truTV: Not Reality. Actuality.

A 25-year-old man, pursued by police after he tried to run down his girlfriend with his car, fled on foot across Interstate 45 near Houston, but was struck and killed by cars (February).

News That Sounds Like a Joke: Toronto police announced in February that they had arrested the man who had stolen the backhoe with the intention of driving it to a car wash in order to break down a wall and get at the facility's coin machine. The call to police came from a snow plow that was hot on the backhoe's heels, with the driver having diverted from his route to chase the thief.

Toronto police announced in February that they had arrested the man who had stolen a backhoe with the intention of driving it to a car wash in order to break down a wall and get at the facility's coin machine. The call to police came from a snow plow that was hot on the backhoe's heels, with the driver having diverted from his route to chase the thief.

(1) William Anderson, 51, was arrested in February after he attracted a lot of attention by parking a Hummer (with Michigan plates) outside the small-town county welfare office in Jonesville, Va., while he applied for benefits; a quick investigation revealed that the vehicle had been stolen. (2) Frederick Watson, 57, was arrested in February in DeLand, Fla., after he attracted attention by pushing a heavy safe in a shopping cart through the lobby of the Putnam Hotel. When questioned, Watson tried to convince police that he had "found" the safe (but actually, it had been stolen from a fourth-floor office).

Teachers Out of Control: Fifth-grade teacher Susan Romanyszyn, 45, was arrested in Bucks County, Pa., in January and charged with 17 counts of threatening bombings and gun violence after she was assigned to teach fourth grade, instead.

Least Competent Criminals: Pat Dykstra, 51, of Fox Lake, Wis., was persuaded by bar patrons, including her boyfriend, that she was too drunk to drive and so took responsibility by calling 911 from her truck to ask that the sheriff send someone to follow her home, according to a January Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story. (Dykstra then ended the call by telling the dispatcher how dangerous it is to drive while on the phone.) When deputies caught up to Dykstra, she registered a .14 blood-alcohol reading, well over the maximum permitted.