Machines Behaving Badly

There've been a couple distressing reports out in the midwest recently about machines behaving badly.

The first account is of a 37 year old homeless man who was rummaging through a bin behind an Oak Park, Illinois supermarket and got compacted along with the cardboard boxes.

The second is more recent and it goes to support the theory that sometimes paybacks are sudden, severe and all out of proportion to the offense.

It seems that two women in Lansing, Michigan (one of whom was the late Tyree Monique Tate) decided to cap off an afternoon of boosting merch by a trip to the local TJ Maxx, where they treated a security man to some pepper spray for having the impertinence to suggest that they should pay for things they want, rather than stealing them.

Making a hasty exit from the premises, the duo repaired to the premises of a nearby Goodwill industries store to conceal themselves, and apparently the decedent Tyree Monique Tate hid out in the compactor and became TyrMonqTat when someone threw the switch. Apologists would likely suggest that the machine did exactly what it was designed for.

All of which proves yet again, as Raymond Chandler opined "Listen, kid: Crime is a sucker's road, and it leads to the gutter, the prison and the grave."

Photo credit Sanitech.