In every issue of this fine rag my hack team of wannabe journalists and I tackle some of the most laughable criminal acts that have recently happened in our area. Then - if we're doing our job - we write about those crimes in a way that makes you chuckle, or at the very least gives you something to take your mind off how miserable your March Madness bracket looks right about now.

This week's Ragnet takes us to Olympia, where, like most other civilized places on earth, there's a Target.

Enjoy. - Matt Driscoll

In some ways we actually feel for the lawbreaking moron at the center of this week's Ragnet. What he (allegedly) did was wrong, of course, but we can understand the motives ... at least just a little.

You see, here at the Weekly Volcano Crime Desk we tried to be sensible ... for as long as we could. We tried to maintain our integrity, and fight the ginormous TV craze. For as long as possible we proudly owned a 27-inch antique (read: pre-1998) box that it took three grown men to move, flicking it on during our lunch hour to watch Maury Povich whenever we had the chance. And there were the special times of year - like March Madness, or those five Septembers in the history of mankind when the Mariners have been in postseason contention. Our old-school TV was always there for us.

Until quite recently, actually, when the powers that be conspired against us.

Though its picture was as true as ever (albeit, certainly not High Definition), we were forced to kick our old Crime Desk TV to the curb when the pictures literally stopped fitting on it. Try watching a March Madness basketball game when only half the score and ticker info show up. It's downright infuriating. This is what happens when the median television size reaches 46 inches.

This may or may not have had anything to do with the motives of a man who allegedly heisted a large flat screen TV from the Target store in Olympia last Thursday night - but I guess what I'm saying is I could understand if it did. According to reports on the News Tribune's "Lights & Sirens" blog, the suspected thief was eventually apprehended and arrested by authorities, though he did lead law enforcement on what's described as a "brief pursuit."

According to reports, a State Patrol trooper attempted to pull the man over in Olympia for having a headlight out. In a shocking turn of events - something that's almost unheard of here at the Weekly Volcano Crime Desk (note: sarcasm) - the man took off instead of stopping. Of course, this almost surely had something to do with the massive stolen flat screen in his car, but that's just speculation, mind you. Nothing definitive ...

Authorities eventually caught up with the man at approximately 8:30 p.m., with Pierce County sheriff's deputies and the Lakewood police having joined the pursuit by that time.

"The lesson to be learned here is that you don't steal a television when you've got a headlight out," said sheriff's spokesman Ed Troyer. "That's why our jails are full."

Yeah!

Wait. What? - TeeVee Humphrey, Television Crime Related Correspondent