There are certain people in this world that are not only unsatisfied with there lives, but are willing to make believe that they are something that they are not. Every once in a while you will either hear about or read a story about someone imitating a police officer. Most of the time they do this because they want to commit a crime, but sometimes it is done only to make the person feel important. There was a bizarre news story that came out a couple of weeks ago about such a person in New York city. Not only did he make believe he was a police officer, but he would arrest people and take them to an office that he told them was used by the police precinct and handcuff them to a desk and then interrogate them. Here is the most amazing part of the story. He hired about 20 people and they all thought that they were working for the police. Imagine being handcuffed and maybe even punched around and held prisoner for awhile then let go. Seeing all those people walking around must have convinced some people that they were really in a police station. This is much more strange than most tales of people imitating cops, but imitating cops is becoming more common.

I remember one guy that liked to commit burglaries. He would make believe he was a cop, talk to people in their home, but he was really doing what they call "casing the joint". This is looking over the place to see where the valuables are hidden. This guy was no rocket scientist. As a matter of fact he when he was caught, he was about 50 years old and had already spent over 30 years in jails and institutions. You would think that this fact alone would deter him from playing this game. Let me tell you how he was caught. When you buy a wallet there is usually a card that comes with it. It is an id card that you fill in. He filled it in and altered it to say he was a NYC policeman and then pasted a black and white photo of himself on it. This jerk then went to a home of a person that happened to be a real policeman and showed him the id and said he wanted to question him. The real policeman knew what police ids looked like. First of all the photos were in color and that id card was a joke. The guy was arrested instantly. It turned out he was driving a stolen car and had just got out of jail. When he got to court he claimed he only stole the car because his mother had cancer and he needed it to visit her before she died.

Sfakianakis Police Bus
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Here is an interesting tale of a twisted crossing guard. One day this crossing guard put on a New York City police department jacket which made her look like a female cop. She was on Staten Island at the time which is a borough of the city. She then walked into a department store there and began to help herself to merchandise. What made her think that nothing would be reported is beyond me. She managed to take about $1,500 worth of stuff before she was arrested. You really have to wonder about this one, it sounds like something snapped in her, doesn't it?

There is a problem in Jamaica, the tropical paradise. The problem is that there are criminals posing as cops and the people that live near the Mobay area where this is taking place, are having a hard time telling the fake cops from the real ones. It seems that the criminals are dressing like cops and even wearing flak jackets. Several people have been gunned down by them in the streets lately putting the populace in a state of terror. Some people even say that the fake cops are real cops. It is almost impossible to tell. To make matters even worse there are all sorts of police investigations against other cops going on there. The murder count has already reached 175.

Mounted Policeman in Montreal, Canada
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A man was driving down the street in Mineola, N.Y. last year. He noticed that there were flashing lights coming up behind him and then thought that it was a police car. He was told to pull over and what he thought was a police officer in a military type uniform got out and walked over to him. This must have made him wonder what was going on, but he didn't have much time to think about this since he was shot twice and died. He never would have pulled over if he didn't think that a police car was behind him. This was a purposeful attempt to make people believe that the police were pulling someone over for a traffic violation. So why was this guy murdered? The real police think that the phony cop was after the man's keys. It seems that he had keys to a bank office.

A nursing student in Florida met a vicious end. It seems that a man had broken into one of those Army Navy stores and stole some police gear that they sold. Now that he had this gear, he put on some of it and convinced the young nurse that he was a police trainee. The young nurse was naive, as most people would be in this situation and she let him into her apartment. He then went on to kill her. It seems that some of these animals know no limits. The famous rapist and robber, Karl Chessman used a flashing red light on the roof of his car to make people pull over in the 1940s. He would then rape the women and steal any valuables. He was executed under California's Little Lindbergh law, which allowed for executions in kidnapping cases.

If you think that criminals are only posing as police, this is not true. Here is a case where one posed as a DJ:

A man was arrested a couple of years ago, he had posed as a DJ and convinced a girl that she had won a contest and then got her to come to his home. He had set up electronic equipment that allowed him to intercept telephone calls that were made to a radio station that was running a contest where they were giving away Britney Spears tickets. He told the girl she had won the tickets and $1,000 and said he would pick her up and take her to get her prize. When he got her to his apartment he offered her money for sex but she refused. She wanted to go home, but he kept her for several hours but finally let her go.

I guess the moral of this article is that you just have to make sure that the person that you are dealing with is really what he or she says they are.