Danger! Will Robinson. Danger!

Wherein I present a bit of PSA relating to electronic pickpocketing.

 

After viewing this I'm sure you'll be checking all your credit cards for that symbol that tells you if it is vulnerable. I did.

OMG!

Eugene, Ore. police have arrested the Tooth Fairy!

Bag of teeth links man to Seattle-area dental burglaries

After reading the story, this 26-year old is anything but The Tooth Fairy.

Shane Carlson had long been on the radar of Seattle-area police after his numerous arrests — and convictions — for car prowls, home burglaries and office break-ins. One Edmonds police detective describes the 26-year-old as "an equal-opportunity burglar."

Seems if it wasn't nailed down, he thought it was fair game.

Sounds like he'll be spending some serious time in the slammer, however.

Interesting...

Here's a rather unique means of combating crime being used in Peoria.

Meet The Armadillo

The Armadillo is the opposite of an undercover operation. Its goal isn't making arrests, but alerting suspects that police are on to them, police say. The surveillance footage is rarely reviewed by the police and is saved for just a short time before it is erased. Still, the unit can have a significant impact.

So effective is it that the police have a four-week waiting period of requests by folks who want it parked in the neighborhood.

However, I wish the author of this piece had left out that one sentence: "The surveillance footage is rarely reviewed by the police and is saved for just a short time before it is erased." Any of the bad guys reading that will assume they can just carry on as if The Armadillo weren't there. In short, the author provides information that will harm the effectiveness of the program.

(h/t to Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit)

Crime does not pay!

Despite constant warnings to not leave the car running with keys in the ignition, some people never learn...

A man in Washington state made sure a pair of burglars didn't get away with his three flat-screen televisions — he moved their getaway car.

And he was the victim of the burglary!

He saw a white van sitting in front of his house with the motor running and the keys in the ignition, and he got in and drove it to a friend's house.

Police say the burglars left the televisions, a laptop computer and a jewelry box by the door and took off on foot.

As GuyK would say: BAAAWWAAAHHAAA!

And another one bites the dust

A groundhog showed up on the lawn this afternoon about 1 o'clock. he won't be coming back if you catch my drift.

About those groundhogs...

My shootin' might have been better than I originally thought.

We've had no grazers since I popped and dropped the one in its tracks. That could mean that the two I shot at just prior to that (the ones I though I missed because the scope was off) may have been able to get off into the tall weeds and maybe even into their den but they could have suffered mortal wounds. Since groundhogs are pests and not food or game animals, I didn't follow up on my "missed" shots the way I would for deer, bear, or even squirrel: no search for blood droplets, no circle search from where last seen, etc.

There are lots of "maybes" and "could haves" in that previous paragraph, however evidence (or lack of sightings) seems to be pointing to a successful eradication of the local groundhog population, however.

Confounded Rodents!

I have been forced to take up arms in defense of my property.

Before we left for California, we were getting daily afternoon visits to our small patch of lawn here at the Aerie. The visitors were not the cute, nose twitching cottontails (they come out closer to dusk to feed on the clover). No, these were whistle pigs, woodchucks, aka: Ground Hogs.

Now being in Pennsylvania, from which Punxsutawney Phil makes his annual predictions, that the Ground Hog would be considered to be more hero or iconoclastic. And when it's out there in the middle of the lawn nibbling on the grass or in some farmer's field or along the side of the road sitting up on their hindquarters like overgrown prairie dogs they may look cute. But when they start to dig it's another story.

We had at least three of the little buggers--well not so little buggers--out on the lawn at a time. Two looked to be youngsters and as near as twins as you could get. The third is a bigger animal with a ring of white just behind it's black nose. When we came home I discovered one of them had decided to try and burrow under the retaining wall I built last year on the west side under the deck. A nice big hole with a mound of dirt and some sizable rocks had been excavated.

Out came the air rifle.

Now, there is a reason people shoot the ground hog from 100-150 or more yards away with a .223 scoped rifle. I reckon that next to the eagle the dadgum critter's eyesight is the best in the animal world! I'd see one out in the lawn grazing away about 20 yards out and slide open the porch door as quietly as possible. Ease myself out the door and slide it closed. (It wouldn't do to have one or more cats go racing outside!) Tip-toe into position so as to get a clear shot and as soon as I would raise the rifle to peer through the scope...ZIP! That fat little bag of blubber would move like greased lightening and dive into the tall weeds. Sometimes it might stop just inside the weeds and sit up to take one more look over its shoulder before disappearing altogether. It didn't help that if there were mourning doves out under the bird feeders or on the wires, they would flush with a lot of twittering sounds warning the ground hog of my presence. Occasionally, early on, I could follow its progress in the tall stuff by the shaking and quaking the tops of the weeds made as it brushed past--at least I could if the wind wasn't blowing. As they cut trail in the tall weeds they no longer shook the weeds and any idea of where they were or where they were going was pure conjecture. Once in a while the little bugger would scoot across a small cleared trail on the other side of the yard and disappear again before I could get a shot off.

I confess, I may have merely wounded one or two before they hit the weed beds. I also missed a couple of easy shots before, scratching my head in disbelief, I checked the scope and found I was hitting high and to the left a couple of inches at 12 yard. The cross hairs were off by more than enough for me to be missing completely at 20 or 25 yards. I fixed that last evening.

As of a little after 5 PM this afternoon, there is one less ground hog about the Aerie.

How?

I sincerely hope this isn’t going to be like Sean Hannity’s radio call-in screener. She, if I remember correctly took the live lobster that Hannity had sent as a “Lobster gram”, a lobster meant to be cooked, and set it free in a freshwater pond near her home. Lobster’s are, of course salt water creatures and will die in fresh water. But in her vegan state, she was not cognizant of this fact.

Crocodile stolen from Norway aquarium

The stolen reptile, named "Taggen" (Spike), is a 70 centimetres (2.3 feet) long smooth-fronted caiman also known as Schneider's dwarf caiman (Paleosuchus Trigonatus).
…
It is normally found in much warmer habitats in South America and is one of the world's smallest species of crocodile.

Ekeli feared that the four-year-old would have poor chances of surviving outside its habitat in the aquarium, and said it would probably die from stress.

And just how the heck do you walk out of an aquarium with a 2.3 foot long croc? Do you wrap it up like a sub sandwich? Drop it nose first into a large umbrella? Roll it up in a copy of your daily newspaper? Use a special pocket in the lining of your trench coat? Slide it down your pant leg? (THAT’S a risky thought!)

(Stray thought: “Are you happy to see me or is that a caiman in your pocket?”

Oops!

This story just warms my heart:

An armed robber picked the wrong target when he raided an Australian bar where a biker gang was holding a meeting. He ended up hog-tied and in a hospital.

There were around 50 bikers holding a meeting at the bar. I have to wonder about their behavior. Did they follow Robert’s Rules of Order? Did they not ride their motorcycles to the meeting and park them outside? How could 50 members of a biker club—at a bar mind you—be so quiet that two idiots didn’t see or hear them despite walking through the room to get to the cashier? And finally, they only hog-tied the SOB?

Jester [Did I mention the person chairing the meeting only gave his name as “Jester”?-ed] said the robbers had walked past the bikers as they entered the bar but apparently failed to notice them, perhaps because the ski masks obscured their vision.

And the money quote:

"I don't think he did his homework very well," Jester said of the ringleader. "He picked the wrong night."

Dude, these were some very civilized bikers!

It must be one hell of a mustache.

Well, he was wearing a garter and boots

PORTLAND, Maine - The Cumberland County Sheriff's Office is looking for a man with a mustache who is pulling in front of female drivers and then jumping out of his vehicle while wearing women's underwear, a garter belt and black high-heel boots.

With that get-up who notices a mustache?

Were there Illinois Nazis involved?

I was unaware they were filming another Blues Brothers movie. This time in Japan.

2,240 police, 460 patrol cars, copter mobilized for car chase in Osaka

(Actually, I wish they were filming another BB flick. The music was great in the first two.)

Oops!

“Heh,” indeed. From a link at Glenn Reynolds’ Instapundit: Voter cited by opponents of Indiana's ID law registered in two states.

Something tells me this is not going to help their argument before the Supreme Court. The opponents' attorneys need to go back to learn how to research their "clients" better. And this woman is in deep doo-do for claiming homestead rebates in both Indiana and Florida. What a bunch of maroons!

That'll work

Car thief has a swift change of heart
I’m guessing he needed a change of undies too.

A thief who stole a car after spotting the keys in the ignition swiftly abandoned it when he was confronted by a great dane that had been asleep on the back seat.

The man was unaware that Diesel, an alsatian cross, was inside the Toyota 4x4. As he drove off he saw the dog, 9st (57kg) and 6ft tall on his hind legs, through his rear view mirror. As soon as Diesel sat up, the man stopped the car and fled.

Yeah, I’m sure Diesel makes a great theft deterrent, but wouldn’t the Club be cheaper? I mean the food alone…. Of course they may have banned those in England too.

The owner, Nick Griggs, 41, of Brixham, who runs a quad bike centre, said: “I’d love to have seen the look on his face when he saw Diesel. He must have got the shock of his life. There’s no alarm, but who needs one when you’ve got the Hound of the Baskervilles in your back seat?”

Indeed.

Go look at Diesel’s picture.

Seeing that mug (no matter how lovable he might be) pop up in the rear view would make me want to get out of the car too.

What we have here, is a failure to …

More than 500 parking meters stolen in Atlanta

What the heck!? How do you steal 546 parking meters?

City officials say crooks sawed off 546 parking meters this year —39 percent of all the meters in the city, at a total loss of $273,000.

Because it happens so often, the city does not report meter muggers to police, said Tenee Hawkins, spokeswoman for the Department of Public Works.

"If they don't report it to us, we don't investigate it," said Ron Campbell, a spokesman for the Atlanta Police Department.

I get it. You do it one at a time and the city never, ever reports the theft so there’s never, ever an investigation.

Another Darwin Award entry

Man Attempts to Steal Copper, Electrocuted

(Or maybe the Lord simply emphasized the Commandment that says:
“Thou shall not steal.”)

(Found at Drew Curtis’ FARK )

Never Mess With A Woman When She's Getting Her Hair Done

Have-a-go heroine fights masked raider

Four foot nine inches, 25-year old Vicky Lowell halts a robbery by a six foot man brandishing what turned out to be a fake gun and chases him 300 yards to his get away car. The police then use the plate information she obtained to arrest the perp.

It’s a cool story but, as it happened in England, and she beat him with her stiletto-heeled shoe, I’m surprised she was given a medal and not arrested.

This being England I'm surprised she was able to determine what a fake gun looks like. After all, aren't pistols banned there?

Of course, the Telegraph article ends with a litany as to why this may NOT be done by others.

What the law says: Have-a-go heroes have no special rights to take the law into their own hands. People who act as policemen or intervene in fights run the risk of prosecution unless the law gives them specific rights or powers.

England has certainly lost some of its spine since WWII.