The 6 Most Hilariously Creative Acts of Revenge

The Bluff City area already had a reputation for using surveillance cameras as speed traps to collect revenue, so when McCrary got a belated ticket from one in 2010, he was damn well going to say a word or two. McCrary went to the police department's website to locate a non-emergency phone number to give someone a piece of his mind, and he made a curious find: a warning message saying that the police department's domain was just about to expire.

Imagine the situation: A computer network professional is fuming about a questionable ticket dealt by the local police department, then unexpectedly finds out that said police department's website is about to be up for grabs. As perfect moments go, it must've been a pretty sweet one.

Within a few days, the BCPD's website mysteriously stopped being all policey and began displaying information about the evils of speed cameras, including the area's specific camera locations and how to avoid them.

McCrary, the site's proud new owner, created and linked to a number of articles highlighting just how much money these cameras were taking in and how said money was distributed. When it became apparent that 50 percent of the revenue went to the company that sold the cameras, it didn't take long for the public to take interest.

Meanwhile, the cops had zero idea about what was going on. In fact, they didn't even know anything had happened until the reporters started calling. A quick investigation revealed that the BCPD had in fact received no less than seven email notifications that their domain rights were about to expire, and they just never got around to renewing them.

This made everything McCrary did nice and legal -- the cops couldn't touch him, and he could just lean back and watch as his newfound publicity jumped his site to a very respectable 90,000 unique visitors, all on a quest to learn about the dark side of speed cameras.

McCrary's site is still alive and well today. Meanwhile, the Bluff City Police Department maintains a limited Internet presence, presumably while attempting to get with the times and figure out how to set up a Myspace profile.

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Bentley University freshman Mark Bao was more than a little pissed off when a thief relieved him of his MacBook Air. Luckily, Bao was pretty handy with computers and used a browser-based backup database to remotely access the stolen computer. Curious to see what the dickbag who took the computer had been using it for, Bao started combing through its files and browsing history. Soon enough, he had dug up the culprit's identity via his Facebook profile information. That wasn't the only interesting thing he found, either:

That video is of the thief, who apparently used the computer's camera to make several videos of himself doing a weird frat boy robot dance to the song "Make It Rain" by Travis Porter.

Once Bao had watched the videos and recovered from the ensuing douche chill seizure, he realized that he'd hit the jackpot. He now had the perpetrator's identity and all the damning proof against the dude he could ever want. So Bao took his case to the cops, they arrested the guy and the laptop was returned to its original owne- ha, no, of course not! Where's the fun in that?

Instead, Bao picked one of the more embarrassing videos and uploaded it to YouTube under the less than subtle title of "Don't Steal Computers Belonging to People Who Know How to Use Computers."

The clip instantly became a runaway YouTube hit (1.7 million views, as of the writing of this article). Before long, the guy himself caught wind of his newfound viral fame. The realization that you're now known to your friends, family and the world as Dancin' Douchebag Computer Thief apparently has a very invigorating effect on a person's honesty glands, because he immediately turned the stolen laptop over to the campus police. He then proceeded to write Bao a rambling email, asking him if Bao could take the video down as a huge personal favor for him, the guy who stole Bao's computer.

History doesn't explicitly state what Bao's reaction was, but judging by how he instantly posted the email on Reddit and the fact that the video is still up, we're guessing his reply was a set of very specific instructions as to where the thief could stick his request.

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One of the millions of homeowners screwed by the economic meltdown in 2008 was Terry Hoskins, who was stuck with a $350,000 house that he was unable to pay off thanks to a failing family business. To ward off foreclosure, he put the house on the market -- only to receive a single offer of $170,000, the house buyer's equivalent of mooning the seller. Still, the world economy was moments away from devolving into Road Warrior territory, so Hoskins was in no position to haggle. While the offer was less than half the value of the house, it was also a full ten grand above what he owed the bank on it. Knowing that it could have been much worse, the relieved Hoskins informed the bank of the deal ...

... only to have them tell him that they absolutely would not accept the arrangement.

Hoskins' bank had chosen to handle the crisis in a manner best described as a feeding frenzy: They just calculated the most money they could make and went for the jugular. And since they could profit the most by repossessing and selling Hoskins' house, well, that's just too bad for Hoskins.

Freshly stripped of fiscal dignity, Hoskins took one last look at the house he had built and lived in for decades. Then he did an inventory of his earthly possessions. He had one home that was no longer his, one business that was likely to go belly-up ... and, as luck would have it, one perfectly functional bulldozer.

As we've mentioned before, the one lesson corporate America doesn't seem to learn is that you never, ever fuck with a man who has access to a bulldozer. Hoskins took it upon himself to remind the bank of this, cranked up the 'dozer's engine and proceeded to tear through his home, aka the house the bank was hoping to seize.

For two hours.

So, when the bank cashed in on their shenanigans and came calling on this ...

... they found Hoskins lounging in front of this:

Hoskins explained his actions by stating that he merely wanted to leave the place in the same condition that he had found it -- that is, sans house. When the bank countered by saying they'd repo his business premises, too, he just shrugged and gave the bulldozer a meaningful look.

Of course, the letter of the law doesn't leave much room for poetic justice, so Hoskins will still have to pay a shit ton of money for the havoc he wreaked. Still, we're guessing the bank managers aren't leaning on him too hard if he misses a payment ... lest they wake up in the middle of the night to the sound of a large, slowly approaching engine.

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To be fair, they did take precautions: The tasks, ranging from stamping license plates to making stationery, were only offered to inmates with a history of good behavior. Unfortunately, even the most mild-mannered con tends to harbor animosity toward the police, what with the whole "getting arrested" thing. So when the prison print shop got the task of producing a bunch of 16-inch logo decals for the doors of 30 Vermont State police cruisers, one inmate just couldn't resist. He sneaked to the computer housing the logo file and made certain alterations to the original design. He didn't bother being too subtle, because surely the decal wouldn't be in place for long -- the cops would probably spot the difference right away.

Fast forward a year. You're a Vermont State police officer, scrubbing a stubborn stain on the side of your patrol car, when suddenly, you notice this:

The police had been driving around for an entire year with a very distinct image of a pig plastered on the sides of their patrol cars. (If you're unfamiliar with criminal slang, "pig" is a common derogatory term for "police.")

And that was just the beginning of their troubles. All of the cars were in active use, so they couldn't just pull them off the street for redecoration. The removal and replacement process took four months. Four months during which both the cops and the public knew the pig was there.

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While the majority of protesters responded in kind, one small splinter group called Defend Life proved ironically unwilling to accept Stave's "live and let live" attitude. Instead, they turned their attention from the clinic to him ... and his family.

That's why one day, five members of Defend Life staged a protest near Stave's 11-year-old daughter's school, carrying signs featuring his picture and personal information. They were also carrying a graphic pictorial of aborted fetuses, because when you're traumatizing children, you might as well go the whole nine yards.

Both sides of the debate, along with Stave, were appalled and furious at Defend Life's antics. The group, however, was just getting started. Their next move was a phone terror campaign, calling the Stave household at all hours and hurling colorful threats at Stave and his family.

Were this a Hollywood movie, at this point Stave would've grabbed a 2-by-4 and beaten the ever-loving crap out of his terrorists while being played by the Rock. But this was real life, and Stave had no inclination for such crude tactics. He had something better up his sleeve: a little organization of his own. He formed Voice of Choice, a volunteer group that would simply call back the people who were threatening the family.

Voice of Choice callers would never threaten, or even be impolite -- they just calmly thanked the harasser for their (often nonexistent) prayers and well wishes and reminded them that pro-choice people have a right to their stance, too. That's it. No follow-ups, no counterattacks. Just a phone call. But here's the kicker: The culprit wouldn't receive just one call. Each and every available member of Voice of Choice would call them, with the exact same polite litany.

The movement grew and grew until it got to the point that the poor soul who chose to harass the Staves would be on the receiving end of around 5,000 calls in return from Voice of Choice volunteers. Per call.

Related: The 6 Creepiest Unexplained Phone Calls

Until recently, Lucas spent a lot of time, money and effort trying to build a huge digital media production studio on his property in Marin County, California. The project was going to create around 600 high-paying jobs and bring loads of revenue to local businesses. Too bad a good chunk of his neighbors reveled in riches themselves, and as such didn't give a crap about business or, for that matter, jobs. They vehemently opposed the project, claiming that it would bring too much traffic and noise, not to mention so much light pollution that their "dark starry skies would be destroyed."

That's an actual quote, by the way.

For a whopping 25 years, Lucas tried to build the property. Although he did secure small victories here and there, he was constantly swimming against a current of "not in our backyard" arguments.

Then, in the spring of 2012, Lucas officially stated that he would give up, sell his property and take his business elsewhere. However, his opponents' cheers died in their throats when he announced the second half of his plan: He had sold his land to a nonprofit organization called Marin Community Foundation. According to their deal, the foundation would build the area full of something the county was in dire need of, but had for some reason been struggling to find space for: low-income residential housing. As in, the projects.

The foundation praised Lucas, but the rich residents were less thrilled. Their initial reactions were absurd shrieks of nonsense that showed the entire world how far removed from reality they were: Lucas' action was "class warfare." The housing project would throw the whole area into a state of "sheer terror." They even, we kid you not, compared the situation to the conflict in Syria. You know, because everyone worse off than you is just waiting to storm your home with a rocket launcher.

Alas, after the initial shit-flinging had died down, there seemed to be precisely jack shit the jackass neighbors could do about the project besides choking quietly on their bile.

And that, friends, is how a famous pop culture icon defeated a wealthy, villainous clique while helping a bunch of poor people. Wait, holy shit. That's the plot of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, isn't it?

For more vengeful acts we don't condone (but still love), check out 7 Legendary Acts of Petty Revenge and 8 Awesome Cases of Internet Vigilantism.