Escape the Law by Hot Air Balloon | Statute of Limitations hosted by Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino | Forensic Files

hey it's your boy Mike The Situation Santino welcome to statute of limitations it's the ultimate lineup
it's Cooks this is not my fault that I stole this car it's conman this is my chance I can be rich for life it's w to
be King Pins we all made together $500,000 and queen pins it was basically a lounge of
criminals these are stories of the non-violent lucky punks and Robin hoods that Dodge the law I could have gone to
prison not jail prison because here's the situation baby it's only a matter of time before the statute of limitations
is up and technically you might walk away Scot free but don't take her from me me guys I'm obviously no lawyer this
is statute of limitations what's up guys I'm Mike situation stino were charging ahead with
two people who waited long enough time to talk about their incredible crimes if you were in Iowa a few decades back you
may have seen Bob you know the guy with the giant toothbrush who passed overhead
and Pablo a man who stole from stores using his own checkbook all right this one comes from a guy in Iowa with a
taste for Mischief the prank toothbrush hey y for stealing this guys it's a mouthful meet
Bob my name is Bob and back in the80s I created the ultimate crime in stealing the Gentle Dental
toothbrush CP is back in the ' 80s growing up was a great City kind of a really good workingman town a lot of uh
industry there I love to fast motorcycles and fast cars everyone knew me as kind of an adrenaline junkie kind
of one to always like to push the envelope outside the city was a lot of rural Farmland so it's kind of known for
its agriculture a lot of corn fields I love to hot air balloon that was always a big thrill for me if someone says hey
let's do it I was the first one in line I was ready to go I was wanted to be the
lead dog and so there's always something to do on Cedar Rapids and when I say something do something
mischievous drinking who didn't love to drink all of my friends and I would always get together whoever had the best
Happy Hour in town kind of told some of the things we did for the week some of the things we were having planned for
the weekend and what trouble we could get into we came out of our favorite bar one night and that time we saw a new
dental office went in across the street called Gentle Dental and looked up and couldn't believe our eyes they had like
a giant toothbrush above the door I mean it was massive from across the street and we're thinking how cool is that and
so instantly I'm thinking in the back of my mind how cool is that to take each week we'd go by and I'd walk
out of that place and I'm like kind of mesmerized with it every time I saw this toothbrush it was like calling me to
just take me and I think I must have you a couple of my friends said hey what are
you planning you got that look in your eye and I said well you know that toothbrush would beat any road sign in
my garage I think that would be a great souvenir as we're sitting there talking about that shooting some pool throwing
back some shots like we normally do back on a Friday night we all thought man this is our next big
act so the general dental office on First Avenue which was one of the main thorough fares in Cedar raid was a
converted house twostory into a Beautiful dental office surrounded by bushes with a giant toothbrush right
there so as I'm kind of going in there and doing some Recon during the day I I knew one time you know I could get by
with maybe not uh being noticed the second time I knew it was going to take a little more planning I'm going to have
to kind of go in and scope out the inside kind of see how the laid out is so I went in there and acting like I
wanted to be a new patient what some of the requirements are but I'm really there kind of scoping out the inside
seeing by chance if there's anything hooked on the inside of the building that's holding that toothbrush up there
I noticed it was sitting on a post that kind of maneuvered over to an L bracket and it was wired to both so I
knew I'd have to cut it free from the post and at that point cut it free from the L bracket I was going to need some
wire cutters and I was thinking maybe more like bolt cutters cuz I I couldn't tell what gauge the wire was it was way
above the anything that I could reach so I knew it was going to take at least a step ladder of some sort and that's when
I knew this is more than a onep person job I need calling a couple of my friends that I knew I could trust I
could keep a secret so as we're planning this out I have a bar napkin and I'm writing
everything down step by step pickup truck big tarp bolt cutters everything that we need for this Caper I knew I had
to keep this kind of really low on the radar you know it took me a few weeks to kind of see the traffic flow at night
what was going on being one of the busiest streets in Cedar Rapids and right across from one of the busiest
bars was going to create a challenge I'm thinking okay I'm kind of a little nervous I'm like are these guys
going to show up I'm like I don't know I've never done anything this big before are we doing the right thing and sure
enough once they showed up I'm like okay there's no turning back now it's on at that time we were all kind of in hot air
ballooning so you know our plan was get the toothbrush get it loaded up in the pickup and then take it to a place
around 6:00 in the morning for our usual morning launch put it in the hot a balloon bring the balloon down we pack
up and take off so they're again all amped ready to go all primed and here he comes and Billy rolls up up and I'm was
hoping he's had his dad's pickup well he doesn't he rolls up in his small little
car and I'm like what are you doing with this small car you knew what we needed and he was saying hey he couldn't get it
this is all he could get and I knew at that point plans have changed now we have to figure a new way to make this
thing fit cuz it's almost bigger than the car itself we kind of come rolling around the corner of the dental office
and at that point I have a little step ladder we throw it down have the bull Cutters I jump up on the step ladder
clip it off the post the first time and and then as we take the little step lat over to the other one realizing the
angle at this there's no way I can even reach it Billy you're going to have to boost me I need some help we can't reach
this thing and I kind of BRAC myself against the house and he's a little shaky so our other friend quickly comes
in helps me boost knowing that we have to get this done quick and as we're doing it's still kind of shaky up there
but I get up there and as I clip that thing that toothbrush comes swinging down and caught Billy in the rips I
can't even hold on anymore so it basically takes us all out so the truth bu crashed to the ground around didn't
even realize it hit Billy cuz everything happened so fast and this dental office
like I said is a converted two-story house in the middle of a residential neighborhood on a busy thoroughfare so
immediately a couple of lights come on and we're like oh crap what do we do now and at that point we're just picking
this thing up you know and he's just complaining that a you know toothbrush hit him and we're trying to carry this
thing out of there as fast as we can so as we loaded this toothbrush up realizing it's way bigger than the
vehicle we had and it's sticking out we didn't know what to do so we covering this thing the best we can and this is
probably now about oh 5 5:15 in the morning we knew our first few rows we had to drive down was First Avenue which
is our busy intersection so we were on that for just a for a few blocks until we could get onto the back roads and
then we knew it was a much safer and cleaner getaway so as we're going down the back
roads all of a sudden the car has engine problems and I'm thinking no way are you
kidding me right here and we're getting close to where we have to be for our hot
air balloon launch we limp this thing along as far as we can until we couldn't go any further and we knew we were still
pretty close so at that point we had to take the toothbrush out and leg it the rest of the
way okay so as we show up to the field to get ready to launch this balloon they look at just like what are you doing
with that toothbrush I said hey we have a new passenger it wants to take a ride with you so at that point we put the
toothbrush in the balloon and off we go we're just kind of sailing just a beautiful morning just floating just
effortlessly having the toothbrush TST us pilot and I are just laughing thinking oh my God what a great story
this is going to be and I'm kind of telling him how we pulled this off and talking about that he's wanted me to
tell him every detail how this happened and so we're really not paying attention and next thing you know off
one of these small country roads we kind of look in front of us and realize some
power lines coming up he's trying to what we call burn which is to get heat into the balloon to raise it quick
enough but realizing we're not going to do it in time and we see these wires we know we're going to clip
them dude if you're headed for some power lines with a giant toothbrush does that mean you're about to have a big
electric toothbrush sounds like a risky situation now we all know he lived otherwise he wouldn't be here to tell
the story but it was close we've got the shocking conclusion of Bob's Story coming up next on statute of
limitations welcome back guys to statute of limitations where our boy Bob just stole a giant toothbrush and he's making
his getaway in a hot air balloon of all things he's headed straight for some power lines this definitely not a good
situation he's about to have a brush with death literally just watch this he's trying to what we call burn
which is to get heat into the balloon to raise it quick enough but realizing we're not going to to do it in time and
we see these wires we know we're going to clip them we're bracing to hit these wires so
the bottom of the basket catches these wires going through and if you've ever seen power lines you just snap there's
just a huge electrical charge that goes through it so you can just see some of the Sparks going through and at that
time we knew we got to get this balloon down quick not only do we crash with some power lines but I have a stolen
toothbrush with me on top of it and then the pilot says to me I'm not going to jail for this so let's get this thing
packed up and out of here the chase crew comes up immediately after we set the balloon down we knew we had to get that
out of there quickly so we load that envelope up into the big bag we have and then we load the bask up in the back of
the trailer and we're out of there in under 10 minutes so after we get home and I have
this toothbrush and it's new happy home which is my garage loving this thing thinking oh man this is going to be a
great at parties to show all my friends man it was fantastic and then later that
next day not thinking you know there's going to be a lot of press surrounding this we think okay it's kind of just
kind of a fun crime not a big deal well it's on the news it's in the newspapers it's all over that someone stole the
toothbrush and I'm thinking holy crap what's going to happen now so I called all my friends and said hey this is all
over the thing more than we expected you need to keep this thing completely quiet
and not talk about this at all I immediately put it up in the attic in my garage and cover it up up there because
I don't want anyone to get in my garage by accident and see this toothbrush so as days went on and still
the press is all over this toothbrush story now there's a reward for it and it was for a couple thousand I mean so I'm
thinking how much is this toothbrush really worth everyone's looking for this toothbrush people already know I'm a
troublemaker I'm thinking I got to get rid of this thing and so I'm kind of a nervous selly now thinking where am I
going to ditch this thing how am I going to get rid of it what's going to happen
I could trust the balloon people but my two friends that help me with the heist one of them man he just loved to brag so
anything that he can make himself sound better he loved especially to the girls and at the bar so I'm thinking I got to
cut this guy off because he could ruin it for all of us so we had to sit him down one night and say Billy you cannot
say a word of this so we talked about this thing and got a plan to get rid of this
toothbrush I did some quick Recon over the next couple of days thinking okay where are we going to dump this
toothbrush that someone's going to find it and yet we can leave it and no one's going to see us leave it so my friend
show up to help me get this thing out of my garage he brings his dad's pickup this time which that definitely f
toothbrush so much better we load this thing into the pickup cover it back up early morning we drive to this parking
lot that I have all set up ready to go carry this thing out of there lug it through the parking lot and set it down
and we just jump back in the truck that the next morning when people showed up for work they're definitely going to see
this toothbrush and at that point the toothbrush has returned and I'm off the hook still a little nervous but we're
already hearing on the radio and people talking that the toothbrush has been found and everyone's happy and we're
thinking to ourselves thank goodness and within days it was mounted back over the
the dental office where we took it from and we're thinking no harm no foul but what a great story so with years gone by
now the dental office is no longer there and my friends and I haven't talked about it since matter of fact they don't
even know I'm here thanks to the statue of limitations I can talk about this now
it's time to let people know who really pulled the great toothbrush Caper that was
me now if you ask me if you steal a giant toothbrush you're just begging for a cavity search now that may be a good
situation or a bad situation depending on who you are but in the end Bob was able to avoid the law long enough to
make a clean getaway and share his story with us now as we're about to see back in the good old days it was a whole lot
easier to commit fraud especially writing bad checks here's a story of a guy who is willing to take that that
chance meet Pablo hi my name is Pablo and the story I'm going to tell you is about fraud and Larsen that I committed
way back in my 20s when I was young and stupid but now the statute of limitations is up so I can tell it to
you here's what happened now I live in Los Angeles it was the late '70s was the Christmas
season shopping and exchanging money in stores was much more casual before every
everything was scanned and they had scanner things on the doors of all the stores and all that people they used
checks they Ed cash or they used a department store credit card so a friend of mine named Joey decided that we could
get all of this stuff just by going into these stores and passing checks CU we called a bunch of these
stores and we got prices on a lot of the items that we wanted so we started filling out the checks one by one
$200 here $300 for something else almost a complete checkbook folder of my checks my name signed by Joey
technically turning them into forgeries that way we could go to each store and very quickly just hand the
check to the clerk saying oh yes we called ahead and we had the item reserved right here could you just pick
it up for us and we'll be on our way they didn't ask any questions because they were too busy it was the Christmas
season but then Joey comes up with this wild idea he thought why don't we take this somewhere else where we could get
even more we could maybe go to a spa or we could maybe go to a nice dinner or something so we decided to go to Vegas
and we'll really have a great time so that's that's exactly what we did we had all of these stores marked and a route
to go through the city stereo equipment camera equipment jewelry all different kinds of stores mostly department stores
cuz they had such a variety of stuff I mean at the sporting goods store I bought cleats and things for my nephews
and I don't like sports I wasn't going to use any of this crap and Joey was even grabbing stuff
off the racks as we would leave with no scanners no beeps no problem and then we thought wait a minute something
happens down the road and the cops want to know where we were then we've got to prove that we were only in La I
remembered that a friend of mine was throwing a party that night 4 and 1 half hours back to LA to go to this party we
let our friends see us we say hi to everybody we were there for maybe an hour or so then we got back in the car
and drove all the way back to Vegas so we could continue our little shopping spree and then Monday after that weekend
I took my ID and I tossed it make sure that it was not in my possession I called the police I called the bank my
wallet was stolen somebody must have used it my checkbook was stolen and that was it and in case they were going to
come and ask us about it or have to go with in and make a report in in person we thought okay we got to figure out
that we were mugged how are we mugged we were beaten up somebody beat us up so we
thought okay I got to hit you and Joey's got to hit me make it look like we were
mug so I was about to hit Joey I pulled my arm back and I thought wait a minute is this
going to hurt man it's one thing to hit to Department stor is and it's another thing to go and hit your boy damn was it
the one two-piece I don't know let's take a swing at part two of Pablo's crime on statute of limitations
next we're back guys with more statute of limitations our boy Pablo and his accomplice have been writing bad checks
left and right now they need an alibi so they don't get popped at least by the police we thought okay we we got to
figure out that we were mugged how are we mugged we were beaten up somebody beat us up so we thought okay make it
look like we were mugged so I pulled my arm back and then he said no wait wait wait
wait let's not let's not let's just leave it at a phone call only you know dumb guys in their 20s would think that
beating each other up would prove anything this wasn't cool anymore I didn't feel like a badass I felt like a
criminal and I just had this knot in my stomach all the time what if I get caught what if we get caught what's
going to happen why in God's name did I try to pull something off like this but I had the perfect Alibi I started
getting letters from all these stores because the checks were bouncing back from the bank after I closed my account
and I started getting phone calls one store had me go into one of their offices and sign a form I had to sign it
20 times my name my signature 20 times to make sure that the signatures on the checks were
forgeries then the real anxiety and fear started and I would go to sleep at night
and sometimes wake up in a cold sweat Imagining the cops at the door ready to drag me off to jail I was just walking
on eggshells wondering why the hell did I do this even though he had this great Alibi everything was coming at me joy
was gone I felt like I was suffering all the punishment for this I was getting the letters and the calls from the
stores you know I was the one who had to talk to the police and the bank and it was only the
beginning I don't consider myself a religious person but I do believe in karma things started happening that made
me think we weren't going to get caught by the police but some Force out there was going to take care of
us within the first year or so things started disappearing the stuff that we had stolen something would break or
something would go missing or I'd leave something somewhere except for a camera this really really cool camera and over
the 12 or so years after we committed this crime it ended up that I was mugged four times in this town my
hometown Karma that was the force behind it things like when I I was at an ATM one night took out 20 bucks stuck it in
my pocket went back to my car and there was another car parked behind me and these three guys jump out of the car
point a gun in my face and demand my briefcase or the time that I was just getting in my car and this car pulls up
beside me asking for directions and the passenger guy jumps out starts pounding on my window until he kicks it in glass
shatters everywhere he slipped and fell and I took off I mean insane stuff but karma so would I ever do something like
this again act like a stupid kid who thought he was a badass it was enough I learned
my lesson I wouldn't even consider something like that again even if I knew I could get away with it you know
there's a statute of limitations with the legal system but the universe has no such
thing they say that if you deserve it the universe will actually serve it eventually in this particular situation
Karma was served and that's our show folks I'm Mike The Situation Santino reminding you don't do the crime if you
can't hide for a crazy long time also being found guilty or feeling guilty are two different things especially if you
got a Catholic mother like myself trust me be sure to check out some more stories of everyday folks confessing
some crazy crimes later this program is for entertainment purposes only and it is not legal advice
the statute of limitations are complicated and depend on many factors if you need advice you should seek legal
counsel from a competent attorney in your [Music] jurisdiction [Music] yeah [Music]

Adventurous Bob pulled off a daring heist by stealing a colossal 6.5ft toothbrush and making his escape in a hot air balloon. Clever Pablo used his own checkbook to commit some serious fraud, indulging in a wild Las Vegas shopping spree. Hosted by the iconic Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, Statute of Limitations pushes the boundaries of justice as individuals confess to non-violent crimes that have long surpassed the statute of limitations. Each episode features the stories of those brazen enough to confess their secret crimes. New episodes of Statute of Limitations will be posted every Friday and Sunday. If you’re ready for more crazy stories, brought to you by Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino, comment below and be sure to hit that like and subscribe button!

Brief Summary

Bob steals a giant toothbrush; Pablo commits check fraud, both share their wild stories.

Key points

The Great Toothbrush Heist. Bob recounts his outrageous plan to steal a giant toothbrush from a dental office.
A Close Call with Power Lines. Bob and his crew face a dangerous situation while escaping in a hot air balloon.
The Aftermath of the Heist. Bob discovers the toothbrush theft has made headlines, leading to a frantic plan to hide it.
Facing the Consequences. Anxiety and fear take over as the reality of the situation sets in.
The Force of Karma. Strange events unfold, leading to a belief in karma's role in his life.
A Lesson Learned. Reflecting on past actions, he vows never to repeat his mistakes.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I could have gone to prison, not jail, prison!

Mike The Situation reflecting on the consequences of his actions.

0:43WatchMar 15, 2024

Tension

60/ 100Some tension

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