truTV: Not Reality. Actuality.

A suspected burglar in Albany, Ore., apparently escaped in June after failing in his quest to break into a warehouse, but he left behind his bolt cutters, some burned clothing, and part of his scalp. Police said the man had attempted to cut through a 480-volt line and probably had "severe" burns.

The burglar who is captured because his tracks lead away from a crime scene in the mud or snow is a story category previously identified as No Longer Weird. However, in May, Albert Jackson Dowdy, 22, in Grants Pass, Ore., took incompetence to a new level. According to police, he tried to smash a glass door with a paint can, but the can broke open. Dowdy eventually got into the home, said police (total take: a can of tuna fish and a box of oatmeal), but on his way out stepped in the spilled paint and created tracks to a nearby motel, where police eventually arrested him.

A 36-year-old man was tackled by customers after he had robbed the Zions Bank in Salt Lake City shortly after it opened on May 2. Several customers had had their eyes on him after they had seen him waiting outside for the bank to open but already wearing a hooded sweatshirt and mask, and the man meekly waited in a bank line for his turn before snatching money from a teller.

Sue the Victim: Kenneth J. Lewis II, serving 12 years in prison for burglary, filed a $140,000 lawsuit against property owner Nina Baugh, who had chased after Lewis and shot him in the arm (Bentonville, Ark., April). Willie Brown, 44, serving 4 years in prison for a convenience store robbery, filed a lawsuit against the clerk who had shot him (with Brown maintaining, "[T]here was no need for the use of deadly force," even though Brown had claimed to have a gun) (Muncie, Ind., April). And in a court filing in May opposing early release for farmer Tony Martin, who had been convicted of killing a burglar, Britain's Home Office argued against parole, maintaining that the government must protect burglars from violent homeowners.

John Gladney, 40, was arrested by Columbus, Ohio, police about a block from the National City Bank that he had allegedly robbed a few minutes earlier on March 27. According to the officers, Gladney was easy to spot because of his conspicuous gait, demonstrating pain, in that he had stuffed the money bag down his pants, only to have the bank's chemical dye pack explode near his groin.

New Concierge Services: In Melbourne, Australia, in March, John Stark, 60, and his wife and son pleaded guilty to running a scheme in which the Starks "ordered" large quantities of upscale goods, which two shoplifter-associates would then go "acquire" for them so that the Starks could resell them in the family's Shopaholic discount stores. And a burglary ring in New York City was even more specific: According to March indictments, they only stole items specifically requested by individual patrons who had heard by word of mouth that they could drop off a wish list and then buy the items at a deep discount when the goods "came in."