Two days before Christmas Jimmy set-off in his minibus to collect a batch of open prison inmates. His mission, as usual, was to take them for their radiation treatment at a nearby hospital.
Since it was Christmas, one of the 12 offered to buy Jimmy a drink. So they stopped off at the Rose and Crown pub, and all had a nice drink. On the way out Jimmy detoured to the gents, when he came out of the loo, all the prisoners had disappeared.
He looked in all the pub’s bars, drove around for half an hour, no sign of the inmates. They had all made their escape.
What could Jimmy do? Thinking quickly, he braked at a particularly long bus queue, and told the waiting people that he was a relief bus. Where-upon he picked up the first 12 and drove them to the open prison.
He then radioed ahead to the warders giving a ‘Code Yellow’ message. This was a pre-arranged signal that some of the prisoners were playing up. Jimmy unloaded his passengers, he then beat a hasty retreat.
Amazingly, his trick wasn’t discovered until the New Year.