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More strange-but-true ATM news

Recent strange-but-true ATM-related news includes a befuddled Boston bandit who mistook a copy shop with an ATM for a bank and a gay rights group that tried to make a political statement with a mass ATM withdrawal.

October 26, 2004

Following are some of the strangest items recently encountered by this editor during her daily searches for ATM-related news. ATMmarketplace collects these odd stories and publishes them on a regular basis in hopes of tickling our readers' funny bones. For more of the same, seeUnlucky in ATM crime, Strange-but-true ATM news andMore strange-but-true ATM news)

State of confusion: Police on Aug. 29 collared a befuddled Boston bandit suspected of starting off a daylong robbery spree by mistaking a copy shop with an ATM for a bank.

According to a Boston Herald report, Paul Michael Callahan, 32, was nabbed covered in telltale dye at a Brookline, Mass., gas station after allegedly holding up a nearby Citizens Bank branch.

Police believe Callahan was the same confused outlaw who tried to pull off a bank job at the Image X-Press copy shop on the Boston University campus earlier the same morning.

"He passed a note to a one of the workers there demanding money,' BU police Capt. Robert Malloy said in the Herald report. "They informed him they were not a bank. He then took his note and left in search of a Fleet bank. He said he was looking for a Fleet bank.'

The copy clerks called police. Less than an hour later and about two miles away, a man fitting the same general description passed a note to a teller at a nearby Fleet Bank branch that read "Put the money in a bag and don't do anything."

He made off with less than $200 shortly after 9:30 a.m. About five hours later, Callahan allegedly passed a similar note to a Citizens teller -- this time taking about $2,500 protected by an explosive dye pack before police caught up with him at the gas station.

Heist with a hitch: According to a report in the Raleigh (N.C.) News Observer, thieves in Wake County, N.C., helped themselves to a pickup with a 16-foot trailer and a Bobcat loader attached in the early morning hours of Sept. 13.

They hauled their load to the State Employees' Credit Union five miles east of Pittsboro, where they unloaded the Bobcat and knocked through a free-standing kiosk to get to the ATM inside. They then wrapped a chain around the machine and started to yank it off its foundation.

When an alarm went off, the thieves bailed in their getaway car, a Ford truck. They left behind the stolen  Ford F-350 and Bobcat with engines running, the 16-foot trailer and the unearthed ATM in the credit union parking lot.

About a quarter mile away, they drove the second truck, headlights off, into a pond.

"They were having a bad day," said Chatham County Sheriff Richard H. Webster.

Using a trained dog, the sheriff's deputies followed the thieves' trail for about a mile before losing them. But the thieves left a big clue: Deputies think the getaway truck was registered to one of them.  Webster said the sheriff's office was close to issuing arrest warrants, according to the News Observer.

ATM as PAC: Organizers of the Boycott For Equality asked their supporters to participate in a coordinated mass ATM withdrawal on Oct. 8.

To demonstrate the need for equality in marriage and the workplace, the organization asked its supporters to each take out $80 from a local ATM.

According to a press release announcing the event, Boycott For Equality, an Atlanta-based non-profit formed to promote the event, envisioned the action emptying some ATMs and providing a reminder of gay economic power throughout the long bank weekend.

Boycott For Equality Co-Founder Dale Duncan urged boycott participants to reference the action when they were contacted by political candidates asking for money. "Just take your ATM receipt, cross out your account number, circle your balance, write GAY MONEY on it and mail it to campaign headquarters in the postage paid envelope they provide. They'll get the message that nobody in America can be taken for granted," he said.

Other components of the Boycott included a one-day work stoppage or "pink flu" day to demonstrate solidarity to employers and colleagues.

According to the release, close to 50 businesses and 15,000 people  pledged to participate using online forms at the group's Web site. Some groups that endorsed or encouraged Boycott For Equality Day included: Don't Amend: The Equality Campaign; The Advocate magazine; Civil Marriage US; DC Diversity; Equality Illinois and Wyoming Equality.

However, there were no reports of large numbers of empty ATMs in the wake of the boycott.

ATM apologists: Two Australian ATM technicians who admitted stealing $70,000 from a machine they installed received light sentences with no jail time, largely because of the "significant remorse" they exhibited after the theft, according to reports in The Age and the Melbourne Herald Sun.

Judge Wendy Wilmoth said the offense involved a breach of trust, and the court needed to denounce the actions of Robert Glen Elkin, 31, and Michael Steven Matterson, 23.

But the judge said there were unusual circumstances in the case, including the men's apparent remorse. Matterson vomited at the scene after the theft, and the court heard the two men were in tears before they admitted the crime to their employer.

On Oct. 7, Wilmoth sentenced Elkin to 12 months' imprisonment, wholly suspended for two years. Matterson was placed on a two-year community-based order with conviction, and must carry out 250 hours of unpaid community work.

According to the published reports, the men took the cash in full view of security cameras hours after setting up the machine at a shopping center in Altona Meadows on May 19 when they realized that cash-in-transit workers had mistakenly left the ATM's safe unlocked. But they regretted the spur-of-the-moment robbery and turned themselves in that same evening.

Elkin and Matterson installed the ATM outside a supermarket about 6.30 a.m. They returned to the machine about 4 p.m., grabbed the cash, stuffed it in a bag and fled in their van.

They drove to Elkin's home in Dandenong and immediately confessed to Elkin's girlfriend, a co-worker who volunteered to tell the boss. Police were called to the house, where they arrested the men and recovered all but $50 of the stolen cash. Elkin told detectives he had no explanation for his "bloody stupid" behavior.

Elkin's girlfriend, Deborah Schulz, told the court the pair was hysterical. "I've never seen two men cry so much."

Elkin's lawyer, Graeme Steart, said his client acted on impulse. He said Elkin, now a truck driver, wanted to put the cash back moments after removing it, but by then the cash-in-transit workers had returned and it was too late.

Both Elkin and Matterson pleaded guilty to one count each of theft.