Free Republic

A Kansas City auto repair shop employee made a snap decision Monday when a woman drove off without paying for repairs. He jumped on the roof of her Cadillac Escalade and held on during a high-speed, three-mile ride that ended outside Kansas City police headquarters. Another auto shop employee followed in another vehicle and told police that he tried to stop the Cadillac by firing shots at its tires. One of the bullets hit the driver’s side door. Police said it was a miracle that no one was injured in the incident that began shortly before 3 p.m. Monday at...

CHICAGO (CBS) – A Chicago man might think twice the next time he goes into a police station to report something as stolen. On Friday night, 31-year-old Adam Wisneski rode his bike to the Shakespeare District police station on the Northwest Side to report a stolen iPhone. He says he didn’t have his bike lock with him, and asked police if he could leave his bicycle inside the station. They said OK, and he did. He then filled out a police report about the phone.

More Than $5,000 Worth of MS Medicine Stolen From Tinley Park Man's Porch The 28 stolen pills were worth $5,166.51, police said. By Joseph Hosey (Patch Staff) December 30, 2014 at 6:14pm The man was expecting to receive a package of Gilenya on Dec. 19. He left his home about 7 a.m. that day. When he returned about 12 hours later, the package was not there, police said.

State police report a shopper at Walmart loaded a cart with $3,500 worth of disposable razors Sunday evening, pushed it through a fire exit door and fled in a car with a burned-out headlight.

A Tarrant, Alabama Police officer who became an Internet sensation after he decided not to arrest a grandmother he caught shoplifting eggs but to buy her some eggs instead, went a step further this week when he delivered two truckloads of food to her home to help her children. "The last time I saw my house this full, I was 12-years-old and staying with my grandmother," 47-year-old mother and grandmother Helen Johnson told al.com Wednesday after the food was delivered to her home. "I've been crying all day." Last Saturday, Officer William Stacy of the Tarrant Police Department was called...

A Memphis man has been charged with theft of property after driving away with a truck full of 7,500 pairs of the newest LeBron 12 Nike shoes with a retail value of approximately $1.5 million. In early November, police say Charles Jennings, an employee of cargo transportation company Intermodal Cartage Group, used his ID card to get into a secure lot and drive away with the valuable shoes.

The former accountant for the Agape Family Worship Center has been indicted for embezzling more than $4 million from the church over a period of seven years, church officials said today. The thefts were hidden in 900 separate transactions in which Gridiron would write checks to himself or arrange wire transfers, said Matthew Davis, a Texas-based attorney representing the church. "As a church, we are trusting people," he said. "We hired a professional, certified public accountant who served us for many years and there was no reason for us to question his integrity in the past.

HUIMANGUILLO, Mexico — The big-time gasoline thieves had already come and gone during the wee hours, filling their tanker trucks with stolen fuel and then fleeing. Then dawn broke, and word spread that a crime gang had again tapped into a gasoline pipeline, and it was spewing fuel into a ditch. At first, only a few farmers showed up, carrying plastic jerry cans. Then dozens. Then even more. All were eager to collect what spilled fuel they could. (...) Mexico is plagued by rampant energy theft. In the first eight months of this year, 7.5 million barrels went missing, a...

A West Boca gas station owner set up cameras to catch six people trying to steal more than 900 gallons of fuel on Friday, according to a Palm Beach County Sheriff's arrest report. The owner of the Chevron station in the 11000 block of West Palmetto Park Road told deputies that gas had been stolen for the past few nights, leading him to set up the surveillance.

In what a taxpayer watchdog group called an unusual abuse, President Obama’s decision over Labor Day to fly home from New York to sleep in his own bed instead of overnighting and then attending the New York wedding of his chef cost Americans $295,227. It was just one expensive leg of a Labor Day work and fun trip with an overall price tag of $1,539,402.10 in flight expenses alone — not including security costs, food, housing or those associated with his staff.

Camera equipment has long been attractive to the eyes of thieves. After all, it’s generally portable, pricey, and a piece of cake to sell through channels such as Craigslist. In Northern California, robbers have begun targeting photojournalists at gunpoint in order to snatch their gear. Developer Trevor Sehrer, a Google engineer by day, has been working on a website that aims to help combat the theft of photography gear. It’s called Lenstag, and is an online equipment registry that makes it easier to report and track stolen cameras and lenses.

The congressional office of Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) recently had several items and cash stolen from her Washington D.C. office, according to a police report obtained by Townhall.Camera equipment with a retail value of $1,079 and $220 in cash vanished between Oct. 3 and 6 of 2014. Bachmann’s press secretary, Dan Kotman, declined questioning as to whether or not this incident is believed to be from a staffer or if these items were purchased with taxpayer money.Capitol Police have declined any comment about the case, citing an ongoing investigation. When asked if there are security cameras in Bachmann’s office, Lt. Kimberly...

Frustrated by his own failures as a deer hunter this newly begun season, a 34-year-old central Minnesota man was caught after stealing a buck dangling from a tree at the home of a more successful marksman, authorities said Monday. The theft occurred midday Sunday from a home in Millwood Township and was reported to the Stearns County Sheriff’s Office by a group of hunters that had several deer carcasses hanging in a tree, said Chief Deputy Bruce Bechtold.

The seminars offered police officers some useful tips on seizing property from suspected criminals. Don’t bother with jewelry (too hard to dispose of) and computers (“everybody’s got one already”), the experts counseled. Do go after flat screen TVs, cash and cars. Especially nice cars. In one seminar, captured on video in September, Harry S. Connelly Jr., the city attorney of Las Cruces, N.M., called them “little goodies.” And then Mr. Connelly described how officers in his jurisdiction could not wait to seize one man’s “exotic vehicle” outside a local bar. “A guy drives up in a 2008 Mercedes, brand new,”...

Running out of funds and ideas, colleges want more public funding to help keep them afloat. During a recent panel discussion at the liberal think tank Center for American Progress, speakers praised President Barack Obama’s higher education push for performance-based pay and incentives for colleges and universities. Ted Mitchell, , U.S. Department of Education undersecretary, complained about today’s higher education funding environment, telling the audience, “There has been systematic disinvestment by states throughout the Great Recession in higher education,” adding that it “really does disadvantage students” from low-income neighborhoods and backgrounds. He felt the state governments, by not funding state...

Tyler Durden 10/26/2014 “How can this happen?” Ms. Hinders said in a recent interview. “Who takes your money before they prove that you’ve done anything wrong with it?” The federal government does. * * * The topic of civil asset forfeiture has been high on our agenda recently as federal 'agents' discover how to steal Americans' hard-earned cash with zero repurcussions , and decide unilaterally how much cash a 'common man' is allowed to carry; but as The NY Times reports, the escalation to The IRS brings a whole new world of possibilities with regard asset confiscation based on no...

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — A truck containing 18 tons of Crisco sticks headed to a grocery store chain distribution center was stolen in a Florida city. St. Petersburg Police say that a tractor-trailer containing the 36,000 pounds of vegetable shortening was snatched Sunday morning.

In the United States, armed citizens are seldom robbed.   When they are, it is usually because the robber does not know that they are armed, and simply makes a mistake in victim selection.   That may be what happened with a Illinois police officer.  It happened on 7 September, 2014.   From wgntv.com: An off-duty Harvey Police Officer is in critical condition after being attacked and robbed. It happened around 3:00am this morning near 59th and Lake Shore Drive, at the nearby harbor. The officer was reportedly hit in the head with a gun, before his gun and badge were...

(CNSNews.com ) -- Wildfire management employees at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) used government charge cards to by $799,000 worth of gift cards from vendors such as REI, American Express, FredMeyer and Visa, according to a report released Sept. 30 by the Interior Department’s Office of the Inspector General. When investigators requested supporting documentation such as purchase orders, receipts, and authorizing signatures, BLM staff claimed that they were “missing,” according to the report. The inspector general describes widespread misuse of government-issued charge cards at the agency, making the “purchase card program susceptible to fraud, waste, and abuse.” In...

To oversee this process, Dodd-Frank created the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), made up of the heads of the financial services regulatory agencies. The council claims very broad power to designate certain activities (like asset management) or companies and products (including mutual funds) as systemically important and subject them to Federal Reserve bank-style regulation, including leverage and capital requirements. And the council is doing just that – first with banks, then insurance companies and now, potentially, mutual funds. President Obama’s “independent” insurance expert on the council issued a blistering dissent when it designated Prudential – the nation’s second-largest life insurer...