5 True Crime Stories That Sound Like The Worst Movie Ever

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A Collection Of Wacky Hustlers Are Fighting Over A 700-Pound Cursed Emerald

This story starts normally enough: with a 752-pound cursed emerald being hauled through the jungle as its carriers are attacked by panthers. A classic! Oh, but then it gets weird. This is the story of the Bahia Emerald, and it is embarrassing.

The first American rubes to set eyes on the legendary Bahia Emerald were Tony Thomas and Ken Conette, back in 2001. Truly, it was a romantic setting, the garage of that Brazilian miner, where a cat peed on the priceless gem. The pair consisted of one failed start-up entrepreneur and one failed dreamer (tough to fail at that, but nothing is impossible if you believe in yourself). They knew immediately that the emerald was their ticket to the big time, and Thomas got the miners to sell it to him for only $60,000 (the cat piss must've really brought down the value).

When Thomas returned to the States, his appraiser valued the jewel at $925 million. OK, so it turned out the appraiser had pulled that number straight out of his ass, but it was a 1,700,000-carat emerald the size of a kindergartner. It was reasonable to assume it was worth a bit more than a secondhand Lexus.

Bhcourier.comEnough to release any man's inner Indiana Jones

They agreed that Conette would stay behind to ship the emerald while Thomas went back home to receive it. And thus began the endless circle of betrayal and backstabbing which always accompanies tales of giant jewels. Instead of sending it, Conette told Thomas the emerald had been hijacked and mailed it to himself. But trying to sell the stone on his own proved difficult. So it was immense good fortune that Conette was soon approached by mysterious tycoon Larry Biegler, who claimed he could find a buyer and the pair would split the profits.

Of course, Biegler was actually a small-time local plumber (with terrible Yelp reviews), and he instead ran off with the emerald and handed it to Jerry Ferrara, an unlicensed private detective living in his car who convinced Biegler he could sell the emerald and split the profits. Can you guess what happened next?

Ferrara also ran off with the goods, using the Bahia Emerald as collateral in a diamond deal with straightlaced Mormon businessman Kit Morrison. But when the deal fell through, Morrison took possession of the stone. Meanwhile, Biegler was kidnapped / faked being kidnapped by the Brazilian Mafia, who also wanted the emerald. When he escaped, he felt it his duty to finally call the LAPD and get a SWAT team to take the emerald away from Morrison.

Ever since 2010, the Bahia Emerald has been resting in a Los Angeles evidence locker while its so-called owners endlessly feud over who gets to claim it. It seemed close to an end when a judge awarded the gem to Morrison, but then the U.S. Department of Justice itself put a restraining order on the stone in order to prevent a diplomatic crisis with Brazil. Oh, and real experts say the emerald isn't great quality and is probably worthless anyway. So in conclusion: CUUUURSSSED!

4

A Hardcore Cop Helped Clean Up A Small Town (With A Twist!)

Like many small towns and commercial airline pilots, Gerald, Missouri had a serious meth problem. So local authorities were only too grateful when a tough-talking agent with a federal anti-drug program rolled into town, promising to get things sorted out. With the assistance of Gerald's five police officers, Sergeant Bill Jakob started dispensing justice like Dirty Harry. Also like Dirty Harry, Bill Jakob was not a real cop.

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A Hijacker Became Italy's Biggest Heartthrob

If the TWA Flight 85 hijacking proved anything, it's that if a criminal looks like Antonio Banderas, they can get away with pretty much anything.

Paris MatchWe'd let him into our cockpit, if you catch our drift.

2

A Fugitive American Drug Lord Built A New Life As An Australian Legend

For 40 years, Dennis Lafferty ran a beloved ecotourism company in the Daintree Rainforest, the most crocodile-infested part of the most crocodile-infested region of Australia. The company was a major local employer, and Lafferty a local legend, the kind of man "who can make a fire out of nothing in a rainstorm." He spent his time fighting to preserve the local rainforest and personally saved hundreds of fruit bats from barbed wire. So when Lafferty tragically crashed into a tree in 2015, the community was surprised that a man a tough as him could even die. They were extra surprised when they found out that this was the second time he had died.

He was in truth Raymond Stansel, the onetime king of Florida marijuana smugglers. By 1973, his drug empire had run aground, and Stansel was caught by the feds. But right as he was about to stand trial in Miami, his lawyer announced his client had died in a "mysterious scuba accident." This may seem suspicious to you, but it's actually the third most common cause of death in Florida, behind "meth lab explosion" and "lost a fight against a reptile."

Not everybody bought it, but even an international manhunt failed to track the man down. That is, until weeks after Stansel's second and final death in Daintree, when his widow told The Tampa Bay Times the whole story, and the paper informed the police -- or at least, the very few investigators who were still alive themselves.

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A Disgraced Roller Coaster Tycoon Tried To Smuggle Drugs In His Rides

Norbert Witte built a small them park empire off the back of his prized Catapult, "the world's fastest roller coaster." But like any good roller coaster, things quickly went downhill. In 1981, Witte personally caused Germany's worst carnival tragedy when the repair crane he was operating collided with an attraction, injuring 15 and killing seven. In true carny fashion, Witte wasn't going to let a few destroyed lives get in the way of doing his job.

After the Berlin Wall fell, Witte bought the former East Berlin's biggest state-run amusement park ... and then ran it into the ground. By 2001, Spreepark had ruined the Witte dynasty, and almost $20 million in debt, he had to abandon his rusting dream. It still stands today, serving as both a testament to his failings and Berlin's premier creepy goth makeout spot.

Abigor/Wikimedia CommonsWhat kind of squares could possibly want to go to Disneyland when getting devoured by nightmare wolves was a option?