Police (Off) Beat | It's hard to find good help anymore

  • A woman applying for a job at a McDonalds on Lower Roswell Road in East Cobb broke into the restaurant manager's vehicle and stole checks, which she forged signatures on and tried to cash at a nearby bank. I'm guessing she's got a lifetime of failed polygraph tests ahead of her.
  • An Atlanta police officer who "deflated both right tires and bent both right rims" said he did not notice the median curb due to "lighting conditions" and "heavy rain" while "attempting to get his bearings." Remember those excuses the next time the wife asks what happened to the car.
  • Speaking of wives, I don't want to be the Acworth husband that has to explain why he left his wedding ring in an unlocked car overnight.
  • A woman told Atlanta police she had been filing her taxes responsibly since 2006, but had never received a return check. An IRS representative told police the 2010 check, for $4,824, was sent to a Jonesboro address and cashed. The IRS said earlier checks totaling about $15,000 were also sent to other addresses.
  • A woman visiting a Smyrna QuikTrip was approached by two gentlemen who offered to sell her two laptop computers for $400. The computers, they said, were still inside two sealed FedEx boxes. The woman retrieved the cash from the QuikTrip ATM. When she opened the boxes she found three-ring notebook binders and notebook paper.
  • A woman at a wing shack on Donald Lee Hollowell Parkway (aka Bankhead) was asked to leave after shouting "I'll kick anyone's [blank]" and no one "had better say anything" to her about it.
  • A Lassiter High student prevented from leaving the school cafeteria by a teacher "disturbed the peace" by yelling "[Blank] this school, I just want to get the [blank] out of here."
  • A Waffle House Rip Van Winkle was told to leave the restaurant by an Atlanta police officer, but he didn't. He was handcuffed and given a room at the jail, where the breakfast is not nearly as good.
  • Once again, walking down the middle of an Atlanta street leads to incarceration. This time, brothers observed stumbling down the center of Dimmock Street were asked what they were drinking from a paper sack. Turns out it was a 24-ounce can of Old English, not orange juice.
  • A woman asked to leave the home of an Atlanta man living on Northwest Drive took time to find a large rock and smash his windshield with it.
  • Five or six unruly youths wearing hoodies stormed Town Center Mall's Belk store, making off with 36 polo shirts. Let's hope the broken tail light on the Honda Accord they left in gets them noticed.
  • The Boy Scouts were not prepared for the theft of their camping supplies at a Johnson Ferry Road storage shed.
  • A Kennesaw man behaved "irresponsibly" with his city-required handgun, police say, firing it at his neighbor's dog.
  • Come on and take a free ride: A motorcyclist walked out of his apartment and noticed his ride was in a different parking space. The ignition switch was damaged and the motorcycle no longer started.
  • A man celebrating his 58th birthday weekend was arrested for exposing himself on a Cobb Community Transit bus and leaving behind a DNA sample.
  • A Marietta woman rented a 2010 Mitsubishi from Enterprise and never returned it. Police are looking for her and the car.