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If you find any news that's slightly to the wrong side of sanity, throw it up here for our entertainment!

He's a Crunchy nut... advert showing man riding dog sparks fury



Breakfast food company Kellogg's has come under fire from animal lovers furious about a television advert showing a man riding a dog like a horse.

Nearly 100 complaints have been made against the new Crunchy Nut Cornflakes advert, which shows a very small man finishing work and riding home on the back of an Irish Wolfhound.

Dog lovers say the behaviour in the scene is cruel and could be copied by children.

However, no action is to be taken by the Advertising Standards Authority, which has dismissed the complaints.

It says viewers would be able to spot that the scenes were computer-generated.

In the advert, the man is seen riding the dog home from work. Text at the bottom of the screen reads: "Don't try this with your dog at home."

After the man arrives home, milk is poured on to a bowl of the cereal by what appears to be the dog's paw. The man is then seen sitting at his kitchen table eating it.

A spokesman for Kellogg's said the idea of their advertising campaign was to depict methods of transport that are so unfeasible they defied reality.

Kellogg's said a vet was present at the shoot to ensure the well-being of the animal. It added that no one actually rode the dog.

The Advertising Standards Authority cleared the advert, providing it was shown away from programmes that children could watch.

LMAO...i would love to see that one!

GREEN BAY, Wis. - A pig on the lam from a trip to the butcher withstood Taser shots from police officers and eluded authorities for more than an hour after wandering onto Green Bay's major highway Wednesday night.

The 150-pound pig was spotted by a passing driver on U.S. 41 at 6 p.m. Wednesday night, Green Bay Police Lt. Todd LePine said. The animal reportedly went into traffic several times, creating a hazard, he said.

Officers located the pig about 7 p.m. and made two attempts to subdue it with a stun gun, he said, but it fled both times after pulling out the Taser probes.

A passerby who described himself as a former pig farmer tried to wrestle the animal, but the animal pulled away from him as well, LePine said.

Three tranquilizer darts were finally used to bring the pig under control, and it was placed in blanket and lifted into an animal control van, LePine said.

The animal was taken to the Bay Area Humane Shelter that evening. Police said a local attorney planned to claim the pig Thursday.

Appleton attorney Nila Robinson, who raises pigs on her farm, told the Green Bay Press Gazette the pig was hers. The animal escaped somewhere between an Appleton Starbucks and Maplewood Meats near Green Bay.

The wild run was a success for the pig, at least for now.

"The pig's not going to slaughter anytime soon," Robinson told the Press Gazette. "It was shot with tranquilizers, and what does that do to a pig? I'll just have to give it some thought. The pig's future at present is unknown."

Maybe not so "off the wall", but still...


Man rejects first penis transplant


Chinese surgeons have performed the world's first penis transplant on a man whose organ was damaged beyond repair in an accident this year. The incident left the man with a 1cm-long stump with which he was unable to urinate or have sexual intercourse. "His quality of life was affected severely," said Dr Weilie Hu, a surgeon at Guangzhou General Hospital.
Doctors spent 15 hours attaching a 10cm penis to the 44-year-old patient after the parents of a brain-dead man half his age agreed to donate their son's organ.

The procedure, described in a case study due to appear in the journal European Urology next month, represents a big leap forward in transplant surgery; it required complex microsurgery to connect nerves and tiny blood vessels.

The surgical team claims the operation was a success. After 10 days, tests revealed the organ had a rich blood supply and the man was able to urinate normally.

Doctors have previously succeeded in reuniting men with their sexual organs after traumatic accidents or attacks, but the Guangzhou operation is the first in which a donor penis has successfully been attached to another man.

Although the operation was a surgical success, surgeons said they had to remove the penis two weeks later. "Because of a severe psychological problem of the recipient and his wife, the transplanted penis regretfully had to be cut off," Dr Hu said. An examination of the organ showed no signs of it being rejected by the body.

Jean-Michel Dubernard, the French surgeon who performed the world's first face transplant on a woman who had been attacked by a dog this year, said psychological factors were a serious issue for many patients receiving certain "allografts", or organs from donors. "Psychological consequences of hand and face allografts show that it is not so easy to use and see permanently a dead person's hands, nor is it easy to look in a mirror to see a dead person's face," he wrote in the journal. "Clearly, in the Chinese case the failure at a very early stage was first psychological. It involved the recipient's wife and raised many questions."

In 2001, surgeons were forced to amputate the world's first transplanted hand from Clint Hallam, a 50-year-old New Zealander, who said he wanted the "hideous and withered" hand removed because he had become "mentally detached" from it. The original transplant was conducted by Prof Dubernard's team at the Edouard Herriot Hospital in Lyons, who have since performed the world's first double arm transplant.

Andrew George, a transplant expert at Imperial College, London, said: "Doing a penis transplant should be no more complex than anything else. But it takes time for nerve sensations to kick in and it's not clear whether the patient would ever be able to have sex with it. The question is whether it's right to be doing a transplant for what may be seen as cosmetic reasons."

10cm (4") may not have been enough.  It's no wonder the wife rejected the transplant!

Police: Would-Be Carjacker Picks Wrong Car

HAMILTON - Hamilton police are looking for a man who attempted to carjack the wrong driver on Sunday. Investigators said a man walked up to a car waiting at a red light at Pershing Avenue and Neilan Boulevard just after 3 a.m., tapped on the window with a handgun and tried to open the passenger door.

Police said that a moment later, the man realized his would-be victim was a police officer -- still in uniform -- on his way home from work.

The man ran from the intersection, with the officer in pursuit. Police said the man fired one shot at the officer, who returned fire.

The gunman managed to avoid capture, but officers said they found his gun and a bike the gunman may have been riding prior to the incident.

 Colombia's exports of "hormiga culona" ("big-butt queen ants") are down this year due to a harsh winter and aggressive lizards and birds, creating steep prices for chocolate-dipped ants in London and ant-based sauces and spreads at home, according to an August Associated Press dispatch. And a July Reuters story on the Explorers Club in New York City called it virtually the only place where gourmets can enjoy such delicacies as scorpion, cricket, tarantula and maggot, and pigeon pate, as well as odd parts of common livestock. Worms are also prized if they've been "evacuated" on oatmeal for a few days before serving.

The Chicago Tribune reported in March that dozens of blind students in Chicago public schools are nonetheless required to take driver education classes. One sightless but otherwise optimistic student told the Tribune she resented the requirement because it made her uncharacteristically dwell on something that she cannot do. [Chicago Sun-Times, 2-11-06]

Weird Chinese:  In rural Jiangsu province, some still believe that a well-attended funeral leads to a successful afterlife, but police have recently cracked down on the practice of hiring strippers to punch up attendance, according to an August Reuters dispatch.

Problem Solved:  (1) Darrell Rodgers, 40, was treated at Bloomington (Ind.) Hospital in August after shooting himself in the left knee because he felt he had to try something to end the pain there (pain possibly from having shot himself in that knee 10 years earlier). (2) Electrician Paul Trotman, 51, was arrested in Clay County, Fla., in August after allegedly rigging an electrical device to shock a 3 1/2-year-old boy who lived with Trotman and his wife, after Trotman got fed up that the boy was constantly urinating on electrical outlets just to see sparks fly. [Herald-Times (Bloomington), 8-12-06] [WKMG-TV (Orlando), 8-14-06]

Alcohol use helps boost income: study

People who consume alcohol earn significantly more at their jobs than non-drinkers, according to a US study that highlighted "social capital" gained from drinking.

The study published in the Journal of Labor Research Thursday concluded that drinkers earn 10 to 14 percent more than teetotalers, and that men who drink socially bring home an additional seven percent in pay.

"Social drinking builds social capital," said Edward Stringham, an economics professor at San Jose State University and co-author of the study with fellow researcher Bethany Peters.

"Social drinkers are out networking, building relationships, and adding contacts to their BlackBerries that result in bigger paychecks."

The authors acknowledged their study, funded by the Reason Foundation, a libertarian think tank, contradicted research released in 2000 by the Harvard School of Public Health.

"We created our hypothesis through casual observation and examination of scholarly accounts," the authors said.

"Drinkers typically tend to be more social than abstainers."

The researchers said their empirical survey backed up the theory, and said the most likely explanation is that drinkers have a wider range of social contacts that help provide better job and business opportunities.

"Drinkers may be able to socialize more with clients and co-workers, giving drinkers an advantage in important relationships," the researchers said.

"Drinking may also provide individuals with opportunities to learn people, business, and social skills."

They also said these conclusions provide arguments against policies aimed at curbing alcohol use on university campuses and public venues.

"Not only do anti-alcohol policies reduce drinkers' fun, but they may also decrease earnings," the study said.

"One of the unintended consequences of alcohol restrictions is that they push drinking into private settings. This occurred during the Alcohol Prohibition of 1920-1933 and is happening on college campuses today. By preventing people from drinking in public, anti-alcohol policies eliminate one of the most important aspects of drinking: increased social capital."

The researchers found some differences in the economic effects of drinking among men and women. They concluded that men who drink earn 10 percent more than abstainers and women drinkers earn 14 percent more than non-drinkers.

However, unlike men, who get a seven percent income boost from drinking in bars, women who frequent bars at least once per month do not show higher earnings than women drinkers who do not visit bars.

"Perhaps women increase social capital apart from drinking in bars," the researchers said in an effort to explain the gender gap.

WARSAW (Reuters) - A Polish woman who grew marijuana to calm the nerves of her cow has been charged with cultivating a narcotic by police in the western town of Lobez.

The cow had been "skittish and unruly" -- once breaking a person's arm -- until someone suggested mixing cannabis in with its feed, the woman told police.

"The cow became as calm as a lamb," the 55-year-old woman said, according to the PAP news agency.

The woman's plants, grown from seeds she bought at a market, reached nearly three metres (yards) tall and were extremely potent, police said.

Marijuana possession is a crime throughout Poland. The woman faces up to three years in jail if convicted.

In an attempt to raise environmental awareness, two concerned citizens of Walpole, Mass., hosted a "pump-out party" in June, with wine and cheese, to encourage neighbors to keep their septic systems in good order. The hosts allowed their own tank to be publicly cleaned as a demonstration, although the drinking and eating portion of the party came to a halt at that point, according to the Daily News Transcript of suburban Boston. [Boston Herald-Daily News Transcript, 6-7-06]

Darwin Award
Ken Charles Barger 47, shot himself to death in Newton, NC. Awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside his bed, he reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson 38 Special, which discharged when he drew it to his ear.

Missing the Boat
A couple of Dublin lads, aged 19 and 20, were running a little late from their day's adventures in Holyhead, North Wales, and missed their ferry boat home. But no problem mate, they decided they'd just take the 30-foot fishing trawler sitting over yonder, and set sail for home a mere 67 miles across the Irish Sea. Well, there was just one small problem with their plan; neither knew anything about boats or the sea. They were hopelessly lost in no time and ended up placing a Mayday call to what they thought was the Irish Coast Guard, which would come to rescue them. Wrong! Turns out it was the Coast Guard in Holyhead. After going 12 miles in the wrong direction, they were towed back to Holyhead and arrested. The police inspector stated that, " probably alchol had a part to play " in the incident.

LAGOS, Nigeria - A Nigerian murder suspect accused of killing his brother with an axe told police investigators he actually attacked a goat, which was only later magically transformed into his sibling's corpse, officials said Thursday.

The man, whose name wasn't released, offered police his explanation after his arrest on Tuesday in the death of his brother the previous day at Isseluku village in southern Nigeria.

"He said that the goats were on his farm and he tried to chase them away. When one wouldn't move, he attacked it with an axe. He said it then turned into his brother," Police Commissioner Udom Ekpoudom told the Associated Press.

Murder suspects in Nigeria, where many people believe in black magic, sometimes claim spirits tricked them into killing. In 2001, eight people were burned to death after one person in their group was accused of making a bystander's penis magically disappear.

(read the last part again)  :-o

It's usually in Florida where one reads of lonely widows persuaded to pay extravagant prices for dance lessons, but Mimi Monica Wong, 61, is a different kind of dancing widow, according to an August Wall Street Journal report. A Hong Kong private banker with a top-drawer client list, Wong contracted to pay US$15.4 million over eight years for cha-cha and rumba lessons from two world-class instructors so she could excel on the international championship Latin dance circuit. However, she soured on their motivational approach ("lazy cow" and "(move your) fat arse" were allegedly part of their dialogue) and sued. In September, a court ordered Wong's $8 million advance returned, and she has since signed on with another instructor whose fee is a bargain: $21,000 a month. [Wall Street Journal, 8-3-06]

Atlantis shuttle's return flight triggers panic in Mexican village
Sep 22 5:08 PM US/Eastern



The Space Shuttle Atlantis's return flight prompted panic in a Mayan village in Mexico, with local residents inundating police with phone calls about a "ball of fire" in the sky and the "sound of an explosion," authorities said.
The emergency calls came in Thursday at about 5:15 am local time (1015 GMT), six minutes before NASA's Atlantis shuttle landed at Cape Canaveral in the US state of Florida, some 800 kilometers (497 miles) from Chunes, a small village on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.



"They asked us to search the area. A military unit confirmed that no small plane had crashed," said Abraham Oliva, director of public security for the municipality.

It was not until the evening, when authorities saw the television news, that they realized the suspicious sights and sounds had been produced by the shuttle as it streaked overhead, Oliva said.

Trial judge Florentino Floro was fired by the Philippines supreme court in April, and his appeal rejected in August, after investigators found that he had claimed to rely on three mystic dwarves (Armand, Luis and Angel) for psychic powers and the ability to write while in a trance. (Floro protested media accounts of his firing to The Wall Street Journal in July, denying that dwarves helped him decide cases and writing that Armand, Luis and Angel are merely "spirit guides" and that he himself is "gifted" from God "to heal and to prophesy.") [BBC News, 8-18-06]

"I shouldn't even be doing this," said Judge Gary F. McKinley in a Kenton, Ohio, courtroom in August. "I'm cutting you somewhat of a break," he told two star athletes of Kenton High who had just been convicted of vehicular vandalism in a prank that caused two men serious, life-long disabilities. The kids' sentence: 60 days in juvenile detention (plus community service), but only after football season. (The families of the victims were appalled, especially the family of the one who was brain-damaged.) [Columbus Dispatch, 8-16-06]

Judge Paul E. Zellerbach was admonished by California's judicial agency in August for behavior in October 2004, when he left a jury deliberating a murder charge in order to attend an Angels-Red Sox playoff game and declined to leave the game when notified that the jury had reached a verdict (forcing everyone to return the next day). [Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, 8-16-06]

In September, police in New Zealand dropped the dangerous-driving charge against the armless driver reported in News of the Weird in April, satisfied that he steers well enough with his left foot (though his speeding ticket remained). In August, though, the St. Petersburg Times profiled Michael Wiley, 39, of Port Richey, Fla., an enthusiastic driver despite having lost both arms and half a leg in a childhood accident. Wrote the Times, "He guides the key into the ignition with his mouth. Turns it with his toes. Shifts with his knee. Bites the headlight switch. Jams his stump of a left arm into the steering wheel and whips it around." On the minus side, his license was revoked long ago, and reckless driving charges flourish, including the latest, one day after the Times story ran. (And in September, he was charged with domestic assault, with his head.) [BBC News, 9-1-06]

Reuters reported in August that a man was killed in his workshop on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro when he tried to open a rocket-propelled grenade (probably to recover scrap metal) with a sledgehammer. And two days before that, in the Indiana town of Brazil (near Terre Haute), a 31-year-old man was accidentally killed in the explosion of the pipe bomb he was carrying (probably to be used to help him catch fish in Birch Creek). [Reuters, 8-9-06] [WRTV (Indianapolis), 8-6-06]

In July, according to a Canadian Press report, a Wal-Mart in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, received a bomb threat and immediately dispatched about 40 employees on duty to look through the store to find the explosive. (Customers were allowed to leave, though, and ultimately, it was a false alarm.) [Globe and Mail-Canadian Press, 7-11-06]

Quote from: Old-Navy on 09-29-2006 -- 10:24:20
In July, according to a Canadian Press report, a Wal-Mart in St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec, received a bomb threat and immediately dispatched about 40 employees on duty to look through the store to find the explosive. (Customers were allowed to leave, though, and ultimately, it was a false alarm.) [Globe and Mail-Canadian Press, 7-11-06]

Isn't that the unionized WalMart?

Quote from: MIRCS on 09-29-2006 -- 18:44:12
Isn't that the unionized WalMart?

No idea, but considering the "caliber" of Wally World employees, do you think they could actually find something???

In September, following complaints of diners, the health department in Springfield, Mo., notified restaurants that Debby Rose's "assistance monkey" could not be permitted to dine with her (in a high chair), even though Rose said she suffers from a disabling social phobia that she can accommodate only if "Richard" (a bonnet macaque monkey) is with her. Monkeys are generally permitted under the Americans with Disabilities Act if they perform certain tasks, as capuchin monkeys have been trained to fetch groceries from shelves for wheelchair-using patrons. However, animals that provide only emotional support fall into a gray area, according to a U.S. Justice Department spokesperson quoted by the Springfield News-Leader. [ABC News-AP, 9-16-06]

Quote from: Old-Navy on 10-02-2006 -- 08:33:04

Quote from: MIRCS on 09-29-2006 -- 18:44:12
Isn't that the unionized WalMart?

No idea, but considering the "caliber" of Wally World employees, do you think they could actually find something???

I've found that most of the Wal-Mart employees here in Ohio can't find their butts with both hands, so I'm thinking that finding an explosive device may be out of their reach...  Maybe they're trained by the TSA!

Sorry it was the wrong one in Quebec.

Wal-Mart closing unionized store

Retailer cites breakdown in union negotiations as cause for shuttering store in Quebec.
February 9, 2005: 10:23 PM EST

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Wal-Mart is closing a store in Quebec that was closest to reaching a union contract after the retailer could not reach an agreement with the union representing workers there.

After months of negotiation with representatives of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Wal-Mart (Research) said it will shut down its store in Jonquiere in the spring.

"It's a deeply disappointing day for us," Wal-Mart spokesman Andrew Pelletier told CNN. "The store in Jonquiere has been struggling for sometime economically, and in our view the union's demands failed to take into account the fragile condition of the store."


The company did not disclose how many workers will be affected, but said they would be offered "very generous packages which will far exceed what is required by law," including severance pay and career counseling.

Wal-Mart said it met nine times with union officials in recent months, but that those efforts did not result in an agreement.

The company said in a statement that the union walked away from the bargaining table on Feb. 1 and asked for arbitration.

A spokesman for United Food and Commercial Workers Union of Canada did not return a phone call seeking comment.

Workers at another Canadian Wal-Mart in the city of St. Hyacinthe are unionizing and the company plans to challenge the process.

Under fire in the United States for its employment practices, the world's largest retailer announced last year that it was overhauling its practices on pay, promotions, diversity and how cashiers are notified of their breaks. In 2003, Wal-Mart was accused of hiring illegal immigrants through a contractor and underpaying those employees.

Wal-Mart Canada employs about 70,000 at 256 Wal-Mart stores and six Sam's Clubs.

Wal-Mart stock fell about 1.3 percent in active New York Stock Exchange trading. 

Black bear eats family's Chihuahua
Children witness death of pet; wildlife biologist says incident was rare

By MARY M. RALL
Alaska Star

A predator-meets-prey encounter hit home for an Eagle River family who lost a dog to a roving black bear Aug. 1.
Ginger Fletcher, 36, lives off Greenhouse Street in Eagle River Valley alongside her three siblings and parents who built on plots of land homesteaded by the family decades ago.

Fletcher said the area has always seemed like an ideal place to raise her three children: Katie, 3, Colby, 6, and Chris, 16. She said she landscaped her yard last year creating an ideal area for her children to play with their many cousins on the family's 10 acres.

Bears are common in the area, Fletcher said, but she never imagined one would be so bold as to prey on her family's 9-month-old miniature Chihuahua, Casper.

She said Casper, weighing 3 pounds, was an indoor dog that only went outside to go to the bathroom or lay in the sun for a couple of hours on warm afternoons.

Casper was leashed outside for a few minutes to relieve himself around 6 p.m. Aug. 1 when it caught the attention of a black bear passing through the family's yard.

"He hadn't been out very long, and my son was getting ready to get him," Fletcher said. "My two little ones started screaming, 'There's a bear, there's a bear.'"

Fletcher said her youngest two children were kneeling on the living room sofa looking out the window when they noticed the black bear. She was in the kitchen when she heard them yell that the bear had taken an interest in the dog, which had begun to bark.

"He was a little dog, but he didn't really bark that often," she said. "I really didn't even hear him barking, so, I mean, it wasn't that much of a bark."

But it was enough to catch the bear's attention.

"When the dog started to bark, the bear turned around and started coming for the dog," Fletcher said. "He grabbed the dog and ripped him, basically, off the leash in front of my kids."

The gruesome scene caused a panic in her children, especially Chris, who began screaming for the bear to put down his dog.

"He was screaming so loud that a car that was going by Eagle River Road heard the screaming," said his grandmother, Evelyn Johnson. "He didn't know what was going on, and he called 911, and the police came."

Chris's screaming also caught the attention of his uncle, Kurt Johnson, who grabbed his gun and drove to the Fletchers not fully realizing what was happening.

Fletcher said she was recovering from knee surgery and was trying to respond as quickly as she could to protect and shield her children from the scene unfolding before them.

"He started to tear the dog apart in the front yard to eat it, and that's when I was trying to keep the kids away so they wouldn't see what was happening," she said, adding that she called her parents for help.

"By the time we got there, the bear was on the hill eating the dog," Johnson said. "We were going to shoot it, but by then the dog was dead. There wasn't anything we could do."

Anchorage area wildlife biologist Rick Sinnott said the family would have been legally within their rights to shoot the bear, but he would advise extreme caution in such a situation.

"You're allowed to shoot a bear in defense of life or property," he said. "Obviously if it's attacking a dog that would be the time to do it, but you have to know what you're doing," he said, adding that a misfired gun in a residential area could pose more of a threat to humans than to a bear.

Sinnott said it's not uncommon for bears to pass through Eagle River as a thoroughfare between Fort Richardson and Chugach State Park, which both have large bear populations. However, he said it is extremely unusual for them to prey on dogs, especially one tethered to a house.

"They walk past thousands of dogs. They are walking through and by people's backyards all the time. If they wanted to eat dogs, they could fill up on dogs every day. They wouldn't have to be tied up. Just about any dog could be pulled down by a bear," Sinnott said. "It's pretty unusual. Bears, for the most part, are after the easy stuff like garbage and birdseed. They'll even go into chicken coops, eat the chicken food and leave the chickens alone."

He said while Casper's being eaten is tragic, it doesn't necessarily mean the bear that ate him is dangerous or going to do it again.

"One time I wouldn't call it a threat. If we see a pattern, if it does it again and we think it's the same bear, then obviously that's definitely a whole different situation. It might have killed it just because it was yapping at it," Sinnott said, adding that there have not been any additional reports of area bears attacking dogs.

But that is no reassurance to Johnson, who said she has seen bears become increasingly bolder throughout her years in the area.

"It's really scary," she said. "The bears, they've taken over this area. Every year we have at least three bears roaming through the yard."

Sinnott said increased bear activity is in large part due to the changes in hunting laws that have occurred over the years.

"People were shooting bears just as a matter of course back in the '40s and '50s and '60s," he said. "Hunting has been closed down throughout pretty much all the Anchorage Bowl and the Lower Eagle River Valley. We've had several generations of bears that have grown up without being hunted.

"You don't necessarily have to shoot at an animal and miss it to teach it that guns are dangerous. All you have to do is shoot the bears that are very bold or very stupid and the other bears are just the naturally wary bears," Sinnott added. "So if you don't shoot the bold bears and you don't shoot the stupid bears, the ones that take the chances come into town and find out we have all this great garbage and birdseed and stuff here and start getting into trouble."

He said it's the human's responsibility to be the more responsible one by keeping bear attractants such as birdseed, garbage and dog food secure from April through October when bears are most active.

Fletcher said her family has always taken such steps, but it hasn't prevented bears from passing close to her home or climbing onto her car in the middle of night. As a result, she said her younger two children are frightened to go out and play in their yard or commit to a new family dog.

"We're kind of in a situation where this house was built, the yard was landscaped for the kids and we can't really use it for that with the bears," Fletcher said. "It was upsetting to lose a pet, but to me, the hardest part was that my kids had to watch that. How do you explain that?"

She said the one small relief she has is that she doesn't think Casper suffered.

"Ripping him from the leash and stuff, I think it must have been pretty quick," Fletcher said.

Water turned off at place offering sex parties
Associated Press
Sept. 28, 2006 08:05 AM

COOPERSBURG, Pa. - There won't be any wet T-shirt contests at a strip bar here - the water's been turned off.

The borough turned off the water to the Silhouette Showbar on Monday, with more than $700 owing on the club's water bill, and the building cannot be occupied without water, Borough Manager Daniel Stonehouse said.

Stonehouse said the action concerning the pending water bill is unrelated to the borough's legal efforts to shut down the bar's Club Kama Sutra, which has been offering Saturday night sex parties.

Lehigh County Judge Edward Reibman has scheduled a hearing later this week on the borough's request for an injunction against the club. Borough officials argue that it's in a part of town zoned for a bar, restaurant and hotel, but not a private club.

The borough notified the bar Sept. 5 that the club violates the zoning ordinance and gave the operators 10 days to appeal. They declined to do so, saying they had not violated any zoning laws.

In an August segment on WWLP-TV (Springfield, Mass.), police chief Anthony Scott of Holyoke, Mass., described the extent of a recent domestic fight in which Ms. Yesenia Ortiz retaliated against alleged aggressor Victor Cruz: "She grabbed another knife and stabbed him in the winky...." (Cruz was arrested and taken to a hospital for treatment of his winky.) [WWLP-TV (Springfield), 8-14-06]

One Hindu family sued another in Springfield, Mass., in July over an arranged marriage after the bride-to-be presented herself to the groom's family for the first time and was judged too ugly. Vijai V. Pandey and his wife claimed they were "extremely shocked" at the woman's "protruded bad teeth" and bad complexion, among other deficiencies. A spokesman for an American Hindu organization tried to downplay skepticism over arranged marriages, telling the Springfield Republican newspaper that he had seen "very handsome men who are happy with somewhat homely women." [The Republican (Springfield), 7-5-06]

Linda Mason filed a lawsuit in Chicago in July against a Borders bookstore, citing a defective toilet in the ladies' room that allegedly triggered near-catastrophic medical injuries. Because the broken seat "shifted to the side" when she sat down, she not only lost her balance and fell to the floor but somehow suffered "multiple spine injuries," requiring "multiple neurosurgical" operations, resulting in permanent disfigurement. [WBBM-Chicago Sun Times, 7-31-06]

In Jhalabordi village in India in August, a pigeon fell into a well, and five villagers went in, in succession, to rescue first the pigeon, and then the succeeding Samaritans, but all five died. And in Surkhondaryo province in Uzbekistan in August, a father and son were digging an overflow pit for an outdoor toilet when the walls collapsed, and five neighbors in succession were lowered into the pit to attempt a rescue, but all seven people wound up dead. [Herald Sun (Melbourne)-Reuters, 8-10-06]

Pennsylvania inmate Donta Thomas was re-arrested in August and charged with operating a drug ring on the outside, carried out via the Fayette County prison's pay phones. According to police, Thomas routinely gave explicit instructions to his accomplices over the phone despite an automated message on each call that the conversation was being recorded. According to a spokesman for the state attorney general, Thomas, speaking, would pause so as not to have to talk over the recording, but then afterward resume planning his deals. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 8-26-06]

Poor at Anger Management

Executive chef George Llorens, 60, was arrested in Bridgeport, Conn., in July, accused of punching a colleague in the face because the appetizers she made were cold. And police in Decatur, Ala., arrested four people in August after intermittent, daylong fighting (that sent three of them to the hospital) that begin when one flicked a cigarette butt near another's property. And Jeffrey Cullen, 58, was arrested in August for firing several gunshots at Kingman, Ariz., firefighters (but missing) when they told him that they weren't permitted to rescue his cat from a tree. [New York Post-AP, 7-20-06] [Decatur Daily, 8-10-06] [New York Post-AP, 8-20-06]

In an August rafting tournament on the Vuoksa River near St. Petersburg, Russia, which used only inflatable dolls of the kind typically sold in adult boutiques, Igor Osipov, 40, was disqualified upon finishing the race when (according to a report by Moscow News) observers "saw signs of recent sexual activity on (Osipov)'s doll." [Moscow News, 8-28-06]

Marine Takes Bids on New Name

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. (AP) - Hoping to raise money for his family and an orphanage, a 29-year-old Marine is running an online auction in which the winning bidder will get to give him a new name - and he promises to make it legally binding.

"I've always thought about different cool inventions and neat ideas like this," said Sgt. Cody Baker, an Alabama native who was most recently stationed in Japan but is transferring to Camp Lejeune this month. "It's just the way my mind works. Most of them are off the wall like this. They just sound ridiculous."

The bidding at Baker's Web site, , began July 20, with a $5 offer to name him Mr. Clean.http://www.choosemyname.com

Later bids supporting such names as George Bailey of Bedford Falls and Mr. Right gave way to a $26,333.31 offer from an online coffee vendor that wants the name tape on Baker's uniform to display its slogan, "Finest Freshest Fastest."

"It will be my name, legally on paper," he said. "I guess everything that comes with the name Cody Baker will transform into whatever my name becomes."

Baker said the money will help support his wife and infant son while he goes to college after leaving the Marine Corps in a year and a half.

Some of the proceeds will also go to Im Jai House, an orphanage in Thailand that Baker has supported during his six-year career in uniform.

"Whatever his name is, we'll put him to work doing what the Marine Corps does best: accomplishing missions," said Lt. Philip Klay, a spokesman for Baker's future unit at Camp Lejeune.

The 30-year-old traditional festival of eel-"bowling" in the fishing village of Lyme Regis, England, was canceled in July after complaints from an animal rights activist that it was disrespectful to eels.

In the ritual, teams of anglers stand on platforms and swing a giant (but dead) conger eel, attached to the ceiling, to see who will be the last person standing.

Said a spokesman for the charitable event, which raises money for lifeboat crews, "But it's a dead conger, for Pete's sake. I shouldn't think the conger could care one way or another." [Reuters, 7-29-06]

Quote from: Old-Navy on 10-09-2006 -- 08:57:01
In an August rafting tournament on the Vuoksa River near St. Petersburg, Russia, which used only inflatable dolls of the kind typically sold in adult boutiques, Igor Osipov, 40, was disqualified upon finishing the race when (according to a report by Moscow News) observers "saw signs of recent sexual activity on (Osipov)'s doll." [Moscow News, 8-28-06]

Good thing they weren't racing sheep...  Coup takes his sport seriously.

In the midst of violence and despair in Baghdad, at least two institutions are working smoothly, according to September stories in, respectively, The Washington Post and Los Angeles Times.

"Iraq Star," an "American Idol"-type reality TV show, attracted 10,000 contestants for 45 slots in filming at the downtown Baghdad Hotel, and will be shown locally and around the Arab world. Other reality-style shows are in the works.

Second, the almost 3,500 Baghdad traffic officers still command high respect despite the city's other problems. Said an engineer, "The traffic law is the only thing nowadays that functions correctly."

In fact, the Web site of the Shi'ite Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani contains a query whether it is permissible, even when a driver has the street all to himself, to violate traffic laws; the ayatollah's answer is no. [Providence Journal-Washington Post, 9-10-06] [Boston Herald-Los Angeles Times, 9-10-06]

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Four Mexicans were killed when a dispute between two Tzotzil Indian families over a pothole in the street escalated into a full-blown shootout.

One of the families closed off the cracked concrete and mud road in the town of Banelos in the poor southern state of Chiapas to fill in a hole left by heavy rain.

That angered a family with a transport business who needed to get their truck through, the Mexican daily Reforma said on Tuesday.

Insults led to blows and finally the two families shot at each other using various caliber guns and a hefty AR-15 rifle, Reforma said. Shootings are not uncommon in Mexico's little-policed indigenous regions, where many take the law into their own hands.

A photo showed somber-looking locals standing in two groups on either side of the pothole -- now filled in with rubble and fit to be driven over again.

SOFIA (Reuters) - A Bulgarian woman who killed her son was released from prison because of terminal cancer. She then went home and killed her husband, police said Tuesday.

The 57-year-old was sentenced to 15 years in jail for killing her 29-year-old son with a garden hoe in April 2005 while he was sleeping.

Last month, authorities judged her to be in the final stages of cancer and let her go home, where she stabbed her husband in the throat with a knife.

"It was established she was in the last stage of cancer, she had it all over her body," said a spokeswoman for the Bourgas regional police.

"They presumed she was feeling bad and she would treat herself and rest. But nothing of the kind. She got aggressive and ... she killed her husband."

The woman, from a village in eastern Bulgaria, has been taken into custody again and is awaiting a new trial.

"She threatened that, if she is released again, she will kill her second son as well," the police spokeswoman said.

"The whole case is like something from the twilight zone."

PALMETTO, Florida (AP) -- Mark Giorgio figured a 50-foot plunge was worth $20. Giorgio, 47, was counting his money and walking across the U.S. 41 bridge over the Manatee River Monday when a $20 bill blew out of his hand and flew over the rail.

He followed. And plummeted 50 feet into the river. Then he swam about 100 yards to fish the bill from the water.

"I got my money back, hell yeah," Giorgio told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. "Twenty bucks is a lot of money when you're broke."

He was fished from the water by a passing Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officer.

Giorgio, who said he was already suffering from a broken collarbone, refused treatment for cuts and scrapes he suffered in the fall.

Quote from: docbyers on 10-09-2006 -- 14:03:13
Marine Takes Bids on New Name

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. (AP) - Hoping to raise money for his family and an orphanage, a 29-year-old Marine is running an online auction in which the winning bidder will get to give him a new name - and he promises to make it legally binding.

"I've always thought about different cool inventions and neat ideas like this," said Sgt. Cody Baker, an Alabama native who was most recently stationed in Japan but is transferring to Camp Lejeune this month. "It's just the way my mind works. Most of them are off the wall like this. They just sound ridiculous."

The bidding at Baker's Web site, , began July 20, with a $5 offer to name him Mr. Clean.http://www.choosemyname.com

Later bids supporting such names as George Bailey of Bedford Falls and Mr. Right gave way to a $26,333.31 offer from an online coffee vendor that wants the name tape on Baker's uniform to display its slogan, "Finest Freshest Fastest."

"It will be my name, legally on paper," he said. "I guess everything that comes with the name Cody Baker will transform into whatever my name becomes."

Baker said the money will help support his wife and infant son while he goes to college after leaving the Marine Corps in a year and a half.

Some of the proceeds will also go to Im Jai House, an orphanage in Thailand that Baker has supported during his six-year career in uniform.

"Whatever his name is, we'll put him to work doing what the Marine Corps does best: accomplishing missions," said Lt. Philip Klay, a spokesman for Baker's future unit at Camp Lejeune.

Unbelievible... :-(

Leon Howard Matter was arrested in Sandusky, Ohio, in August for sending a letter containing "anthrax" (though it turned out to be harmless powder) to the local FBI office.

He told agents the reason he did it was because he was facing earlier child pornography charges and didn't want to go to prison for that because he'd get beaten up.

Threatening the FBI, he reasoned, has a better cachet. [WKYC-TV (Cleveland)-AP, 8-9-06]

Hundreds of people descended on Liverpool Street station for the biggest ever turnout for the latest internet craze - mobile clubbing.

Armed with MP3 players loaded with favourite tracks the "clubbers" arrived on the concourse just after 7pm last night. Students, business people and office workers danced in silence as they listened to their iPods among commuters listening to announcements about late trains.

Details of the time and venue were sent by email. The event is similar to the flash mobbing movement pioneered in New York which involved large numbers of people gathering to conduct bizarre activities.

One commuter said: "It was entertaining if strange to see all these people gyrating to their own beat. It was the Soul Train arriving at platform one."

WEWS-TV in Cleveland reported in August that the pregnancy rate among girls at Timken High School in Canton, Ohio, was 13 percent, despite the fact that the school's athletic teams are known as the Trojans.

OTTAWA, Canada (Reuters) -- Canadian troops fighting Taliban militants in Afghanistan have stumbled across an unexpected and potent enemy -- almost impenetrable forests of marijuana plants 10 feet tall.

General Rick Hillier, chief of the Canadian defense staff, said Thursday that Taliban fighters were using the forests as cover. In response, the crew of at least one armored car had camouflaged their vehicle with marijuana.

"The challenge is that marijuana plants absorb energy, heat very readily. It's very difficult to penetrate with thermal devices. ... And as a result you really have to be careful that the Taliban don't dodge in and out of those marijuana forests," he said in a speech in Ottawa, Canada.

"We tried burning them with white phosphorous -- it didn't work. We tried burning them with diesel -- it didn't work. The plants are so full of water right now ... that we simply couldn't burn them," he said.

Even successful incineration had its drawbacks.

"A couple of brown plants on the edges of some of those [forests] did catch on fire. But a section of soldiers that was downwind from that had some ill effects and decided that was probably not the right course of action," Hiller said dryly.

One soldier told him later: "Sir, three years ago before I joined the army, I never thought I'd say 'That damn marijuana'."

Sometime next year, if all goes well, Brett Holm of Chaska, Minn., will begin selling his Season Shot, an improvement over current shotgun shells because its pellets dissolve on contact in the game meat and, more important, automatically flavor it for cooking.

Holm told the Chanhassen (Minn.) Villager newspaper in August that he will initially offer lemon pepper, mesquite, Mexican, and Creole flavors, but, he said, chemists are at work right now to expand the selection. [Chanhassen Villager, 8-3-06]

SEATTLE - He uses binoculars to peer into people's windows, and the things he does after that make his neighbors absolutely disgusted.

One woman caught this peeping tom on tape - and she wants police to take action.

It's happening at a high-rise apartment building in downtown Seattle. But the peeper is terrorizing his neighbors without leaving his apartment, making it hard to determine whether he's committing a crime.

Diane Earl's apartment window has a beautiful, sweeping view of Elliot Bay, but she doesn't get to enjoy it very often.

"I just sit in the corner," she said. "With all my lights off and my drapes drawn."

She feels like a prisoner in her own apartment -- all because of a man living across from her.

"When I get up in the morning he's over there watching me all day long," she said. "He takes his clothes off and will walk around his living room nude -- masturbate in full view with all his house lights on."

But what the man across the way didn't know is that he too was being watched. After getting fed up with the man watching her Diane set up a camera and got it all on tape.

Her video shows the man sitting in his window peering at her through binoculars while masturbating in plane sight.

Seattle police say they plane to follow up on Diane's initial complaint because the man's actions may be considered voyeurism - a Class C felony.

So far, though, the man has not been arrested or charged.

Diane said she filed a formal complaint with the managers of the apartment where the man lives, but she says they haven't done enough, to make him stop.

And at this point, that's the only thing Diane wants.

"I just want this to stop," she said."I want him to go away."

Seattle police plan to visit Diane's home on Tuesday to take the tape and say they will continue to investigate.

In September, police in Madison, Wis., said Milo G. Chamberlain's blood-alcohol content was .425.

Experts said that is normally attainable only by those either dead or in a coma, but he was picked up, quite conscious, allegedly causing a disturbance at a Marathon gas station.

Hereportedly got into a fight with a gas pump before being restrained by passersby.

Police said Chamberlain responded to each of their questions only by rattling off strings of numbers of no particular pattern. [Capital Times (Madison), 9-23-06]

What's next?  PENCILS??


ATTLEBORO, Mass. - Tag, you're out! Officials at an elementary school south of Boston have banned kids from playing tag, touch football and any other unsupervised chase game during recess for fear they'll get hurt and hold the school liable.

Recess is "a time when accidents can happen," said Willett Elementary School Principal Gaylene Heppe, who approved the ban.

While there is no districtwide ban on contact sports during recess, local rules have been cropping up. Several school administrators around Attleboro, a city of about 45,000 residents, took aim at dodgeball a few years ago, saying it was exclusionary and dangerous.

Elementary schools in Cheyenne, Wyo., and Spokane, Wash., also recently banned tag during recess. A suburban Charleston, S.C., school outlawed all unsupervised contact sports.

"I think that it's unfortunate that kids' lives are micromanaged and there are social skills they'll never develop on their own," said Debbie Laferriere, who has two children at Willett, about 40 miles south of Boston. "Playing tag is just part of being a kid."

Another Willett parent, Celeste D'Elia, said her son feels safer because of the rule. "I've witnessed enough near collisions," she said.

Quote from: Old-Navy on 10-18-2006 -- 10:50:59

Another Willett parent, Celeste D'Elia, said her son feels safer because of the rule. "I've witnessed enough near collisions," she said.

Okay, I have to comment on this because that last comment just pisses me off.  What kid hasn't been hurt growing up?  Are we now restricting their playtime because the might get a scratch or God forbid, feel pain!?  Now I know why the school banned it, because the suit-happy parents would say it was the schools fault for allowing them to play because the parents "don't want their kids to get hurt".  B******t.  They just want the money that would fall from this frivolous lawsuit.  So now our kids are stuck doing what exactly at recess?  Standing around, since pretty much everything has been removed from the playground.  Well hell, we can't even really call it a playground anymore.  "Hey kids, go to recess and stand around for a while.  No, don't move you might get hurt.  Just stand there."  WTF!?  They are so eager to keep their children from getting hurt physically or emotionally that they do stupid s*** like this.  Okay, I feel better now.

Yeah, it's a wonder that I survived 6 years of catholic school.  Still haven't figured out which was worse, tumbling around, falling, jumping, getting sore, scratched, head knocked on the playground, or getting the "attitude adjustments" from the nuns   :evil: :roll:

I thank my lucky stars that I survived my childhood...

I rode my bike for miles every single day, jumping whatever I could find and never once put on a helmet.  On top of that, I never even had a car seat as a child let alone ever wear a seatbelt.   Me and my brother roamed the car freely.  Not until the AF told me that I had to or else they wouldn't pay my hospital bills or life insurance did I pay any attention to wearing one...  Oh yeah, and we had corporal punishment in school where I used to get my a$$ whooped on a pretty regular basis by some teacher, coach, or principal starting in the 1st grade.  Hell, my T-ball coaches thought it was a good time to have 2nd graders go a few rounds bare-knuckle every once in a while for absolutely no reason (got a nice chipped tooth out of that one).  My shop teacher used to settle arguments with the line "get the gloves", there were 2 pairs of boxing gloves hanging on the wall, and out we would go to take care of it.  Good times.  I can only imagine the lawsuits that could have been brought during my childhood.

Now, you can't spank kids in school, I can get in trouble if I ride a bike without a helmet, a ticket if I'm not wearing my seatbelt, and probably thrown in jail if my kids hadn't been in carseats.  I can even get in trouble if I don't wear a reflective belt (which I refuse to do) during hours of darkness!  My God, if I can't safely cross the street at my age, I'm in real trouble.

And now they're taking away the game of tag...  What the hell?

In a September raid, sheriff's deputies in Vista, Calif., seized jars of urine from the home of a suspected methamphetamine user.

Deputies said the user appeared to be saving his own urine in order to extract, and reuse, the meth he had already used.

A Drug Enforcement Administration agent said he was unsure whether the practice was widespread.

Quote from: judgefloro on 10-20-2006 -- 00:10:53

hi i am judge floro --- here, philippines, asia, it is now 1 pm friday

Gawwwwwd... I LOVE TROLLS!!

A 'judge' that shows up on a PMEL site?
I bet he gets a lot of "BENCH TIME"!   :roll:

His IP does trace to the Phillipines...  I think it may really be the judge from the story.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A Russian region has ordered an inquiry into a report that hunt organizers, keen to make the King of Spain's chances of killing a bear easier, provided a tame one drunk on vodka, a regional spokesman said Thursday.

"The governor has ordered a working group set up...to check the facts published in local press about the killing of the bear," said a spokesman for Vyacheslav Pozgalev, governor of the northwestern Vologda region.

National paper Kommersant carried a letter from Vologda's deputy chief of regional hunting resources management, Sergei Starostin, which accuses hunt organizers of plying a captive bear named "Mitrofan" with vodka-drenched honey and then forcing him from a cage to be shot by Spain's King Juan Carlos I.

"His majesty Juan Carlos killed Mitrofan with a single shot," Starostin wrote in his letter.

Russian hunt organizers are not complete strangers to such tactics. Keen hunter and former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev had trouble with his aim in his later years. Some of the animals he liked to stalk were either tied to trees or plied with booze.

In a remote region of China, relatives shower graves with objects that supposedly make the deceased's afterlife more pleasant, and some families of dead bachelors even buy corpses of unmarried females and bury them with their sons in posthumous "weddings."
Ironically, according to a September New York Times dispatch from Chenjiayuan, since men outnumber women in the region (in part due to abortions of girl fetuses), families of these dead women are able to command high "dowries." [New York Times, 10-5-06]

Dutch transportation planner Hans Monderman has been pushing his innovative plans for improving traffic, and several towns in the Netherlands and Germany have already signed on, according to an August report by the German news organization Deutsche Welle.

His proposals include eliminating traffic signs and street markings, which he believes will force drivers to be careful as they hunt for their destinations, and building children's playgrounds in median strips of roads, figuring that drivers would surely slow down. [DW- World.de (Bonn, Germany), 8-27-06]

Man dies after explosion at party
October 23, 2006

NEW MILFORD, Conn. --Police were trying to determine who tossed a beer keg into an open fire at an outdoor party early Sunday, causing an explosion that sent shards of shrapnel slicing through a crowd of partygoers, killing one.

The explosion, which could be heard miles away, killed Sean M. Caselli, 22, of New Milford. Police say seven other people were taken to New Milford and Danbury hospitals.

Caselli, who lived with his family about a mile away from where the party was being held, died after being struck by a piece of flying metal in the neck, police said.

Sgt. Lee Grabner said investigators focused on taking measurements and gathering evidence. Interviews with witnesses to determine who threw the keg in the fire, and whether criminal charges would be filed, "is something we're going to start working on," Grabner said.

Witnesses told police they saw someone put what appeared to be a quarter-keg of beer into one of the burning barrels just after 3 a.m.

Seven people suffered non-life-threatening injuries, including burns and shrapnel wounds, police said.

Over 50 people attended the party, which was an annual event, neighbors said.

"This is a certain tragedy," said Police Chief Colin McCormack. "However, nothing I have been apprised of to this point in this investigation, which I caution is at the very early states, indicates a deliberate act on anyone's part.

Robert Greco, who lives in the area, went to the scene after hearing the explosion.

"It was an unbelievable explosion," Greco told the News-Times of Danbury. "It rattled the street."

coup in the UK:
Sheep sex immigrant caged

By ALASTAIR TAYLOR
November 03, 2006

COMMENT ON THIS STORY


AN asylum seeker had sex with a ewe as its "male partner" looked on, a court heard.

Factory worker Hidyat Amin — who came to Britain from Iraq — romped with the sheep in a farm shed.

The 30-year-old Kurd was trapped by DNA evidence after his underpants and socks were found at the scene.

Shocked farmer Frank Davidson said: "The ewe was not very well and not very happy." He told cops he feared "something funny" was going on involving his sheep and Shetland ponies.

A man had been seen acting suspiciously under a full moon and was spotted several times previously lurking in the farmyard.

On one occasion he casually smoked a cigarette before driving off, Hull Crown Court heard.

The sheep and a ram had been isolated as part of treatment for foot rot, at Mr Davidson's farm in Preston, East Yorks.

He said he had found pants and socks nearby on THREE occasions as well as bread crumbs — apparently used to entice the animals.

Amin was found guilty by a jury of having sex with an animal. Prosecutor Caroline Wigin said DNA swabs suggested a billion to one chance it was not him.


link  (http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2006510113,00.html)

Quote from: tater on 11-03-2006 -- 21:25:21
coup in the UK:

He was gone from the board for a while... hmmmmmmmmmmm

Oh GOD,  ACC just walked in!

The chosen professional interest of biologist David Scholnick of Pacific University (Forest Grove, Ore.) is in how shrimp act when they get an infection, which he gauged by building a tiny treadmill in order to run crustaceans through their paces to measure blood lactate levels.

"As far as I know," Scholnick told LiveScience.com in October, "this is the first time that shrimp have been exercised on a treadmill."

To increase the shrimps' stress, Scholnick designed tiny backpacks out of duct tape but still found that healthy shrimp could go for about an hour without fatigue. [MSNBC-LiveScience.com, 10-18-06]

Family Values: Republican U.S. Rep. Don Sherwood of Pennsylvania was trailing in his race for re-election, owing in large part to the lawsuit filed two years ago by his 29-year-old mistress, alleging that the supposedly happily married Sherwood beat and strangled her. (Sherwood settled the lawsuit and acknowledged the affair but denied any abuse.)

And Ohio Democrats had to scramble in September to find a replacement to run for a U.S. House seat after their original nominee, Stephanie Studebaker, was jailed along with her husband after the couple brawled at their home in Dayton. [ABC News-AP, 10-4-06] [WCPO-TV (Cincinnati), 8-15-06]

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A Delaware judge on Friday ordered a man who twice exposed himself to a 10-year-old girl at his workplace to wear a T-shirt with the words: "I am a registered sex offender" in bold letters, a prosecutor said.

Russell Teeter, 69, who pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent exposure, also was sentenced to 60 days in jail by Superior Court Judge Jan Jurden in Wilmington.

Deputy Attorney General Donald Roberts said he requested the unusual T-shirt punishment because he was concerned about Teeter exposing himself to children at the gardening business he runs with his wife.

"This is a unique way to let his customers know that he is a sex offender," Roberts told Reuters.



Roberts said Teeter had at least 10 prior convictions dating back to 1976 for exposing himself to children and had been diagnosed as a compulsive exhibitionist.

Teeter, who has 30 days to appeal the sentence, will have to wear the T-shirt at work for 22 months after he gets out of jail.

Teeter's attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.

SYDNEY, Australia - More than 200 Australian motorists have avoided parking and speeding fines by blaming either a dead man or an interstate resident for their errors in what police said Saturday may be a widespread fraud.

Under New South Wales state law, if a car owner signs a sworn statement that they were not driving the vehicle when an offense was committed, they can avoid paying speed camera fines, which arrive by mail, and parking tickets left under windshield wipers.

A recent government audit of the excuses given in those sworn statements revealed that 238 motorists had blamed one of two people — a dead man who had, when alive, lived in Sydney and a person living in neighboring South Australia state — Police Superintendent Daryl Donnolly said in a statement.

Some 80,000 Australian dollars ($61,000) of fines have been avoided this way in the past three years, Donnolly said.

He did not identify the scapegoats or explain why police had not uncovered the scam by pursuing the pair for the money owed.

Donnolly said 49 of those car owners have since been charged with swearing false statements and face up to five years' imprisonment. The others will be questioned as part of a police crackdown, he said.

"These offenses amount to fraud and, if proven, those involved could face stiff penalties," Donnolly told reporters.

LAKE WALES, Fla.  —  A man trying to save a dog being pulled into a stump grinder was caught in the machine and killed, authorities said.

Robert J. Wagner, 25, and his friend, John Santilli, of Port St. Lucie, were using the grinder while at a hunting camp in the River Ranch area about 9:40 a.m. Sunday, said Polk County sheriff's spokeswoman Donna Wood. Santilli's dog got entangled when the animal's leash got caught in the machine, Wood said.

Wagner tried to rescue the 6-month-old Weimaraner, but was pulled into the machine's blades. He died of lacerations and major head and body trauma, Wood said.

Deputies had to use four-wheel drive vehicles to get to the scene. Wagner and the dog were dead by the time authorities arrived.

EL CERRITO, Calif. -- A man was arrested on suspicion of carrying a concealed weapon after police found him outdoors -- naked -- and he told them he had a tool in his rectum, authorities said.

The man was lying on a tree stump, masturbating beside a nature path, near a Bay Area Rapid Transit station Thursday, police said.

John Sheehan, 33, of Pittsburg, was initially arrested on suspicion of indecent exposure. But when asked whether he was carrying anything police should know about, Sheehan mentioned the tool, said El Cerrito Detective Cpl. Don Horgan.

"You can't get much more concealed than that," Horgan said.

Officers drew their weapons and firefighters were called to the scene. Sheehan removed a 6-inch metal awl wrapped in black electrical tape without incident.

Sheehan, who was paroled from state prison last week, was then booked into jail on suspicion of parole violations, indecent exposure and one felony count of possessing a concealed weapon.

"When you're talking about an awl or an ice pick and you're dealing with somebody who's fresh out of prison, it's a weapon. That's a stabbing instrument," Horgan said.

It was not immediately clear what Sheehan was on parole for. A person answering the phone at the jail Friday night did not know whether Sheehan had a lawyer.

 A man is accused of having sex with the carcass of a deer that he found lying beside the road – but his lawyer denies that he committed bestiality, on the grounds that a dead deer isn't an animal any more.

20-year-old Bryan James Hathaway of Superior, Wisconsin allegedly had sex with the deer corpse after he found it on the roadside on October 11 this year. Authorities say he told police that he noticed the deer lying in a ditch, and then moved the corpse into the woods.

He is charged with 'sexual gratification with an animal' – but in a magnificent piece of legal footwork, his attorney argues that he can't be guilty of that crime, because a carcass isn't an animal, the Duluth News Tribune reports.

Public defender Fredric Anderson filed a motion last week which claimed: 'The statute does not prohibit one from having sex with a carcass.'

He said that if you try to include corpses in the category of 'animals', then 'you really go down a slippery slope with absurd results.' The only clear place to draw a line in the definition of what is an animal, and what isn't, was at the point of death, he argued.

He gave the example of a roast turkey – with which it would be illegal to have sex under the braoder interpretation of the law – claiming that it was unreasonable to suggest it should still be classified as an animal for the purposes of law.

In response, prosecutor James Broughner argued that a deer carcass is still an animal – pointing out that in his statement to police, Hathaway called the corpse a 'dead deer,' demonstrating that he still thought of it as an animal.

Judge Michael Lucci noted when hearing the arguments that: 'I'm a little surprised this issue hasn't been tackled before in another case.'

If Hathaway is convicted, he could serve up to two years in prison, because of a previous conviction in 2005 for shooting dead a horse called Bambrick. So that he could have sex with it.

Researchers at the University of Bradford in the UK said in October that bandages soaked in maggot secretions were successful in accelerating tissue repair.

In September, researchers at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, seeking to create a robot to traverse the colon but without tearing the colon's delicate walls, successfully tested one such tiny robot that can propel itself smoothly by gliding along mucus. [New Scientist, 10-9-06]

According to 2005 transcripts made public by The Wall Street Journal in September, a British Airways 747 flew its entire 10-hour-plus route from Los Angeles to Manchester, England, even though the pilot knew that one of its four engines had caught fire and burned up 30 seconds after take-off.

The pilot surprised the Los Angeles tower by radioing his decision to fly on "as far as we can" (after checking with BA headquarters, which might have been mindful that returning to Los Angeles would have meant dumping $30,000 worth of fuel and possibly incurring $275,000 in European Union fines for the delay).

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration initially proposed a fine for BA but recently closed its investigation. [Wall Street Journal, 9-23-06]

Even though protests grow against Wal-Mart for supposedly treating its employees badly, Kellie Guderian is not fazed.

In October, she and her husband won Iowa's $200 million Powerball lottery, but she cheerfully said she was keeping her job at the Fort Dodge Wal-Mart.

Guderian, said her husband, "loves her job, and the people she works with are like family." [Omaha World-Herald-AP, 10-4-06]

In September, health officials in Macerata, Italy, rescued a 57-year-old woman identified only as Carmela, after a brother reported he wouldn't be able to keep delivering food to her.

It turns out that Carmela had become fearful of influenza 26 years ago, had sealed the windows of her apartment, and had not ventured out the entire time except to collect the food her brother left at her door.

She weighed about 65 pounds and had hair 7 feet long, and workers required respirators to enter the home. [Reuters, 9-10-06]

  The City Council of Greenleaf, Idaho, passed an ordinance in November to require nearly all residents to keep a gun at home in case the town becomes overrun by people relocating after Gulf Coast storms.

Also in November, a report from the Missouri House's Special Committee on Immigration Reform blamed much of their state's acquiescence to illegal immigration on the fact that since Roe v. Wade in 1973, 80,000 potential Missourians have been aborted, thus helping to create job vacancies for aliens. [MSNBC-AP, 11-16-06] [Jefferson City News Tribune, 11-14-06]

At the county jail in Dubuque, Iowa, in November, Michael Kelley Jr., 29 and accused of attempted murder, was swapping stories with inmate Jamie Brimeyer, 34, when he asked about Brimeyer's facial scar.

As Brimeyer described being stabbed in the cheek by an unknown assailant in 2005, Kelley realized that he was the one who had stabbed him and recalled the incident so well that he corrected some of Brimeyer's recollections.

Brimeyer later reported Kelley, who is now also charged with assault with a dangerous weapon. [Des Moines Register, 11-6-06]

England's Liverpool Magistrates Court granted police a temporary "sexual offenses prevention order" in October against Akinwale Arobieke, 45, who had been jailed for pestering people with requests to feel their muscles.

Arobieke is prohibited from touching, feeling or measuring muscles or asking people to do squat exercises.

(2) In October, airline baggage courier Rodney Petersen, 30, pleaded guilty in Melbourne, Australia, to stealing hairs (head and pubic) from clothing or hairbrushes in women's luggage.

At his home, police found 80 plastic bags containing hairs, labeled with each owner's name. [The Guardian (London), 10-26-06] [Agence France-Presse, 10-20-06]

In November, a judge upheld a rule passed by a condominium association in Golden, Colo., prohibiting owners from smoking even inside their own units (in that neighbors had been complaining for five years that a couple's cigarette smoke had been seeping into their town houses).

A few days earlier, Belmont, Calif., became the first American city to ban smoking everywhere in the city limits, including condominiums and even cars (but not detached, single-family homes).

(A day before that, however, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted to instruct the police to treat marijuana-smoking as the city's lowest law-enforcement priority.) [WSB-TV (Atlanta)-AP, 11-17-06] [San Mateo Daily Journal, 11-15-06] [San Francisco Chronicle, 11-14-06]

The Powys County Council in Wales warned the maker of Welsh Dragon sausages in November that it must label its product better, such as by marking it "pork sausages" (so as not to mislead about the type of meat it contained).

And in October, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services sought to extend its abstinence education program (which currently gives grants to states for programs for teenagers), to start reaching unmarried people up to age 29. [The Times (London), 11-18-06] [USA Today, 10-31-06]

A 48-year-old woman died from a timber rattlesnake bite during services at the East London Holiness Church in London, Ky., in November.

The church features a monthly snake-handling service, during which people can prove they are true believers by not getting bitten.

In Shamokin, Pa., in October, Terry Jackson, 36, distraught for an undisclosed reason, kept police at bay in a suicidal standoff in which she wielded five poisonous snakes (from an aquarium in her home).

They bit her hand and face numerous times, leaving her bloody, until police subdued her with a Taser gun. She was hospitalized in critical condition but survived and will face charges for threatening police.

 In November, the upscale New York City menswear and accessories store Jack Spade removed from its holiday catalog a $40 frog-dissection kit (with a real carcass) after numerous queries from people wondering what in the world the store was thinking.

A holiday party for inmates at Britain's Peterborough Jail promised a fun time with Xbox and PlayStations, along with cash gifts of 5 pounds each (about US$9), which is greater than the value of the candy boxes the jail will give its guards for Christmas.

Police in Rock Hill, S.C., put a 12-year-old boy under arrest at the insistence of his mother after he had defied her and opened his Christmas gift three weeks early.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals overturned the cocaine-possession conviction of Timothy Stone in September, ruling that a search of his person was unconstitutional even though he had given police permission.

The judges agreed with Stone that when he consented, he never expected that the search would include the officers holding out the waistband of his sweatpants and shining a flashlight on his genitals (which is where he happened to be hiding a small container of cocaine).

The "Berkeley Pit" in Butte, Mont., is the nation's largest environmental-disaster site, with 40 billion gallons of highly toxic copper-mine waste that the federal government has long feared too expensive to clean up.

However, Montana Tech researchers, writing in the Journal of Organic Chemistry in July, have found more than 160 types of "extremophiles" (organisms that thrive in toxicity) in the pit and have demonstrated that some are effective against lung and ovarian cancers.

Kimberly Baker, 22, sought child support in Warrensburg, Va., in October from the father of her daughter.

However, when officials realized that the father, now 16, would have been 13 when the child was conceived, that made him a rape victim under state law, and thus, they arrested Baker

Ricardo Meana, 81, was charged with attempted murder in November in Sun City, Fla., when his 82-year-old wife, who has Alzheimer's, was found inside a van in a store's parking lot struggling with the plastic bag over her head.

Police were called, but Meana seemed unconcerned and even nonchalantly resumed shopping, saying that he often put the bags on when his wife felt sick, so that she would not vomit on herself.

With dozens of puzzled beachcombers witnessing, a cow marched into the surf off the coast of Queensland in Australia in November and swam out as far as 300 yards for four hours (returning to shore twice but venturing out again) before drowning from swallowing water.

In October in Vancouver, Wash., a Doberman pinscher named Victoria jumped on an electric stove and accidentally nudged a switch that started a fire in her apartment, resulting in about $100,000 damage.
It was the second time this year that Victoria had jumped on the stove and started a fire, but the first one did much less damage.

In yet another case of a person practicing what is allegedly acceptable in another country but illegal in the United States, a 28-year-old woman from Cambodia was arrested in Las Vegas, Nev., in October for kissing her 6-year-old son's penis, which she said was simply an expression of motherly love.
An official in California's Cambodian Association of America confirmed the custom to the Las Vegas Review-Journal but said it never extends past age 2.

Noel Methot, 24, was cited for inattentive driving after her car wound up half-submerged in a pond near downtown Orlando, Fla., in November.

She was driving down a street but apparently missed the signs warning of the end of the road, and according to witnesses, the most likely reason for that was that she was arguing loudly with her boyfriend over her cell phone.

The car went airborne about 20 or 30 feet before splashdown, but Methot was not seriously hurt. [WFTV (Orlando), 11-2-06]

Pleading guilty to manslaughter in Pierre, S.D., in August was Mr. Austin First In Trouble, 19.

And in Providence, R.I., in November, the teenager sentenced to life in prison for murder (where his life might rot away) is Mr. Phearin Rot.

On the brighter side, a linebacker for South Sumter High School in Bushnell, Fla., had a good year: Yourhighness Morgan (whose brother Handsome Morgan and cousin Gorgeous Morgan were undoubtedly proud of him). [Sioux Falls Argus Leader-AP, 8-24-06] [Providence Journal, 11-7-06] [Orlando Sentinel, 8-18-06]

In 2002, Jeffrey Klein and Brett Birdwell, both 17 at the time, trespassed onto a railroad yard in Lancaster, Pa., and climbed atop a boxcar to see what the view was like, but were severely burned by a 12,500-volt line on the roof and thus sued Amtrak and Norfolk Southern railroads for not having done enough to prevent them from trespassing. In October, a federal jury awarded the two men a total of about $12 million in compensatory damages plus $12 million in punitive damages.

After shooting video undercover in 10 Army recruiting offices in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, ABC News released in November an episode of recruiters telling a prospect that no one is going to Iraq anymore.

"No, we're bringing people back," he said, and his partner followed with, "We're not at war. War ended a long time ago."

In a separate on-camera interview, Col. Robert Manning, who is in charge of Army recruiting in the Northeast, generously told ABC News that he disagreed with the recruiters. "We are a nation and Army at war still." [AOL.com-ABC News, 11-4-06]

Man sold step-daughter's pet for beer
From correspondents in Berlin
December 29, 2006

A THIRSTY German sold his 6-year-old step-daughter's pet beagle to the owner of a bar to pay for beer, the Bild newspaper reported today.

The unemployed man offered to take the dog for a walk and then stopped at a bar where he convinced the owner to buy the 3-year-old dog for 40 euros ($66.75).

The man spent the proceeds quenching his thirst for beer. The bar owner has now returned the dog to its owner.

Nick Fennelly, 31, was rushing his in-labor girlfriend, Sharon Taylor, into the parking lot at Calderdale Royal Hospital in West Yorkshire, England, just as their baby's head started to appear, and, in a corridor inside, little Ashleigh shot out of her mother so quickly that Fennelly couldn't grab her in time.

She hit the floor, skidded, and then came back on the umbilical cord, according to a December report in the Halifax Courier. Except for a bruise, Ashleigh is fine. [Halifax Courier, 12-15-06]

New York City has more than 400 soup kitchens but nothing else like the Broadway Presbyterian Church's, where master chef Michael Ennes presides three days a week, turning leftover restaurant ingredients into gourmet meals.

In fact, one pre-Christmas meal included octopus, as well as day-old bread from Le Bernardin restaurant.

Ennes told London's Independent that he is motivated by the chance to help troubled people get "real nutrition," but he also likes serving "famous" homeless people, such as diners who claim to be, among others, George Bush, George Washington and Jesus Christ. [The Independent (London), 12-21-06]

Buddy, a 6-year-old German shepherd mix, wandered into the emergency room at the Kaiser Permanente Hospital in Bellflower, Calif., in October after having just been hit by a car, and he resisted efforts to remove him, apparently waiting until someone attended to his injured hind leg (which turned out to be broken), according to local animal control officials interviewed by the Whittier Daily News. Owner Fabian Ortega was called (by virtue of Buddy's implanted microchip), and a vet fixed him up. [KNBC-TV (Los Angeles), 10-5-06

In October, in front of other people, town manager Bonilyn Wilbanks-Free of the upscale village of Golden Beach, Fla., referred casually to her black female assistant as "Mammy" (which is not her name) and then, when the assistant took offense, tried to soften the gaffe by telling her how much she "loved Aunt Jemima."

(A subsequent investigation suggested that someone besides Wilbanks-Free might have made the latter comment, but Wilbanks-Free nonetheless resigned in December.) [Miami Herald, 11-24-06]

Condoms are proving such an attractive target for shoplifters, according to Phoenix's Arizona Republic, that some stores are putting them in locked display cases that require a customer to call a clerk for help.

However, as an official of the Arizona Public Health Association pointed out, condoms are a purchase that consumers choose to make in low profile.

A spokesperson for a condom maker mentioned a recent incident in a CVS pharmacy in which a clerk, assisting a customer, shouted several times, "Who's got the key to the condoms?" [Arizona Republic, 12-20-06]

Many voters, and critics in both parties, chided the "do-nothing" 109th Congress (2005-2006) as a body tied up in partisanship and divisiveness.

However, the Congress did manage to pass 383 pieces of legislation, except that almost 100 of those laws were merely authorizations to name post offices and other federal structures after famous Americans (such as Ray Charles, Ava Gardner and Karl Malden). [CNN, 12-13-06]

The Texas Ethics Commission ruled in November that a public official in the Lone Star state, receiving money as a gift such as from a lobbyist, need disclose only that he received "a check" or "currency" and need not reveal the actual amount of money.

Said the district attorney in Austin, who was outraged by the ruling, it is now "perfectly legal to report the gift of 'a wheelbarrow' without reporting that the wheelbarrow was filled with cash." [San Antonio Express-News, 11-27-06]

 0ne trick that zookeepers have used to get male pandas interested in mating with dowdier females (according to a December dispatch from Sichuan, China, in Australia's The Age) is to let an attractive female roam around a pen, leaving her scent, and then, in darkness, with the male in the pen and frisky at the scent, to introduce the less attractive female into the pen, back-end first, so that the pre-excited male will quickly begin copulating.

Said zookeeper Zhang Hemin, "When the males find out (that they've just mated with unintended partners), they get very angry and start fighting the female. We have had to use firecrackers and a water hose to separate them." [The Age (Melbourne), 12-17-06]

Baggy Pants Trip Up Robbery Suspect

Jan 25 5:11 PM US/Eastern

   
         




COVINGTON, La. (AP) -- Police said they caught a 16-year-old robbery suspect who had eluded authorities on several previous occasions when his baggy pants fell down, causing him to stumble as officers chased him.
"We literally caught him with his pants down," Lt. Jack West of Covington police said.

Suspected of robbing a man at gunpoint and stealing another man's car after beating him with a brick, the teenager had run away from police several times in recent weeks, West said.

An officer spotted the teen standing on a street corner Monday, called in for two backup officers, then tried to make an arrest.

"They all converged on him from different directions," West said. "He started to run, but his low-riding pants fell down and he stumbled to his knees."

The suspect, whose name was not released because he is a juvenile, was booked on warrants for armed robbery, carjacking, two counts of aggravated battery and being a child in need of supervision.

Man With Mannequin Fetish Sent to Prison

Jan 25 4:22 PM US/Eastern

   
         




PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) -- A man who acknowledged a sexual fetish for female-shaped mannequins was sentenced Thursday to more than a year in prison after repeatedly breaking into storefront windows.
Ronald Dotson, 39, of Detroit, was sentenced to 18 months to 30 years on charges of breaking and entering and being a habitual criminal.

He was arrested in October after police in the Detroit suburb of Royal Oak spotted him near a smashed storefront window containing a mannequin wearing a French maid outfit.

The arrest came less than a week after he had been paroled for his sixth breaking-and-entering conviction in 13 years.

Some of the previous cases also involved mannequins. Police once found him in an alley behind a women's clothing store with three mannequins dressed in lingerie.

"I've never been able to take care of myself," Dotson told Judge Denise Langford Morris at sentencing.

Morris acknowledged that Dotson had never assaulted a person but said his behavior "strikes fear in the community."

ANTWERP, Belgium (Reuters) - Mozart, an iguana with an erection that has lasted for over a week, will have his penis amputated in the next couple of days.

Veterinarians at Antwerp's Aquatopia had sought to treat the animal's problem, but decided removal was the only solution because of the risk of infection. The good news for Mozart and his mates is that male iguanas have two penises.

Mozart, sitting on the shoulders of his keeper as camera crews focused on his red, swollen erection, seemed unperturbed by the news.

"It doesn't bother him. He doesn't know what amputation means," said vet Luc Lambrecht, adding that Mozart's sexual activity should be undimmed by the operation.



"I don't think so. That's all in his head."

Sudan Provost, 40, walked into the River City Bank in Sacramento, Calif., on Dec. 29 and, reported the Sacramento Bee, quietly announced to employees that he had come to "rob" it, but then handed a teller his driver's license and a money order to be cashed.

The teller asked if he had an account, and Provost replied, "This is not a joke. I have a gun. I do this for a living."

However, he opened his bag to reveal that he had no gun and then asked for a tissue for his runny nose.

The teller said she didn't have one. Provost said he'd be right back and walked across the street to a drugstore, and by the time he had returned, police were on the scene.

Provost was arrested on suspicion of attempted robbery. [Sacramento Bee, 12-30-06]

The recent traditional Christmas Nativity play at St. Stephen's church in Tonbridge, England, centered on music from the Beach Boys, with Mary turning into a "surfer girl" to sing "God Only Knows" and the Three Wise Men portrayed as Brian, Carl and Dennis Wilson performing such favorites as "Fun Fun Fun" and "Good Vibrations" (according to a December Agence France-Presse report). Said the pastor, "(N)ativity plays ... can just be a bit dull. (This) made it more realistic." [Agence France-Presse, 12-22-06]

(1) A bill passed in November by the Michigan House of Representatives makes it a crime for a cohabiting boyfriend to pressure his pregnant girlfriend into having an abortion, including by simply moving out of the house.

(2) The Michigan Court of Appeals, ruling in November, said an obscure but unambiguous state law makes any "sexual penetration" a serious sexual assault if it occurs during any other felony, including simple adultery, with a maximum penalty of life in prison. [Detroit News, 11-30-06] [Detroit Free Press, 1-15-07]

James Lane III, 27, was arrested in Carrboro, N.C., in January after police chased him, in his car and later on foot.

Officers tackled Lane about 20 feet into a wooded area and recovered a white plastic bag containing a pound of marijuana.

When police pulled Lane to his feet, he said that someone must have left the bag on the ground at precisely the spot in the woods where Lane fell, because he had never seen it before. [Chapel Hill News, 1-10-07]

Neil Rodreick II, 29, shaved his body and posed as a 12-year-old boy, and then allegedly had sex with Lonnie Stiffler, 61, and Robert Snow, 43, in Chino Valley, Ariz., before all three were arrested in January (as the result of Stiffler's attempt to enroll Rodreick in a charter school as a boy).

The two men were said to have been quite upset when police told them Rodreick was not 12 years old.

After Emmalee Bauer, 25, was fired by the Sheraton hotel company in late 2006, she sought unemployment compensation from the Iowa agency that offers benefits to employees terminated through no fault of their own.

However, the judge noted that Bauer had written a 300-page journal, during office hours, chronicling her efforts to avoid work.

Among her entries: "This typing thing seems to be doing the trick. It just looks like I am hard at work on something very important," and, "Once lunch is over, I will come right back to writing to piddle away the rest of the afternoon," and, "Accomplishment is overrated, anyway." (Her claim was denied.) [Des Moines Register, 1-18-07]

Theatre ruling gives Dutch peep shows a tax break
02/13//2007 - 11:14:02

An Amsterdam judge has ruled that peep shows – where sex workers performing strip shows and explicit acts can be watched from booths – are a form of theatre and club owners are entitled to a hefty tax break.

"Admitting customers to peep shows is equivalent to admitting them to a theatre performance," an Amsterdam Appeals Court judge wrote in a ruling published today. "The erotic character of the performance does not diminish that."

The national daily De Telegraaf reported that the owner of the peep show, who was not identified, will receive thousands of euros back from the tax service as a result of the ruling.

"Working in a peep show is very labour intensive, so it's great if you have to pay less tax," Andre van Dorst of an association of Dutch sex club owners told De Telegraaf.

"A judge has ruled for the first time that peep shows are also art forms," he added. "Great. It's the end of years of discussion."

Denver International Airport was reputed to be an "all-weather" facility that would operate seamlessly in a blizzard, but when it failed during the January snowstorms (closed for 45 hours), an embarrassed airport spokesman, Chuck Cannon, admitted he'd like "to choke the person who came up with (the 'all-weather') term." The Associated Press then discovered a 1992 interview with Chuck Cannon, bragging to reporters about his new "all-weather" airport. [Rocky Mountain News, 12-28-06]

Tennessee's death-row-execution procedures came under attack in February when critics realized they were a hodgepodge of lethal-injection rules intermingled with old electric-chair protocol. (Lethal injection thus now requires shaving an inmate's head and having a fire extinguisher ready.)

Also in February, at a hearing investigating Florida's botched December execution of Angel Diaz, a special commission concluded that the executioner should have re-checked whether the IV line was in the vein, instead of (as he did) merely continuing to push the resisting chemicals into the arm. (The only formal qualification to be appointed a Florida executioner is to be at least 18 years old.) [CNN-AP, 2-9-07] [St.Petersburg Times, 2-13-07; Tampa Tribune, 2-14-07]

Michael J. DeWitt, 39, was arrested for DUI in Fort Wayne, Ind., in February after he drove erratically into the parking lot of an Indiana State Police station early in the morning and told officers that he was there "to get a room." (A Holiday Inn was next door.) (Police later said they matched DeWitt's Hummer to the vehicle that minutes earlier had collided with a car nearby and left the scene.)

A 47-year-old registered sex offender died of a heart attack in Palm Beach County, Fla., in January; his body was found, nude, in front of his home computer on which he had been viewing pornography.

Another 47-year-old man was killed late at night, in February in Belle River, Ontario, when his snowmobile collided with a tree stump embedded in Lake St. Clair. The man had been waging a notorious, three-year campaign to have the stump removed from the lake because of the danger it posed to nighttime snowmobilers.

William Davis filed a $1.5 million lawsuit against the Murfreesboro, Tenn., police in December because, when they raided his home after complaints from neighbors, they seized and destroyed the 114 dead cats and one dead dog that Davis kept in freezers and which he said had "emotional value" for him.

In addition, according to the petition filed in Chancery Court for Rutherford County (and uncovered by TheSmokingGun.com), the carcasses were potential business property, in that he was planning to start his own pet cemetery, and also one of the cats, he claimed, was destined for the Guinness Book of World Records because it had been so large at birth. [TheSmokingGun.com, 1-5-07]

George Dalmas III, 48, a 20-year, mid-level CIA employee, pleaded guilty in Fairfax, Va., in December to breaking into 10 homes and stealing many items of expensive jewelry, plus 1,074 pairs of women's underpants, all of which Dalmas carefully maintained, in that, said the prosecutor, he was most of all a pack rat. [WPXI-TV (Pittsburgh)-AP, 12-1-06]

Joshlynn Leigh, 30, was arrested in December at a Pennsylvania state police barracks as she arrived for fingerprinting in preparation for being hired by the agency. Leigh was discovered to have driven to the barracks in a stolen car (the same one that was the subject of a warrant against her in Georgia for auto theft). [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 12-27-06]

The West Tennessee Detention Facility (Mason, Tenn.) made a video pitch for California inmates, hoping some would volunteer to be outsourced under that state's program to relieve overcrowding.

The hard-timers should come east, the video urged, because of West Tennessee's "larger and cleaner jail cells, 79 TV channels, including ESPN, views of peaceful cow pastures, and ... the 'Dorm of the Week,' (with its inmates) staying up all night, watching a movie and eating cheeseburgers or pizza," according to a March description in Nashville's Tennessean. "You're not a number here," said one inmate.

"You come here, it's personalized." (California's outsourcing program is facing a lawsuit from the prison guards' union, anxious about job loss.) [The Tennessean, 3-6-07]

Walter C. Stevens, 81, thought he had buried his allegedly disreputable past, but an underground water problem at his former residence in Sierra Vista, Ariz., brought it back.

When an area in the yard flooded, a plastic bag emerged, containing videotapes that the FBI now says Stevens had made in the 1970s and 1980s of himself having sex with underage girls in Japan, South Korea and Thailand. [Arizona Republic, 2-21-07]

According to a Beijing Youth Daily report distributed by Reuters news service in February, an unidentified Chinese businessman posted an online job offer for a "substitute" mistress.

That is, in order to save his marriage, he had agreed to allow his wife to beat up his mistress and thus needed a stand-in to absorb the whipping, to spare the real mistress.

He offered the equivalent of about $400 per 10 minutes of pain. [Reuters, 2-26-07]

In Omaha, Neb., in February, Kevin Oliver, 36, was convicted of criminal impersonation for tricking two women into giving him urine samples by convincing them, falsely, that he was a recruiter for T-Mobile and needed the samples to complete their employment applications. [MSNBC-AP, 2-1-07]

The New York City children's services agency took away former "breatharian" David Jubb's 20-month-old son in February after Jubb refused to let physicians treat the boy's fractured ankle.

Breatharians believe that humans can subsist primarily on air and sunlight.

Jubb said he has evolved since those days and now eats, but extremely few calories' worth, and he drinks his own urine.

He acknowledged that his child's diet is absent the generally recommended nutritional building blocks for infants, according to a New York Post report. [New York Post, 2-5-07]

Super-charismatic Stacy Finley, 34, pleaded guilty in January in Shreveport, La., to defrauding 22 middle-class victims by somehow convincing them to pay a total of $989,000 to have medical scans done of their bodies by overhead satellite and to be administered secret therapeutic drugs while they slept, by CIA agents who would sneak into their homes. [KTBS-TV (Shreveport), 1-19-07]

A 17-year-old was arrested in January in Sheboygan, Wis., and charged with stealing a snowmobile from the Sheboygan Yamaha lot.
However, the next morning, even before the dealer realized the vehicle was missing, the boy had brought it in for service. [Sheboygan Press, 1-30-07]

Following a three-year investigation by federal and local authorities in Orange County, Calif., the owners of at least 10 massage parlors were arrested in March and accused of running prostitution establishments.

Among the investigators' findings was that, to reduce the cost of supplying condoms, the salons urged customers to use plastic food wrap, which management bought in large quantities.

Said District Attorney Tom Rackauckas, "I really don't think about (plastic food wrap) in the same way anymore." [Los Angeles Times, 3-22-07]

The Scandia Family Fun Center, which operates a super thrill ride (168 feet high, spinning at 60 miles an hour, pulling 3.5 g's) called the Screamer, in Sacramento, Calif., decided in March that because of neighborhood residents' noise complaints, riders would be prohibited from screaming (and subject to ejection from the park). [KOVR-TV (Sacramento), 3-31-07]

South Carolina Highway Patrol officers arrested Howard Fisher, 54, in March and seized 43 pounds of marijuana from his car, after he for some reason was unable to avoid crashing into one of their cruisers, with which they had blocked two lanes of Interstate 95 while investigating accidents. [Orangeburg (S.C.) Times & Democrat-AP, 3-6-07]

Arrested recently and awaiting trial for murder: Gary Wayne Ray Jr. (Oklahoma City, February); Larry Wayne Brigman (St. Paul, Minn., charged in February for a 1989 murder, but already in prison for a different murder); Lewis Wayne Fielder Jr. (Laurens, S.C., February); Robert Wayne Wyant (Charlottesville, Va., February). Confessed to murder: Timothy Wayne Shepherd (Houston, March). Sentenced for murder: Jimmy Wayne Bass (Mobile, Ala., February, life in prison for DUI homicide). Re-captured after a brief escape: convicted murderer Michael Wayne Brunner



Have you noticed anything?   :?

So many U.S. executives want to visit India to make deals to outsource their companies' jobs that in March, India's Washington, D.C., embassy said it was forced to outsource the job of processing the executives' visa applications. [United Press International, 3-3-07]

Yet another U.S. job was outsourced to India in May, that of "local government reporter" covering city hall politicians in Pasadena, Calif.

The publisher of the Web site PasadenaNow.com said the local beat could be handled very well from India, through telephone interviews and by watching live city council telecasts on the Internet. [Canoe.ca-AP, 5-10-07]

In lawsuit-friendly Madison County, Ill. (termed "the promised land" by some trial lawyers), a judge awarded $311,700 to Amanda Verett for a long series of painful injuries that her courtroom-veteran chiropractor has been treating.

Verett said she was holding a door open at a Pizza Hut when an employee yanked it open farther, and calamitous shoulder, arm and hand injuries resulted. [Madison Record, 5-16-07]

In January, Joshua Vannoy, 18, filed a lawsuit against the Big Beaver Falls School District near Pittsburgh for the disruption to his high school years when he and his family were forced to moved to another school district because Joshua was being too harshly taunted.

His troubles stemmed from an incident a year earlier, just before a Denver-Pittsburgh playoff football game when Joshua chose to wear a Broncos jersey to class and was then forced by one teacher to sit on the floor and endure paper wads being thrown at him because he was, according to the teacher, a "stinking Denver fan." [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 1-17-07]

"Hey! Pick Up That Wrapper!":

Great Britain is now famously saturated with surveillance cameras monitoring public spaces (4.2 million of them), creating alarming privacy concerns.

On top of that, in April, after a pilot project in Middlesbrough, the government announced it will attach loudspeakers to the cameras in 20 districts so that officials who monitor the video can actually scold citizens who are spotted engaging in "antisocial" behavior. [Agence France-Presse, 4-4-07]

Try to Read This Without Wincing:

A cable broke on a leg extension machine at a YWCA facility in Akron, Ohio, in 2004, catapulting a steel bar forcefully at a 22-year-old football player working out for a shot at a college scholarship, hitting him squarely between his parted legs, whacking his left testicle.

Three years later, he still walks gingerly and bow-legged because the slightest contact is painful (although he did manage to father a child in the interim).

In April 2007, a jury awarded him $786,000 after hearing that the machine had been in disrepair. [Akron Beacon Journal, 4-11-07]

Claude White, 34, was arrested in April in Elizabethton, Tenn., and charged with stealing a forklift, which sheriff's deputies later found overturned in the middle of a road, but with a pair of shoes and socks trapped underneath.

Around the same time, a call came from Sycamore Shoals Hospital about a patient (White) telling an odd story of how he had suffered a foot-mangling (but not mentioning a forklift).

By that time, however, deputies had found an exact match for the patient's missing toe, inside the sock that was inside the shoe that was underneath the forklift. [WSMV-TV (Nashville), 4-3-07]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=509713&in_page_id=1770

Noxious Substances: State and federal authorities descended on Quality Pork Processors of Austin, Minn., in December after 11 workers contracted a mysterious neurological illness, which apparently came from inhaling the mist that results from blowing hogs' brains out with compressed air. [Tampa Tribune-AP, 12-8-07]

Quote from: docbyers on 09-18-2006 -- 10:56:35
10cm (4") may not have been enough.  It's no wonder the wife rejected the transplant!

Actually I am thinking just the opposite. I hear that asian men are not well endowed maybe it was too much for his wife?

Quote from: PMEL_DEVIL-DOG on 10-11-2006 -- 11:35:23

Quote from: docbyers on 10-09-2006 -- 14:03:13
Marine Takes Bids on New Name

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. (AP) - Hoping to raise money for his family and an orphanage, a 29-year-old Marine is running an online auction in which the winning bidder will get to give him a new name - and he promises to make it legally binding.

"I've always thought about different cool inventions and neat ideas like this," said Sgt. Cody Baker, an Alabama native who was most recently stationed in Japan but is transferring to Camp Lejeune this month. "It's just the way my mind works. Most of them are off the wall like this. They just sound ridiculous."

The bidding at Baker's Web site, , began July 20, with a $5 offer to name him Mr. Clean.http://www.choosemyname.com

Later bids supporting such names as George Bailey of Bedford Falls and Mr. Right gave way to a $26,333.31 offer from an online coffee vendor that wants the name tape on Baker's uniform to display its slogan, "Finest Freshest Fastest."

"It will be my name, legally on paper," he said. "I guess everything that comes with the name Cody Baker will transform into whatever my name becomes."

Baker said the money will help support his wife and infant son while he goes to college after leaving the Marine Corps in a year and a half.

Some of the proceeds will also go to Im Jai House, an orphanage in Thailand that Baker has supported during his six-year career in uniform.

"Whatever his name is, we'll put him to work doing what the Marine Corps does best: accomplishing missions," said Lt. Philip Klay, a spokesman for Baker's future unit at Camp Lejeune.

Unbelievible... :-(

SEMPER FI FRESH COFFEE GUY!!!!