Waco Thieves Use Stolen Forklift to Steal an ATM

You might be able to call this a case of 'organized crime'. There used to be an ATM machine in the photo above. Now it is gone.

So many of the crime stories we see in the news each week could be called impulsive mistakes or just stupid people tricks. Every once in awhile, you see a story that had to require some planning on the part of the criminals. Look no further than the story of this stolen ATM machine in the city of Waco.

Crooks had their eye on an ATM at the First National Bank of Central Texas in the 7500 block of Woodway Drive. News 10 reports that Waco police Sgt W. Patrick Swanton said the thieves ended up using a forklift to pick the ATM up off the ground and place it in a vehicle.

According to police, this was all going down at about 4 am today. How do these crooks do it? It's all I can do to wake up and brush my teeth at 4 am let alone plotting how I'm going to make off with an ATM full of cash. Something tells me these guys had their eye on this location for a while because they knew that not all that far off was just a construction site with a forklift.

They used the forklift stolen from a construction site in Woodway to rip off the ATM machine at the bank in Waco. This means police in Waco get to investigate the ATM, while the cops in Woodway get to track down just how someone was able to steal a forklift in the middle of the night.

Someone must have all or part of this on surveillance video, right? No word on how much cash may have been inside the ATM. It would be hilarious if it was almost empty.

Police later found the ATM within a few miles of the scene of the crime as the crooks appear to have dumped the ATM in a wooded area of Gateway Boulevard near Texas Central Parkway. The thieves also left their Uhaul trailer and a bulldozer at the scene.