Here’s a case where advertising didn’t pay.

Robert Peter Nelson III, a Washington County plumber accused of holding up two convenience stores and trying to rob a third, was arrested early Sunday as he got out of a van emblazoned with the name “Nelson Plumbing and Heating” and a phone number.

Allegheny County Assistant Police Superintendent James Morton said the robbery spree went down the drain when Nelson and the van matched the descriptions from witnesses at all three stores.

“He made it pretty easy to solve by advertising himself,” Morton said.

Clairton police Officer Sean McGrail knew where the van was usually parked and arrested Nelson, 21, as he got out of the vehicle on Halcomb Street.

About 2:30 a.m. at the Shop ‘n’ Go in West Elizabeth, a man demanded the clerk open the cash register. When she refused, he grabbed the machine and left, the police affidavit states.

About two hours later, Clairton police responded to a call from a Uni-Mart on Carnegie Avenue. A man matching the description of the robber in West Elizabeth had said he was armed and demanded money, the affidavit states.

When the clerks refused to follow his orders, he left without money and without showing a gun, police said.

Another robbery occurred several minutes later at the Uni-Mart on nearby Miller Avenue. After the robber grabbed some cash and was driving away, police said, the store manager got a look at the van.

Police said they found a suspected crack pipe and $13 in Nelson’s pockets, and the Shop ‘n’ Go cash register.

Nelson, of Monongahela, was charged with robbery, attempted robbery, criminal mischief and possession of drug paraphernalia. He was arraigned and jailed in lieu of $10,000 bond to await a preliminary hearing scheduled Jan. 29.

David Conti can be reached at or (412) 320-7993.

I am a police officer in Halifax, Virginia.

I received a call one weekend to respond to a lover’s quarrel gone horribly awry. We ended up arresting a guy for stabbing his girlfriend and his cousin (one person - his girlfriend was his cousin). When we got to the station, I read him Miranda and asked him if he understood his rights. He said he did.

Then I said, “Having these rights in mind, do you wish to make a statement about what happened?”

He confidently said,” No way, man…I ain’t stupid. I ain’t making no statement…I mean, I DID STAB HER, but I ain’t dumb enough to make a statement about it.”

He was found guilty.

A Stratford, Ontario woman has learned that recording your crimes in a diary isn’t a good idea.

The 37-year-old’s entry into her diary detailing plans to steal a vehicle backfired when police who came to her apartment saw the open book.

“Guess I’ll get ready to see what kind of car I can grab today,” police quoted the entry as saying. “Hopefully one with lots of gas and extra cash for gas.”

While investigating a report of a vehicle break-in on Monday, police followed fresh footprints in the snow to the woman’s apartment, said Insp. John Hagarty.

The woman answered the door in her pyjamas and asked the officers if she could have time to get dressed, said Hagarty.

While the officers waited for the woman to change, they noticed an open diary on the kitchen table.

In an entry written shortly before the officers arrived, the woman stated: “Well so much for that idea. I got caught getting out of a woman’s truck, she freaked.”

The woman was arrested and the diary was confiscated as evidence.

Police have not released her name or the specific charges she faces.

A pair of robbers in Germany dubbed Dumb and Dumber left their ID cards and the cash behind after a bank raid.

The offenders, from Recklingshausen, have been sentenced to 33 months jail.

Marcel Koenig, 23 and Rocco Moeller, 33 were arrested half an hour after the failed heist.

The cashier asked for their ID cards which they put on the counter after they pretended to want to open new accounts.

Rocco then pulled a pistol and demanded cash.

Employees collected £2,500 from the safe and handed it over to the men who then ran out of the bank, forgetting to take the cash but also leaving their cards behind.

Koenig told the court in Recklingshausen he realised his mistake as soon as he got out of the bank but by then it was too late.

Released Tuesday after serving eight months in Placer County jail for auto theft and drunken driving, Jessie Del Alexander never got out of the facility’s parking lot.

Less than 15 minutes after being given his freedom, the 28-year-old Loomis resident was back in jail for allegedly plotting a bank robbery with an undercover officer who met him in the parking lot.

Placer County Sheriff’s Capt. Rick Armstrong said it was one of the quickest arrests he has seen of a man released from jail.

“I’ve seen them get arrested for getting into a fight in the parking lot with their wives or girlfriends, but not one where they walked into the arms of law enforcement for planning another crime,” Armstrong said.

Roseville Police Lt. Gary Shonkwiler said authorities learned that Alexander planned to rob a bank within a week of being let out of jail.

Four agencies — the FBI, Placer County Sheriff’s Department and the Roseville and Rocklin police departments — arranged for an undercover officer to meet with Alexander in the parking lot.

Shonkwiler said Alexander then solicited the undercover man’s help for a bank robbery. He was arrested at 6:10 a.m. — just 14 minutes after he’d walked out of jail, the lieutenant said.

Alexander is charged with soliciting another person to commit a felony and is being held on $30,000 bail.

A woman who escaped from mall security guards with $900 of clothing from a Miami, Florida department store jumped into the parked car of two off-duty police officers in an ill-fated attempt to hide.

Marsha Reid, 19, of Fort Lauderdale, was charged Thursday with retail theft, resisting arrest without violence and escaping from police.

Security guards at Dadeland Mall stopped Reid and her teen-age friend as they tried to leave a store with bags full of clothes they hadn’t paid for, according to police reports.

Reid slipped out of her handcuffs, ran to the parking lot, and climbed inside a parked car that had its front door open, hoping to hide.

The dark blue Ford Taurus belonged to two Miami-Dade Police officers, Maj. Grace O’Donnell and her husband, Lt. James O’Donnell, who were putting their purchases in the trunk.

A security guard ran to the lot and the officers pointed him to Reid.

I am a serving officer with Cambridgeshire Constabulary, England.

Last year while dealing with minor crimes at Wisbech, Cambridgeshire I took on a fairly sorry attempted deception using a stolen credit card. After a bit of asking around I nicked the suspect and brought him in for an interview. After initially protesting his innocence claiming that he had nothing to do with it he relented and admitted that he had tried ‘clocking’ a bent card (presenting a stolen card for goods and paying the supplier on a sale or return basis if you don’t get caught). After that the interview went something like this;

“So Thomas, who else went into the shop with you?”

“No one I did it myself”

“Are you saying that you tried to use the card?”

“Yeah”

“I’ve watched the video tape, sure it was you?”

“Yep, absolutely.”

“So on that day you were a short heavily pregnant young girl then?”

“Er, well, alright then that was Stacy.”(his girlfriend)

Then after a bit more talking I asked, “Tom, if you’ve decided to be so honest with me, why were you so upset when I arrested you earlier?”

“I thought you were nicking me for that shoplifting from yesterday.”

“What shoplifting?”

“I nicked some gear from Woolworths yesterday, didn’t you know about that?”

“I do now, thanks.”