On November 7, 2000, Officers of the Ste. Genevieve Police Department were interviewing a suspect in several break-ins and two car thefts. The suspect had not been arrested yet, but had failed the CVSA and was starting to break. At first we thought he was going to be smart because he told us he did not want to talk with us anymore and asked to leave. We were still lacking enough PC to arrest him on the charges, but we did have officers at the Prosecutor’s Office applying for a search warrant to search the suspect’s apartment where we had learned from a witness that evidence from one of the break-ins was being hidden.

The suspect did not know we were getting the search warrant, but did request to leave because “His girlfriend was going to be worried.” We told him that his girlfriend was in another room being interviewed, so he asked if he could wait in the lobby for her. We knew he wanted to leave to get back to the apartment, and we were worried if he got back to the apartment he would destroy or remove the evidence.

I had an officer watch him in the lobby. The officer had to come back into the office from the lobby to talk with another officer. Right after the officer left the lobby, the suspect broke into the display case and attempted to steal a one-hitter out of the case. What the suspect did not know, that there was an officer in the police department still watching him and witnessed the whole attempted theft.

Officer took him into custody and took him to jail. This gave us the time needed to sucessfully search the apartment and retrieve the evidence.

Phil Robinson, a PC with the Bolton Traffic Unit, Greater Manchester England is not too fond of dogs. He is not happy to deal with inebriated men either, so he was not pleased when his two aversions came together to spoil a recent afternoon.

Phil called at a local garage to buy a chocolate bar and when he returned to his vehicle he found a very drunken man sitting in the car reviewing the in-car video and playing with the controls. He took the man by the arm to take him out the car but then spotted a huge Rhodesian Ridgeback dog bounding towards him from across the car park set on rescuing his master.

The dog then attached himself to Phil’s arm and what they call a bit of a fracas ensued. Order and calm was eventually restored when the drunk was taken to the local jail and placed in a cell. The dog could not be found anywhere until Phil returned to his car to find it laying comfortably on the rear seat apparently watching the video.

Over one weekend, our agency, as well as a neighboring county, took several reports of counterfeit twenty and fifty dollar bills being passed. Even though the transactions were taped, the female suspect was savy enough to wear a ball cap and clothes that made it difficult to distinguish her features. As the weekend passed, and we investigated as well as taking more reports, we realized that a male was returning expensive items that the female purchased with counterfeit currency, and of course receiving real money in return.

Monday mid-morning, we were called to a department store where counterfeit had been passed. A male was returning merchandise requesting a refund. The clerk, on top of things, realized the time frame and register number matched when counterfeit bills were passed, and called us. The male was still present when we arrived… but there is more.

The male provided consent to search his vehicle. Inside I found several items of new merchandise. One he was kind enough to tape a receipt from another department store to… another store where counterfeit had been passed over the weekend… and that transaction number matched the one provided earlier by the store…. but there is more.

He was arrested and taken to our office. After denying knowledge of any counterfeiting, and claiming he returned the items at his girlfriend’s request, our Chief Investigator checked his wallet. Inside was the original fifty dollar bill that had been used to make copies of the counterfeit fifties… with the same serial number.

And believe it or not, he still denied knowledge of the counterfeiting until the Secret Service paid him a visit the following day.

Five citizens had their hands full detaining a polite, but not so bright bank robber in Aldergrove, British Columbia.

According to police a rather large man, who weighed in at somewhere around 300 pounds,entered the Toronto Dominion bank in the Aldergrove mall and waited patiently in the line until it was his turn to be served.

The man then approached the counter and rolled a stocking, which he’d been wearing as a hat, down over his face, produced a knife and then passed the teller a note demanding money.

As he was leaving the bank with a large,undisclosed amount of cash a group of patrons and bank employees gave chase and tackled the man outside the building as the teller set off the alarm.

When a mountie from the Aldergrove Community Police Office on the next block arrived, he found the five seated atop the man as he lay sprawled out on the pavement.

Constable Kai Hildebrandt arrested the suspect and handcuffed him before recovering the stolen money and the knife.

Bruce Alexander Armstrong, 44, of Chilliwack has been charged with one count of armed robbery, one count of wearing a disguise with the intent to commit an indictable offense.

About 10:30 am on the morning on August 16, we got a report of a bank robbery in progress. We arrived a little after the robber left the scene and we had a look at the surveillance video. The criminal had no type of cover over her face, nothing to disguise her appearance. Since we had the suspect’s face on camera we alerted all officers to be on the lookout for the robber.

We got a report about 3 hours later from a local used car dealership that the suspect was just in there buying a used vehicle with the money she stole from the bank. Well, since she bought the car the dealership had all the info they needed on her. We showed up to her house and there was no one there. We find out who her employer is and show up at her work place and behold what do we have - she is at her workplace working away as if nothing had happened. She even drove the car that she bought with the money she stole.

I am a Conservation Officer in Dekalb County Alabama. Bow season for deer was in and I had several “baited areas” that I was watching, hoping to catch a bowhunter hunting over piles of corn and various other goodies.

I approached one of the baited areas late one afternoon, just as a subject was climbing out of a tree stand. It was not yet gun deer season, but this guy had a loaded .270 rifle.

I approached him and asked for his hunting license (which he did not have), and asked him if he knew it wasn’t deer season. He stated that he was squirrel hunting and that the squirrels were a real nuisance while he was trying to deer hunt (squirrel season was in). He said the .270 he was using was the only gun he owned (a brand new stainless steel Ruger with a composite stock) and that was why he was hunting with it.

I asked him about the bait. He said it was his, but didn’t think hunting squirrels over bait was illegal.

Allowing his own statements to incriminate him, I charged him with hunting squirrels with illegal firearms and ammunition, hunting squirrels over bait, and hunting without a license. Of course he got out cheaper than a hunting deer over bait charge and hunting out of season charge, but not much. The judge knew he wasn’t squirrel hunting. He pled guilty and paid all the fines and court costs before court.

Two bandits found their getaway plan foiled by an alert grocery worker who drove off in their car while they were inside robbing the store, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office said Friday.

Deputies arrested one suspect’s girlfriend on charges of providing the car and are seeking the robbers.

The holdup occurred Wednesday about 10:30 p.m. at Rouse’s Super Market, 5245 Veterans Memorial Blvd. in Metairie, said Col. John Fortunato, a Sheriff’s Office spokesman.

The store’s assistant manager, whom Fortunato would not identify, was tidying up the parking lot when he noticed two men wearing ski masks and carrying guns walk inside.

He saw a red Ford Thunderbird with its engine running, figured it was their car, and got in, driving to a nearby business where he called authorities.

“The suspects exited the store and, realizing they had no escape vehicle, ran off toward Yale Street on foot,” Fortunato said.

Detectives checked the car’s registration and called the owner, who told them she had loaned it to her sister’s roommate, Michelle Romero, Fortunato said.

He said Romero, 29, let investigators search her apartment at 5027 Yale, where they found a 9 mm rifle, a ski mask, a marijuana plant and some partially smoked marijuana cigarettes.

Romero told investigators she had given the car to her boyfriend, Paxton Levy, 30, and a man she knew only as Jimmy, for a robbery, Fortunato said. They dropped her off at a bar and said they would return later, but when they didn’t come back, she called the apartment. She said Levy told her the robbery worked fine but the car was missing, Fortunato said.

Detective Scott DeJong obtained warrants charging Romero and Levy with conspiracy, armed robbery, cultivation and possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia and possession of a gun by a convicted felon.

Levy also is wanted in Florida on a theft charge and by the Louisiana corrections officials for an unspecified probation violation, Fortunato said.

Anyone with information on Levy or the other suspect may call the Sheriff’s Office robbery division at 364-5300.

Story by Drew Broach
East Jefferson bureau/The Times-Picayune