Phony Guards

Phony Guards

TIGARD, Ore. (AP) - Tigard police say two men dressed as security guards fooled a pair of bank customers into giving them deposits. Police spokesman Jim Wolf says the phony guards stood outside a night deposit slot at the Wells Fargo Bank at 9200 S.W. Washington Square Road on Friday evening and and told the victims it was out of order. The men offered to take the money and make the deposits when the bank reopened.Wolf says the men wore uniforms and had badges and guns. The night deposit slot was covered by a sign saying it was out of service. Police learned of the crimes when a business contacted the branch to ask about its deposit. The bank says it has never had a problem with the slot.

I have always been interested in reading about all the classic Scams and Con games. The really interesting thing is that most of them have been around for over a hundred years and yet still work today. The above article is a case in point. The bank guard scam has been around for as long as there have been night deposit slots or ATM’s. For the price of a cardboard sign and a uniform rental these guys were able to get people to willingly hand over their money to them. The victims probably even thanked them for it, thinking it was saving them a trip back to the bank the next day. No need for guns and violence, instead they just rely on peoples blind trust of authority figures and inherent laziness of not wanting to drive around all night looking for another branch or holding on to the money till the morning.

I totally recommend:

“How to Cheat at Everything: A Con Man Reveals the Secrets of the Esoteric Trade of Cheating, Scams, and Hustles” (Simon Lovell)

It’s a really good book on all sorts of scams and cons. My all time favorite is the section on Carnival games which shows you exactly how the games are rigged to best part you from your money.

Myrtle ave 1951

Myrtle ave 1951 4.jpg, originally uploaded by zombie_criminalist.

So they are re-paving Myrtle ave this week and as part of that they have scraped off the top layers of asphalt. What is interesting (to me at least) is that in doing so they have uncovered parts of the original road surface. In some areas you can see the trolly rails, which they apparently chose to just pave over instead of remove, and even the original cobble stone style road surface.

I included the scanned slide I have of Myrtle from 1951 which shows the rails and stones in question.

Other then random musings on the history of paving the local streets, which probably no one finds interesting but me, not too much has been going on. Work is going good, still doing fire debris training. We are working on some practice cases where we get the data and have to figure out what if any ignitable liquids were present. This is the second level of practice cases, which are quite a bit harder then the first set as one could imagine. Still it’s interesting work. Tomorrow I will start testing the first can of soil+gasoline that I had talked about in my last post. I ended up making 4 cans of soil, so will do 1 a week and see what if any changes occur in the gasoline patterns. The science geek in me is really interested to see what sort of results I get.

Yeah I am THAT big a nerd that I am excited to see what science I can do on dirt.

Er…it’s for science!

So at work I am currently training in the Fire Debris section. Basically I am learning how to analyze evidence from fire scenes and see if there are any ignitable liquids present. This could indicate the fire was intentionally set, or not…not my call. All I do is say what’s there or not there really.

ANYWAY…for part of the training one side experiment we are doing is to see the effects of soil microbes on Gasoline. Literature says that stuff in soil can actually “eat” some compounds in gasoline. So to test this the plan is to add some gasoline to dirt, let it sit, and see what happens. So there I am out back behind my apartment building last night with a small metal can and a large slotted spoon digging up some dirt from the little garden area we have against the back fence. This is all fine and good at first, but it seems that my new landlord (who up to now I have met exactly once when the old one brought him around to meet all of us) was doing some work down in the basement, the door to which opens on the back of the building in full view of the garden area. So from HIS prospective he opens the door to see someone squatting down behind his building shoveling dirt into a can with a slotted spoon.

He finally said something like “uh hi what’s going on?” and I realized who it was and got up to introduce my self and told him exactly what I was doing back there. I didn’t really go into much detail other then where I worked and that it was “for science” which really I have found works quite well in a large number of situations. He was cool with it all once he realized who I was and all that and we both went on our ways. If nothing else, I suppose, it gave him a odd little tale to tell at home or work the next day.

The truth is out there…unfortunately

Meg and I are back in NYC. We have been in CT since Wednesday to dog sit for my parents and do a few little day trips to our favorite CT/MA places.

While in CT we also went to see The Dark Night which was really good and X-Files which was really not so good. The big problem we both had with X-Files was that the movie really didn’t have to be “The X-Files movie” it could of been any movie with an FBI agent and Medical Dr. investigating things. Now the movie didn’t HAVE to have aliens per-say but more then 10 years out of the series they really needed to come back strong to get people back into the story. Instead we get a story about organ/body part thefts with Mulder and Scully sort of investigating what was going on, and the rest of the time talking about their relationship. Meh!

Rest of the weekend was fun. Northampton and the Book Barn both were a good time. We both sold and bough a bunch of books and yesterday got our cheese burger fix in from Shady Glen. Mmmm crispy cheese.

Street View

Google maps street view has updated their photo database and now covers like most all of Queens, especially around where we live. I stumbled on it by accident going to look up directions for Meg to tell the taxi guy when she flys in tomorrow (she has been visiting her family in FL for the last week). So I start with my address and there pops up a picture of the front of my appt. building. Even stranger is you can totally see my car parked there in front of the building.

Cool and at the same time a tad creepy I suppose.

But then the geek in me takes over and I start analyzing the pictures to see if I can tell when they did their drive by so the speak. I can see in the picture of my car that it is missing the license plate still so that puts the range somewhere between June 29-Sept 23rd of 2007. I really can’t narrow it down much more than that at this point other then the half month in July is out when we were on the cruise and I rented a parking space in a driveway for 2 weeks.

With a little more sleuthing I should be able to narrow it down a bit more. I’m sure if I was like the guys on CSI I could take the shadows of the trees and stuff and triangulate the date and exact time the picture was taken but as we all know sadly I am not. Plus if I were I would be much better dressed and driving a Hummer to work everyday.

Like I said before the girl gets home Tomorrow and then we are heading up to CT to Dog sit for my parents and do a few little day trips. Meg has been itching to go to the book barn and Northampton, MA again this tip and we will likely try and see a few movies. *I* want to see the new Batman even though she apparently want to go see it with her family…grrr….if I had know THAT I could of seen it by my self this past weekend. Oh well, she will just have to see it twice now.

Dr. Horrible part III

All I have to say is “Joss Whedon you bastard!”

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

Go visit and watch Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, a project from Joss Whedon and Neil Patrick Harris. Part one is out today, the next two will be out later this week.

High Class

 

071308_1038.jpg, originally uploaded by zombie_criminalist.

If you come visit us here in Queens you too can get your very own “High-Class bag of CDROM”!

HMS Pinafore

The girl and I just got back from a local theater production of H.M.S Pinafore that they put on down at Forest Park. It was a really fun time. Neither of us are really into musical theater or Gilbert and Sullivan per-say but it was free and a fun night out at the park. The show was…what you would expect for a free community theater production but we both enjoyed it. Some time in August they have FAME the stage production/musical which we might check out also.

This week at work has been going good. We have Friday off for the 4th so it’s a short week. As srot of a 4th of July celebration we had an indoor BBQ/Picnic of sorts for lunch today. A bunch of us all chipped in and got 2 bags of tacos, 2 buckets of KFC, and a “crave case” (30) white castle burgers. It was a horrifying sight to see all that junk food laid out on the table….horrifying but YUMMY! hehe

Since I have Friday off and don’t have to worry as much about getting up early for work the Girl and I are going to go out to the movies tomorrow night after I get out of work. We are both keen to see WALL-E and figure that a Thursday night should (we hope) have fewer children in the theater then say our usual Saturday movie trips.

I guess that’s why I am here…

So today I had to go down to NYPD medical for a check up of sorts for my SCOTT pac air tank training (see this from last year). Had to be there for 6 am so that was oodles of fun, like last time I took a cab. It was worth the 10$ not to deal with the bus at 5am.

So I get there and the rent-a-cop…er security guard in the loby asks what I am there for. I tell him I am with the NYPD and am doing a medical screening. He looks at me again and then asks “Oh…are you here for psychological screening?” I just stared at him for a moment and said “uh no…for hazmat related training medical check up”. He told me what floor to head to and I went on my way. So you know thanks security guy for my needing psychological testing being your first guess as to why I was there. Maybe a just had an extra crazy look this morning, a combination of being out at 6am and not having eaten anything for the last 12 hours due to the blood test (which was the LAST thing they did…seriously..take my blood first then while I am standing for 20 minutes waiting to see the Dr. I can eat a snack cake or something)

But I digress, rest of the thing went fine and I was back at work a few hours later…medically fit apparently but I guess I will just never know about my psychological state Maybe next time!

Men’s Room at the Hilton

Men’s Room, originally uploaded by zombie_criminalist.

Phone cam pict from the Men’s room at the Las Vegas Hilton. They had these pictures up over all the urinals.

Leaving Las Vegas

We are back from our Vegas adventure!

The Meg and I flew down to Las Vegas this past Thursday so we could see our friends Jenn and David get married! This is our first time in Vegas so it was also a vacation/adventure for Meg and I.

We stayed at the Las Vegas Hilton while we were there. It was a nice hotel/casino but we mostly stayed there because it is also home to The Star Trek Experience!

See the plan for the wedding is that they were going to be married on the bridge of the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) but the ceremony would be performed by none other than…

Thats right….the King him self…ELVIS! (Oh yah, David decided to wear a dress command uniform in lieu of a tux)

He was a really good Elvis! Everyone at the attraction got a total kick out of the whole thing. This was Elvises first Star Trek Wedding and the Star Trek Experiences first Elvis wedding. Elvis also got a good number of pictures not only with our group but also with a bunch of the characters including the hot Klingon woman we had there with us. Elvis did a nice short little ceremony, asking if Jenn took David to be “her hunk-a-hunk-a burning love” and sang three songs.

After the ceremony we went down to Quarks bar for dinner, drinks, and wedding (vegan) cupcakes.

The whole thing was a total blast. I had Romulan ale, which I think was just normal beer with blue food coloring. They also had these HUGE drinks, which came in 2 sizes, the large one being the size of a fishbowl and containing 10oz of just liquor with a number of other things including dry ice to make it smoke. Elvis hung out with us for a bit and got quite a few odd looks, which is saying something in a Star Trek theme bar.

After the wedding we spent the rest of the weekend doing touristy type stuff. Spent some time down by the pool. We went back to the Star Trek thing as just regular tourists and got to see all the props and did the Borg and Klingon rides which were a lot of fun.

We also visited Madame Tussauds wax museum:

Saturday night we all split up and people went to see different shows. Meg and I ended up going to see one called BITE at the Stratosphere which is basically naughty vampire girls set to classic rock. It was a really fun time. We had dinner at the Stratosphere and did a little gambling on the video poker. I won enough to just about cover dinner which isn’t bad.

Sunday we all took a tour bus down to the Hoover Dam and had a DAMN tour! Yeah the DAMN /DAM jokes were a plenty. The girl at the gift shop even told me “here’s your dam receipt”.

Monday we packed up and headed home. Trip home was mostly un-eventful except for being delayed 2 hours due to weather. All in all we had a really good time our first trip out to Vegas and will probably go back again at some point. There was a LOT of stuff we didn’t have time to see/do so I wouldn’t mind going back. Who knows, maybe next time it will be our turn to finally get hitched!

Lie Detector?

  

Lie Detector, originally uploaded by zombie_criminalist.

Thanks to Alison for getting me this nifty ruler…er I mean “Lie Detector” from UNH’s Alumni weekend. Now you can get the truth out of the suspect that you just chased down and arrested after doing “forensic science” on the evidence you your self collected from the crime scene and analyzed in 20 minutes.

But seriously…on the one hand it’s a cute little…promotion…or something but one would think that in advertising the “Henry C. Lee Institute of Forensic Science” at the University of New Haven you would go for something a bit more….well scientific? I mean granted there is science involved in the little thermal reactive patch on the ruler which changes color with the temperature (think Mood Ring) but presenting it as a lie detector…even as a joke, doesn’t really do much for science credibility. They may as well of printed a star chart or Ouija board on it and told people to use that to catch the criminal.

I guess it just bothers me that in a field where we have to constantly fight the media image of forensic science as something that is akin to magic process that can solve any crime in 30 minutes or less, even the big “reputable” organizations of higher learning further the stereo type instead of…well you know…educating people as they are supposed to be doing to the truth of Forensic Science and all the work that goes into it. We have enough problems with jurors expecting “cool science stuff” in every trial, and really the last thing we need is them now wondering why the officer didn’t just use is portable lie detector to find out the truth.

AC hell

So since last summer we have been planning on getting a new AC, the one we have works…mostly but doesn’t seem to do a great job of keeping even one room cool. So given we are in for 3 days of 90+ weather we decided this was as good a time as any to pick up a new one. So we ran out to Home Depot found a decent model, both power and size wise (so we though). First adventure was in the parking lot when we found that the box wouldn’t fit in either the trunk or back seat. Oopse! So there we are in the parking lot taking the thing out of the box with all the packing materials and what not and finally managing to fit it in the trunk. Get it home, carry it up the stairs and into the appt. Now the old one we had was…smaller. As in portable with a handle and what not. This one…isn’t It’s not HUGE I mean it fits in the window but was a nightmare to install. The instructions were less then helpful and the screw holes were a fraction too small with the paint so it made bolting stuff together a nightmare. But I did finally get it installed and it does look/work nice. We haven’t tried the cooling features yet (not that hot so far) but the fan function works nice. I guess my writing about it really can’t convey the true hell it was to put together and install but needless to say my arms are killing me this morning. So glad I am not working today.

Speaking of working my Fire Debris training is going well. Learning all about….well fire and what not. Only working two days next week then its off to Vegas for Jenn’s wedding! Woo for that!

Today we may do a movie and then dinner out somewhere tonight. Sunday is our 1 year engagement anniversary so we figured a touch of celebration is in order. And no we haven’t set a date yet, though Jenn keeps saying we should bring our Birth Certificates with us to Vegas just in case the mood were to strike us to join her at the alter with Elvis

The letter in the pond

The story of the letter in the pond.

Short version is someone bought a house, went to remove a small garden pond that was on their property and found this letter laminated under the bottom liner.

I am totally signing all my notes “Oh, and by the way, I hope your head falls off” from now on!