James Meyers was driving his daughter to school in North Carolina when he was pulled over by a police officer for a tail light that was out. But, that wasn’t all!
The police officer ran his license plate and then asked Meyers to step out the vehicle. The dad wasn’t expecting what came next.
“The officer said, ‘I don’t know how to tell you this but there’s a warrant out for your arrest from 2002. Apparently you rented the movie “Freddy Got Fingered” and never returned it.’ I thought he was joking,” said Meyers.
The officer was very polite and allowed the VHS criminal to still take his daughter to school as long as he promised to report to the police station that day.
Meyers thought everything would be straightened out at the station, but he was handcuffed and led to a magistrate for not returning a VHS tape from a store which is now closed. Meyers barely remembers even renting the video. Perhaps he returned it and it was a clerical error!
Comedian Tom Green who starred in the movie is supportive of his “fan.” After learning of this, Green said, “If it’s 200 bucks of course I’ll pay it for him, just for the principle of the thing.”
Meyers pointed out that, while it makes a good story, it prevented the officer and magistrate from focusing on serious issues and was a serious waste of government resources.
To make things even more strange, the VHS thief has been pulled over since 2002, but this is the first time he has heard of this!
This isn’t the first time someone was surprisingly arrested for a VHS rental. Kayla Michelle Finley of South Carolina was surprised when she went to the police department in 2014 for something unrelated and ended up getting arrested for not returning a “Monster In Law” VHS nine years earlier.
These are the hard crimes that can unknowingly send you to jail!
Do you think either of these movies is worth going to jail over? How would you react if this happened to you? Please share your thoughts.
H/T: WSOCTV