Police seek missing trucker, nickels

chicagotribune ^ | 01/09/05

[Ellesu]

MIAMI, FLORIDA -- A truck driver has disappeared with the 3.6 million nickels he was hauling to the Federal Reserve Bank in New Orleans, police said Friday. Angel Ricardo Mendoza, 43, picked up the coins, worth $180,000, Dec. 17 from the Federal Reserve in New Jersey and was supposed to haul the cargo--weighing 45,000 pounds--to New Orleans for a trucking company subcontracted by the Federal Reserve, police said. On Dec. 21, Mendoza's empty truck and trailer turned up at a truck stop in Ft. Pierce, Fla. Miami-Dade police, the FBI and the Federal Reserve police are investigating.

[Psycho_Bunny]

lol

[woofer]

I once had to investigate and correct a main substation mafunction at the Federal Reserve in St. Louis. The most vivid memory of that excursion was this:

Don't ever ask a Federal Reserve employee if they have free samples available.

[R. Scott]

22 ½ Tons of nickels - worth $180,000.
I doubt he stole them. It wouldn't be worth it.

[Viet Vet in Augusta GA]

Look in Vegas, near the nickel slots.

[bencarter]

I'd hate to be the salesman he tries to buy a car from

[Jewels1091]

kinda hard to carry around 45,000 pounds of nickles!!

[ErnBatavia]

When I was in the frozen seafood business, our L.A. to Chicago Cold Storage trucking company had a driver get disgruntled on 'em...he owned his own tractor and phoned them that he was in Chicago and quit - NOW, and that they could get their trailer full of fish; only he didn't give any detail as to where he'd dropped it.

It took around five days to find it...by that time the unit had run out of fuel and the truck brokerage had the pleasure of paying us around $30,000.00

[ExSES]

22 ½ Tons of nickels - worth $180,000. I doubt he stole them. It wouldn't be worth it.

Perhaps he didn't know what he was transporting and thought that he was transporting real money like Gold Eagles???

[mabelkitty]

Wonder if he did the math first.

[csvset]

Hijacked by the Mob is my guess.

[AngrySpud]

The driver is currently in an abandoned warehouse, sifting through the bags, looking for old buffalo head nickels.

[Glenn]

These will show up on eBay as 1/2 pound lots of an "unsearched hoard" from the estate of an eccentric farmer in Iowa. S&H $5.95.

[stopem]

LOL Too funny!
With a name like,Angel Ricardo Mendoza maybe they should head for the border and look there and while the FBI are there maybe just maybe they can catch those pesky illegals flooding our country.

[ikka]

The story I head about the Federal Reserve was that there are security cameras everywhere during loading and unloading. One time the converyor belt they used to load bags of 20s (about $10,000 per bag) broke, and one bag was not in view of any camera - and yes, it went missing.

[Publius6961]

Sounds like some 8-year olds managed to steal a car...

Who else would want that many nickels?

[Riley]

"If I Had A Nose Full Of Nickels, I'd Sneeze Them All Atchoo..."

'Coinstar' ought to be able to pinpoint the guy in a couple of days. :-)

[Cogadh na Siths Girl]

Look in Vegas, near the nickel slots.

LMBO! i was going to say Atlantic City since he took-off from Jersey. And as a Jersey girl, i have to say, it would take an idiot from Jersey to pull something like this!

[TADSLOS]

He'll probably surface attempting to launder nickels into pennies.

[BobL]

This guy obviously is planning to do a lot of travel in Texas in the future.

Our governor here is in the process of converting our freeways to toll roads - well, maybe not quite - but he's licking his chops over charging us to drive on every new cubic yard of concrete that he pours - and he has attempted, on at least 3 occasions, to convert fully paid for freeways into toll roads. I believe he's been shot down all 3 times, but for no lack of trying.

I think this trucker may have some NAFTA runs coming up in TX, and he'd rather use the nickels than have to go on food stamps.