America's Dumbest Criminals - Season 3, Episode 16 - Chimney Surprise - Full Episode | Forensic Files

tonight on america's dumbest criminals just because santa can make it down chimneys why do crooks believe they can
do it too this cabbie isn't driving miss daisy but he'll definitely come out ahead and maybe just maybe this guy
should have called a cab instead of tempting fate you're destined for a head-on collision with these and other
frazzled folks right here on america's dumbest criminals [Music] wow [Applause] [Music]
[Applause] [Applause] all right now tonight we present a study in contrast actually uh much like you
and me what are you doing say look right step down there what are you doing yeah it's
avant-garde tv come on step down see all right look at this look i'm gepetto what you don't realize is that i'm 510.
he's eight one wow well sure with the shoes no this doesn't work i'm talking to your knees yeah but my knees are
listening heavy they're we'll be listening and conventional i think you were making a point though
yeah yeah that tonight's show is full of contrast well that it is we're going to
take you from high-tech surveillance to a guy who blames his driving problems on
a deer yeah yeah often our surveillance camera footage captures people who are clueless about electronic wonders but
not this next guy no not this next guy he wasn't just a novice in such wizardry he was a cell phone salesman watch how a
sticky fingered approach to computer software will clean his clock [Music] this employee of a cell phone franchise
thinks he has a great idea he'll go downstairs take a computer game off the shelf and return to his workspace in the
center of the university bookstore now here's the master plan download the program on his computer at
work and then transfer it to his computer at home but here's the problem four different cameras are following his
every move downstairs upstairs downstairs upstairs three trips in less than two hours and
every minute of it is on tape oh what are you looking at don't be silly those cameras aren't on yeah it's just a
prop really it is isn't this fun playing games at work and nobody knows i've got to tell somebody
about this just two weeks earlier co-workers had teased him about not wearing shoes at
work they had seen his bare feet on camera and told him to put on his shoes if only he had put on his thinking cap
instead [Music] some people break the rules plain and simple others however try bending them
and bending them until they snap back and whack them right in the face watch it all right that's the case with
this guy who isn't exactly a drunk driver or is he his unconventional approach earns him a place in something
to remember me by [Music] i was dispatched to a prowler call and as i'm arriving in the area we get a
description of the vehicle that the prowler's supposed to be in from our dispatcher
the dispatcher gives us the description as i'm passing by a quick shop right there i noticed that there's a vehicle
parked in the lot that looks exactly like the one that they had put out they also put out a description of the person
that was driving it so i pull up into the quick shop and go inside there's only one guy inside so
i go up and talk with him say hey is this your truck outside and he says no no not my truck
so at that point i basically told him that i knew it was his truck and i knew that he was drunk because the
guy was staggering as he was walking around the quick shop smelled real bad from alcohol no no no that's something
that's not my coffee i tell him i know you're drunk so just don't get in your car and drive you need to walk home
and we won't have any problems otherwise i'm going to have to rest for dui just go walk on home
okay okay so he walks off i leave the store i see him leave he walks about a half block away i go around the corner
and sit and wait because i know this guy's most likely going to be back to drive off
as i'm sitting there watching i see him walk back up onto the parking lot and pretty soon i see the vehicle leaving
only he's not sitting in the driver's seat instead he's running alongside of her driving it with his right hand stuck
in the window and i thought maybe somebody was pushing but when it cleared into my view i could
tell nobody else was helping him so i pull up behind him and turn on my red lights and as i do that he looks
back and kind of loses control of the vehicle at that point and just about crashes into the curb trying
to get the vehicle stopped i walk up to him and say what are you doing because i'm thinking this guy's really an idiot
and he looks at me and says well you can't arrest me for dui i wouldn't drive i was walking turn around get your hands
up against the vehicle his basic point was that since he wasn't inside the vehicle he couldn't be arrested for dui
that didn't consider driving totally i was walking home put your hands up against the vehicle give me your hand
behind your back so basically i ended up arresting the guy for what i call dw rui
driving while running under the influence which though in some states is called a
pui with that or pushing under the influence yeah same thing it's happened so often that we have come
up with a name for it it's santa syndrome it's the insane belief that crooks hold that they can sneak and
slither their way through ducks chimneys and other objects that are always smaller than they appear yeah our latest
victim put the squeeze play on himself in a home where he could have become a permanent fixture let's go up on the
rooftop to fish out our latest victim of the santa syndrome santa zooms up the chimney with the
blink of an eye this would be rather required a crane and a firefighting unit instead of
making off making a smoking exit with stolen goods he sat tight very tight what was it like in there
rather dirty and real tight there wasn't a lot of air in there based on the way this guy is moving this soot-covered
fellow won't be returning to cinders anytime soon hopefully this little slip up and slide
down have taught him a lesson that'll help him stay clean after all everyone else knows that grime doesn't pay
[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] hey check out this dumb law in oklahoma it is illegal to fish for whales
some kids wonder how some laws come into existence well our next story is a head
scratcher as well but it's an excuse not a law and not just any excuse the story
this guy told was strange enough to be enthroned among america's dumbest excuses
[Music] guy's involved in an accident we show up and he says hey this wouldn't happen if
that deer just would use the crosswalk and then he went on to describe the deer to us as being big brown and eyes that
glowed in the dark so we had something to look forward to christians hate it when wildlife doesn't
follow the rules daniel oh yeah oh i guess that rebellious streak is what put the wild in wildlife
huh well tonight's blue light special is a little gem about a wild man who saved
officers a lot of trouble to catch him so listening for drugs they didn't need undercover officers or unmarked cars no
sting operations or wiretaps the only way it could have made it easier on them is if he driven himself
to the jail and locked himself up see what we mean i was working undercover a few years ago
in narcotics division and i was doing some cold hits at the layton hills mall and i saw these guys and and
went up to him yo mike mike oh wait a minute you're not mike never mind i'll see you later and he goes wait wait
what do you want and i said well i'm just looking for a pipe man me and my buddy over there we just scored some bud
and we want to blaze up and we'll pinch you a big old butt if you can can just give us a pipe and and he said well let
me ask my friend he talks to his friend and his friend says sorry we don't have a pipe okay see you later and i turned
to walk away and and he said well wait a minute come here just a minute and so i
walked up to i said what do you want he goes you know anybody wants to buy some crank
oh funny you should ask i didn't have any buy money on me at the time so i pointed to my partner who was parked in
a swat truck about 50 feet away had red and blues right on the front of the swat
truck i said i don't do that stuff but my partner there he he loves to tweak my buddy there so if you can give me the
stuff i'll go show it to him if he thinks it's good man we'll buy it from you because i wanted to see his doe so
he pulls the dope out he gives it to me and he looked right at the sweat truck too and i thought oh my gosh i blew it
he's gonna see those red and blues it's never gonna work now and i couldn't believe the idiot still
sold me the dope even after seeing those red and blues like this guy's really stupid
man there's a reason why builds called doe yep here's something to keep in mind an
id with something added can easily become the word idiot that's what you'll find spelled out in our next tale let's
take a little road trip to orem utah we got a call on back in september of two guys who had
gone into a local computer store to fill out an application for credit for some laptop computers
the problem was they'd been in the same store two months earlier and had ripped that store off for one of their laptops
on a previous time the clerk recognized them and called us when they saw they were filling out this the second
application they got a little bit hinky and left while they were supposedly checking out
this credit application when we pulled them over we found that they each had two phony california drivers licenses
with the same name all the information in fact everything was the same except for the photos which were the two
bad guys that's a pretty easy case to make when they make it that easy for you by using
the same name for both guys [Applause] [Music] [Applause] coming up later a man with multiple
marks on his record doesn't know when to quit but now with news that contradicts
the theory of evolution here's daniel with abc headlines [Applause] [Music] [Applause]
a man in columbia missouri was pulled over for driving without his headlights on no big deal right but he feared that
he was being stopped for driving with a suspended license or for possession of marijuana
to avoid further problems he identified himself as his brother bad choice his brother was currently being sought
for two outstanding arrest warrants okay growing more panicky he assaulted the officer and fled only to be captured
the next day and have eight charges filed against him he should have quit while he was ahead you know
to make his getaway from a bank robbery in traverse city michigan the unarmed man demanded the keys to a car belonging
to one of the tellers he ran out of the door and immediately they called police when officers arrived they found the
frustrated suspect still in the parking lot trying to figure out how to drive a stick
shift you know he thought his getaway would be automatic but you know maybe not just any car we'll do
in a clutch huh 30 fugitives responded to a phony contest sponsored by state and federal
officers in gary indiana all were seated awaiting the announcement that they had
won valuable prizes when the curtains opened and outstepped 20 uniformed officers
with cups in hand one of the disillusioned felons reportedly asked do i still get my tv
and that closes the file on adc headlines news ripped from somewhere near the back of your local newspaper
debbie just how much is a friendship worth if a friend ran out of gas and needed help
you'd probably come to the rescue huh but what if that out of gas vehicle was stolen from your place of business now
that complicates matters well that's only the beginning of problems for our next crook take a look
we got a call from a sheriff's department in arizona regarding the truck that was stolen from a business
there seems the employee taken the truck drove to vegas or to our area didn't have any gas so he called back to
the employer asking to get some money wired 24 gas that's dumb employee there called police
department knowing the truck was stolen they relayed the information dust he still parked at the gas pumps when we
got there he snuck up behind that took him out of gunpoint placed him under arrest
what he didn't realize is he had nine thousand dollars underneath the front seat of that truck and the nine thousand
dollars was that week's payroll could have gone out and bought gas bought some new truck and played a lot of slots in
vegas [Laughter] hey now you've always heard the expression things go better with coke
well not in this case here's another expression that's appropriate old habits die hard and for this guy he couldn't
have been in a worse place for that truth to come to light here's this week's dim-witted chapter of um where
you who [Music] one night i arrested a young man for possession of rock cocaine he was taken to jail and showed up about
a week later for his preliminary hearing in court while walking into the courthouse
he was passing through the metal detector and set it off right at about the same time the judge is walking
through the courtroom doors out towards the lobby area where the metal detector was the bailiff at the
court made the young man empty his pockets into a tray next to the metal detector he was unaware that he had
brought three rocks of cocaine into the courtroom with him and set them down the
tray right in front of the judge so in addition to the count of possession of rock cocaine that i arrested him for the
judge gave him another count right there and sentenced him to jail he should have
known the rock didn't roll most people are at least a little bit embarrassed when they get a ticket or
are charged with breaking the law but not this guy he's fighting back with some very original logic
one day i noticed the vehicle was speeding down the freeway checked the license plate and it came out stolen so
i turn on the lights and siren the vehicle speeds up and he's all over the road running off in front of cars trying
to run cars off the road eventually gets off the freeway runs red lights just all
kinds of dangerous stuff well eventually we even have to sort of ram the vehicle
to get it to pull over and stop and pin it the guy even fights with us trying to
get out of the car well he cools down we get him in the car in handcuffs and he's
actually being quite friendly he says well what are you guys going to charge me with suddenly read off this long list
of all the charges all the felonies against him you know evading arrest stolen car no license uh you know uh
being under the influence of drugs and i said oh yeah and you weren't wearing your seat belts guys get real big and he
says wait a minute wait a minute all right i stole a car and i was driving without a license tonight i was
resisting arrest but i had my seat belt on no way you can pin me down without wearing my seat belt
i was wearing my seat belt all right all right i have my seat belt on [Applause]
[Music] [Applause] now we come to our last story of the evening which centers around a relaxing
drive in the country well drive yes relaxing no what it actually was was a setup for a crook to rob the taxi driver
but we don't think his mental meter was running because of what he did next see how justice is swiftly dispatched in
tonight's episode of we're not making this up [Music] a couple of weeks ago there was a
man hired taxi cab and he had the taxi driver just ride around randomly from place to place
finally ended up on a country road over here in chesapeake and at that point he decided to rob the
cab driver that'd be a good time to pull over come on give me your money come on
that's all you've got that's it get out of here and the cab left and of course called in
the robbery well the robber found out that he was out on a country road with nowhere to get back to town
so he went to a house nearby and called the cab company he called the same cab company and
talked to the same dispatcher that he talked to earlier was the dispatcher recognized his voice called
the police cab driver went up and picked up a police detective they went to the country road and picked up the suspect
right near where he was let off and arrested him on the spot i just wanted a cab put your left hand
behind your back [Applause] [Music] [Applause] just call him one of america's dumbest
criminals but unfortunately he's far from alone in wearing that title and we'll be adding more crooks to the
lineup so make sure you join us next week and if you've got a lead on a story or you just can't wait till next week
for more state of the art stupidity visit our website at www.dumbcrimes.com to put it simply committing any crime is
dumb that's the underlying truth we bring each week and every week we want to make sure that we recognize the law
enforcement officers who work really hard to help protect us and keep us from harm's way we thank them for the job
they do and we thank you for joining us tonight as always we hope that we've all
learned from others mistakes but if you haven't we just might see you next week on america's dumbest criminal goodbye
[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] wow [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]
you

In this episode of “America’s Dumbest Criminals,” we’ll witness a few criminals who try to play “Santa” and dive down a chimney, a cab driver who gets the best of a passenger and a man who should have just called a ride.

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

Criminals make foolish mistakes, from stealing software to calling a cab after a robbery.

Key points

Driving While Running Under the Influence. A man tries to evade DUI charges by running alongside his car.
Santa Syndrome. A crook believes he can sneak through chimneys, but it doesn't end well.
Dumb Criminals Caught in the Act. A man tries to rob a taxi but ends up calling the same cab company for help.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

You can’t arrest me for DUI, I wouldn’t drive!

5:49WatchMar 3, 2022

Tension

40/ 100Low tension

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