Tarantula security guards

In the mid-1970s, there was a fad among jewelry stores to use tarantulas as security guards. Stores claimed it helped prevent thefts, although tarantulas aren't going to do much to stop a thief, besides looking scary. Rattlesnakes, I imagine, might work better.

La Crosse Tribune - July 19, 1975

Posted By: Alex - Fri May 08, 2020 - Comments (5)
Category: Crime, Insects and Spiders, 1970s

Family Feud

Source.

More on the Dyotts, here and here.

Posted By: Paul - Fri Mar 27, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Crime, Family, Patent Medicines, Nostrums and Snake Oil, Nineteenth Century

The Dangerous Sports Club at the Golden Gate Bridge

Article source.

Their Wikipedia page.

Article about other bungee-ers at the bridge.



Source.

Posted By: Paul - Tue Feb 18, 2020 - Comments (1)
Category: Antisocial Activities, Architecture, Crime, Daredevils, Stuntpeople and Thrillseekers, Twentieth Century, Twenty-first Century

Bewitched by a sandwich

Compelling excuse. Back in 1947, when police apprehended 18-year-old Raymond Adame as he was attempting to kidnap Celina Jarmillo, he explained, "Last April she made me a sandwich of potatoes, beans, and macaroni, and according to our legend she bewitched me... I couldn't get out of her spell."

Vancouver Sun - Nov 7, 1947

Celina Jarmillo

Raymond Adame
source: Los Angeles Public Library

A follow-up report, from January 1948, noted that Adame was, in the end, only charged with assault rather than kidnapping. And it revealed that the bewitching sandwich had also included "fish eyes".

Does that literally mean eyes from fish, or is "fish eyes" a term for some less disgusting type of food?

Arizona Daily Star - Jan 9, 1948

Posted By: Alex - Fri Nov 29, 2019 - Comments (5)
Category: Crime, Food, 1940s

Juvenile Offender

Throw the book at her!

Source.

Posted By: Paul - Thu Nov 21, 2019 - Comments (3)
Category: Art, Crime, Toys, Children, 1930s, Postal Services

Jackson Barnett, “The World’s Richest Indian”

From Wikipedia:

With the discovery of oil on Barnett's lands in 1912, a series of court actions by interested parties litigated the control of Barnett's trust. Barnett was declared incompetent and denied access to his affairs simply because he only spoke the Muscogee Creek language and not English. Barnett was permitted a modest income and was installed in a house near Henryetta. In 1919 the courts allowed the diversion of money from Barnett's trust to the construction of the "Jackson Barnett Hospital" in Henryetta. In 1920 Barnett, then in his seventies, married Anna Laura Lowe (1881-1952), a fortune hunter whom he had met only once before. The couple had to marry in Kansas after a marriage license was denied in Oklahoma. Barnett's guardians were unable to annul the marriage and the hospital plans were never pursued. Instead, the trust was divided between Anna Barnett and Bacone Indian College.[3]

The Barnetts moved to Los Angeles and bought a mansion on Wilshire Boulevard, where Jackson passed his time directing traffic at a nearby intersection. Legal actions continued from 1923 to 1929, which provoked congressional hearings on the role of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in establishing and administering the Barnett trust and others like it. The hearings led to criticism of BIA administrator Charles H. Burke's actions, and during the 1930s, to the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934. In 1927 Barnett v. Equitable again proclaimed Jackson Barnett incompetent in federal court. In March 1934 another federal ruling annulled the Barnetts' marriage and Anna Barnett's rights to Jackson's trust on the grounds that Jackson had been "kidnapped" by a woman of suspect moral character, but allowed Anna to act as Jackson's caretaker. Jackson Barnett died on 29 May 1934 of natural causes: allegations that Anna had poisoned him were found to be false.[3][4]

Anna was finally evicted from the Wilshire Boulevard residence after four years, even though she had gained significant support from Los Angeles society,[5] including Los Angeles District Attorney Burton Fitts and California Governor Frank Merriam. Anna had to be tear-gassed after she threw a hatchet during the eviction,[5] and lived the remainder of her life with a daughter while unsuccessfully attempting to regain a share of the Barnett estate, which amounted to $3.5 million in 1934 ($55.4 million estimated value in 2012 dollars).

Source.



Lots more info here.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Nov 10, 2019 - Comments (0)
Category: Crime, Unauthorized Dwellings, Forgotten Figures and Where Are They Now?, Frauds, Cons and Scams, Government, Hospitals, Twentieth Century, Native Americans, Weddings

The Devil’s Toy

Posted By: Paul - Fri Oct 25, 2019 - Comments (1)
Category: Antisocial Activities, Crime, Daredevils, Stuntpeople and Thrillseekers, Fads, Sports, Teenagers, 1960s

Black Samson

The Wikipedia page.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Aug 28, 2019 - Comments (1)
Category: Antisocial Activities, Crime, Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Movies, Exploitation and Grindhouse, 1970s

How to catch a shoplifter

Some tips, according to Dick Deal, professional shoplifter:

"Watch people’s hands. We steal with them! Don’t let their hands out of your sight."

Also, "Watch for the dance, the almost ritualistic dance. The strange movements [shoplifters] make."

Posted By: Alex - Tue Aug 27, 2019 - Comments (1)
Category: Crime, 1980s

The Man Who Stole Art

The strange tale of Stéphane Breitweiser, arguably the world's greatest art thief, who managed to steal hundreds of works valued, in total, at well over one billion dollars.

His success was largely attributable to a a loophole in the world of art security: that there's not much security on the front-end (in the museums). Instead, as Michael Finkel notes in a Feb 2019 article in GQ, "art crimes are typically solved on the back end, when the thieves try to sell the work."

And that's why Breitweiser managed to get away with his thefts for so long, because he never tried to sell anything. He stole because he loved the art and wanted to have it for himself, accumulating it all in his mother's house, where he lived.

His case reminds me of Joseph Feldman, who stole over 15,000 books from the New York Public Library, simply because he loved books. It suggests a recurring weird-news theme: thieves who steal not from a profit motive, but instead to indulge their obsessive collecting.

Stéphane Breitweiser

Posted By: Alex - Sun Jul 28, 2019 - Comments (3)
Category: Art, Crime, Collectors