Shop n’ Sniff

It is not uncommon for me to pick up things in the grocery like soap, detergent, deodorant, or candles, and get a big whiff of their various scents before I decide which one to finally buy.  Apparently there is an unknown assailant in England who also likes to use his olfactory system while shopping, but he prefers to seek out a different kind of aroma therapy while he’s perusing the assorted aisles.  I realize there are countless people in the world with all sorts of bizarre and incomprehensible fetishes; so when it comes to what floats some people’s dingy, it takes quite a bit to surprise me in this day and age.  The following story, however, is one of those rare instances where no amount of logic or reasoning will allow me to justify this type of behavior – unless the unidentified man recently received an experimental nose transplant from a German Shepherd.

Police are hunting a man who carried out what they describe as ‘bizarre’ sexual assaults after he repeatedly knelt behind a shelf stacker to smell his behind.  The man was caught on CCTV creeping up on the unsuspecting worker at least 20 times as he stacked shelves at a Co-op store in Plymouth, Devon. The footage shows him casually pretending to chose items from shelves before suddenly crouching down behind the employee.  With his face near his victim’s derriere, he seems to take a whiff — and once gets so close his nose touches the man.  The man’s odd behaviour to the employee was spotted on at least two occasions on consecutive weekends. The offenses only came to light when the employee became suspicious and informed his manager, who then checked the in-store security video.  The man is described as a white male in his 40′s, with red hair and glasses - police also believe he enjoys car rides, walks in the park, and having his belly rubbed.