# Criminals donning conspicuous apparel then dumping it to aid escape - ever been a thing?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 7, 2024, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307 "2024-12-07T15:46:13Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/1 "2024-12-07T15:46:13Z")
This question is prompted by the 4 December assassination of the UnitedHealthcare CEO where the dark clad murderer wore a distinctive light backpack, and may have dumped it later.
I have reflected on on crime witnesses often being wrong on details, and it occurs to me that for someone planning to commit a crime in public and making good their escape, it would make sense to wear something very conspicuous but easily got rid of, to deflect witnesses‘ attention from less easily changed characteristics.
So, if I planned to commit a crime (a robbery, say), wouldn‘t it make sense to commit the crime wearing a high-visibility vest, a neon necktie, or some such (which would make witnesses pay less attention to my face, and cue law enforcement to look for persons wearing that item) then when getting away dumping it at the first opportunity?
The factual question here being: Have criminals ever used that strategem?
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/2 "2024-12-07T16:49:32Z")
In the modern world faces are likely to be caught on video no matter what else a criminal is wearing. In the case of the insurance CEO the killer was hiding his face with a mask, something frequently done. And some people are good at remembering faces whether or not distracted by apparel. Obviously exchanging any clothing after a crime will help obscure the criminals identity as long as they are significantly different. Either way it clouds the search for the perpetrator as their known appearance is made available to police and the public.
I know that’s been done without using a high-profile accessory like a neon necktie. I would think taking it to an extreme and wearing something like a clown suit would be most effective. Wearing a full face mask will be the best way to prevent facial recognition though.
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### Author:  [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/3 "2024-12-07T18:39:07Z")
> [@TriPolar](#):
>
> I would think taking it to an extreme and wearing something like a clown suit would be most effective.
As seen in this documentary film.
> **[Quick Change](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quick_Change)**
>
> Quick Change is a 1990 American crime comedy film directed by Howard Franklin and Bill Murray (in their directorial debuts) and written by Franklin. Based on the novel of the same name by Jay Cronley, the film stars Murray, Geena Davis, Randy Quaid, and Jason Robards. Quick Change follows three people on an elaborate bank robbery and their subsequent escape.
> Filmed and set in New York City, Quick Change is the second adaptation of Cronley's novel, after the 1985 Franco-Canadian film Hold-Up. It ...
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/4 "2024-12-07T18:56:48Z")
[Clown bandits San Diego](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03Hanr86mc0)
[Clown bandits Dallas](https://www.fox26houston.com/video/533890)
[Clown bandits Santa Ana](https://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/investigators-who-is-this-clown/2097607/)
[Clown bandits Detroit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mywgD9PAHYE)
[Clown bandits Viginia](https://www.wric.com/news/tidewater/suffolk-police-looking-for-clown-mask-wearing-armed-robbery-suspect/)
[Clown bandits Australia](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boAb5fyjOdY)
Probably thousands more.
These are more recent than the movie mentioned, but clown masks go way back. Even the Joker had his men wear clown masks in early comics and I think in the 60s TV show. I bet they were drawing on real news stories even then.
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### Author:  [@ByrdJrHs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ByrdJrHs)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/5 "2024-12-07T19:35:01Z")
This is a non clown one.
> **[Peggy Jo Tallas](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peggy_Jo_Tallas)**
>
> Peggy Jo Tallas (June 6, 1944 – May 5, 2005) was an American bank robber who would cross-dress as a man to conceal her identity, earning her the media epithet Cowboy Bob for always sporting a white ten-gallon hat. She robbed a total of five banks in Texas between 1991 and 1992 before she was caught by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, but as Tallas never used a weapon during her robberies, she received a light sentence of 33 months. In 2005, after living quietly for the past decade, she Her s...
Bank Robbers seem to be much more into this strategy. Not all bank robberies end up on the local news, but if they had a silly disguise on, it’s sure to be on the 6pm news.
Most bank robbers eventually get caught.
There are unsolved crimes with video. So did they get away with it because they wore a disguise? We will never know because it’s an unsolved crime. We don’t know if the criminals were disguised or not, because we never caught them.
Pre-ubiquitous video, there was the issue of “eye witness “ accounts. Multiple “eye witnesses “ can sometimes have very different physical descriptions of the subject. Sometimes leading to wrongful convictions.
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### Author:  [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/6 "2024-12-07T20:45:29Z")
In the fictional series Lupin, the lead character pulled off a robbery driving a bright orange car, then after the crime immediately drove it through a car wash to rinse the water-soluble paint, revealing a boring gray car. The police drove right past him looking for an orange car.
Fictional but entertaining.
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### Author:  [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/7 "2024-12-07T21:45:57Z")
I was on the subway (“tube”) in London when there were Mayday riots in 2000, and some stores, especially a McDonalds, were trashed. They pulled up the grass in Parliament Square and made a grass mohawk on Churchill’s head. I almost got run over by the riot police horse squad while trying to take a picture of them on London Bridge. (Bloody tourist!)
A bunch of young guys got on the train, and then sat down and began swapping out or taking off the jackets they were wearing and hats, replacing them with other coloured items in their backpacks. They’d obviously planned their part on the mayhem.
A Loss Prevention Officer where my wife worked once mentioned the key to people who did serious theft was they hid their faces, changed their clothes, but were identified because they were always wearing the same expensive distinctive sneakers.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/8 "2024-12-07T21:57:57Z")
I remember that case and another where a man dressed as a woman to rob banks. _She_ was usually described as a _tall woman_.
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### Author:  [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/9 "2024-12-07T22:05:51Z")
Here’s one who wore a sombrero. He didn’t get away with it.
> **[Tucson man sentenced to 12.5 years for robbing a GECU in east El Paso in 2022](https://kfoxtv.com/news/local/gallery/tucson-man-sentenced-to-125-years-for-robbing-a-gecu-in-east-el-paso-in-2022-arizona-texas-tx-sherman-edward-lester-vista-del-sol-drive-bank-robber-prison?photo=1)**
>
> A 45-year-old Tucson man convicted of robbing a GECU bank in east El Paso in 2022, has been sentenced to over a dozen years in prison.
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### Author:  [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [December 7, 2024, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/10 "2024-12-07T22:54:32Z")
> [@TriPolar](#):
>
> I would think taking it to an extreme and wearing something like a clown suit would be most effective.
Texas’ famous Santa Claus bank robbery started going disastrously wrong almost immediately.
> **[Santa Claus Bank Robbery](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Claus_Bank_Robbery)**
>
> The Santa Claus Bank Robbery occurred on December 23, 1927, in the Central Texas town of Cisco. Marshall Ratliff, dressed as Santa Claus, along with Henry Helms and Robert Hill, all ex-cons, and Louis Davis, a relative of Helms, held up the First National Bank in Cisco. The robbery is one of Texas' most infamous crimes, having invoked the largest manhunt ever seen in the state. Boyce House, editor of the Ranger Times, a newspaper in the county at the time, wrote that this was "the most specta Ma...
Willie Sutton had success with much less conspicuous disguises (cop, mailman, maintenance man) that helped him gain entry to the banks he robbed, but his M.O. was distinctive enough that they generally figured out it was him.
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### Author:  [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2024, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/criminals-donning-conspicuous-apparel-then-dumping-it-to-aid-escape-ever-been-a-thing/1011307/11 "2024-12-08T14:10:59Z")
> [@md-2000](#):
>
> …
>
> A Loss Prevention Officer where my wife worked once mentioned the key to people who did serious theft was they hid their faces, changed their clothes, but were identified because they were always wearing the same expensive distinctive sneakers.
If I were ever to be robbed my fixed intent has been to take a good look at the perp’s shoes, because these are the item they are least likely to change.