It's either apathy or a sense of humour.
My sister was in bed when she heard the sound of breakage outside. Peering out through the curtains she could see a Jaguar parked outside with the back window smashed in.

She was on the phone to the police like a shot to report this vandalism and/or theft of items from the parcel shelf of the car.

While she was squinting at the car to see if she could make out the registration number, she realised that she'd misidentified it.

"Actually it's not a Jaguar, it's one of those Rovers"

"Oh." said the policeman on the phone. "Do you still want us to come out?"
(richardm, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:28, Reply)

I saw nothing
Many, many moons ago I was in a really shitty, horrible club in Liverpool called "Buzz" (dunno if it still there, it was next to Lime Street station, last I heard, it was called "Zzub"). We were only in there because we were 14 and they bouncers didn't give a shit as long as we had money. To demonstrate how shitty it was, it was the first place (other than an airport) that I'd ever seen a metal detector in and they bouncers would insist you checked you coat in, then search you, meaning you could take a weapon with you, you just couldn't get it into the club itself.

Now on this particular night, an argument between two local "firms" came to a head. While I was the bar, some bloke walked onto the dancfloor, produced a shotgun from god-knows-where and gave both barrels to some other bloke. The noise of the shot was drowned out by the awful ScouseHouse and I only realised something was going on when I turned away from the bar with my pint of cider and saw everyone running for the exits.

Merseyside police later commented that the club had the largest toilets in the city, as 700 people said that's where they were when the crime took place.

As an aside, I discovered not long after that the Krazy House (called Sloanes at the time) would let 14 year olds in and didn't play shitty ScouseHouse.
(ScousersPet, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:26, 3 replies)

I once saw a chav
steal another chav's bike from outside a shop. Part of me wished I'd been able to stop it but then, judging by the victim, the owner had probably nicked it himself. It's the circle of bikes. Or cycle...?
(The_Judderman, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:21, Reply)

Nonchalant
While / after out drinking in the city centre, I’m proud to say that I played part in averting a potentially serious assault. Waiting in the taxi queue, I was contentedly swaying back and forth on the sea of Stella in my Sambuca boat, watching the inebriated antics of swarms of revellers.

In a heartbeat, I was awakened from my daze by a slurred screech. Something along the lines of “Aaaammgaannnaaafuuuuggginnnkkiilllllllllyyyyeeeeeeaaaaarrrrrrggggghhhhhh”. I turned in time to see some oaf running parallel with the queue of folk of which I was part, wielding aloft a hazard warning temporary road sign. (You know the type, triangular sign in a heavy steel frame, usually employed at road-works etc.)

I can only assume that my scant used ‘vigilante synapse’ was unaffected by the considerable volume of alcohol consumed, as it sprung into action with frankly astonishing pace. I crouched down on the pretence of tying my shoelace, and deftly stuck a leg out, into the path of the violence-intentioned moron.

To say that the result was satisfying would be a heavy understatement. The would-be attacker sailed through the air for a rather impressive distance before landing face first atop his makeshift weapon and sliding to a stop on the road amid the jeers and rowdy chorus of cackling laughter from the throng of party goers.

In the few intervening moments until I departed in my extortion carriage. I chuckled at the sight of my deserving prey sitting against a nearby wall, repeatedly spraying “mmmphuggun llbbashhchab!” at an unknown vigilante through a mash of blood and broken teeth.


I only hope that his attack wasn’t justified by some previous event unbeknown to myself, in which case, I would actually be a right proper cnut!
(Greencloud Wanted to go fishing on, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:15, Reply)

Crazy Dad
Before my old Dad popped his cloggs he had quiet a few issues and was a bit of a nutter. When he had been on the sauce, he would often go a bit loopy and do all sorts of mental stuff. He was faily posh really but would still end up doing stuff that would make the hardest Chav-scum from Huddersfield blush. One particular crime he perpetrated sticks out more than others.

I can't remember what led up to the situation whereby our neighbour was trying to protect himself with a tennis racket while my Dad was trying to stab him with a kitchen knife, but luckily the neighbour managed to run back to his house and obviously called the police. My Dad went back inside and opened another can of beer and started ranting about some bollocks. Around 5 minutes later, around 10 police dressed in full riot gear, burst through the front door and piled on top off him and then carted him away.

If it hadn't been quite so traumatic for us kids, it would be have been quite a funny sight watching his face as 10 armour-clad plod charged at him, batons in hand.

There are many, many other examples of his "tomfoolery" but this one sticks out as one of his more mental crimes.

Nice one Pops!

Length? A night in the cells if I remember rightly.
(Tom Jones's Mojo Hasn't had any since, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:11, Reply)

My Old Local........ a Hive of Scum and villany
During the 10 odd years i drank in this pub i witnessed all sorts of crimes from the usual dealing of class A narcotics to people getting a good hiding to someone getting striped (which still ranks up there as one of the worst things ive witnessed).

But by far the Boldest event happened one sunday afternoon when the footie was on. The Pub was heaving with people watching the game when bold as brass the 2 brothers from the "mental/criminal" family, that every pub like this seems to harbour, pulled up to the side doors in a Van and without saying anything walked in with a sack barrow unplugged the quizz machine (whilest someone was playing it) and wheeled it out of the pub, into the van and off.

5 minutes later the landlord came back into the bar and flipped out. Cue 30 blokes doing the worst "wow, i didnt even notice that/ What happened there" faces.

Fastforward an hour and the Police turn up, and althou they knew that we had all seen it and knew who it was (most of the robberys and drugs realated crime in the area was down to this family) no one in the right mind was going to grass them up as you can be sure that you would get away with a knee capping at best.

Shockingley that crime never got solved.

But kept us amused for a while.
( caffeinefreak, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 10:05, 2 replies)

Stupidest crime ever
In the middle of summer last year, I decided to go to my local chippy, since I couldn’t be arsed cooking. Place was kinda busy and I’d ordered Chinese stuff (as opposed to just chips n stuff), so I knew I was in for a bit of a wait. Since it was one fo the few warm days, I stood in the doorway, looking out into the street.

While I was stood there, two Traffic Wardens pull up in their scooters, having spotted a shitty, battered Ford Orion that was parked on the zig-zags of the pelican crossing adjacent to the chippy. As they are writing their tickets, horrible chavvy Manc bloke comes flying out of the door to the flat above the chippy, having seen his car about to get a ticket and starts arguing with the wardens, quite loudly, since he was clearly a good few Stellas into his night.

The traffic wardens around here must have panic buttons of some description, since neither of them used their radios but, within a few minutes, a police car pulls up and a couple of members of the local constabulary pile out. Bloke starts arguing with them as well.

I start paying more attention at this point, as it was getting really interesting. Guy is getting more and more wound up, especially when one of the coppers starts throwing around phrases like “it’s not taxed or insured” and “confiscate it” and “we’ll crush it”. Guy is really wound up at this point and a police van pulls up, blue lights and all, disgorging half a dozen of Manchester’s finest. Guy is obviously about to get nicked.

Now comes the stupid crime:
As all this is going on (and don’t forget, there is now two traffic warden scooters, a police car and a police van, with it’s lights on, in the road and about a dozen coppers and two traffic wardens stood on the pavement), a woman pulls up and parks across the pedestrian crossing and runs into the newsagents next door to the chippy. This actually brought the row that was going on with the Orion owner to a complete halt as they all stared at this woman and her illegally parked car.

My Chinese arrived at that point, but I hung around long enough to hear one of the coppers explain to the woman why she was getting a £60 fine and three points on her licence.
(ScousersPet, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 9:33, 3 replies)

Qotw.
I worked in Security for over a year (gave it up as a bad idea last Oct). It was a very dull job most of the time. It might have been better if I had worked in a huge city but and not a little shitty fishing town. Though it gave me plenty of opportunity to witness lots of shoplifting and some VERY VERY strange behaviour.
Highlights include:

Stopping a 72 year old man leaving the store as he had pocketed a 80p packet of knicker Elastic (In my defence I only stopped him as the week previously he had taken a packet of razor blades but I refused to believe it till I watched him empty his pockets (He had TONS of stuff) into his sons car boot, but by then it was too late to stop him.) We only banned him, didn't phone the police or anything!
Having a screwdriver pulled on me over a £2 box of fish.
Finding a line of Tippex bottles the mini-chavs had set fire to along the path at the side of the shop.
Watching the same junkie come in everyday, see me and duck into the toilets, then leave. One day he was in the disabled toilets for 15 minutes so I knocked on the door saying that if the door was locked for too long it set off an alarm incase of accidents with disabled people. He answered the door in just his trousers. Jumper and shirt hanging over the toilet, socks and shoes lying on the floor. We still don't know what he was doing though we suspect he was shooting up and injecting his feet. He said he was "washing".
Umpteen thefts, the odd arguement and the day when 25 kids marched into the store as one of them was about to have a fight with a boy in store! WOO FIGHT! Death threats, drunk people falling off chairs and breaking their nose on the floor. A lady collapsing at the door and customers COMPLAINING they couldn't get past her. Etc etc...

There was also the guy who almost got away with £220 of booze and ending up assaulting an old lady trying to get away.
Would I do that job again? Not in a fucking lifetime.
( Maffers I flow kinda strange like Spina Bifida footprints, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 9:15, Reply)

news in breif
Two days before he was killed, I heard him say the sweetest thing I’d ever heard. I was trying not to drink at the time, so I was in bed, awake, looking for reliefs in the re-enntries in the map which the stain had made on the ceiling. But there was no relief there. I was touching my wife’s skin with my skin, but somehow lightyears had crawled slow and malicious in the atoms between us. A time ago, we were so close. I was listening to her breathing, deep and cool and even and I was wondering how long it would all last. The house is 80 odd years old, and other people must have lain in that room wondering how the distance had crept in and lain between them too, surely, and I was wondering about that as well. Once you’re that far away after being that close, closer than close, I don’t know how you go the distance. And I was wondering if I even wanted to wonder about it all. Downstairs, I knew where I’d hidden a bottle of gin.

Outside, with the window habitually propped open, I heard XXXf walk clatter down the council’s street of souped up cheap cars and broken down expensive dreams.

“oh god her”. She lived across the road, but she was no neighbour. God knows I’m not fit to judge but (and you knew that “but” was coming, didn’t you?) she was a wreck of a woman. Blackened teeth lurched in a drunken smile and her unbleached roots oozed white lightning and class As. In the day, I’d see her, and wave. Sometimes I gave her kids a quid or two for some sweets. The kids were unkempt, ill fed, uneducated and cheerful. I liked the younger of them, but we’d lived there a while and I noticed that they soured as they aged. And then at night, the whole street would wait for the hullabaloo. Cars and women would screech, men would curse. Women would shout louder. Threats and incoherence.

“I told her not to serve you. Ow many times have I told her not to serve you. What’s she doing serving you? Come on, lets get you in” I heard XXXm say as they passed the window. And I wondered how he could say something so sweet to her, when I could say nothing, nothing at all to my wife. I wondered that too long a time.

The next night was quiet and the night after that he died. It started with the usual fandango, or so we thought. We were in bed watching tv. I was wondering about the distance thing, but there was no way I was going to mention it.

Outside we heard “Smash the door down”. We turned the tv down and then we heard the same woman, outside, say “He’s fucking dead”. Scared, I dressed and went out into the street. I think that I’m giving evidence about what I saw next later on this year and I’m paranoid about the internet and privacy so I am going to delete this whole thing before the question is closed. There was blood on the ceiling and blood on the doors. Blood on the window and blood on the floors. A horror had unfurled itself and stained the whole street. I could see the way the arm was over the leg, and I could hear the screaming. Most of all, though, I could smell the blood. The night was frozen solid and the smell of the blood had crystalised and I could taste it on the back of my throat. Night after night we’d all lain there. The walls are thin, so if we’d heard the screaming every night, others must have too. But we did nothing. The whole street did nothing. 80 years ago, surely, our grandparents would not have just sat in their rooms and done nothing? We did and that’s the crime I witnessed, too. The look in my neighbours' eyes as we talked on the street, later, amongst the cider cans and flowers left in tribute about what we all knew was going to happen.

“I’m never going to drink again” I promised her after we were allowed back in our house. But I remembered where the gin was, and I felt the distance and I have, of course.
(sirolimus, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 8:15, 2 replies)

I live in a world of my own..
Evidently.. As I used to reside in a wonderful area of London named Whitechapel. Hurrah for the druggies and murderers.

Case one. I was sleeping quite happily in my 'safe' little flat (namely safe because of the Bolton madman I used to life with.. I wouldn't want to break into his place, he'd kill me with a fork!) and a rather loud noise happens at about 5am. I grunt it off and go back to sleep for I am at the epitome of my student sleeping through things days. In the morning I get up, wander slowly through the courtyard and off to work, returning seven or so hours later. At which point I find Dee (my other housemate, from Frinton on Sea, incredibly sheltered and very delicate young thing, she was great :) ) shivering quietly in the living room with a look of horror mixed with fear on her face. Being the caring soul that I am I drop everything and rush over, 'Oh my god Dee are you ok??' She answers me by dragging me to the door and pointing down at the large and loud bustle of a police team in our courtyard busy cleaning up blood and mess and interviewing some of the tenants of the lower floors. Must I add that I had rather calmly walked through/around this police action earlier that day?

Anyway, turns out that the loud noise was no car backfiring, neither was it retarded Whitechapel kids setting off fireworks into somebody's face. No, no. A gang shooting had occured in my courtyard and I had effectively just stepped over the body on my way to work.


Case two. By which point Dee is convinced that I am the most stone faced, cold hearted bitch on the face of the earth by my lack of acknowledging dreadful things.

Dee and I are walking along Whitechapel, again, on our way home. Happy days, that sunny bliss. We're just walking away chatting and contemplating getting chinese from that okay takeaway when Dee grabs my arm, stops me and says 'Seriously, how can you just walk BY something like that and not even react??' huh? Says I. She turns me around and sure enough, there in the pavement lies a 'youth' with a nice little stab wound in his arm and another stupid little kid running off into the distance, hotly persued by various people. And I just didn't notice this stabbing, which I had, yes indeed I did, stepped to the side to avoid and kept walking.

I have no idea why my brain blocks out these things. Maybe I am most sheltered by my brain! Who knows. Either way, it's a little disturbing.. But at least I noticed that bomb that went off when I was standing on Aldgate East! I'm not completely out of it..
(darras jeg har en grevling i hodet. Grevling, grevlang, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 8:11, Reply)

in keeping with the spirit of this question
which seems to be a lot of didn't witness a crime but I've heard of one.

I knew a lad called Rod a good 30 odd years ago, incredibly quiet, picked on a bit at school but not systematically bullied, but fairly notable in his ordinariness, and as kids do we lost touch. I was with another mate a few years after that who happened to have kept in touch a little bit better than I had and we bumped into him.

He had changed. He was now spectacularly tall and looking like a real hippy. Not wierd, but just as though he was a lot more confident and he'd found a look and a style he liked. He seemed more outgoing and generally more of a person. In short, as most people do, he'd changed from the bumbling youngster we all are between 10 and 15 and become the kind of guy who you'd think was pretty cool as a mate.

We chatted briefly and said our helloos and parted again, I remarked on how different he was and my mate filled me in on a few details. Apparently Rod had been through the mill. A few family hassles, divorces and deaths of close family, and some close friends shitting on him a bit and the like.

Reading the local paper a couple of weeks later was a report that young Rod was up in court, for probably the oddest crime I've ever known someone actually charged with, and one which I've never seen anyone charged with (at least not until I googled it 5 minutes ago to check anyway) before or since.

Grave Robbing!

Robbing a Grave!!

To be fair I don't think it was a 6-foot-down-using-a-JCB fresh 'un for the pleasures of a lady cadaver or anything really hideous like that, but an old Victorian cemetary for human bones. Nonetheless I still wonder what thought process actually went on beginning with "Mmmm, what to do today?" and culminating in bones in his house.

Have googled the name and nolinky. Sorry.
(tinypod will never learn. Ever., Fri 15 Feb 2008, 8:00, Reply)

C&A robbery Bradford
Me and a friend were once stood on "Broadway" in Bradford, at about 8pm on a sunday night, waiting for a mate to pick us up.. This was quite some time ago.

Suddenly, we saw someone running towards us, in what looked like some sort of strange costume.. Like a giant chicken.

It was in fact, some scally, with a huge pile of shit clothes in his hands, piled up higher than his head.. running down the street.

We could hear an alarm going off.. it all happened very quickly.

He ran past and said "don't tell anybody" - or something to that effect.

We went up the road to check it out, he'd basically kicked the big handle off the glass door, snuck in and raided em.

The police arrived shortly afterwards.. and I think they ended up catching him just round the corner.


Thing is.. the value of the clothes probably totalled around a tenner.. so it's hardly worth it.

Some people in Bradford would do fuckin owt for a tenner tho.. it's full of crack heads.
(binarymilk Rossz csillag alatt született, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 7:21, Reply)

Uni halls
During my first year of uni the same few groups of kids always wanted to piss around in my halls of residence. Most of them wanted to skateboard or BMX around a little group of steps, which tore the flagstones up to hell. Mostly we ignored those lot.
But one day I wake up around 2pm to the sound of spray paint cans being emptied.
I get dressed into whatever seemed cleanest and step outside to see a group of kids a few years older than the norm, closer to 16 than 13. All of them had spray paint, and all of them were tagging the brickwork, windows and general empty spaces that were within arms reach.
I thought that a quick shout of "Oi, what do you think you're doing?" would shift them, it nearly always did with the younger ones.
But the cry of "Fuck off you lanky haired cunt" drifted over to me, followed by some sniggers while the rest of the group laughed at the head-honcho-dick-head.

So I walk at him.
The fact all the other kids were swarming round the speaker told me he was the boss. Or, at least, he thought he was the boss.
And after 5 years of beasting layabout cadets, I know how to shout at someone.

"What did you just say to me, maggot? You aren't worthy of breathing the same air as me you horrible little man! If I had any sense, I'd rip you open and spread your guts from here to the holy land to stop you fouling this earth with your very being!" Screams me, loud enough so that anyone in the rest of the halls is now coming to my aid.
All the time I was less than 1/8th of an inch from his face, nose to nose, only I was taller and so had to lean over him.
"You pox ridden horrible excuse for the shit I've just had, I thought I'd flushed you away! You should have told me you could climb out of the toilet! I'd have forced you down to where you belong, lad, have no fear of that! And what are you drawing here? It looks like Da Vinci has taken speed and started pissing against a wall! You call this art, boy? You wouldn't know art if it jumped off the floor and inserted itself length ways into your lower colon!"....

I had to keep it up for about 5 minutes, but the little bastard and his gang slinked off uni property and never came back.
I think the cheer I got from the first floor as I walked back in made it all the sweeter.
( Pointy Head poked another hole in my anorak on, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 6:01, 2 replies)

My dad
is a vigilante, and not really the angry xenophobe type, either.

He's apprehended several drunk drivers (with my help, hooray), one bank robber, and has uncovered local police brutality. He's got a reason for doing all this - he's the photographer for our local newspaper, and his success in the past 40 years has been due to his incredible fucking nosiness.

Oh, and on his days off he uses his telephoto lens to spy on scantily-clad women. Classy.
( trintrin has jam for blood, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 5:18, 1 reply)

silly me
Not so much witnessing a crime as being witnessed whle committing a crime...
Back in my yoof a few girlfriends and my self came across a great money making scheme - find out what the kids in school want, pop to town after school and shoplift across the high street, then take the goods back to school to sell at a knock down rate...
After a fair few months we started to get a bit brazen, and lazy, and while robbing round woolwoths we spotted a dirty old peopdo.
Old, dirty brown coat, watching 5 girls in school uniform a bit to closey. Oh how we laughed at the sad old man...
Untill we tried to leave the shop and realsied he was in fact the in store detective. Cue police cars and warnings :(
(Emily Salvage, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 3:26, Reply)

Technically I wasn't the witness...
This just happened a few weeks ago and my wife is still furious. What follows is a tale of child abuse, foreigners, sensationalist reporters, and a belligerent drunk Mrs Traitor.

It all started about three Fridays ago, when I was just about to go home for the weekend. On a message board for ESL teachers in Korea, a Kiwi girl made a frightening report. Behind her apartment is a daycare. She was home for the day because her mom was visiting, and they both heard the sound of a small child screaming. Looking out the back window, they saw this:
daehanmindecline.com/digital/20080125kindergarten/99.JPG
daehanmindecline.com/digital/20080125kindergarten/98.JPG
A little girl standing naked at the back door on a metal fire escape, in a temperature around freezing. She was out there for 15 minutes, until the door opened and an angry woman yanked her inside. The Kiwi assumed that this was a punishment for the little girl wetting her pants.

This was not the first time she'd witnessed this; it had happened with an even younger boy back in December. And usually she's at work during the day, so who knows how many other times it happened? So this time she took a picture and decided to do something about it. Problem was, as a foreigner in Korea, she had no idea what to do.

I was the first to reply, and I said with my wife's help I could get these pictures spread all over the Korean Internet. Korea has a vicious Internet vigilante community, and are known for regularly destroying human beings.

When I showed my wife the pictures, she knew we had to do something. We decided our first step should be to phone the police, because if we went to the media first we'd look kind of like media whores.

So my wife called the police station and spoke to an uncooperative detective. The detective told us that we couldn't report the crime as we weren't actual witnesses. The fact we had the pictures (uncensored originally; blur added by me) wasn't enough--only the Kiwi could report the crime. Moreover, the right police department was closed for the weekend, and we had to bring the Kiwi in on a weekday between 9 and 6. The cop then started asking my wife why she was involved; she didn't have kids at the daycare, she didn't know anyone who had kids there, and she hadn't witnessed the crime. She claimed she was friends with the Kiwi and just helping her out, which was basically true.

So we decided to go to the media. First my wife contacted an investigative TV programme with SBS, a major Korean broadcaster. They were very interested, and planned to sneak hidden cameras into the daycare. Next, we contacted a reporter from the online Korean newspaper ohmynews.com, who also was on duty when the cops weren't. By the way, keep in mind that all our progress was being reported back on the ESL site by me.

The ohmynews reporter scooped the story. He contacted the daycare owners, who belligerently told him where to stuff his allegations. It was quoteworthy enough to make them look like bad guys, so he ran the story with the abuse pictures. Right after it went online, the daycare people called him back and confessed that they had abused the kid, but only that one time (despite the fact the Kiwi's insistence she'd seen it twice).

By Monday, the shitstorm had begun. The Kiwi reported to me that there was a circus of people outside her apartment, and furious parents were physically pulling their kids out of the daycare.

The daycare turned out to be government-funded, and was intended for low-income families who couldn't afford anything else. The owners selected their youngest employee and claimed that she had locked the little girl out in the cold (although the Kiwi claimed the employee she saw was much older). Ah, Confucianism.

Believe it or not, the parents of the little girl identified in the pictures chose not to take action, after the daycare worker was shown on TV bowing to them and apologising for torturing their daughter. In order for further action to be taken, the Kiwi had to file a complaint with the police, which she did.

The story made it to the front page of every Internet news site. The entire country was furious. For once, a foreigner was in the headline news, and she was being called a hero. But since no reporter in Korea seems to know any English, they had to go through my wife to contact her, set up interviews, etc. So my wife's phone was ringing nonstop, although she was mostly kept out of the news.

One thing we'd been talking about on the ESL website was the initial poor response of the police. Of course now that 40 million Koreans were paying attention they were a lot more responsive. Then the shitstorm widened.

An anonymous Korean woman, I'm assuming the wife of another ESL poster, called the police herself. She claimed that she was friends with the Kiwi, and the two of them had contacted the police together on Saturday. Not true, as it was my wife and I who contacted the police, and the Kiwi wasn't with us. Anyway, this anonymous woman hurled abuse at the police and hung up.

The police didn't get her name, but they knew how to find her. They called up the ohmynews reporter and asked him "Who's that Korean woman who's been helping you out?" The reporter told them my wife's name and gave them her phone number. So the police started calling my wife nonstop about "her" complaint, saying that they would begin an investigation and punish the detective she spoke to. She said she made no such complaint, but they didn't believe her. She had to go down to the police station to sort it out, and she told me the police were furious that she was causing trouble for this detective. But, she sorted it out and promised she would not make any sort of complaint against them. The police also told my wife that the Kiwi was angry at her, because she didn't want to go to the media. Of course, meanwhile, the Kiwi was enjoying the attention of several million Koreans, and thought no such thing.

Then, a new interview came out with the Kiwi, who was quoted saying that my wife physically went to the police station (the wrong police station, mind you--she gave the name of a police box rather than the appropriate headquarters) and the police didn't help at all. This was written by the ohmynews reporter, who knew full well my wife phoned, not visited, the police. My wife called the reporter, who, keep in mind, had already betrayed her by giving her over to the police, and demanded he take that part out of the story before the police see. Oh yeah, and while the Kiwi's identity was kept secret, the reporter had no trouble running a quote of her thanking me personally (by username).

Of course, the police had seen the article as soon as it came out, and they were even more angry at my wife now. They accused her of breaking her word. She did her best to sort things out, but they didn't trust her. Even the reporter believed that she was the anonymous caller, and now just didn't want to back up her words.

The media got a whiff of this, and they started calling her nonstop to get a quote about how the police mishandled the situation. I got a couple propositions for interviews, but I just told them someone had made a big mess of things and now my wife looked bad.

We managed to get all the new articles out to remove all references to the police doing a bad job, and immediately the story went from top of the headlines all the way to the bottom. Now that police incompetence was out of the picture, nobody cared.

I came home on Friday, a week after it started, to find my wife had skipped work and had been drinking all day. Everyone had been praising the Kiwi for standing up, but they were mad at my wife for not having the balls to take down the police. By this point my wife wished she had never gotten involved.

Anyway, sorry for length, but it took you less time to read this than it did for the daycare workers to let that poor little girl in out of the cold.
(racetraitor has an alibi for, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 2:59, 6 replies)

London Underground numpties
I commited a crime...
A long long time ago in a city many (thankful) miles away from my present location I was at the bottom of the M1 and wanted to be in Shepherds Bush. And I had 50p. Being ticketless on the tube was unpleasant in those days due to numpty uniformed numpties in all stations. So I bought a child fare from the ticket machine to the next station, travelled to Oxford Circus and changed to the Central Line without going through a ticket gate. I don't know why it is possible to do this at Oxford Circus but if you wander around long enough it just seems to happen. Got to Shepherds Bush and walked up to gate. Whereupon following conversation ensued.
Me "hello, I dropped my ticket in a gap in the floor by mistake so I can't show it too you."
Numpty "Lying hippy student scum, No you didn't. You're trying to cheat London Underground of a trivial amount of money. You evil bastard. I will prosecute you for millions. What station did you get on at?"
Me "(gives name of station at bottom of M1) Honest, I bought a ticket there."
Numpty "All our stations have cctv. I will check and then prosecute you you thieving hippy scumbag."
Me "Crack on..."
5 mins of thumb twiddling....
Numpty "You are on cctv at (station at bottom of the M1) buying a ticket from the ticket machine"
Me "Damm right I am tube numpty"
Numpty "Go home while I curse the evils of cctv"
Ha.
(godisdove I like cheese, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 2:43, 1 reply)

Walking back to the ship from the seaman's club
I was in Naples on a merchant ship. A colleague and I were walking back to the ship from the seaman's club, when out of an alley stepped a small Italian thug, he showed us his knife, my shipmate showed the thug a .30 caliber semi-automatic pistol, the thug ran back into the alley.

Apparently, my shipmate had been mugged in Spain some years before and always carried a gun, when he went ashore.

Moral: Never bring a knife to a gunfight.
(Dneprdave, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 2:25, Reply)

Helping him out
Guy upstairs from me was murdered. I didn't see it happen but I did say hello to him on the stairs a lot - no-one had told me that he had just been to prison for having sex with one of his teenage school charges. He always seemed nice and smilingly said hi to my son also when we met him so we both thought him a good egg.

Anyhow he met someone in prison who having killed him after sex cut up his body in the bath and put the bits into different wheeliebins.

Now the interesting bit of this story was that the death was discovered by a neighbourhood watch old biddie who looking out at 4am, to the deserted streets of suburban Edinburgh as one does at that time of the morning, saw two legs sticking out of one of the large communal bins and went out to help the person who had presumably fallen into that particular pit of refuse hell.

I get a certain malsatisfaction from imagining her reaction as she pulled the two legs to find the guy was a little lighter than she expected he would be.

Moral of the story: don't be nosey. Oh and don't fuck kiddies either. But mostly don't be nosey.
(beaverwastemanagement a real company. I want to work for them!, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 1:57, Reply)

A Confession
I've committed a crime.

After years of hatred and loathing I've finally got a shiny new MAC.

In my defence, I need one to test compatibility with various projects I'm working on and, also in mitigation, the first thing I did was load up Virtual Box and shoehorn XP onto it.

So now it sits there in my computer room looking all superior. Sneering at my my other machines.

Now it's very powerful (even more so since Apple fucked up the order and gave me twice the memory, twice the graphics card and double the hard disk) and it looks amazing but what does it actually *DO*?

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 1:01, 15 replies)

Is it legal?
I witness a crime every time I take a slash at work.

There's a CCTV camera in every gents bog. To stop the shitters being vandalised apparently.

Is it illegal? Company says no as law states CCTV can be used in order to "prevent criminal activity" which, according to them, overrides the clause saying CCTV cannot be used in public lavvies.

Any lawyers out there who can clarify? I can't complain cos they'll just make some shit up and sack me.

Oh and the union agreed to it :(
( P45 Sent by my Bosch 509e in the year 2000, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:53, 7 replies)

Might not count as a crime but....
I was involved in a car accident in Paris a few years ago. Me and my mate were driving about admiring the scenary when some drunk arse in a bloody great big mercedes decided to try and race us. I think he was trying to show off or something, anyway we managed to leave him for dead at an underpass.
(bluetuba has a special friend in Blue Label Smirnoff, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:51, Reply)

blue october
I saw them twenty feet away, and they still sucked.
I call them a crime.

That and he said he would eat me...

I believed every word.
Mainly because his mouth is big enough.
(fisherOfApples123 -=destroyer of toilets=-, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:37, Reply)

Shitloads
Due to the nature of my work I have witnessed:

3 non fatal shootings (You guys need to learn to fire a gun properly, not side on like on tv)

1 fatal shooting

Dozen or so Bank robberies

Shitloads of hit and runs (Be careful crossing the street)

3 Attempted suicides (a crime apparently)

2 Successful suicides (fucking horrible)

Oh and I almost forgot the serial killer that dragged someone off the street to her death.



apart from that, not much
( Terry Oblong There's nobody here but us chickens on, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:29, 4 replies)

Caring citizen?
As a student of politics and a true and devout believer in the virtue of the social contract I once had a wonderful opportunity to help out one of my fellow citizens.

Back when I lived on a road in East Oxford oft frequented by drunks and other midnight wanderers, I arrived home one late afternoon to find a Merc parked outside my house with the driver and rear-nearside windows wide open. This was obviously a mistake on the owners behalf as the doors had been carefully and meticulously locked.

I thought to myself "Bheroniphr, here is that moment you've been waiting for - it's not exactly a downed passenger jet but it will have to do." I wrote down the license and colour etc etc and proceeded into my house to call the filth.

-Good afternoon, Oxford Constabulary, Cowley Road station - how can I help you?

-Hi, I live on Div Road and some guy has parked his car outside my house and left his windows open. I thought it wise to inform you so you may try and let the driver know.

-Can you tell us what crime has been committed sir?

-Err, no crime, at least not yet. This chap has left his car wide open on my street, there's all kinds of stuff on his back seat and it's asking to be nabbed!

-Well, I'm afraid we can't help with that sir, no crime has been committed.

-Yes, but this is crime PREVENTION, you know like all those adverts on TV in the 80's about citizens and the Police working together to 'prevent crime'.

-Are you trying to be smart with me sir?

-What? No, of course not! I'm just saying that something should be done.

-What would you suggest we do sir?

-Well, you could trace his plate and somehow get a messge to him...

-I'm afraid we can't do that unless a crime has been committed sir.

-(Getting frustrated at this point) Look, how about I take something, like a map, out of his back seat and put it in my house. Then *tell you* I've taken it, that's theft then, isn't it. And you can call him. So some eejit doesn't come and steal his Merc and all the shiney things on his back seat.

-It's not a very wise thing to do to tell a Police Officer that you are about to commit a crime sir. We *would* have to arrest you if you did that.

-(Now very frustrated) Are you taking the fucking piss? I'm trying to do this bloke a favour and you're threatening to arrest me for it!

-DO NOT raise your voice and threaten police officers sir, that is a criminal offence. I'll be needing your address so we can send a couple of officers round to your house sir.

-(Hangs up quickly)

I PROMISE you that that conversation actually occurred. Car was gone the next day, whether via the hands of the rightful owner I can't tell you. I do hope this post inspires a copper to explain WTF that was all about or I will have to go on believing that rozzers are a bunch of cunts.

Oh, and one gave me a £30 fine for going on the pavement on my pedal bike last week. On Holloway Road. Whilst stood next to a crackhead. Go figure.



And I'll never apologise for the length. They love it!
(TheBenga Niggerrape, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:22, 4 replies)

I told of my crime....
but being the 8 year old attention seeking whore I was (hey, I'm 25 now and I still crave attention, but I've calmed down a lot) I had a tendency of lying. I know most kids do, but I doubt to this extent. Call it being an only child, call it a bad neighbourhood, being fat and bullied. I dunno. I don't like to assess my history. It's best staying where it is you know?

Anyway, apologies for my interruption. I was 8 or something similar and I lived in a crappy area. It wasn't terrible, but it had potential to be (and since has started to go badly with all the scummy kids). I thought I would play on this. Being the one for lying, I told a kid at school that I'd been approached by someone. I dunno why, I just thought it might be a tall tale we could laugh about. So, I told this guy Greg, and he seemed a bit impressed. Rock and roll. So told another kid, got some more gleeful looks. Cool.

Now, when I was young I used to go to school by my aunt, and she used to take me and pick me up from school as parents worked in City centre early/late and collected me from there on way home. So one morning I told her about my approachment for some strange reason. I thought it might be cool, hoping for the same kind of reaction, which I thought I got.

So, next evening, while I'm sitting in my room playing something, we had visitors. I was called down and it was two Police Officers. Wow, cool, I've never seen a copper close up. They seemed really friendly. Wanted to ask me about this 'man' I'd saw. "oh poop" thought I, now backed in to a corner in my mind because I've either got myself in a situation I will be found out in, or I'm gonna make up some random shit to try and remember so I could at least be semi-believable.

I was scared of my mom (and was for many years after. She passed away less than a year ago, and it still burns me that i was an ungrateful shit for so long) so I went with the 'make up something'. I wasn't a great liar under pressure though. I described some vague clothing, beard, greyish hair. "Was he wearing a hat?" Actually YES, this figment of my imagination was now wearing a hat. It was chequered..... "Really? A baseball cap, a flat cap?" No, I decided, or only knew one type of hat at the time and told them it was a chequered bowler hat. Now, I have forgot parts of this since, but I'm fairly sure they didn't ask me any more questions when I told them it was a bowler hat. I think at that point they sensed a false witness. I also think my parents did, but I'm not sure because we've never discussed it since, and I've never told them I lied.

It has played on my mind so long though because I feel so (a) ashamed for lying to that extent (b) embarrased for coming up with such bullshit story although I was young and hadn't a wealth of knowledge (c)amused that it went that far. Shit I'm such a twisted cunt sometimes.

Thanks for reading, and I know it's kind of off topic, but I did witness a crime, honestly.... Do you like me?? hee hee
( Mart No Fool No posts but lots of stalks recently., Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:17, 1 reply)

I unintentionally saw Bring Me the Horizon live
honest to god a crime against everything rock and heavy metal has accomplished since the late 70s. The wall of death in which no one bothered to actually run back into the room was especially painful to behold.
(serge-fabrizio taught the Talk to Frank robot to call him father, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 0:06, Reply)

Crime?
Last weeks QOTW...
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 14 Feb 2008, 23:56, 3 replies)