Busted again: the old tattooed toes clue

Shooting Industry, Dec, 2006 by Commander Gilmore

A good pair of cotton socks would have saved him, but for whatever reason, Richard Costello was barefoot when he photographed a bunch of expensive motorcycle parts he had recently stolen. Being a thoroughly modern marketing-minded criminal entrepreneur, Costello wanted some slick pics of the goods to circulate out on the street, generating interest and maybe even starting a bidding war. Great idea, huh?

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Our man, Rick, carefully arranged the parts on the floor, perched himself over 'em with his camera and snapped some beauties. A short time later, prospective customers--and a couple of other guys--were checkin' 'em out. Those "other guys" were detectives with the Clearwater, Fla., police.

They thoroughly examined the rather nice photos and identified the stolen parts--but they saw something else, too. Down at the bottom of the frame, Richard's bare tootsies were stickin' out into the photo. Tattooed across his 10 toes were 10 letters spelling out "W-H-I-T-E" and "T-R-A-S-H."

Now, these ever vigilant detectives thought, how many scumbags do you think there are in any town, anywhere with "white trash" inked onto their toes?

The Clearwater cops sorta glanced at the photo, looked at each other, and went somethin' like, "Hmph. Let's go hook up Costello, okay?" Rickie is now showing off his tootsies to a whole new set of buddies. Oh, yeah.

Brain And Other Pain

The first question Salt Lake City, Utah, cops had to answer in a recent investigation was. "Is this an assault with a firearm or what?" There was a "gun" involved and it fired a projectile and the victim got "nailed." so--well, read on.

The case filed in 3rd District Court related that an unnamed 43-year-old man got into an argument with another guy at a construction site. Words and tempers got kinda hot, until Mr. Unnamed suddenly grabbed a nail gun. flicked off the safety and shot his now ex-pal in. well, this hurts just writing it, the crotch. You're probably asking, "Did he actually hit the guy's--oh, more pain!" Okay, okay, we'll say it: Yes, he shot a nail into Mr. Ex-Pal's ... AHHHH!

Officers, grimacing and clenching their teeth, and trying not to let the images settle into the "nightmare niche" of their brains, finally gave up on legal definitions. They just called it "second-degree felony aggravated assault."

If the Mad Carpenter can post the $25,000 bail, he'll have to do his hammering manually for a while. The judge doesn't want him operating nail guns until the case is settled.

We don't either. OUCH! This gives a whole new meaning to "getting nailed."

Upstanding Dope Dealer

"Hey, listen, you dumb cops!" Yeah, that's more or less what Adam Curtis Hunter told officers in Cookeville, Tenn., when they found him at the scene of his accident. Hunter's car had sorta skipped off the road and crashed into a house. Lots of debris was scattered around, but the cops couldn't help noticing considerable amounts of marijuana and drug paraphernalia spillin' out of his crunched-up car. Hunter was kinda crunched up, too, and officers were debating whether or not to arrest him for driving under the influence of funny-weed. That got his attention!

Hunter gathered his wits--well, what little wits he possessed--and told 'em firmly that if they gave him a blood test for marijuana, they wouldn't find anything because, "I don't smoke it; I only sell it!"

Officers went over this with him a few times, just to make sure they had him quoted properly. Oh, yeah, he insisted. they had heard him right. He wanted that absolutely clear. As a fine upstanding and abstaining dope dealer, he wasn't going to take a fall for DUI. Oh, no!

That's when they informed Hunter that he had just flipped outta the misdemeanor fryin' pan into the felony fire. Instead of a possible overnighter in the local GrayBar Hotel, he was now lookin' at a lengthy period of employment at the state's license plate factory.

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