Crime for Dummies, Springfield, Missouri, Style

This morning’s Springfield News Leader had a twofer too good not to blog about, both stories having to do with dumb criminals.

Dumb Criminal #1
Wednesday the local media was aflutter with reports that an unidentified man was pulled from a sinkhole after being trapped for over 24 hours. I had wondered how he ended up there. Was he out for a walk, and you know, nature called and whoops, where’d that sinkhole come from? But then, today I read where he was involved the following night in a police standoff, which ended with him being arrested for possession of a firearm. Turns out the reason he ended up in the sinkhole to begin with was that he was running from the cops who had a search warrant they were trying to execute when he wandered off a trail and fell into the sinkhole. Ah, justice prevails.

Dumb Criminal #2
Cab driver gets a request to take a man to Camdenton from Springfield, Missouri, which is about an hour and a half drive. Cabbie tells the man it’s going cost $150. The man calls back later and says he has the money. Cabbie picks up the man who says he needs to stop at the bank “to cash a check.” They stop at the bank; the man robs the bank and the cabbie and robber head on their way. Cabbie keeps cool and tries to figure out what to do next. After all, he really doesn’t know if the man has a gun or not. As they are nearing the heavily patrolled I-44 onramp, the cabbie is hoping a cop will tag him for speeding, and indeed a cop stops the cabbie, who is quoted as saying to the robber, “He’s going to give me a speeding ticket. I’ll take care of it.” Cabbie tells the police who his passenger is, and well, justice prevails. Turns out the robber is a convicted bank robber with a long record.

According to the News Leader, cabbie returns to the bank because “I wanted to apologize for bringing a robber to my bank.”