Carys Weldon Blog
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Silly armed robbery...?Okay, well, I know you count on me to find interesting things to talk about, and sometimes I fall short, but I have a new one today.
So, a kid walks into a store and does his best to perpetrate an "armed robbery"...but he doesn't have a weapon under his clothes (Jimmy Cagney style), oh no, this is a modern Einstein.
Get this...he had a banana.
Yep, that's what I said. A banana?
When he ended up detained by being locked in the store until the cops arrived, he ate the banana...thus destroying evidence.
When will modern day criminals get smart enough to realize there are cameras everywhere these days?
You can read the short blurb on that story here:
http://apnews.myway.com//article/20090516/D987HMC00.html
And in MY local news, Friday (yesterday a.m.), I was at a Kum & Go gas station. For those of you who live in more civilized parts of the world, YES, they really are called that. Google if you don't believe me.
Anyhow, I was filling up my gas tank when I heard some commotion. Running out the door of the gas station, the manager--a tall lanky dude--(that's a little crazy)--starts hollering, "Hey! Don't you dare drive off! You owe me!"
The guy in the van who was driving away without paying for his gas had his driver side window down, elbow on the "sill." So, there was no doubt he heard, because I turned to look/watch and he actually leaned out his window, head swiveled backwards toward the guy running after him, yelling. Yes, while he was driving away. So, he compounded the situation by endangering another car or two pulling into the station off the busy street.
Next thing I know, (while I'm still trying to figure out what the heck is going on)--yes, I know, I'm a little slow at having the words sink in. Anyhow, the manager lobs a rock (God knows where he found it. For all I know he had it in his pocket for just this sort of occasion.)
The rock hits a dead center to a window, shatters it. So, now everyone is looking, mouths agape.
The driver hits his brake, leans halfway out the window and screams, "You crazy sonofabitch!"
To which the manager replies, "Yeah. That's right. Why don't you come back here and we'll talk about it."
"Oh, fuck you!" The driver calls, hitting his accelerator hard, swerving to narrowly miss the next car coming in.
The manager then announces to a packed parking lot of onlookers, "I had a feeling! Sometimes you just know somebody's gonna try and drive off like that."
I was still wincing over the possibility of somebody, like a kid, being in the van, and maybe being hurt by something like a fist sized rock coming through the window. So, I went inside, making up the excuse that I needed another water bottle. (in my head, of course, no one else would care if I needed a wb or not.)
The guy is already back behind the counter and rattling on, obviously still on an adrenalin high from his little situation. No one is saying a word. It was funny to me because the rest of those people couldn't have hiked in there to pay any faster.
I had paid outside at the pump. I just wanted to see what he was saying in there because every time the door opened, I could still hear him talking at high, pumped up, volume.
Anyhow, the line gets long fast, people behind me. I get up there to the counter and break the stunned customer silence by asking, "Did you get his license plate number, so you could file a report?"
"Call the police?" He shook his head. "Didn't you hear me say we'd settle this between us? He won't be coming back here any time soon."
I was thinking, "Oh, yeah he will. Guys that'll drive off owing $30 for gas will come back and throw a rock through your window from the street later, or watch to see your car and slip around to damage it when you're working the next time."
I didn't say it. The guy asked us all, "Did you see it? I nailed that window with that rock."
I said, "Yeah. You broke it. I hope there were no kids in there." That gained some murmurs of agreement from the crowd.
And I'm thinking, I wonder, in a court of law, who would be out most? A drive off is stealing, but there are rules on how to report things like that. I'm sure no one in the world would go to that gas station if they knew the manager might lob rocks at their vehicle.
I mean, the average person isn't a thief. (I know, I'm an idealist. I NEED to have faith that people are basically good, and the ax murderers and rapists are few and far between.) BUT sometimes honest people pump gas, climb in their cars and pull away, then realize (V-8 slap to the forehead) and turn around and go pay. Imagine having a moment like that, heading toward the road--and getting a rock through your windshield. The guy in the van wasn't within 100 feet of the exit/roadway. Barely pulling away from the pump when the rock hit.
I know my husband sometimes will pull the car up to the front of the store, in a parking space before going in to pay, if the place is hopping and people are waiting in line. I learned a big lesson. Hold up the pump traffic. Don't take a chance of getting a window knocked out by some psycho $8 an hour gas clerk.
I dunno. Maybe it was HIS station/franchise. Do you think that makes it a validated response?
The guy didn't miss a beat to my comment about kids being in the vehicle. He said, "Well, now, if he had a kid in there that got hit by flying glass--"
I inserted, "Which could blind a kid. Or how about the rock hitting a kid in the head and killing 'em on the spot?"
The guy said, "Well, that guy deserved what he got."
Now, I don't think it's right to drive away from a pump without paying. My brother and one of my daughters have worked at gas stations, and my brother's pay was docked the amount if he didn't insist someone prepay. (Nevada stations all have PREPAY on the pumps.)
Gas stations, to me, are getting scarier and scarier. The one my daughter worked at...the managers/owners of that store were idiots...she's a cute little 5'6" white chick with long blonde hair, and they'd have her work the nightshift ALONE. It was the most robbed store in Springfield, Missouri. When I found that out, (learned both in the same convo), I insisted she quit right then.
Love her, but sometimes she's too confident in herself. Probably because she always had her fat mama and big Italian daddy backing her up. Apparently, she would do things like go out to the parking lot to tell the Mexicans they couldn't fight in her parking lot. (Not a racial slur here. Apparently, they did it regularly there.)
It was the care in Springfield MOST LIKELY to get your car stolen from. One shift, someone stole a car with a baby in a car seat in the back seat. They brought it back two minutes later when they realized it. I guess it's one thing to steal a car, another to get a baby with the deal.
I don't know about you, but I love to read THE DARWIN AWARDS. Talk about your stupid criminals. And the CAUGHT ON TAPE shows are funny when it goes to convenience store thieves. (Grosses me out when it is about cooks gone bad.)
Do you have any stories that are funny or horrifing like these?
Labels: armed, Darwin Awards, gas, highway robbery, stealing, thieves
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