STORY: https://www.nj.com/essex/2021/06/ca...r-worth-192k-from-nj-party-shop-cops-say.html
 
The ex-president of a French university has been charged with "desecrating a corpse"

"The ex-president of a French university has been charged over a scandal in which bodies donated for research were left piled up and decomposing.

Biologist Frédéric Dardel is accused of "desecrating a corpse". He headed Paris-Descartes University in 2012-2019, in Paris's famous Latin Quarter.

The university's Centre for Body Donations received hundreds of bodies before it was closed.

In 2019 L'Express magazine discovered shocking conditions at that centre."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57399309
 
An elderly US nun is to plead guilty to stealing from a school she worked at to fund her gambling addiction.

"An elderly California nun will plead guilty to stealing from the Catholic school where she worked for decades in order to support her gambling, according to US prosecutors.

Mary Margaret Kreuper, 79, allegedly stole more than $835,000 (£590,000) while working as the principal of a school in suburban Los Angeles.

She is now facing 40 years in jail.

A plea agreement released on Tuesday says that she will admit to diverting funds to pay off large gambling debts."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-57419373
 
He was arrested and faces charges, so I'm calling this Fortean crime ... This man managed to get himself stuck for days inside the tubular support for a giant anti-frost fan (aka wind machine) in a California vineyard.

StuckInVineyardFan-1.jpg
StuckInVineyardFan-2.jpg
Man gets stuck for days inside giant fan at Sonoma County vineyard

Sonoma County deputies discovered a man trapped in a vineyard fan Tuesday morning who had been stuck there for two days.

A caller told the sheriff’s office there was a suspicious car parked at a private property on Piner Road near Winberrie Knolls.

“The vehicle was parked in a location that made no sense,” the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office wrote in their release. ...

A deputy who responded to the call found the vehicle but not a driver and also spotted a lone hat sitting on some farm equipment.

That’s when the sheriff’s office says the deputy looked down the shaft of a fan, where a man was stuck inside. The sheriff’s office later learned he had been there for two days.

Fire personnel were able to free the man from the shaft and he is expected to make a full recovery. ...

Sheriff’s officials say the man claimed he was taking pictures of engines on antique farm equipment. However, investigators discovered the man had taken methamphetamine sometime before climbing into the vineyard fan. ...
FULL STORY: https://www.kron4.com/news/bay-area...fan-in-sonoma-gets-stuck-for-2-days-sheriffs/
 
Police find man hiding under a big teddy bear

"Police officers searching a house for a wanted man said they found him hiding underneath a large teddy bear.

Derbyshire Police's dog section said the "game of hide and seek" started after the suspect locked himself inside a house in The Green, Hasland, Chesterfield.

The man was wanted over a breach of the conditions of his electronic tag.

Officers joked on Twitter the bear remains in custody for "assisting an offender"."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-derbyshire-57440977
 
From Twitter:

I remember the curator of an exhibition about Antinous telling me that when she opened up a crate containing a bust of him that had been sent from the Louvre, she found the marks of lipstick left all over his lips.

No wonder say I:

20210612_205245.jpg
 
This could fit in so many threads

Family targeted by man with 'explosive diarrhoea' for years outside home catch him on CCTV​

A FAMILY blighted by a disgusting vandal who has been targeting their home with "explosive diarrhoea" for years has finally caught the culprit on camera.​

By CONOR CLARK
PUBLISHED: 00:00, Tue, Jun 15, 2021 | UPDATED: 00:04, Tue, Jun 15, 2021


The family has been finding faeces outside their house up to “several times a week” in a distressing attack that has gone on for years. They have had no indication of who the phantom pooer is or why they they were using their home as a toilet, but recently decided to take the matter into their own hands by installing cameras.

Late last year, they spent £600 on a CCTV system to try and identify the culprit and finally report them to the police.
And last week the cameras managed to serve their purpose when they caught a man in the middle of public defecation on Tuesday morning.
Although the video does not confirm that the man was responsible for the other incidents, the family are confident that it was probably him.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1449816/cctv-catches-phantom-pooer-family-home-hove-brighton-news
 
A wife tipped boiling water and sugar over her husband as he slept. It took him a month to die.


Killer Cheshire wife scalded 80-year-old husband while he slept with boiling water and sugar


Neston woman Corinna Smith, 59, mixed boiling water with 3kg of sugar then poured it over her sleeping husband

A cold, calculating killer has been found guilty of murdering her husband after scalding him with a concoction of boiling water and sugar while he slept.

Corinna Smith, of Highfield Road in Neston, mixed boiling water with three bags of sugar which left her husband Michael Baines with severe burns to all over his body.


Her 80-year-old victim was taken to Whiston Hospital in the early hours of Tuesday, July 14 last year in a serious condition.

He received treatment for his injuries but, despite the best efforts of medical staff, he died a month later – on Tuesday, August 18.
 

Ex-lawmaker insisted her sister-in-law was murdered in burned trailer. Now she's been killed at the same site.

1200x0.jpg


Ashley Henley

The grassy property surrounding a charred trailer had grown wild over the past six months with no one living there anymore to mind the lawn. Its former occupant, Kristina Michelle Jones, had been found dead in her scorched bedroom in the early hours after Christmas Day.

So last weekend, Jones's sister-in-law - former Mississippi Republican state legislator Ashley Henley - went to the Northern Mississippi property with a weed whacker to tidy up.

Henley, 40, and her husband, Brandon Henley, had transformed the place into a makeshift shrine, including an oversize wooden sign that read "I WAS MURDERED" - a visual reminder of the couple's insistence that Jones had been deliberately killed and their claims that police haven't taken the investigation seriously.

She was shot Sunday as she rid the grass of weeds, police told the North Mississippi Herald. Her death is being investigated as a homicide, the Yalobusha County coroner confirmed to The Washington Post.

Henley's husband told local news that his wife was shot in the back of the head.

It is unclear whether Henley's and Jones's cases are connected. But Brandon Henley said he believes the same person killed both women.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Ex-lawmaker-insisted-her-sister-in-law-was-16248525.php

maximus otter
 
Maybe it's a poltergeist?

Residents of a Surrey village are "under siege" and "living in fear" after a spate of catapult attacks, police say.

Homes in Russell Drive, Stanwell, have been hit by stones, thought to have been catapulted from a neighbouring nature reserve, police said. When officers arrived one stone smashed a police car wing mirror, and another landed at an officer's feet. Police have used a drone at the scene, but no-one has been arrested.

Sgt Paul Grinter said: "We believe these stones are being fired at random from the nature reserve behind the houses - often two or three stones at a time."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-surrey-57495074
 
I'm not sure why this guy chose to steal the ambulance rather than locating the associated paramedics who were presumably nearby.
Man Having Medical Crisis Steals Ambulance In Baltimore, Police Say

A 38-year-old man having a medical crisis allegedly stole an ambulance in Baltimore early Monday morning, police said. The ambulance was recovered.

A Baltimore City Fire Department Medical Unit responded to a call for service in the 900 block of Seagull Avenue around 1:22 a.m. ...

When they were inside the location, a man jumped into an ambulance, which had keys inside running. ...

When medics came out they radioed police and officers stopped the ambulance ... blocks from Harbor Hospital a short time later.

Officers took the man into custody without incident. The man told officers he was having a heart attack and took the ambulance to drive himself to the hospital.

After speaking with the man, the officers determined he was going through a medical crisis.
SOURCE: https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2021...sis-steals-ambulance-in-baltimore-police-say/
 
One way to make the rest of your life come into reliable focus - plan and commit a murder ...
Austrian tells police he killed a man to get into prison

Police in Austria say a 29-year-old man arrested on suspicion of stabbing another man to death told officers he had planned the killing for weeks in order to be imprisoned.

Innsbruck police said Tuesday that the suspect, an Austrian citizen, had walked into a police station Monday in the town of Kufstein, near the German border, and claimed responsibility for the killing.

The man, whose name wasn't released, told officers that he wanted to be imprisoned because he was unhappy with his life.

Police said the man appeared to have selected his victim, lured him into an ambush and killed him.

“There was no chance the victim could have survived,” police said in a statement. ...
SOURCE: https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/austrian-tells-police-killed-man-prison-78285084
 
Maybe it's a poltergeist?

Residents of a Surrey village are "under siege" and "living in fear" after a spate of catapult attacks, police say.

Homes in Russell Drive, Stanwell, have been hit by stones, thought to have been catapulted from a neighbouring nature reserve, police said. When officers arrived one stone smashed a police car wing mirror, and another landed at an officer's feet. Police have used a drone at the scene, but no-one has been arrested.

Sgt Paul Grinter said: "We believe these stones are being fired at random from the nature reserve behind the houses - often two or three stones at a time."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-surrey-57495074
A man has been arrested over catapult attacks.

"A man has been arrested by police after a Surrey village was hit with a spate of catapult attacks.

Homes in Russell Drive, Stanwell, were hit by stones, thought to have been catapulted or thrown from a neighbouring nature reserve.

When officers arrived one stone smashed a police car wing mirror, and another landed at an officer's feet.

Surrey Police have arrested a 20-year-old man from Ashford on suspicion of criminal damage and common assault."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-surrey-57495545
 
A man has been arrested over catapult attacks.

"A man has been arrested by police after a Surrey village was hit with a spate of catapult attacks.

Homes in Russell Drive, Stanwell, were hit by stones, thought to have been catapulted or thrown from a neighbouring nature reserve.

When officers arrived one stone smashed a police car wing mirror, and another landed at an officer's feet.

Surrey Police have arrested a 20-year-old man from Ashford on suspicion of criminal damage and common assault."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-surrey-57495545

I didn't see much detail in the report. Does anyone know how this incident might compare with the "phantom attacker" stone-propelling cases of Fortean lore?
 
Athens priest arrested for acid attack on bishops.

"A priest has been arrested in Athens after he threw acid on seven bishops of the Greek Orthodox Church, police say.

The attack took place during a disciplinary hearing against the 36-year-old priest on Wednesday afternoon, according to police.

Three bishops are being treated in hospital for the burns, mostly on their faces."

A policeman, who ran to help the bishops, was also taken to hospital.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-57591002
 
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