An officer in Florida told us about a dumb criminal who showed up too late to be caught in a “sting”—but still managed to work his way into jail:
“The sheriff’s department had set up a fake pawnshop that bought stolen goods. We videotaped all our transactions for several months, then shut the whole operation down and arrested thirty or forty people who had sold things to us. That sting attracted national attention, and the press was having a feeding frenzy—almost non-stop coverage—because the audio and video were so good. We recovered everything from sets of silverware to an eighteen-wheeler.”
About a week after the pawnshop sting had been closed, sheriff’s department personnel went in to unload their equipment and dismantle the operation.
“We arrived in an unmarked cruiser car that, of course, clearly looked like a police car, with antennas and all. We used a huge truck from the jail with the jail’s name printed on the side, two guards, a couple of prison trustees to do the hard labor, and a couple of plainclothes deputies.”
Then the bearded man reached into his pocket and pulled out three stolen Social Security checks. “I’ll sell these to you for ten cents on the dollar.”
They pulled up to the “pawnshop” to find a bearded man sitting on the front steps. He looked at the entourage, recognized one of the undercover agents who had worked the operation, and signaled him to come over.
The agent strolled over to the guy and asked, “What’s up?”
“Where’ve you been?” the bearded man asked.
“We’ve been around. Why?”
Then the bearded man reached into his pocket and pulled out three stolen Social Security checks. “I’ll sell these to you for ten cents on the dollar.”
Needless to say, they soon had that man in handcuffs. But as they were putting him in the squad car, the officer couldn’t resist asking him a question.
“Didn’t you recognize the police units and the security guards and the truck with ‘County Jail’ on the side?”
“Well, yeah,” the dumb criminal answered. “But I just figured you’d stolen the truck and were bringing it down here to sell.”