Make no mistake, we've seen some fairly boneheaded moves (even someone rocking this very same gaffe!) made by technologically-illiterate bank robbers, but the latest case involves a fellow who was quite the opposite of that. Yes, the 20 to 25 year male who decided to hold up an Alabama bank the day before his taxes were due actually did the deed without hanging up his cellphone. And there's surveillance footage to prove it. Quite honestly, we can't imagine what the conversation here would've been like, but at least he made the most of whatever minutes he had remaining as a free man, right?

[Via textually]

Odds are, if you're committing a series of robberies while wearing an ankle bracelet put on you by the law, you might not be the brightest bulb in the bunch. That's exactly what one Ohio resident got up to recently, though unfortunately for him, he was located by the GPS chip embedded in the aforementioned bracelet. Apparently, after six or so burglaries in his neighborhood, police got wise to the situation and pinpointed James Wombles using signals from his fashionable accessory, finding him innocently relaxing in a vehicle filled up with stolen items. The man had no comment, though we imagine upon capture he might have said something like, "Durrr." Once again GPS technology proves it's not just for getting cars stuck in cherry trees.

High-tech foreign criminals may have hacked into retail security systems in order to remotely monitor customers and employees in the course of at least 12 bold robberies in as many states during the past week, officials say. FBI agents are seeking an individual or group of conspirators who have been calling stores and banks from Texas to Kansas to Rhode Island on pre-paid, overseas cellphones and informing whomever picks up that a bomb will be detonated at the location if funds are not wired to a specific offshore account. What's more, the caller claims to have visual surveillance of the premises and proceeds to give certain accurate details about the environment -- in one case attempting to get a hostage to cut off another's fingers, and in another forcing everyone in the store to strip naked. CNN is reporting that at least $13,000 has been extorted so far -- though the total is likely much higher -- and that investigators are now pursuing a suspect in Portugal "who appears to be linked to the account number" that the money is being transferred to.

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[Via Slashdot]

A band of would-be PlayStation-delivery truck thieves in Australia had the rug snatched out from under them when police used the vehicle's built-in GPS to track and locate the stolen goods. The truck, loaded with more than $1 million AUD worth of PS2s, was taken from a freight depot in Sydney that the thieves had broken into. The group of evil-doers would have made off clean, save for the fact that local authorities were able to follow the direction and speed of the truck to the gang's suburban shed, where they had begun unloading the game systems -- clearly they should have picked up a few tips from Best Buy's dastardly villains. When questioned later by police, the leader of the ring was reported to have said, "And we would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for your meddling GPS!"

[Thanks, Ricky C]

The anecdotal evidence for a spike in electronics robberies is piling up, with the latest high profile robbery netting the thieves $50,000 worth of cellphones from a T-Mobile store. Three armed men walked into the store in Fort Bend County in Texas on Thursday, and demanded the "good phones" from the store's safe and the tapes from the CCTV. Staff were tied up, and the thieves deposited the phones into black plastic bags and walked out. Unfortunately for the robbers, T-Mobile keeps a good track of its inventory, and can identify any of the phones if they turn up on the network (meaning that the $50,000 sticker value is much lower on the black market). Crime doesn't pay, especially when your stolen goods can be tracked.

[Via textually]

A diabolical ring of super-thieves has been terrorizing the good people of Tulsa, OK., by conducting elaborate burglaries of stores like Best Buy and Office Depot. In their most recent exploit, the robbers cut two holes in the roof of a Best Buy, rappelled into the store, disabled the alarm system, and then stole more than 40 laptops, a number of plasma TVs and the store's safe. A local crime reporter claims they "leave behind no fingerprints, no witnesses and no surveillance tapes". They also reportedly have super-human strength, psionic powers, and can all fly at nearly supersonic speeds.

Proving that Malaysian industrial complexes aren't the only venues where shoddy security can facilitate the theft of thousands of PC components, a pair of crooks in California turned a minor fender bender into a successful heist of some 100,000 microchips on Tuesday afternoon. Police suspect that the men had been planning the crime for some time, as the victim's Fremont-bound Mazda MPV had just left a warehouse with $190,000 worth of chips when the robbers rear-ended it with their white van; rather than using weapons to subdue the driver, however, the two thieves simply waited until he exited the vehicle to discuss the accident, when one of them proceeded to slip into the minivan and drive away. The driver of the van followed suit, leaving the victim standing on the side of the road, no doubt confused and worried that his employer would chew him out for being so careless with the precious cargo. Although the brand of chip has not been revealed, since this all went down in Santa Clara, it's not too difficult to figure out whose products got pinched. So far authorities have no leads as to the whereabouts of the chips or the two robbers, but if someone in an MPV with license plate 4NKV115 tries to sell you a CPU for a buck and some change, do the right thing and notify law enforcement officials after you've purchased enough silicon to meet your needs. And if you're driving back home with your cheap booty when someone happens to ram your car, for heaven's sake, don't leave the keys in the ignition when you get out to exchange insurance info.

[Via Boing Boing]

While selling a PS3 soon after launch day probably paid some hefty dividends for those lucky enough to secure one, pistol-whipping someone in order to make it happen probably isn't worth the trouble. Apparently a cash-strapped (or completely crazed) Massachusetts duo couldn't quite weigh the consequences before taking action, and are now under arrest for "attempted murder and robbery." One gunman, William J. Robertson, is already being held under a $1 million (or about 600 to 700 properly eBayed PlayStation 3s, whichever you prefer) bond, while his 17-year old partner in attempted larceny remains "on the loose." While we knew the PS3 launch would potentially bring out the worst in people, unloading ammunition to get your game (or profiteering) on is just taking things a bit too far -- so while camping out weeks in advance for a next generation console may surely pay off in the short-term, we'd say pulling a criminal stunt to get one probably won't.

Update: Looks like the second fellow has now been apprehended and faces his own $1 million bond. Tsk tsk.

In our last installment of Stupid Gadget Criminals, we brought you the amusing tale of two dimwitted Arkansas men who had made a habit of stuffing videogames from Wal-Mart down their pants and then reselling the stolen merchandise at a local GameStop outlet -- which happened to be right next door to the 'Mart. Today's episode features a Marin County, California gentleman by the name of Jon Houston Eipp who was caught by police trying to steal a number of Apple computers from Portal Publications in Ignacio; Eipp was captured following a brief struggle, while his accomplice was apprehended minutes later after crashing the getaway car on an off-ramp. So far there's nothing all that noteworthy about this crime -- until Eipp showed up in court last Wednesday for his hearing, that is -- when, upon being released on bail, he proceeded to hide in the Civic Center courthouse until closing time and steal even more computers by carting them out in a recycling bin. Even though he was stopped by maintenance workers and sheriff's deputies on the way out, Mr. Eipp still managed to vacate the premises without being apprehended, and might have remained a free man for awhile longer had he not been caught later that night trying to steal a 1996 Volkswagen. Although one might gather from this story that Eipp has a severe Internet addiction, he later admitted that he was just stealing the PCs for drug money, a habit that he'll hopefully be able to kick during a likely prison term of 4+ years.

[Via Fark]

It should already be fairly obvious that your iPod is a hot commodity, and the last thing you need is a crazed individual taking a stab at you, or worse, swiping your portable. You've already been warned by the NYPD that rocking the token white headphones is a big no-no, and Thomas Pink even designed a shirt and tie to keep iPod-jackers at bay, but the folks over at CNET UK have a few tricks of their own to keep you from becoming a statistic. As you may or may not be aware, gadget theft in Britain is out of control, and the methods were devised after a CNET UK editor was mugged, not too dissimilar from a situation of our own. The gaffer tape method consists of taping the iPod to your body -- using 15 rounds of tape -- so that your assailant gets frustrated with the challenge and hopefully gives up pursuit, while the paperback method throws back to secrecy of old by suggesting you remove an inner chunk of a novel to let your iPod reside, and since most thieves don't care about bestsellers, you'll likely avoid a tragic conclusion. For owners living in really sketch areas, the Christopher Walken method is nearly foolproof: for Pulp Fiction fans, the iPod's hiding location comes as no surprise. For more clever disguising options to keep you and your Apple tagalong safe, be sure to hit the read link for CNET UK's suggestions, complete with "Anti-mugger" ratings and all.