Career criminals? I think not.

I am thinking that Joburg must have some of the most creative and interesting criminals around. Our cops are most certainly not bored. It must be quite something drawing up the press releases they send out.
Take this latest breakthrough by the Edenvale cable theft unit: they spent a bunch of time trawling the suburb and came across a tall gent who had successfully wired his house to some electricity cables in the area and therefore set himself up with a serious supply of free electricity. Our men in blue arrested him and the courts told him not to do it again and that he should rather go to the municipality and pay for his power.
"The suspect was out on warning on the 9 June 2009 instant the suspect to stop illegal connection. He went further and connect. At this stage the suspect owes the council more than R40000.00," reads the Cable Theft Unit's new press statement on this matter. Ja, I also don't know what it means.
They continue: "The suspects connect in the street pole, our electricians spotted the wire which goes direct to the suspect and our members were warned and the owner of the house was arrested who is the suspect."
Basically the upshot is that this 46-year-old mechanic is now in custody and about to be charged with theft.
The second enterprising suspect is a woman who sent her husband a text message to let him know she was going to be working late so that he did not worry about her failure to return home at the normal time. But then, later that evening, the poor husband receives a follow-up SMS telling him his wife has been kidnapped and he mustn't call the police or try and look for her.
So, as would be the course of action taken by most thinking husbands, he immediately calls the cops and they launch a massive manhunt. The activate the tracker device in missing wife's car, locate it outside a flat and surround the place. Ten squad cars respond and they pounce on the place. Missing wife is found inside the flat, relaxing in her pyjamas, apparently intent on spending a quiet evening at home with her no-longer-secret lover.
The upshot: she is to be billed for the manhunt and will receive a formal warning not to pull such a stunt again.