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The World's Dumbest Criminals

From our 'Self-Dissuading Criminals' mailbox ...

Burglar enters shop by smashing window with a rock or brick. Burglar attempts to break through interior window-like barrier the same way and knocks himself out.

Rock thrown at bulletproof glass hits burglar in the face
Police in Maryland shared security camera footage of a burglar throwing a rock that bounced off some bulletproof glass and hit the man in the face.

Prince George's County Police shared security camera footage showing the man successfully breaking into a carryout business in Suitland last month by using a large rock or brick to shatter a window.

The "bad luck bandit" then attempts to use the same object to shatter the glass protecting the front counter, but it bounces off the barrier.

The man's third attempt causes the object to ricochet and hit him in the face, knocking him to the ground.

Police said the man was on the ground for a few minutes before getting up and fleeing the scene.

Investigators are asking anyone who recognizes the man to contact the department.

SOURCE: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2018/1...-hits-burglar-in-the-face/3561538487151/?sl=5
 
Fitbit offers key clue to slain San Jose woman’s alleged 90-year-old killer:

A woman’s Fitbit clocked a rapid rise in her heart rate before a sudden drop-off to nothing, helping San Jose police piece together clues and charge her 90-year-old stepfather with her murder, according to court records.

Tony Aiello was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of murdering his 67-year-old stepdaughter, Karen Navarra, on Sept. 8. Aiello is married to Navarra’s 92-year-old mother.

SJM-L-SJHOM-0928.jpg


Navarra, a pharmacy technician described by family as a “recluse,” was discovered deceased by a co-worker Sept. 13 after she failed to show up to her job.

Police said Navarra was found slumped over in a chair, clutching a large kitchen knife with a “gaping” slit to her neck. To investigators, the scene appeared to be staged to look like a suicide. But a later autopsy revealed “multiple deep and intrusive wounds” to her head and facial area, most likely inflicted by a small hatchet or ax. The doctor told investigators Navarra couldn’t have inflicted the wounds herself and classified the case as a homicide.

At his initial interview, Aiello told San Jose police that he dropped by Navarra’s home on Saturday, Sept. 8, to bring her pizza, according to court records. He also said he was outside his own home a few hours later, and witnessed his step-daughter drive by and honk with someone else in the passenger seat.

But police say Aiello’s account didn’t match up with what they saw on surveillance footage.

Nearby cameras captured his car at Navarra’s home for at least 21 minutes that day, between 3:12 p.m. and 3:33 p.m, but they didn’t show her car ever leaving in the direction Aiello described, police said.

Investigators noted Navarra was wearing a Fitbit, a wristband device that can collect data like number of steps walked and heart rate, when she was found, and they later consulted with the company to see if the device could offer any clues. A company employee told police Navarra’s heart rate spiked at 3:20 p.m. Sept. 8 and then rapidly slowed. The device stopped registering a heartbeat at 3:28 p.m.

Aiello is being held without bail and is due in court Oct. 4.

https://www.sfgate.com/crime/articl...to-slain-San-Jose-13266777.php#photo-16247211

maximus otter
 
Screwing with your court-ordered ankle monitor + Posting a 'How To' video of it = Pretty Damned Dumb ...

Man allegedly posts video of how to remove an ankle monitor
A Missouri man is charged with a felony after he allegedly filmed himself removing an ankle monitor and then posted the video on Facebook.

Thirty-three-year-old Dustin Burns of Springfield was charged last week with tampering with electronic monitoring equipment.

The video shows someone using a butter knife and screwdriver to remove an ankle monitor. The man advises viewers to remove the ankle monitor without damaging it to avoid hefty fines.

The Springfield News-Leader reports court records show Burns pleaded guilty to violating a restraining order earlier this year and was placed on probation.

Court records show warrants were issued this summer after several probation violations were filed against Burns. He has been in the Greene County jail since Aug. 28. ...

SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/413640ab20be...posts-video-of-how-to-remove-an-ankle-monitor
 
Some criminal masterminds at work here.

Belgian robbers asked to come back - and arrested on their return
  • 3 hour
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Image captionSix men walk into a shop...
A gang of robbers walk into a shop. The owner asks them to come back later when he has more money, and when they do...

It feels like the makings of a joke, but for a Belgian e-cigarette shop owner this was a frightening reality.
etc

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-45958404
 
A few years back in Staffordshire, the police were getting pissed off with the amount of people using scanners in their cars to listen in to the police so they staged a fake radio report that a UFO had been spotted landing locally, complete with over excited coppers talking breathlessly about the amazing spectacle. They waited for the cars to turn up and then nicked everyone :dalien:
 
A few years back in Staffordshire, the police were getting pissed off with the amount of people using scanners in their cars to listen in to the police so they staged a fake radio report that a UFO had been spotted landing locally, complete with over excited coppers talking breathlessly about the amazing spectacle. They waited for the cars to turn up and then nicked everyone :dalien:
A bit unfair. One or two of those people may have heard the news from somebody else and then turned up.
 
A bit unfair. One or two of those people may have heard the news from somebody else and then turned up.
Well yeah .. I mean only the people with the scanners would have been arrested and later charged.

(people used to mount them in their cars, a few of my mates had them before the police switched the tech, so the drivers would have been nicked)
 
A few years back in Staffordshire, the police were getting pissed off with the amount of people using scanners in their cars to listen in to the police so they staged a fake radio report that a UFO had been spotted landing locally, complete with over excited coppers talking breathlessly about the amazing spectacle. They waited for the cars to turn up and then nicked everyone :dalien:

There was a similar thing a few years back where a film crew were making a documentary about graffiti artists and managed to interview all of the local ones, even getting them to show how they did their 'tags' for the camera. Then the film crew revealed they were cops and nicked all of the buggers.
 
There was a similar thing a few years back where a film crew were making a documentary about graffiti artists and managed to interview all of the local ones, even getting them to show how they did their 'tags' for the camera. Then the film crew revealed they were cops and nicked all of the buggers.
I haven't got any time for taggers although I used to 'bomb' busses with sticker tags in Birmingham .. sWoFTy with the letter O being a frowning smiley with fangs etc
 
I hope the law had a very long arm while handling that evidence

Baby-faced burglar who left his DIRTY UNDIES at crime scene up in court again
Jordan Edge was this time caught with a bag with 55 wraps of Class A drugs hidden up his bottom


By
Neil DockingCrown Court Reporter
  • 17:32, 2 JAN 2019
  • UPDATED17:35, 2 JAN 2019
NEWS
Enter your postcode for local news and info
0_JS137010913.jpg
Jordan Edge, 19, has been sentenced to 33 months in prison
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A prolific burglar tracked down by his dirty underpants was hit with more jail time after stashing crack cocaine up his bum.
Jordan Edge carried out a spate of raids but was undone when a disgusted victim found his soiled underpants in their back yard.

etc

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/new...h3jhlxFp-LVV_ycLBz7rVKrbSoLqAlD6mHQjrFnTxuyNo
 
I'm pretty sure "Keep your mouth shut about it" is still one of the Top 10 rules listed in the Criminals' Handbook.
Oklahoma game warden catches poacher via dating app
An Oklahoma woman looking for love got more than she bargained for when she unwittingly shared her exhilaration about illegally shooting a “bigo buck” on a dating app with a state game warden.

Oklahoma Game Warden Cannon Harrison says he uncovered the poaching in a conversation on Bumble with a McIntosh County woman. She talked about using a spotlight to shoot the deer at night, outside the rifle season. The woman only harvested the head and back-strap meat — and she sent Harrison pictures as proof.

The woman has pleaded guilty to charges of improper possession of an illegally taken animal and taking game out-of-season. She and an accomplice face $2,400 fines. ...

SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/0ed204ee34904b48b029f15cd7e06f73
 
Breaking into police facilities seems to be a fad in this our new year. If you elect to try it, I'd suggest you make a point to take your wallet with you if and when you leave the scene of the crime ...
Detectives: Burglar in closed police substation left ID
To identify the burglary suspect who broke into a closed Florida police substation and ate an officer’s chicken dinner, detectives didn’t need to lift fingerprints or get DNA from the discarded meal.

The ID cards authorities say the suspect left behind did the trick.

Boynton Beach police said Wednesday that officers arriving for a morning shift at a department substation last week found a broken window and the remains of a hastily eaten chicken dinner scattered in the kitchen.

Finding a suspect wasn’t hard. They say 29-year-old Yvelande Jean-Pierre left behind her wallet, which contained her two identification cards.

Police say security video shows she spent about 45 minutes in the substation before leaving. ...

SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/62d5fa9f4fbd42f9a952fa64170eeaf2
 
A British runner, cyclist, and mob hitman has been convicted for the murders of two rival gangsters, in part, because of his GPS watch.

Mark “Iceman” Fellows, 39, was found guilty by a jury at Liverpool Crown Court of killing organized crime leader Paul “Mr. Big” Massey and his associate John Kinsella, 55 and 53 at the time of their deaths. Massey and Kinsella were also career criminals, part of a gang scene near Manchester.

1_Mark-Fellows-accused-of-murdering-Paul-Massey-and-John-Kinsella-taking-part-in-the-the-Great-Manch.jpg


Though police already suspected Fellows in Kinsella’s death, it was his Garmin Forerunner that linked him to Massey’s unsolved 2015 murder. While detectives were investigating Fellows, they came across a photo of the suspect wearing his Garmin Forerunner during 2015’s Great Manchester 10K (he ran 47:17, pictured above) two months before the murder of Massey that July. Detectives then located the device at Fellows’s home and checked its GPS data for files that could link him to Massey.

Manchester police asked James Last, an expert in satellite-based radio navigation, to examine the Garmin for evidence that Fellows had been been near the scene of Massey’s murder, reports the Liverpool Echo. Last said that almost two months before Massey’s death, the watch had recorded a 35 minute activity starting in Fellows’s neighborhood and traveling to the field near Massey’s home.

Professor Last said the wearer set out initially traveling at around 12 mph, which suggested they were on a bike. When they reached the field, the speed dropped to about 3 mph, consistent with walking, before they stopped for about 8 minutes. According to the Liverpool Echo, this is the alleged escape route that Fellows ran or perhaps rode his bike on two months later, after gunning down Massey in his own driveway.

On January 17, 2019, he was sentenced to life in prison.

https://www.runnersworld.com/news/a25924256/mark-fellows-runner-hitman-murder/

maximus otter
 
police asked James Last . . . to examine the Garmin for evidence

Last orders.jpg

Last discovered, to his horror, that he had, himself, died in 2015 but said he would question Massey, as they shared an especially hot lounge in Hell.

I had not heard of this particular James Last but I know Manchester's Metrolink trams are run by Peter Cushing! :oops:
 
Last edited:
After failing to make a clean getaway he was on the run for some time.
https://www.local10.com/news/florid...ng-pleasuring-himself-in-southwest-miami-dade

FLORIDA
Florida man learns hard way he stole laxatives, not opioids

By Jeff Tavss - Executive Producer
Posted: 2:30 PM, January 28, 2019Updated: 2:30 PM, January 28, 2019
view


  • Shares: 40,969
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - A Florida man thought he was being smart when he stole opioids from the medicine cabinet of a home where he was staying.
However, Peter Hans Emery, 56, quickly learned he didn't steal opioids at all. Instead, the laxatives he took probably sent him running to the bathroom.
etc

https://www.local10.com/news/florid...MgGCYLRhIbN8JypcWZRzmNmX-bgwm9DE5XBoNqpvB-Vb4
 
This guy is possessed of really low cunning.

Mother’s Day might really awkward this year for a man in Sumter, South Carolina.

Authorities are accusing 19-year-old Emmanuel Franklin of faking his own kidnapping in hopes of extorting money from his mother.The desired ransom? A whopping $130, according to local station WACH TV. Franklin was arrested Sunday and charged with blackmail, The Associated Press reports.

According to an arrest warrant obtained by Newsweek he “caused his mother to believe he would be killed by kidnappers” if she did not come up with the money. The woman, whom the sheriff’s department has not publicly named, told deputies she received a call on Jan. 22 from a private cellphone number. Her son was on the call as well as someone with an unfamiliar voice who demanded $130 be placed in a mailbox or Franklin would be killed. However, she got suspicious after she noticed the mailbox address was the same as his father’s.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entr...cid=newsltushpmgnews__TheMorningEmail__013119
 
I'm not sure if this thief simply gave up on trying to sell the collectible coins for their prospective value or was simply dumb enough to not even try.
Police: Stolen rare coins ended up in change machines
Authorities say a Florida man stole collectible coins worth tens of thousands of dollars, then ran them through grocery store change machines that returned just a fraction of their value.

The Palm Beach Post report s 20-year-old Shane Anthony Mele of Riviera Beach told investigators he stole the commemorative presidential dollar coins and other items from a North Palm Beach office in December.

The coins were worth $33,000. A Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office arrest report says Mele sold some coins for a few thousand dollars, and he ran many through change machines that only produced their face value. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.apnews.com/4ce3633879634d9e9f4d779bc067830b
 
Authorities are accusing 19-year-old Emmanuel Franklin of faking his own kidnapping in hopes of extorting money from his mother.The desired ransom? A whopping $130...

Is anyone else remembering that little-known Python sketch with the Scots hijacker on an airliner? “There’s a bomb oan the plane, and ah’ll tell ye where it is for a poond!

maximus otter
 
PORT HURON, Mich. - A man who was allegedly attempting to transport meth from Montreal to Calgary was busted when his iPhone navigation took him to a border checkpoint.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection inspected a Canadian vehicle at the bridge on Wednesday, driven by a Canadian citizen, Constantine Xethalis. Two others were in the vehicle.

After they were unable to provide proof of citizenship, the vehicle was searched. Officers found approximately 10 pounds of meth in tablet form.

https://www.clickondetroit.com/news...hen-navigation-takes-him-to-port-huron-bridge

maximus otter
 
A man who surmised that a ghost may have planted methamphetamine in his Louisiana home eventually admitted that he, and not an otherworldly force, was responsible for the drug being in his residence, court records show.

Michael%20Auttonberry_1538587967044.jpeg_57773165_ver1.0_640_360.jpg


Michael Auttonberry, 60, was arrested in October after police arrived at his home in response to a purported assault. Auttonberry, cops say, had called 911 to claim that he had been “stabbed on the head by an axe.”

When officers arrived at Auttonberry’s West Monroe home, they determined that he was not suffering from any axe wounds . Cops did, however, spot “in plain view on a night stand a open brown paper containing approximately 1 gram of suspected methamphetamine,” according to a probable cause affidavit. A subsequent pat down of Auttonberry yielded a pill bottle containing an additional gram of meth.

Quizzed by cops, Auttonberry said that "a ghost or intruders" planted the drugs before climbing out a bedroom window.

This claim, investigators determined, “was not accurate.”

http://thesmokinggun.com/buster/ghost/meth-ghost-cleared-285430

maximus otter
 
Florida lawyer Andrew Lippi who has just bought an $8 million private island (and also owns a massive house he rents out for $999 a night) has just been arrested for trying to scam budget retailer Kmart out of $300!

Lippi bought two coffeemakers, a bed skirt, and some light bulbs. He then returned them in their original packaging and asked for a refund. But what was actually in the boxes?

One of the coffeemakers had been replaced with an old machine and the other with a basketball. The new lightbulbs had been swopped for old, and the bed skirt replaced by a pillowcase.

Asked for comment, Lippi responded "It's very complicated and I'd rather not get into it."

How did he ever think he'd get away with it???
 
I debated whether this should go under Strange Crimes or the Conmen thread, but ended up deciding it was just plain dumb ...
Police: Bank robber used oblivious dad as getaway driver
Police in Maine say a man who robbed a bank used his unwitting father as a getaway driver.

An affidavit written by a police detective says Keith Tilton dropped his 39-year-old son, Joseph Donald Tilton, at a Lewiston bank Tuesday afternoon, believing his son needed to cash a check. In the few minutes he was inside, police say Joseph Tilton actually robbed the bank.

After dropping his son off in a different part of Lewiston, Keith Tilton drove past the bank, and was stopped by police who had the getaway car’s description. Keith Tilton isn’t charged, as police don’t think he knew what was happening.

The Sun Journal reports Joseph Tilton is charged with felony robbery, accused of stealing $620. ...

SOURCE: https://www.apnews.com/69484ba1ac9949d0a22aec175efd860e
 
A rather dozy burglar.

A burglar who was found asleep on his victim's sofa with a bag of stolen property next to him has been jailed.

Jimi Aldington, 22, broke a window of a house in Foxhole Road, Paignton, and stole drugs from a bedside cabinet. He cut his hand on the way in, leaving a trail of blood which led upstairs to the bedroom and then back to the sofa, where Aldington was found by police. Aldington, of Helston Close, Paignton, admitted burglary and was jailed for 18 months at Exeter Crown Court.

Brian Fitzherbert, prosecuting, said Aldington had drunk alcohol and taken prescription drugs before entering the house at 19:00 BST on 5 April by smashing a ground-floor window when the occupier was out.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-devon-48218707
 
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