America's Dumbest Criminals - Season 2, Episode 9 - Shell Shocked - Full Episode | Forensic Files

[music playing] -Hi. I'm Daniel Butler. Welcome to another edition of "America's Dumbest Criminals."
[music playing] ANNOUNCER: On this episode of "America's Dumbest Criminals," a loony landlord in "Shell Shocked," silly swindlers
in "Swipe and Wipe," a harried hoodlum in "Heist Anxiety," a repeat performance in "Rice Man Cometh."
-You don't remember me? -I don't know you. -Three years ago. I've been promoted.
ANNOUNCER: All this and more coming up on "America's Dumbest Criminals." Here's your host, Daniel Butler.
-Sometimes a dumb criminal can be as close as your own front door, and even someone that you know, like your landlord.
That's what Bob and Deb Sherwood of Novato, California, found out. But they hatched a scheme to scramble
their egg-tossing manager's rampage. They set up a camera to watch their car over a series
of weeks and were able to capture some eggs-cellent footage of their crafty poacher.
Grumpty Dumpty broke one of their windshield wipers, then came back and tossed an egg.
Then the next day, another. Then a few days later, another. Then another day, some spray paint.
And of course, more eggs. The Sherwoods had enough footage for the police to crack the case and send our hard-boiled creep
over easy to court. [music playing] The police photographer plays an important role
in every investigation. Photographs can preserve vital clues left at the scene of a crime.
And sometimes, the photographs are taken by the criminal himself. The restaurant needed some European charm,
explained the owner, so he imported a 19th century Venetian statue worth $50,000.
It stood in the foyer, until workers discovered it missing one morning. The case went unsolved for weeks.
But when a probation officer paid a regular home visit one of his case subjects, he noticed
the guy's new interest in fine art. -You like fine art now? MAN: Uh, wait-- no. No.
That's, uh-- POLICE OFFICER: Interesting is what it is. Very interesting. MAN: Yeah.
-You know, these look like the statues that were taken a couple weeks ago we got flyers on.
DANIEL BUTLER: Unable to sell the cumbersome loot, the thief dumped it on the beach,
but not before posing for a few intimate Kodak moments with the statue. The statue never made it back to the restaurant.
But the artless dodger has been put on display just a few blocks away, in a little room
down at the local prison. [music playing] Perhaps we place too much faith in machines and not enough
in our own common sense. But what do you do if you possess neither? -An officer at Fremont made a traffic stop.
And they pulled the driver over. And the driver stopped and suddenly threw open the door,
jumped out of the car, took his, his radar detector and threw it on the ground, smashing it to bits.
And then he started jumping up and down on the bits. And he started yelling. He says, I paid $200 for this damned radar detector.
And there it sat on my dashboard not making a sound while I drove right by you. DANIEL BUTLER: Unfortunately, our mad motorist
acted a bit too soon. MARK HUTCHINS: And the officer looked he said, I wasn't stopping you for speeding.
Your taillight's out. -Haste obviously made waste of this basket case. [music playing]
Some crooks are doomed by their own lack of imagination. Officer Larry Rice of Jamesville, New York,
had such a case twice. This guy was arrested for keying cars in a shopping mall parking lot.
He then began threatening the officer with repercussions for his actions. He said he was Steven Rice, the nephew
of Larry Rice, a sergeant on the force. Only problem was that the arresting officer was Larry Rice.
-What does this say? DANIEL BUTLER: About three years later, Officer Rice arrests
a guy at a different mall, this type for shoplifting. Once again, the officer seemed to have encountered
a long-lost member of his own family, the same Steven Rice. But as often happens over time, the suspect's uncle,
Larry Rice, was now a captain. MAN: Yes. The captain of-- LARRY RICE: The Larry Rice?
Captain Larry Rice? -Yes. Yeah. -Of this department? -Yes, sir. That's who-- -You've got to be kidding me.
-Pssh. I ain't kidding. I'm not stuttering, am I? -This guy. You don't remember me, do you?
DANIEL BUTLER: The officer told his nephew the story didn't work the first time and it was even dumber the second.
Officer Rice says he's amused that the suspect promoted him in the second story.
If the suspect goes for a three-peat, he hopes to be named police chief. Hi. I'm Daniel Butler and this is the sizzling Beaumont Bacon.
-Hello. -They're fast and funny. -They're bleak and indiscreet. They're foolish felons trying to outrun the long arm of the law,
and not getting very far. -Nope. Making the most of the carpool lane, an Orange, New Jersey,
gentleman was arrested for stealing a 40-foot commuter bus. --[laughter] He wanted the big-- lot of room.
He had a lot of luggage, I guess. -Livin' large. His reason for the crime, I needed a ride home.
An unusual twist to the story, he did stop to pick up a few passengers along the way,
even charging the correct fare. -That is so sweet. -He was not charged with kidnapping.
-But he did require the exact change, didn't he? -Yeah. And he gave transfers. -God love him for that.
Well, maybe this daredevil dummy from Baltimore should've taken the bus instead of the police
for a thrill ride. He led the police on a fast chase to a low bridge over a small stream.
The faux Fairbanks jumped off the bridge seeking to make his escape into the waters below.
However, he missed the stream entirely and hit the rocky bank below. -Nuh-uh. -Broke both legs.
You ask my mother, he did. Yes, this loser was led not kicking, but definitely screaming, directly to jail.
-He didn't pass Go or collect his $200, did he? -No sir. -Neither did this Montgomery, Alabama, moron.
He was stopped by patrol officers for driving a brand new pickup truck with no tags.
-And with no brains. That's against the law. -Yeah. I'm afraid so. When asked for his license, the driver replied,
I don't have one, and took off running. The police were unable to catch him, but fingerprints were obtained from inside the vehicle.
The officers returned to the truck-- to its dealership. BEAUMONT BACON: That's a good thing to do.
-They did. And the next day the same truck was reported stolen again. BEAUMONT BACON: The same truck?
-The same truck. The police found the vehicle parked outside a shopping mall. -With the thief's name and address
spray-painted probably right across the windshield. -Well, you're not far off, Beaumont.
This time, they found a phone book and marijuana in the front seat. After contacting a few of the thief's nearest and dearest
listed in the address book, the police reached Aunt Mary, who led them to the house
of the same suspect. Fingerprints from a previous marijuana charge allowed the officers to search the residence,
where they found the vehicle's keys, and for a second time, their man. -Again. Talk about a one-truck mind.
-Yeah. -And now for our Vidiot of the week. From all the stories we've gotten this week,
this ranks up there with the dumbest. -Way up. -This is number one. An officer in Indianapolis received a report of a burglary
at a local paint store. The owner had reason to believe that a recently-fired employee
might be the culprit. The officer got the canned con's name and address and drove by to check it out.
The officer was greeted at the door by the man's wife. She immediately said-- -If you're looking for my husband, he ain't here.
BEAUMONT BACON: The woman refused to give any additional information about the location
of her shady spouse or any knowledge of his crime. The officer started to leave, then turned and asked one more
quick question before she got into her house. POLICE OFFICER: One question. Do you know what he did with all the paint cans?
-Oh, those. I think he threw them in the backyard. POLICE OFFICER: OK. Thank you.
Have a nice day. -Gee. Thanks, honey. -I mean to say, wasn't that nice of her? -Oh, yeah.
Husbands and wives working together. [music playing] The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
But sometimes, our fears get the best of us no matter what we try, as this dumb criminal found out
recently. In Boston, a security guard reported a possible break-in at a building across the street.
But when police arrived on the scene, the suspect was nowhere to be found, until they looked up on the roof.
He was spotted hiding on the dark side of the building, which is where he had evidently fled
when he heard the police arrive. They ordered the man to come down. But he refused, saying only, I can't move.
I can't move. They found the guy lying on his stomach with a crowbar pressed to his chest.
He was so terrified of heights that he just froze and had to be finally carried down on a ladder by local firefighters.
But they did promise to give him the bottom bunk in his jail cell. Whew. [music playing]
These next two criminals thought they deserved an A-plus for dreaming up this one-stop shopping plan.
A is for ambition. And these morons had plenty of it. Forging stolen chicks is an art, and takes
a keen eye and a steady hand. A also stands for action. The plan now required a quick getaway
before the clerk got suspicious. So they walked directly to the store's automotive department
to pick up their car, which they'd dropped off earlier that morning for servicing.
Meanwhile, the store clerk discovered the ruse and quickly told the mechanic to stall
the guys until police could arrive. Surveillance cameras followed them to automotive,
where the self-proclaimed artists got the bad news. Their car wouldn't be ready until the following day.
The mechanic proceeded to barrage the guys with an overwhelming list of diagnostic terminology,
enough to distract them until the police arrived just a few minutes later. Hey, but the day was not a total loss.
The forgers learned a valuable lesson. A also stands for arrest. While some dumb terminals are not so clever,
they can definitely be persistent. Our next motor-stealing moron had just been arrested that morning by an officer
and was released on his own recognizance. It was the end of the day and our officer
was in the police headquarters parking lot getting ready to transfer into his own private car.
Suddenly, the dispatcher comes on the radio saying that from her office window she could see someone breaking into her truck,
just 100 yards away from the officer. He quickly got out of his cruiser and approached the man to discover
it was the same criminal he had arrested earlier. POLICE OFFICER: You in the car, get out.
You again? You just been released for stealin' cars. What are you stealing cars again for?
MAN: But officer, you took the car I used to get here. How did you expect me to get back?
-Ever heard of the bus? [music playing] This next story gives new meaning to the word deficient.
We may have to give these criminals an award for displaying stupidity above and beyond socially-accepted standards.
After months of planning their escape from a North Carolina detention facility, the bozos finally make their break.
But they were not counting on Sergeant Hannah Dowry driving by at the exact moment of their desperate move.
Sergeant Dowry was off duty, out of uniform, and unarmed. But that didn't stop her from fingering the escapees.
One of the escapees was so startled he fainted dead away. MAN: You shot him! MAN: You shot him!
SERGEANT DOWRY: Shut up. He's not shot. DANIEL BUTLER: Sergeant Dowry was able to hold the men until correctional officers came
to the scene. When asked how these clueless cons could have mistaken her manicured finger for a loaded gun,
Sergeant Dowry replied, I don't guess they get out much at all. [music playing] Sometimes you get a criminal in such a bad position
that it's stupid for them not to confess to his crime. Some military policeman at the Army's Fort Devens
in Massachusetts during the Vietnam War had just such an experience. It seems there had been a small rash of thefts on the base.
And kids from the local high school were the prime suspects. When the sergeant encountered two soldiers who
looked a bit off, he thought he had his men. SERGEANT: What unit you in, son? MAN: We're from the 58th Engineer Brigade, sir.
DANIEL BUTLER: And that's when the sergeant called their bluff. SERGEANT: Guess what, son.
I got good news for you. We're shipping out. It's time to go to 'Nam. War's a'callin', boys!
Let's go! Let's go! Move it out! Move it out! Move it, move it, move it! DANIEL BUTLER: Of course, the kids
admitted that they weren't really in the Army, and also confessed to the thievery.
In this case, it was clearly a much better solution than sticking to their guns, literally.
[music playing] An officer answered a silent burglar alarm at a local fast food restaurant at about 3:00 in the morning.
Almost immediately, he was on the burglar's trail, a trail of weenies. It was a simple matter for officers
to follow the markers right across the alley to the back door of the first house across the street.
The door was open. He continued through the living room to the bedroom, where they found three more boxes of frozen wieners
and the thief, who was arrested on the spot. POLICE OFFICER: Put the wieners down
and put your hands up in the air. Put the wieners down and put your hands up in the air.
-It was a perfectly understandable crime when the police learned the thief's motive.
He simply replied, I was hungry. Our next story is proof positive that couch potatoes do not make good crooks.
Here's a hopeless criminal who just couldn't get the picture. An armed robber in Michigan was full of bright ideas
one evening. Idea number one, hold up a convenience story at midnight. Idea number two, empty the store clerk's pocket,
as well as the cash register. But when he stumbled on the remote alarm control, he ran out of ideas and luck.
MAN: What's this, huh? DANIEL BUTLER: Little did our dime store dummy know, one push of the button would trigger a silent alarm
and alert police, who were right around the corner. -Off. On. Off. Is it on? Is it on or off?
Hey! Off. On. -This idiot is getting a clear picture today. Crime doesn't pay. [music playing]
If there's a fake Fort Knox somewhere full of fool's gold, these guys would probably try to rob it.
Seems that the buzz boosters thought that the local bartending school would be a good source of liquor.
So they broke in and stole all the bottles that were set out on the counter. However, when they got back to their house,
they soon realized that the vodka was water, the whiskey and the bourbon were tea.
If they had done a little homework instead of getting drunk all the time, they would have found out
that those liquors were there for looks, not crooks. [music playing] When criminals confess, they usually
have some reason for their inability to conform to the laws of society. This pathetic perpetrator from Denver
might just qualify for the moronic motive of the month award. After responding to a call, two officers
arrested a man who was attempting to rob a local convenience store. They quickly cuffed him and were quite surprised
to hear him suddenly blurt out his reason for committing the bungled burglary. -I'm glad you caught me.
Tired of my wife always saying I can't do anything right. This will prove it to her.
-Sure will. I'll prove you can't do anything right. Come on. DANIEL BUTLER: Oh, yeah.
He showed her. And they showed him to the nearest jail. [music playing] Usually cleaning up their act is what
criminals do when they go straight. But for the truly dumb ones, it's just a new way to get into trouble.
Here in tiny Hanson, Idaho, a quartet of robbers smashed their way into the local grocery store.
As you can see from this actual footage, they briskly passed by the open, full cash register
and ran further into the market, only to return later with loot that is undoubtedly
priceless, as in very, very funny. As you can see, cradled in their arms are rolls and rolls of toilet paper,
as well as paper towels and cigarettes, which they promptly dropped in the parking lot.
Yes, folks. It was a classic case of swipe and wipe. But the crooks did not get away clean.
Chief of Police John T. Casey reports that the video helped arrest all 4 men within 32 hours of the crime.
Yahoo. [music playing] Well, our bumbling buffet is now closing. But please, join us next week as we serve up another heapin'
helpin' of hapless hoodlums here on "America's Dumbest Criminals." [music playing]
ANNOUNCER: The laughs just keep coming on the next episode of "America's Dumbest Criminals."
A creeping crook in "Crate Escape," a couple of bungling boys in "Bad News Boobs."
[explosion] Gotta be the shoes. MAN: Hey, I didn't steal these shoes. ANNOUNCER: A couple of perps make a pit stop.
All this and more on the next episode of "America's Dumbest Criminals." [music playing]
-Working around the schools in LA, you always catch kids outta-- ditching school.
I had this one, one kid I remember. He was probably in the eighth grade. And jumped over the fence and ran right into my police car.
And I thought I was going to have to have a traffic unit come over and take an accident report,
because he ran actually into the side of my car, because he was looking back to see
if anybody was, uh, had seen him. So he was stunned. I was a little stunned. And I said, where you going?
He said, I have to go home and turn over my roast or else it will burn. [laughter]
MAN: This is an eighth-grader. -Eighth-grader. That was probably one of the best excuses I've ever
heard in 20 years in law enforcement. So rather than taking him in and-- to the school and maybe
he would get suspended for ditching, I made a deal. I said, tomorrow I will be back at the school.
And I expect to have a slice of roast. And if there's no roast, you're in trouble.
MAN: You're toast. -So the next day I showed up at the school. Sure enough we had about three slices of roast for me.
To this day I don't know if he was actually going home to turn over the roast or if he had
his mom make some roast that night. [music playing] [music playing]

In this episode of "America's Dumbest Criminals," idiots will get "Shell Shocked," attempt the "Swipe and Wipe," experience "Heist Anxiety" and we'll witness the "Rice Man Cometh."

Crime is no laughing matter, except when the criminals are bumbling fools. Hosted by Debbie Alan and Daniel Butler, this show looks at lawbreakers through a humorous lens.

Brief Summary

This episode covers bizarre criminal antics, including a vandalizing landlord and clueless robbers stealing toilet paper.

Key points

Egg-tossing Landlord. Bob and Deb Sherwood set up a camera to catch their egg-tossing landlord.
Radar Detector Meltdown. A driver destroys his radar detector only to find he wasn't being stopped for speeding.
The One-Truck Mind. A thief steals a truck, only to be caught twice with the same vehicle.
The Paint Can Confession. A wife inadvertently reveals her husband's crime while denying knowledge of him.
The Wieners Trail. Police follow a trail of stolen hot dogs to catch a hungry thief.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Sometimes a dumb criminal can be as close as your own front door.

Introduction to a story about a landlord.

1:13WatchFeb 17, 2022

Tension

40/ 100Low tension

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