Criminal Mastermind Attempts to Rob Gas Station With a 5-Foot Snake

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) - A man is in jail after allegedly attempting to rob a store three times, including the use of a snake.

Reginald Cook, 26, is charged with two counts of attempted aggravated robbery.

Police say around 2 a.m., Cook attempted to rob the Shell convenience store at 3599 Elvis Presley Boulevard and implied that he had a weapon.

According to the affidavit, Cook entered the store again and demanded money from the register. The victim said that Cook kept reaching into his clothing, implying that he had a gun, but Cook left the store after the victim refused.

At approximately 3:05 a.m., Cook entered the store for the third time, but with a five-foot snake wrapped around his neck. Cook went up to the counter shouting “Give me the damn money.”

The affidavit states that the victim saw Cook reaching inside his backpack, implying that he was armed with a weapon. The victim pulled his gun in self-defense.

Police say no money was taken and no injuries were sustained.

Minutes later, officers arrived on the scene and took Cook into custody.

Hell fucking yes dude. I respect a criminal with a little bit of innovation. My guy Reginald Cook (26, Memphis, Tenn) needed a little bit of walking around money, and used the tools at he had at his disposal to acquire it (or at least try to acquire it). He didn't want to have to break out his 5-foot snake. He tried to go the fake gun route the first time. He tried to go the fake gun route the second time. But when push came to shove, ol' Reggie had no choice but to dip into his terrarium and mount up with his 5 foot pet python.  

I really wish we had more information on this snake. I don't know if it was actually a python. I would love to see a video of this. I have to think the gas station had some sort of camera that recorded the incident. Was the snake aggressive? Did Reginald have his snake trained to attack? Was it more of a docile snake? Or maybe Reginald was swinging his snake over his head like a lasso, threatening to whip the gas station attendant across the face with it. I have no idea. But robbing a gas station with an animal is a hilarious move. It should honestly be done more often.

Impromptu Speed Rankings of Animals to Rob a Gas Station With

1. Pit Bull

Beaubizz. Getty Images.

Not the Miss Peaches kind of pit bull. More like the Mike Vick kind of pit bull. An angry pit bull is honestly a better weapon than a gun. Because if you draw a gun, then the man behind the counter could just pull out a gun himself, and would be perfectly justified to shoot you in the chest (maybe idk how the law actually works). But if you unleash a pit bull… not only is an angry pit bull terrifying, but a pit bull is still a dog. Nobody is going to shoot a dog. Even an scary dog. They're just going to reach into the cash register and give you all the money they have so that you don't let your scary dog off leash. It's actually kind of genius. 

2. Bald Eagle

THOMAS KIENZLE. Getty Images.

For some reason I decided to eat my lunch on a park bench the other day and I was immediately swarmed with pigeons. I didn't like it one bit. If a pigeon, or any sort of bird decides to attack your face, you're so fucked. You can't fend off a bird. Especially a bald eagle. They have sharp beaks and talons. If you happen to be in possession of a trained attack eagle, and you unleash it on the gas station employee, that'll buy you more than enough time to rob the store of whatever the hell you want. Not to mention, if the gas station employee dares to hurt the bald eagle, then that qualifies as treason. 

3. Lion

Cameron Spencer. Getty Images.

Idk how you'd acquire a lion but if you walk into a store with a lion they're gonna give you whatever you ask for

4.. Western Lowland Gorilla

Andrey Tikhonovskiy. Unsplash Images.

They'll be so shocked that there's a gorilla in their store they won't even noticed that you've jumped behind the counter. 

5. Bees

Karl Callwood. Unsplash Images.

Idk if you can train bees. But if you walk into a gas station with a container of bees and tell the guy, "if you don't give me all your money I'm going to unleash my bees", I guarantee that works. Nobody fucks with bees. And you can't defend against bees either. No gun, or weapon is going to protect you against a swarm of bees.

6. Skunk

Bryan Padron. Unsplash Images.

Honestly skunk should be way higher on the list. Skunks are maybe the scariest animals of all. If a skunk spray in your store you have to shut down the entire operation for at least a day. There's a skunk that lives outside of my apartment and once every couple of months I see it when I take my dogs out and it terrifies me. If that skunk ever sprays me and my dogs I think I'd just have to kill myself. 

7. Siamese Twins

Hulton Archive. Getty Images.

Kinda scary tbh. At minimum you could use him/her (them?) as a distraction.

On a different note, the article says that the victim (i.e. the gas station clerk) pulled out a gun of his own in self-defense. But if you're working at gas station, would you even want a gun? Even if you owned the gas station yourself? I absolutely would not. I mean.. I guess I'd take one just in case shit really got crazy. But if some crackhead walks into my store in the middle of the night, shoves a gun in my face and says "give me all the money in the register", I'm certainly not going to war for that. I'm not going gun to gun with a deranged criminal to protect my minimum wage gas station job. No fucking thank you. He can have the $200 in my register. There's not a chance in the world I'm risking gunfire for that. 

Coincidentally, this Reginald guy looks exactly like my friend Mike who lived with me at a hostel in South Central LA. I suppose he didn't actually live there. He just kinda hung around the place. He definitely didn't pay rent. He just chilled outside and sometimes crashed on the couch when nobody was there to kick him out. I did DMT with him once. I still feel kind of bad about how that went down. He was offering me a hit of DMT for hours. But I was being a huge pussy about it. Then at the last minute, right before he had to  leave for work I was like, "No wait don't leave I want to do your drugs". Then he skipped work to do drugs with me. He ended up getting fired. I've always felt bad about that. But honestly that was his decision. It's not like I was holding a skunk to his head. Either way, the DMT was actually pretty sweet. DMT is wild. My only regret is that I didn't take it all the way. When you take DMT, if you fully embrace the trip, you'll be able to "cross over" into some sort of crazy spiritual realm. But right before I got to the point of crossing over I got scared and snapped myself out of it. It was still a neat experience, but I didn't get the full experience. Shoutout Mike. I hope he's doing well. Fingers crossed that he's still alive.