Malarkey is Andy Clarke, a creative designer with a passion for accessibility and web standards. This is his personal website.

The perfect crime

Why are certain types of criminals glamorous? Not murderers or muggers, but forgers, safe crackers and con-artists. From the fictional Italian Jobster Charlie Crocker (original, not remake) to the late Great Train Robber, Ronnie Biggs, I see a certain romance in a life outside the law. But what would be the perfect crime and what role could I play?

I have always had a keen fascination in forgery, ever since I saw Donald Pleasance in The Great Escape. And classic con movies like The Sting make me want to be Paul Newman. Now I know that life is not a movie and that in real crimes, someone always suffers. but still the romance lives on.

Armed robbery is out (stockings make me itch) and I can’t keep a straight face when I lie (or so my wife tells me), so conning is out too. Internet scams are just too boring and I never could hustle playing cards.

Maybe I should just stick to what I know and get used to the idea that I’ll never go down in history as a criminal mastermind.

But what is your criminal fantasy?

Replies

  1. #1 On May 17, 2004 11:22 PM Gez said:

    My favourite crime film is Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. I like the film so much, I’ve made it my favourite film for any genre. It’s my favourite musical, romance, news, etc. It would also put anyone off considering armed robbery as a career. It’s dangerous, and could easily result in someone getting hurt.

    My favourite crimes are the bare-face cheek variety. The idea is that you just walk into an establishment as if you work there, load whatever you like into a van in front of everyone and just drive off with it. Because the victims are so ashamed they just let it happen, they dramatise it a bit and inadvertently give you the perfect alibi. Although, I may have just made all that up. I’ve done that before.

  2. #2 On May 24, 2004 12:37 AM Gordon Mackay said:

    I don’t think I would want to go down in history as a criminal mastermind at all, but going slightly off topic I read a most amusing story of a bungling petty criminal in the paper the other day.

    This guy was one of them low-life thieves. He thought he would nick the diesel from a parked mobile home thing by siphoning it out using his mouth and a longish bit of plastic piping. Only problem was, and ewww this ain’t nice at all, he sucked out of the sewage tank instead of the diesel tank.

    How’s that for poetic justice? :)