History Main / SmokescreenCrime

* ''Film/TheDarkKnight'': The Joker announces that if Coleman Reese isn't killed in sixty minutes, he will blow up a hospital. While the authorities focus on protecting Reese and evacuating every hospital in Gotham, the Joker sneaks into Harvey Dent's hospital room and preys on the prosecutor's trauma to trigger his full descent into a murderous rage.

* ''ComicBook/{{Preacher}}'': Herr Starr is tasked with killing two journalists who are in a mental hospital, but to do it in such a way that the authorities don't investigate too deeply. Starr blows up the hospital, killing everyone inside and leaving the investigators with several hundred potential targets to sort through. This also avoids posthumously vindicating the journalists, who were sent to the asylum before they could reveal too much about the Grail.

* ''Anime/TransformersRobotsInDisguise'': In "Landfill", the Decepticons sabotage the Autobots' [[PortalNetwork Space Bridge]] and launch a series of attacks across the city which the Autobots are unable to respond to due to the bridge taking them to the wrong locations. This is all a diversion to keep the Autobots preoccupied while Megatron and Scourge attack an energy research facility. The Autobots ultimately fix the problem with the bridge and head to the facility to deal with Megatron and Scourge.

During an investigation, it comes to light that the crime the protagonists are investigating is merely a smokescreen that was committed to cover up the criminal's true objective and leave the authorities chasing a false lead.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Arcane}}'': Jinx goes on a rampage on Progress Day, murdering several enforcers and blowing up a building, all to create a distraction while she stole a refined crystal.

* ''Series/NineOneOne'': In "Ocean's 9-1-1", two thieves teamed fake a chemical attack at a bank to distract from them stealing money from an armored truck parked in front of the bank. Then it is revealed that one of the two thieves used the armored truck robbery as a distraction from the theft of diamonds from the bank's vault.

* ''Film/TheNailGunMassacre'': It's implied the killer murders numerous other random people in addition to the five rapist construction workers who were his true targets to disguise his motivations.

* ''Film/ThePinkPanther2'': The plot deals with the theft of valuable items by the Tornada, a PhantomThief who has never been caught and whose identity has been unknown for years. The DreamTeam find him dead from an apparent suicide with all the stolen items, except the Pink Panther which his note says he destroyed. Everyone except Clouseau believes the case is closed. [[spoiler:Clouseau turns out to be right: the real thief is actually Sonia Solandres, the Tornado's ex-lover, who framed him for the thefts so she could lure him out of hiding and kill him. As the Pink Panther was the only item that could be fenced by being cut into smaller gems, Sonia allowed the team to find the other items, while she kept the diamond for herself.]]

* ''Manga/OutlawStar'': In the "Final Countdown", a terrorist named Crackerjack plants a bomb on the Outlaw Star and threatens to detonate it unless Heifong is granted independence. This act of terrorism is actually meant to be a jewelry store robbery after the store's security system was disabled when the power was cut in response to the decoy crime.

During an investigation it comes to light that the crime the protagonists are investigating is merely a smokescreen that was committed to cover up the criminal's true objective and leave the authorities chasing a false lead.

** ''ComicBook/{{Batman}}'': It was long believed that the shooting of Thomas and Martha Wayne by Joe Chill was just a random robbery-homicide. ''ComicBook/DetectiveComics'' #235 reveals that Chill was hired by mob boss Lex Moxon to kill Thomas as revenge for getting Moxon arrested and imprisoned. Bruce believes that the reason he wasn't killed that night was so that Bruce could testify that his parents were simply the victims of a violent robbery. This revelation is largely forgotten in subsequent comics, but has influenced a few Batman adaptations as seen below.

** ''ComicBook/PlasticMan (1943)'': In issue #42, Plastic Man apprehends a gang of criminals who are robbing a doll store. The robbery is actually distraction created by Dr. Devious who intends to rob a diamond company just across the street.

** The Kingpin sometimes has his men commit minor crimes like carjackings and purse-snatchings to draw Spider-Man away from a major crime he has underway. They don't mind being used as a diversion since the Kingpin can always bail his them out and provide them with good lawyers.

* ''Film/{{Shooter}}'': The main protagonist is framed for an assassination attempt on the U.S. President's life which resulted in the death of the Ethiopian archbishop, Desmond Mutumbo. [[spoiler:It turns out that the archbishop was the real target all along, as he was threatening to expose a massacre in an Ethiopian village committed by the villains. Since killing Mutumbo would've resulted into an investigation as to why someone would want him dead, the villains made it look like he was an unintended victim in an attempt to kill the president.]]

* ''Film/{{Tenet}}'': The Protagonist intends to steal a painting hidden in a high-security warehouse inside an airport. To that end, he hires a crew to hijack a cargo plane carrying gold on the runaway and crash into the warehouse. This to creates a security breach that allows him to enter the airport, with the authorities assuming that the crash was either the result of a terrorist attack or an attempt to steal the gold that went wrong.

* ''Literature/{{Worm}}'': Coil uses the Undersiders gang to rob a bank on a day the only available local heroes in Brockton Bay available were the teenaged Wards. With the Wards distracted and no other major heroes available to respond, Coil is able to complete his true objective -- kidnapping a young and powerful precognitive only he is aware of.

* ''Series/BlackMirror'': The episode "Crocodile" takes place in a world where a person's memory can be accessed with a special device. Mia's boyfriend Rob killed someone in a hit-and-run 15 years ago, and now wants to write a letter to his widow. Mia kills him so he won't drag her down with him. Then, when Shazia might investigate her memories and uncover the crime, Mia kills her to cover up the murder, and then kills Shazia's husband and baby son to cover up ''that'' murder.

* ''Series/BrooklynNineNine'': In the season 7 finale, Jake and Charles arrest a man who caused a citywide blackout by getting drunk and driving into a power substation. Jake and Charles notice that something is off when the man is not only sober, but is revealed to be a recovering alcoholic who has been clean for two years. [[spoiler:It turns out that the man simply caused the blackout as a distraction so his friends could rob a bank.]]

* ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'': In "Raw", a grisly school shooting by a white supremacist is eventually traced back to a pair of greedy white adoptive parents who put out a hit on their adopted black son so they could collect on his life-insurance policy. By sheer dumb luck, the white supremacist happened to be affiliated with a terrorist group, and thus the SVU was too busy investigating their many other crimes to look at the insurance angle from the start.

** "Mr. Monk and The Missing Granny": An old woman is kidnapped from her house by two members of a radical group (which Monk quickly determines is a frame-up) with the ransom being to serve a decent meal to the homeless. The woman is released unharmed after the ransom is paid, but Monk later realizes that the kidnapping was a cover-up to steal her antique chair which the kidnappers used it to carry her out of her house.

* ''Series/TheMysteryFilesOfShelbyWoo'': A string of arsons on abandoned houses draws the attention of the local police enforcement. It is later discovered that the culprit is [[spoiler:a local veterinarian]] who is trafficking exotic animals by hiding them in the abandoned houses, and the purpose of the fires was to destroy any material evidence. Fittingly, the episode is titled "The Smoke Screen Case".

* ''Series/BlackMirror'': The episode "Crocodile" takes place in a world where a person's memory can be accessed with a special device. Mia's boyfriend Rob accidentally hit and killed someone 15 years ago, and now wants to write a letter to his widow. Mia kills him so he won't drag her down with him. Then, when Shazia might investigate her memories and uncover the crime, Mia kills her to cover that up, and then kills Shazia's husband and baby son to cover ''that'' up.

* ''Series/BlackMirror'': The episode "Crocodile" takes place in a world where a person's memory can be accessed with a special device. Mia's boyfriend Rob accidentally hit and killed someone 15 years ago, and now wants to write a letter to his widow. Mia kills him so he won't drag her down with her. Then, when Shazia might investigate her memories and uncover the crime, Mia kills her to cover that up, and then kills Shazia's husband and baby son to cover ''that'' up.

** ''ComicBook/SpiderManBeyond'': This is the end goal of [[spoiler:Beyond's plan to coopt superheroes. By staging their own superhero battles, Beyond hopes to control the news cycle by keeping people's attention solely on fights between costumed individuals or groups while more important incidents and crimes fly under the radar. As Marcus Momplaisir points out, this plan would require Beyond to create their own supervillains for their heroes to fight, which Beyond is also doing.]]

* ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'': The Kingpin sometimes has his men commit minor crimes like carjackings and purse-snatchings to draw Spider-Man away from a major crime he has underway. They don't mind being used as a diversion since the Kingpin can always bail his them out and provide them with good lawyers.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'': A decker hired to break into a company's computer on a specific mission (e.g. to steal data) could try to make his objective less obvious by doing random damage (deleting unrelated files, crashing the system, etc.).

->''"No-one looks for a bullet wound in a bomb-blast."''

* ''Series/TheMysteryFilesOfShelbyWoo'': A string of arsons on abandoned houses draw the attention of the local police enforcement. It is later discovered that the culprit is [[spoiler:a local veterinarian]] who is trafficking exotic animals by hiding them in the abandoned houses, and the fires are to destroy any material evidence. Fittingly, the episode is titled "The Smoke Screen Case".

* ''Film/SherlockHolmesAGameOfShadows'': Professor Moriarty arranges for a group of [[BombThrowingAnarchist anarchists to bomb up the conference room]] at a peace summit in Paris, as a diversion from the sniper he employed to shoot one of the [=VIPs=] at the conference immediately before the explosion.

* ''Film/BlowOut'': Burke is tasked with killing a prostitute who knows too much. He starts killing several other prostitutes first in order to make her death look like she was the victim of a serial killer.

** ''ComicBook/PlasticMan (1943)'': In issue #42, Plastic Man apprehends a gang of criminals who are robbing a doll store. It turns out to have been a trick by a criminal called Dr. Devious who wanted to distract the hero while he robbed a diamond company just across the street.

* ''ComicBook/PlasticMan (1943)'': In issue #42, Plastic Man apprehends a gang of criminals who are robbing a doll store. It turns out to have been a trick by a criminal called Dr. Devious who wanted to distract the hero while he robbed a diamond company just across the street.