The mouse in the soup was a ringer, police say: Customers accused of trying to hoax Cracker Barrel
When stupid people breed, this is what can happen, y'all.... Perhaps this could more reasonably be titled "Stoopid Kriminull Trix"??
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. — A woman who said she found a mouse in her soup at a Cracker Barrel restaurant last month made up the whole story, the Commonwealth's Attorney's Office announced this week.
Carla Patterson, 36, and her son, Ricky Patterson, 20, both of Hampton, Va., were both charged Tuesday with attempted extortion and conspiracy to commit a felony after they tried to get Cracker Barrel to give them money in the hoax, said Howard Gwynn, Newport News' commonwealth's attorney.
Carla Patterson was eating at the Newport News restaurant on May 8 when she said she discovered the mouse in a bowl of vegetable soup. Her screams prompted other patrons to leave the restaurant, and the incident caused Cracker Barrel to stop serving vegetable soup at all its 497 stores nationwide.
The Pattersons were arrested Tuesday after a sting operation in which officials from Cracker Barrel met the Pattersons at an undisclosed location and handed them a check, with law enforcement officials witnessing the handover from nearby, Gwynn said. The police department's economic crimes unit had developed the plan for the arrest after gathering evidence in recent days, police said.
Julie Davis, a corporate spokeswoman with Cracker Barrel's headquarters, near Nashville, Tenn., said the Pattersons had demanded $500,000 from the company,
Under the deal that Cracker Barrel had arranged with the Pattersons for the sting, the restaurant chain was to turn over the money in exchange for pictures of the mouse that Ricky Patterson had taken with his cell phone camera. Also as part of the deal, Davis said, Ricky Patterson was to publicly admit that he had made up the story.
But instead of getting to keep the check, the Pattersons got arrested.
Why? Because their DUMB@$$E$, that's why. Good criminals plan and think through the crime they are about to commit. Good criminals consider the process as well as the result. Good criminals at least have the foresight to drown the mouse in soup before trying to scam a restaurant. Then again, no one could accuse Mother Patterson and her doting but doltish son of being anything but your everyday, run-of-the-mill, garden variety DUMB@$$E$.
Davis said Cracker Barrel had undertaken an in-depth investigation as soon as the mouse was found in the soup.
But when the laboratory analysis of the small, black mouse came back, Davis said, it was clear that something was amiss.
For one thing, she said, the autopsy showed that the mouse had not drowned, and was not cooked. The mouse did not have any soup in its internal system. The mouse, Davis said, died of a skull fracture.
Also, an audit of the vendor that provided the soup indicated it would have been impossible for the mouse to make it through the soup-making process in one piece, Davis said.
Here's a suggest for some creative punishment. How about forcing mother and son to serve out their sentence bussing tables at a Cracker Barrel and living off nothing but vegetable soup? It's endorsed by DUMB@$$E$ everywhere...er, well, at least in Newport News, VA.
