By Tim Binnall
A peculiar piece of security footage from England shows a clever ne'er-do-well illegally dumping trash in front of a home while clad in an inflatable dinosaur costume to hide their identity. The weird case of fly-tipping, as it is called in the UK, reportedly occurred last Tuesday evening in the coastal community of Southend. While out for the night, homeowner Carmine Rizzo received a notification from his security system and, upon checking to see what triggered the camera, watched a rather surprising scene unfold.
In the video, the faux purple dinosaur shuffles along a sidewalk carrying two sizeable garbage bags. After dramatically looking both ways for oncoming cars, the fly-tipper crosses the road, tosses the trash next to Rizzo's bin, and then scurries back to the other side of the street.Adding a comical flourish to the already rather foolish-looking caper, the dinosaur seemingly celebrates successfully pulling off the crime by doing a little spin around a lamppost before vanishing into the night. For his part, Rizzo was amused by the situation, saluting the 'bad Barnie' for their creativity.
"It's really lifted everyone's spirits. Hats off to them," he marveled, "I must have watched it a thousand times!" That said, not everyone found humor in the incident as local official Lydia Hyde criticized the colorful troublemaker and, unable to resist a good dinosaur pun, called fly-tipping "a selfish act that should also be extinct." Should the miscreant be unmasked and brought to justice, they could receive a $500 fine for the illegal trash dump.