This isn't nearly as profound as some of the other stories but a pointless crime that had severe consequences. The stupidity that surrounded this felony still befuddles me today. I'm about to tell you the tale of the Nerdy Bookmark.In my late teens and early twenties I worked for a small company known as FExpress. Perhaps you've heard of them? Anyway, like thousands of other people in Indianapolis, I worked at FedExu2019s second largest terminal at the time, at the Indy airport.As you can imagine, being on the airportu2019s lot, as well as handling federal mail, security was a major priority for FedEx. Background checks were conducted and if you passed, you were issued a badge which was literally your lifeline to your job. I'm not joking, without that badge, you didn't really work.For one, you needed it just to get into the massive off site parking lot. From there, you had to flash your badge to the shuttle bus driver to get out of the parking lot and over to the HUB. Walk in the HUB doors and at that point, you'd had better be wearing that badge, either on a lanyard or attached to your arm in a bright orange arm band pouch, it had to be clearly displayed and was required to be above your waist. This was necessary in order to speed up the security line you had to walk through, and by security line, I mean airport security, complete with full body metal detectors and x-ray machines for your backpack to pass through. Not to mention, the random wand screenings they would do as well as random bag checks.This security screening was so tight you couldn't sneak anything through in your personal bag and for the most part, you didn't want to either. Why?Let's say one day you decided to sneak in your iPod to listen to music during the sort. You'd carefully place it in your bag and as you sat the bag down to pass through the scanner you crossed your fingers hoping they wouldn't see it and make you take it back to your vehicle. And with a little luck, voila!, you'd get in with it and have sweet jams to listen to for your 4u20137 hour shift. Then, After sort, you put it back in your bag to pass through Security.Yeah that's right! The way you enter, is the same way you leave, scanners and all, only now, the guards watching the x-ray machines are on high alert for any possible theft!! You may have entered with your iPod but you sure weren't going to leave with it. Yeah security had the right to confiscate anything they felt was stolen, and to get it back you had to show proof of purchase and a picture of you with the item taken prior to the date it was confiscated. Yeah everything from ear rings to electronics could be subject to this.Metal, electronics, and anything with a cord or plug in were easy to spot items that could easily get taken from you. Now, all of that security was in place to keep you from brining anything harmful in and to keep you from stealing anything from the inside. Why was that needed?Literally millions of shipments come through the FedEx hubs on their night sorts. Everything at some point, crosses someone's potentially sticky fingers. To ensure their customers packages and contents weren't being stolen, security check outs were mandatory.Im not saying everyone that works at FedEx is a thief, not at all! They're very hard working and trusting people in my experience. It's not like people are grabbing boxes and ripping them open with the hopes of finding something to steal, it's not like that at all. The check is really only necessary because of the structural integrity of most cardboard boxes and Manila envelopes, is poor at best. A lot of people don't know this, but your package, when shipped in the mail, isn't handled with care. What that means is, your box, will be kicked, thrown, dropped, shaken, smashed, run over, crushed, and pummeled as it winds its way through all mail carriers sorting systems. This leads to all kinds of contents literally leaking out all over the place.I can't even begin to describe some of the things you would see pass by that had come out of a box that had been pushed past its limits from the sort. Magazines, candy bars, flowers, plates, movie posters, toys, video games, iPhones, iPods, cds, misc computer parts, advertisements for hookers, DVDs, live fish, dead fish, cow sperm, cow manure(yeah that was a bad night, literal poop in my work area) human bile, and I'm not joking when I say I literally found a pair of human kidneys, yeah! Organs people! Human organs that had fallen out of a dry ice packaged styrofoam box. I literally picked up the bag they were sealed in and then radio downed to the hazmat crew that we needed them immediately.So then, with all the chaos going on with sort and these packages breaking open and spilling their goodies on the ground, certain low value items could be easily swiped by anyone really. Food items, books, magazines, any small non electronic item that came out of packages and someone could grab quick, shove in a pocket or eat right there, were gone and by gone I mean stolen.One example, during Easter time, we had a massive 50 lb box of those small chocolate Cadberry eggs break open on the slide my group was working. Out of no where, like a little kids dream, candy started sliding down to us in bunches. Team members were literally picking them up, ripping off the foil, and popping into their mouths by the handfuls! In all reality, this was a federal crime but one that no one really would've cared about or reported to management. Once management knew of any potential theft, they were automatic required to disclose that to security.Now that you know all these details, I can finally answer the question I came here to answer.One night, I was working on the manual secondaries. This was an area where a giant belt brought a variety of packages to a metal slide. An automated diverter machine pushed packages off the belt, down the slide and into work areas where we stood. We would grab the packages as the hit the stop, look at the labels and throw them on one of 6 belts based on the digit destination code. We were required to sort 34 packages a minute, for a full 4 hours. It was exhausting!On this particular night the re-wraps, broken open boxes hat we tried to put back together with tape, were extremely heavy. Open boxes were flying at us left and right. In the secondaries, all the rewraps were done at the end of the slide. So when you'd get an open box, you'd shout, u201cOPENu201d, place the open box on the middle belt behind with any of its contents and then watch it to make sure the guy doing re-wraps on the end grabbed it and started taping it up.The guy doing re-wraps this night was a particularly annoying kid in his early 20u2019s that clashed with everyone. He thought he was FGod and everyone should bow to him and his superior knowledge. He had been there about a year before I got hired on, so he felt he was better than most on the team and in all reality, he wasn't. He was just obnoxious, annoying and arrogant and he had rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. He was also a total nerd who loved anime and Poku00e9mon, wore glasses and a white head band while he worked. Getting a good visual for him? Ok good.Out of nowhere a giant box comes down the slide completely ripped open and spewing these cardstock printed bookmarks. Printed on these ordinary bookmarks was some sort of anime character. I don't know who it was or anything, I don't follow those cartoons. These things were everywhere. So we'd grab them by the handfuls, put them on the middle slide and send them down to the nerd on the end to box back up.Well, whoever it was that was printed on this bookmark, it appealed to the village nut. He decided, quickly that no one would notice if just 1 of these little bookmarks went missing. So he pocketed one of them instead of putting it in the box. The girl working next to him, saw this as an opportunity. Finally, a chance to rid herself of this annoying kid from her life once and for all!On her next break, she told our manager what happened and what she saw. This obligated our manager to report this to security so they stop and search him on his way out. I honestly had no idea this was going on at the time. I find out all this information the next night.So, as he trudged his way up to security with the bookmark still in his pocket, security stopped him and took him and his bag into a room to be searched. They found the bookmark as described and immediately suspended him, pending investigation.After a few weeks, it was determined that he did indeed attempt to steal the bookmark, he was terminated and I think, charged with mail tampering, a felony, I'm told. I'm not 100% sure if that's what he was charged with, he was fired over it but him being charged may have just been a rumor.Either way, his crime, stealing a bookmark, the cost, his job and likely his reputation, maybe even a criminal charge. Pointless because it was a bookmark! He could've ordered 50 of them online and it would've cost him next to nothing.