Funny Facebook Chat: 5 Craziest Crimes of the Week

The lengths we'll go for love ... or lots of pennies. Some 300,000 of the latter factor into the craziest crimes of this week.

• American Jailed for Floating Into Canada on Mattress: As the judge put it, "Pardon the pun, but it seems to me you wanted to get there, come hell or high water." That was apparently the case for an American nabbed while crossing illegally into Canada on an air mattress last week. Officials say John Bennett, 25, was busted after he washed up on shore in New Brunswick. Bennett said he had tried to cross the border at Calais, Maine, the normal way, but was denied entry after a background check turned up criminal mischief charges pending in the US. Why did he need to get in so badly? "I sense that there’s this element of a Romeo-Juliet type of thing," says the prosecutor.
• Cops: Man Stole 300K Pennies From Work: A Pennsylvania man needs 5 million pennies to cover his bail after being accused of stealing about 300,000 pennies from his employer. Police in Taylor, just outside Scranton, have charged 34-year-old Robert Napolitan with burglary and related offenses. He's accused of taking a steel drum filled with $3,000 worth of pennies from Pyne Freight Lines, where he worked as a mechanic. But he allegedly left some telltale clues behind.

• Yoga Teacher Cleared in Bizarre Bar Mitzvah Case: It's a weird non-crime, ultimately, after an unusual trial ended without charges in Arizona. In the case, a 32-year-old yoga teacher was accused of exposing her newly augmented breasts to a group of seven boys, ages 11 to 15, at a bar mitzvah party, inviting the boys to touch them, and performing oral sex on a 15-year-old. Prosecutors opted not to pursue felony charges given a scarcity of evidence, but Lindsey Ann Radomski's trial on 18 misdemeanor counts was most unusual in one way, according to her lawyer.
• Eating a Cop's Fries Is Apparently Illegal: Stealing food off a friend's plate might be acceptable, but it's best not to take such liberties with a police officer. Police say a 26-year-old Maryland woman and a friend started a conversation with an officer at a DC restaurant on Wednesday, then the first woman began nibbling on the officer's French fries. The officer told the woman, "to not do that again because … she was stealing from me." She allegedly then took another, and her response to the cop didn't exactly help things.
• Suspect Keeps Facebook Promise to Cops, Turns Self In: It was just your average Facebook chat between two folks trying to arrange a get-together, except that one party was a man with outstanding warrants who resembles a bank robbery suspect and the other was the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary. After the RNC post about 25-year-old Brandon Melbourne went up on Monday, Melbourne himself commented, advising police that he'd turn himself in later that night. "I just got a few things to take care of busy day then I'll be down."

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