We kid you not — a man described by security as wearing a white ninja suit crashed his car through the Greensboro Apple Store before fleeing on foot.

Greensboro police received a call around 4:43 a.m. after a dark gray or blue Honda crashed into the store. According to police, the man crashed into the store in a robbery attempt.

The store will remain closed today, of course, while they see to damages. (And perhaps look into hiring some samurai to increase security?)

[MyFox8. Thanks @spencefos]

In the category of no good deed goes unpunished, a man went to get a iPad for a friend and not only had the iPad stolen from him but also lost his pinkie finger.

He had been asked by a co-worker in Canada to pick him up a iPad. As he was leaving the store with the new iPad, two thieves grabbed for the iPad bag and began to yank. Unfortunately, though the man tried to let go, the thick Apple bag’s cord stayed stuck around his fingers and would not release.

Gore alert: the cord ended up shearing the flesh and tendons from the 59 year old victim’s finger. The only thing that remained was the bone which had to be amputated later at the hospital. The whole incident was captured on surveillance but as of writing this, no arrests have been made.

The victim did have a few choice words for the thieves, however, saying that they had changed his life forever for a piece of technology which will be junk in a couple of years.

Sadly, the victim had moved from New Jersey to Colorado to get away from a crime that had been committed 15 years ago.

[Engadget via CBS4Denver]

Where did the Russian Black Market, get 4000 stolen iPhones 3GS? If you guessed from that from that Belgium iPhone warehouse theft, you would be 100% correct.

Russia currently does not sell the iPhone 3GS and the importing of unlocked phones is a hot commodity. Cult of Mac is reporting that the stolen goods are being sold for cash on the Russian Black Market in lots of 100 at below average prices to cell phone vendors.

Some vendors are a little skeptical about purchasing the devices since they know where they came from and know that they can be tracked via IMEI numbers that are all on file. Even so, there are some vendors out there who are not aware and are eager to snatch up a good deal and make a profit. Again, the problem with a vendor selling these phones is if law enforcement forces the local carriers to block the IMEI numbers they will have many customers returning very unhappy.

Our advice to you if you live in Russia, avoid these phones.

[Via Cult of Mac]

Over the weekend in Belgium thieves made a clean getaway with close to 4,000 iPhones. The market value of that many iPhones, 2 million euros, or $3 million U.S.

The iPhone thieves cut a hole in the ceiling of a warehouse where the devices were being stored waiting to be delivered to Mobistar in time for holiday shopping season. According to Mobistar, local police have zero leads but think twice about landing one of these phones as a spokesperson from Mobistar is promising they will not work.

“We have the serial numbers of stolen iPhones blocked anyway so they can not be used,”"People who want to buy an iPhone, which is best done in an approved outlet and not on street or on the black market.”

In the end, crime does not pay folks…

[Via AppleInsider]

Man goes into Apple Store for help with iPhone. Man gets frustrated with iPhone. Man threatens to shoot iPhone if it doesn’t start working. Man draws attention to previously concealed weapon. Apple Store techie tells manager. Manger calls police. Police arrive. Police arrest man.

No iPhones were injured.

[WPCO 9 via Gizmodo]

A robbery victim has taken advantage of his MobileMe service and put it to good use. A Pittsburgh man, who’s name has been withheld, told police he was forced to turn over his wallet, his PIN number and his iPhone at gun point (Pellet Gun as it turns out) by 3 robbers early Sunday morning. Lacking any tech savvy skills or common sense for that matter, the robbers were clueless about one of MobileMe’s very helpful features, “Find My iPhone“.

After calling the police, the man used his computer and MobileMe to track down his iPhone along with the 3 not so smart criminals having a late night snack at a local restaurant.

Police said they will charge Bryant Rather, 22, of West Mifflin, Brent Ray Potter, 22, of Swissvale, and Myron Knox, Jr., 22, of Homewood, with two counts each of access device fraud, conspiracy, receiving stolen property and possessing instruments of crime. Mr. Rather and Mr. Potter will also be charged with robbery.

Moral of the story: crime doesn’t pay.

[Via Post-Gazette]

A lady in the UK had her gear bag stolen, including her iPhone, laptop, and Nintendo DS, and to rub salt on her wounds, the thief decided to mock her on her own Facebook page:

“I have the laptop, phones ok but a bit scratched itll do, tv was rubbish so I left it , ds was a bonus, now to the porn shop, thankyou toshiba is my favourite make”.

While we hope the thief gets every ounce of karma (and justice) returned to him/her, we also echo Gizmodo‘s hope that everyone reading this takes a moment to enable the passcode lock (and Remote Wipe if you’re an Exchange or MobileMe user) on the iPhone, and BIOS/Login passwords on the laptop. An ounce of prevention beats a pound of curses later…

[Telegraph via TechRadar]

Gizmodo made our Friday just a little more bizarrely amusing with a story about a British gang whose DJ made some music, got it up on iTunes (and Amazon) with a 40% commission, and then used stolen credit cards to buy it — making them look popular, and $300,000 “richer” at the same time. Strangest part?

the British police won’t know why they did it until they ask them?

Us neither then.