A Maine news website tells us how a homeless man in South Portland, Maine– with an ATM card and 140 dollars in his account –somehow found a way to make a quick profit and had his hands on $37,000 all for five minutes.

As he maneuvered the ATM to do his bidding, the woman waiting behind him got impatient suspicious and called the police. As the police rolled up, he was seen shoveling copious amounts of greenbacks into a shopping bag in sure efforts not to look completely like a bank robber.

The unnamed man started with withdrawing $140, which he apparently actually did have in his account– but something signaled him to keep going. And keep going he did until he reached up to $37,000. There is a possibility that he might have gotten more if the lady behind him was not so impatient that she called the police about his dawdling.

The bank, for obvious reasons, will not detail what made this glitch occur and the machine was put down all day Friday. They did not press charges on the man, although it was pretty obvious that a little finagling was used to receive the large amount of funds. The police have also divulged that they have dealt with this man before, but they decided to just promptly return the money and leave it at that.

A bank ATM can hold up to $200,000. It makes one wonder if the kinda-a-bank robber-but-not guy knew this and was banking on signing a new lease on life that early Thursday morning.

Image via Wikimedia Commons