Stupid People Tricks Redux

WRONG BANK
Sidney Reuben Smith decided to open a bank account using a false identity. He noticed the obituary of one Jerry Cain and cleverly acquired a copy of Cain’s birth certificate and social security number. He went to a branch of the BB&T; in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and tried to open an account.

Bad move. The teller was Melinda Cain, widow of the recently deceased Jerry Cain. She had no trouble recognizing the false identification and called the police. Smith held out for an hour, claiming to be Jerry Cain, despite Melinda’s affirmation that he was not her husband and that her husband was indeed dead.

INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES
Police in Radnor, Pennsylvania, interrogated a suspect by placing a metal colander on his head and connecting it with wires to a photocopy machine. The message “He’s lying” was placed in the copier, and police pressed the copy button each time they thought the suspect was telling a lie. Believing the “lie detector” was working, the suspect confessed.

WATCH WHERE YOU’RE DRIVING
It all happened when a party goer this Halloween backed over a smudge pot marking a hole in the pavement, when he stopped to talk to a friend who was also leaving the party. The smudge pot flame caused his gas tank to explode, setting the car and a telephone pole nearby on fire. The pole burned down, canceling power, phones & cable TV to homes for a mile down to the end of the road, and subsequently fell over, taking out a mailbox & crashing through the roof of another car. The fire department arrived a half hour later to a smoldering tangle of metal. The driver escaped with singed hair & slight clothing damage.
(Oct. 31, 1998 DeKalb County, Ga.)

DON’T LITTER
A dimwit in Metairie, La. decided to buy a picnic table on sale at the local Home Depot store, and discovered it would not fit into the back of his Honda pickup. He tied it to the bumper with a rope and decided to drag it some 2 miles to his house. Upon arriving at home, he discovered one lone piece of wood, still attached to the rope. Moments later, a police car arrived and he was presented with a ticket for littering.
The score: Picnic table- $35.00 and The Ticket- $150.00.
Reported in the Times-Picayune 11/98.

THE CAMERA WORKED
Ben Ritson writes:
I thought that this would interest you – a true story of Australian stupidity. Most of the other chefs that I work with are into fixing up their cars and hooning them about. One of the young kitchen hands was on his way home one night when he passed a speed camera. A big flash illuminated the dash. He looked at the dash and saw he was going under the speed limit. He made a decision to drive back and test the machinery again. Yet again a flash went off as he drove by. By this stage he was really getting pissed off so he decided to turn around and try the camera yet again, this time driving at a snails pace. Sure enough the camera goes off again.

Deciding it was time to take action into his own hands he pulled over and walked up to the police van and knocked on the side door. “What the hell are you doing? Your camera is on the blink; I wasn’t even speeding and I’ve been past it three times”.”

Coolly the officer replied, “No mate, we weren’t targeting speeding. We got you three times for not wearing a seatbelt. Expect three fines in the mail.”