Man Arrested for Siphoning 300 Gallons of Grease

This is what happens when gas prices get so high. Police arrested David Richardson, 49, for siphoning 300 gallons of grease from the on-site storage tank at a Burger King in San Jose, California.

Richardson worked for a Las Vegas company called Restaurant Oils of America and was cleaning out the grease storage containers of restaurants in San Jose and other South Bay cities where he did not have a service account.

Richardson's 5,000 gallon tanker was about 1/2 full. "He certainly had been to other places in the area," said Morgan Hill police Cmdr. David Swing. "Our guess is its a bio-diesel fuel thing. It's like someone stealing copper wire. This might turn into something that starts to occur more frequently."

Ned Cruey, the owner of the company, told police that Richardson was instructed to drive to a recycling center in Atascadero to drop off the grease. Cruey said he uses the recycling facility in Atascadero because it pays $1.35 a gallon compared to the $0.80 per gallon he gets in Las Vegas.

It's unclear if Restaurant Oils of America was aware of - and approved of - what Richardson was doing.