Brilliant Criminals

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I mentioned a couple moron criminals in another post. That inspired this one. Feel free to add more:
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For a trio of drug thieves, it was their lucky day. They broke into a home in Silver Springs, Florida, and discovered three jars of cocaine. They took it home and snorted the contents. That’s when they discovered that the jars were in fact urns, and that they were snorting the cremains of the victim’s husband and two dogs.
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It’s the worst possible time to faint—in the middle of robbing a bank. But that’s what happened to a Beavercreek, Ohio, thief. The teller called 911 and asked for medics. But you have to applaud the man’s stick-to-it-iveness. While the ambulance was en route, the suspect handed a note to the teller demanding all her cash.
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The victim’s jewelry was missing, the electronics were gone, and a window was smashed. No wonder she was hysterical when officer Charanjit Meharu of the Calgary police arrived. Then her French-speaking father called. Speaking in French, she explained that it was all a scam in order to get the insurance money. What she didn’t suspect was that Officer Meharu speaks six languages, including French.
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A 12-year-old boy adamantly denied having stolen an iPhone when questioned by police at his home. And then the iPhone rang in his closet.
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Don’t you hate it when you suffer a heart attack and think you’re going to die, so you confess to a 17-year-old murder, only to find out you’re not going to die and then get sentenced to life in prison as a result? Yeah, so does James Washington, of Nashville, because it happened to him.
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Following a dispute, Craig Aylesworth, of Bithlo, Florida, allegedly tossed a Molotov Cocktail at his neighbor’s trailer home … just as the winds shifted, sending embers on to his own trailer. Luckily, he was arrested, since he no longer had a home of his own to return to.
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A San Francisco thief pedaled his bike up to a woman on the sidewalk, snatched the iPhone out of her hands, and rode away. Unknown to him, the woman was in the middle of demonstrating the iPhone’s new GPS tracking device, which worked—the thief was captured minutes later.
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Klaus Schmidt tried to rob a bank in Berlin by walking in with a pistol and demanding money. So far, this is pretty standard for a bank heist. However, as the robbery progressed, the bank employees noticed that the criminal was acting rather strangely. At one point, one of them asked the robber if he needed a bag, and he replied, “You’re damn right it’s a real gun!” This made them realize that Schmidt had a noticeable handicap—he was deaf.

Taking advantage, one employee set off the alarm. Schmidt remained oblivious. Even while the incredibly loud alarm was going off and the police approached the bank, the robber remained calm and patient, occasionally spouting threats. When the police arrived, they quickly took the criminal into custody. However, Schmidt found a way to turn a negative into a positive—he tried to sue the bank for exploiting his disability.
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18-year-old Ruben Zarate wanted to rob a muffler shop in Chicago. He entered the store armed with a gun and demanded money. But there was a problem—most of the money was in the safe, only the manager could open it, and the manager wasn’t in. Ruben decided that he would try again later. To save himself some time, he left his cell phone number with the store employees. That way, they could call him when the manager returned.

First, however, the employees called Chicago police. Police arrived and instructed the employees to call the robber, and Zarate returned to find officers waiting for him. They engaged in a brief shootout, and in the end, Zarate was arrested.
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Albert Bailey and an unnamed juvenile accomplice decided to rob a bank in Fairfield, Connecticut. To streamline the procedure, Bailey called the bank in advance to let them know that they were coming to rob it. The intention here was to give the bank plenty of time to get the money ready so that the two of them could just walk in, take the cash, and leave.

Minutes after the phone call, Bailey sent in his juvenile accomplice along with a note (to eliminate any confusion, perhaps in case the bank was also waiting for a different robber). Meanwhile, a bank employee had the police on the phone and updated them about everything that was happening.

The robbers had demanded $100,000, but they settled for a lot less ($99,100 less, to be exact). They then walked out into the arms of police, who arrested both of them immediately without incident. They were charged with first-degree robbery and threatening in the first degree, and Bailey faced up to nine years in prison.
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On a sunny March day in Omaha, Nebraska, Melissa Peters was getting ready to take her son to school. She was heading for her car when she found a gun pointing at her face, courtesy of 17-year-old Mganga Mganga. He had little interest in the mother or her child, who fled quickly. Instead, he simply entered the vehicle to steal it. There was only one problem—the car had a manual transmission, something with which Mganga was unfamiliar.

What followed was a scene straight out of Mr. Bean as Mganga turned on the lights and the windshield wipers trying to make his escape. A neighbor called the police. It took them about eight minutes to arrive and find an empty car sliding gently into the neighbor’s yard, knocking over the fence.

After several minutes of failing to move the car more than a few yards, Mganga had decided to make a run for it. Police officers went after him on foot and had no problem catching up to him a few blocks away. At least he avoided a weapons charge, as the gun he used turned out to be fake.
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Grand larceny is quite the stressful endeavor, so robbers are bound to make mistakes. It gets even tougher when you set your sights on a prominent target such as the Halifax Bank in London. This particular robber probably should have aimed a little lower.

He entered the bank with a gun in one hand and a bag in the other. He demanded that the cashier give him £700,000 in cash. So far, so good.

Next, he planned to hand over his bag, so the teller could fill it with money. Instead, he got mixed up a little and gave the gun. A brief pause followed. It took the robber a few seconds to realize his mistake. The teller, too, was understandably confused.

The robber tried to grab his gun back, but the bank worker had the presence of mind to back off and point it at him. Even so, the robber still managed to make a run for it. He didn’t go away empty-handed, as he pedaled off on a bank employee’s bicycle.
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A good disguise obviously needs to hide your true identity. Furthermore, a good disguise needs to be inconspicuous so you can blend in with the crowd. The disguise chosen by Dennis Hawkins, a 48-year-old Pittsburgh man who decided to rob a bank, failed on both counts.

His disguise consisted of a woman’s blonde wig, a pair of fake breasts, and clown pants. The first problem was that the get-up revealed his face, which was captured on CCTV surveillance. You might guess that Mr. Hawkins wanted to fool people into thinking he was a woman. In that case, he should have considered getting rid of his mustache and goatee.

The second problem was that his disguise was not exactly inconspicuous. Right after police released a description to the public, a gas station attendant called to report someone sporting that unique look while trying to steal a car. And as if the man were not noticeable enough, when police arrived, they found Hawkins covered in red paint from a dye pack exploding in his face.

Post-robbery, he’d tried to mug a woman and get away in her car. She just ran off, taking the keys with her.