Legal Juice

I think it's fair to say that virtually every kid on earth is told not to play with fire. Many kids ignore it, and manage to escape unscathed. Such was not the case for an 11-year-old boy in Sweden. He was 9 on that fateful day. Per The Local (Sweden):

An 11-year-old boy has been ordered to pay 1.9 million kronor (US $276,000) in damages after causing smoke and water damage to a Stockholm home, the Aftonbladet newspaper writes.

The boy, who was nine at the time, was visiting another family in the suburb in southern Stockholm when he got hold of a cigarette lighter and proceeded to set light to some paper in a wardrobe with devastating consequences.

The insurance company agreed to meet the costs incurred by the family for the damages to their home - 1.9 million kronor - and then proceeded to sue the boy in court.

The court has now ruled that the boy is responsible for his actions - the debt can not be claimed from the other members of his family.

"According to Swedish law children can be liable for damages to the same extent as adults," said Mårten Schultz, an expert in liability law, told the newspaper. "The debt is the child's, it is the boy that has to pay up," he confirmed.

I would imagine that 911 operators get a lot of strange calls. Still, I'll bet they don't get calls like this too often. As reported by the St. Petersburg Times:

Joshua Basso said his cell phone ran out of minutes Wednesday, so he called the one number that he knew is always free — 911 — with an unusual request.

He wanted someone to have sex with him.

When 911 operators hung up on him, he called back four times, police said.

Fifteen minutes after his last call, police arrested Basso at his home, at 4202 N Nebraska Ave., on charges of making a false 911 call. He was taken to the Hillsborough County Jail, where he remains without bail.

Basso has been arrested a dozen times in Hillsborough on charges including grand theft of a motor vehicle, violation of probation, domestic violence battery, possession of marijuana, trespassing and burglary, jail records show.

Did you know that eight is a very lucky number in China. Know why? Per the BBC:

The number eight is considered auspicious in China because it sounds similar to the word for "to make money".

A Beijing court has jailed and fined five men for fighting over a "lucky" licence plate containing the auspicious number 8888, Chinese media report.

The men used knives and clubs to beat anyone who came near a machine issuing the number plates at a Beijing vehicle registration centre, Beijing News said.

The incident occurred in July last year as number plates ending with the numbers "8888" were about to be issued, the reports said.

Several people were injured, one of them seriously, it added.

Three men were sentenced to one year in jail. All were ordered to pay $8,000 (£5,000) to compensate the victims.

The ringleader, identified only as Xu, had paid four accomplices 10,000 yuan ($1,500) to guard the machine.

OMG, that is a sausage in your pants! A bunch of them, as it turns out. Per The Cairns Post:

A man has been caught stuffing sausages down his pants in a bizarre alleged theft at an Innisfail supermarket.

The 38-year-old Innisfail man was charged with stealing after he was seen leaving IGA Innisfail about 6.15pm on Friday.

Police allege he had items of meat concealed in his shorts and several other items in his pockets.

The items were not returned to sale ...

It's strange enough that the dude stole a ferret, but even stranger how he got it out of the pet store. By putting it down his pants! Per The Florida Times-Union:

A Jacksonville Beach police arrest report said a 17-year-old saw a man take a ferret from the pet store, stuff it down the front of his pants and walk out of the store. The teen alerted store clerks to the theft, then followed the man to a nearby parking lot on First Avenue North.

The teen tried to retrieve the ferret from the shoplifter, but the man punched him and they both fell to the ground. As they tussled on the ground, the man shoved the ferret in the teen's face and squeezed it.

The ferret, a small domesticated type of weasel, lunged at the teen and bit him, leaving two puncture holes in his ear, the arrest report says. The ferret was not injured.

... Rodney Bolton, was arrested ... and charged with stealing the $129 ferret from the Pet Supermarket at 609 Beach Blvd. in Jacksonville Beach. He was also charged with battery with a "special weapon," police said.

I'm all for a dad spending as much time as possible with his son. I guess I need to qualify that a bit. That time should not include committing burglary together, while intoxicated! Doh! Check out this story, as reported by whnt.com:

A father and son are in the DeKalb County Jail, facing burglary and other charges. Authorities say one of them fell asleep on the botched job.

According to reports, 37-year-old Christopher Wright and his son, 19-year-old Caleb Wright, broke into a woman's home in the Cartersville community overnight Sunday. Authorities say the two were apparently intoxicated and stole several items from the home.

The sheriff's office reports the men decided to hide when the woman woke up. The woman found the younger Wright, Caleb, passed out beneath the bed of her invalid husband.

She called police and a neighbor. It turns out the neighbor was Caleb Wright's grandfather.

Authorities say the grandfather removed his grandson from the home and later turned him over to officers. The father, Christopher Wright, was also later taken into custody.

A North Queensland man, aged 21, has stunned police by proving impervious to a Taser deployment and casually removing the barbs - not once but three times.

Octavian Borges casually removed the barbs fired into his upper body by police during a tense situation at Townsville on Monday.

He was Tasered again twice, but on both occasions only one barb made contact and the weapon could not make a circuit.

The incredible situation developed after Borges allegedly stole a car from a Garbutt address early Monday morning.

He was chased by the vehicle's owner until he became bogged at Rowes Bay.

A brutal roadside fistfight then broke out sparking a flood of Triple 0 calls to police from passers-by.

When a crew arrived, a bleeding Borges ran off towards an RSL retirement village where he is alleged to have broken into an elderly lady's apartment.

As officers entered the unit Borges was alleged to be rifling through a cutlery drawer and removed an item placing it under his shirt.

When he approached officers in a threatening matter and refused to drop the object a Taser was presented.

He failed to comply so the weapon was deployed with the barbs hitting him in the shoulder and rib area.

Incredibly, the Taser appeared to have no effect on him and he removed the barbs, taunting police with “is that the best you’ve got?”

He then ran off out of the apartment with stunned police following close behind.

He was approached and Tasered a second time, but only one of the barbs made contact – which he again pulled out.

A third deployment was also unsuccessful and Borges allegedly pulled out a torch he was hiding under his shirt.

When police realised he was not armed with a knife, they approached him and after a short struggle were able to physically restrain him.

He was taken to Townsville Hospital for treatment for a drug-related condition and the injuries he suffered in the roadside fight.

Police said the Tasers involved in the incident had been sent to Brisbane for testing to ensure they were functioning properly.

Borges was charged with enter with intent, unlawful use of a motor vehicle and multiple counts of obstructing police and appeared in Townsville Magistrates Court on Tuesday.

He was remanded in custody until his next hearing on Monday.

With an estimated 200 million-plus guns in the United States, it's a good thing most folks aren't this crazy about politics. As reported in The South Asian Post:

Hyderabad, India - A die-hard fan of actor-turned-politician Chiranjeevi killed his father for not casting his vote for the superstar’s newly formed Praja Rajyam Party. The incident took place in Visakhapatnam district in coastal Andhra after the first phase of the ongoing Indian general elections. Rajubabu is said to be an ardent fan of superstar Chiranjeevi since his childhood, but his father was a supporter of legendary actor N.T. Rama Rao and the Telugu Desam Party he founded. In Andhra Pradesh, especially in the coastal region, popular Telugu actors enjoy the status of demi-gods. The fan following of superstars like the late N.T. Rama Rao and Chiranjeevi borders on madness.

The Route 66 Kitchen in Toledo is apparently the place to be ... if you like out-of-control gunfights. Check out the security video below. Incredibly with all those people shooting at each other (police believe at least 20 shots were fired), nobody was hurt! You can read more (a lot) in the Toledo Blade article.

Yes, April S. Uwanawich (am I the only one who reads this name and thinks "You Want A Witch?"), was born on 7/7/77. And she is a fortune-teller in Pennsylvania. Just one small problem - it's against the law. As reported in The Pottstown Mercury:

A person is guilty of the charge if they "tell fortunes or predict future events … pretend to effect any purpose by spells, charms, necromancy or incantation, or advise the taking or administering of what are commonly called love powders or potions," reads the statute.

Persons violate the law if they "stop bad luck," "give good luck," "win the affection of a person," or "tell where to dig for treasure," in return for "gain or lucre."

According to court records and Uwanawich's statement in court to Judge Anthony Sarcione, a woman named Yun Su of Bridgewater, N.J., met her at the "psychic reading" storefront she had operated in Downingtown. There, Su told her that she had been unlucky in love and wanted to find happiness.

Between February and August 2008, the two met many times. Uwanawich said they would go out to dinner or the movies and shop together.

At some point, Uwanawich told Su that she was cursed and that she would have to take deliberate steps to have that cloud lifted from around her. Specifically, she was to put a box under her bed and put coins and cash into the box on a daily basis. Then, after several weeks, Uwanawich went to Su's home and took the box, which she said she needed to "burn the curse," according to the criminal complaint filed by Downingtown Detective Pamela Fentner.

Su turned over the box, which contained $16,320.

But the disposal of the box did not make any changes in Su's life, and she pressed Uwanawich for more help.

This time, Uwanawich told Su that she should buy urns for $7,000 apiece to help lift the curse. Su bought one, and then ran out of money.

According to [Uwanawich's attorney], when Su confronted Uwanawich with her displeasure of the situation, Uwanawich offered to pay the money back. She turned over about half of the $23,320, but then Su went to police and Uwanawich was charged [with fortune-telling, theft by extortion, theft by deception, and receiving stolen property] on Aug. 4, 2008.

Rule number one for a bank robber preparing a note for the teller: make it legible!

Hokc ogll sht es wlll ikkk you! Now!

Hillsboro police said Stephanie Martin walked into a Wells Fargo bank in Hillsboro and handed the teller a note that read, "Need $300 or I'll kill you. I'm serious."

The teller told Martin she couldn't read the handwriting, police said. Martin then walked to a counter and re-wrote the note on a bank slip, according to Lt. Mike Rouches, of the Hillsboro Police Department.

The teller then hit the silent alarm and the bank's manager asked how he could help Martin, Rouches said.

Martin then said she wanted to open an account with the bank, according to officers.

Police and FBI agents arrived at the scene and arrested Martin

... police determined [Martin] was under the influence of drugs ...

So you say you like to cut your grass in the nude. Hmmm. Then what were you doing, topless, walking down the road? As reported by the Rock Hill Herald [North Carolina]:

Angela Jonas [age 50] ... told officers she likes to cut her grass in the nude, a York County sheriff's report says.

One neighbor complained in the report that Jonas has walked down the road topless several times before. Police tried several times to speak with Jonas when they first arrived, around 7:30 p.m., asking repeatedly why she was walking down the street "naked from the waist up." She could not give a clear answer, officers said in the report.

She was charged with indecent exposure and remained in jail Wednesday morning on $1,000 bond.

How about some nice, relaxing rollerblading through the park? No? How about running over some little kids who are in the way? Perhaps I'm overstating it a bit. Here's what happened, per the Stamford Advocate:

A 43-year-old Stamford in-line skater is charged with risk of injury to a minor and assault after an alleged confrontation with a father and his two sons over the right-of-way on a path in Cove Island Park Monday morning, police said.

Skater Chris Karamon, of 1307 Hope St., was charged with risk of injury to a minor, third-degree assault, fourth-degree criminal mischief, and breach of peace, according to Stamford Police Lt. Sean Cooney.

Shortly after 9 a.m. Monday, Karamon was skating down the path when he shouted and cursed at the father that his 4-year-old son on a tricycle was in a designated area for in-line skaters, police said.

"Mr. Karamon's contention is that the 4-year-old was on the wrong side of the path," Cooney said. "But the path is for use by everybody and we can't have Rollerbladers or anybody cursing out people."

A short while later, Karamon was approaching the family again and collided with the father who shielded his 4- and 2-year-old sons, Cooney said.

Karamon fell to the ground, and threw his helmet and water bottle at the father, police said.

Several bystanders called police, Cooney said, and another witness intervened to separate Karamon and the father. Karamon declined comment when contacted about the incident Tuesday morning.

Karamon was released on $10,000 bond, and is to appear in state Superior Court in Stamford on Oct. 13.

I like animals too, but this is nuts. As reported by The Daily Telegraph:

In one of Sydney's weirdest crimes, a young woman has been accused of pulling a gun on a dog owner at their home in a brazen attempt to steal a Chihuahua puppy after posing as a would-be buyer.

A police spokesman said: “About 11.30am, the 26-year-old woman went to a house on Perkins Avenue at Kellyville after making an appointment to purchase a Chihuahua puppy.

“Once inside the home, the woman allegedly produced a firearm and demanded the puppy.

“The woman was then restrained and the firearm seized by the occupants, who included an off-duty policeman from The Hills Local Area Command.

“Police attended the house and the woman was arrested and taken to Castle Hill police station. The woman’s firearm was found to be a replica of a Glock pistol. She has been charged with robbery whilst armed and possession of a prohibited weapon and will appear at Parramatta Local Court on October 15.”

Who knew a couple mankinis would cause such a fuss? As reported by the BBC:

Two students who dressed up as the TV character Borat are at the centre of a row in Vietnam.

The pair performed a dance act at a company party dressed as the spoof Kazakh journalist in his notoriously skimpy "mankini" swimming costume.

They have now found themselves suspended from college for 12 months.

The incident, dubbed the "nude dance of FPT Arena students", has stirred up a storm on internet forums and also in the domestic media.

The leading technology firm FPT owns the college where the two performers were studying design.

In a statement, FPT Arena said the organisers of the party did not know about the act in advance, adding that two of the firm's executives had been sacked over the incident.

Hanoi Cultural Inspectorate on Tuesday fined the college 4m dong ($240; £135) for a number of offences including "use of improper clothing".

Would you turn your kid into the police if you knew he was breaking the law? This mother answered "yes" as reported by The Sandusky Register:

A 16-year-old boy who used a page from his Bible as a rolling paper for a marijuana joint was charged with drug possession, an Erie County sheriff deputy's report said.

The boy's mother called deputies at about 11:35 p.m. Tuesday, asking them to meet her at a car wash on Ohio 101.

The mother said she saw her son smoking in his bedroom and found a small bag of marijuana in his night stand, the report said.

The mother told deputies her son "was smoking a marijuana cigarette using a page from his Bible," the report said.

So what's the problem with a guy washing his pants at a laundromat? Um, he apparently didn't have any other pants to wear ... and was walking around bottomless. Per the Naples Daily News:

Arresting Deputy Jeffrey S. Magner reported making contact with [Mr. James T.] Lowe while he sat against the window of the laundromat at 6000 Radio Road, and states he was wearing a jean jacket around his waist, but no pants. However, the report notes, "it was not completely covering his genitalia. At this time, there were several adults and small children walking around the plaza and in and out of the coin-operated laundry."

The report further states that Lowe appeared impaired, and had a plastic mug with a "Bud Light" logo on the ground next to him, filled with a partially-consumed substance that smelled like alcohol. While taking him into custody, the report states, deputies also found a baggie of white pills on Lowe, but were unable to identify them through poison control.

... indecent exposure in public, trespassing, having an open container of alcohol in a public area and resisting an officer without violence.

If you do a good job, you should get a good tip, right? Let's say you work for Notre Dame University's catering department, and you earn a tip of $29.87. Such was the case for Sara Gaspar. As luck would have it (good luck, initially - now, not so good), per The South Bend Tribune:

...because of a "mistake," court documents say a total of $29,387 was deposited into her account.

Gaspar ... says she tried to alert the university about the large sum that showed up in her bank account, but that when her messages [at least 3 of them] weren't returned, she decided it was meant to be.

"I guess because it was there and I was in a bad situation, I went out and spent it [on medical bills and a 2002 Jetta]," Gaspar said when reached by phone.

You'll have a hard time believing what this Minnesota man's fetish is, and that he will be spending a year in jail because of it. Per the Duluth News Tribune:

Christopher Neil Bjerkness is not a rapist, but a Duluth judge lectured him on Wednesday that unless he stops carrying out a bizarre sexual fetish of slashing exercise balls with a knife, he could some day find himself facing an indeterminate civil commitment as a sexual psychopath.

Bjerkness was sentenced in St. Louis County District Court to 21 months in prison, but as part of a plea agreement the sentence was stayed for five years of supervised probation, which includes a one-year sentence at the Northeast Regional Corrections Center, where he will enter a sex offender treatment program.

The judge said no one wanted to send him to prison at this time but that his behavior was a violation of privacy and his predilection for the fetish seemed to be escalating.

If he doesn’t change his ways, the judge said, Bjerkness could wind up in prison and potentially face a civil commitment process.

Sexual psychopaths can be civilly committed after their prison sentences when the court determines they still pose a risk to the public. It can be a lifelong commitment.

In a July interview, [he] told the News Tribune that he couldn’t explain his fetish. He said he suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome, bipolar depression and cerebral palsy. That information was later confirmed by his adoptive parents.

Bjerkness said his fetish for exercise balls has nothing to do with the people who work or exercise at gyms and he doesn’t believe he is a threat to anyone. He is unemployed, but said he has worked mowing lawns, as a dishwasher and as a telemarketer.

I seriously doubt that Mr. James Lewis will ever complain about his wife's cooking again. I can tell you how I know this in 2 words: fifty stitches. As reported by wral.com:

Deputies responded to an assault call Friday morning on the 5000 block of Justice Branch Road and found paramedics treating James Lewis, 85, for head injuries. Lt. Stevie Salmon of the Halifax County Sheriff's Office determined that Lewis and his wife, Rosie Lee Lewis, 71, had argued over what she had cooked for breakfast.

The couple continued to bicker as Rosie Lewis cooked another meal, Salmon said, and the argument escalated to the point that James Lewis raised his cane as if he were ready to hit his wife. Rosie Lewis then hit him on the head several times with an iron frying pan, knocking him to the ground, Salmon said.

James Lewis was taken to Halifax Regional Medical Center, where he received 50 stitches to close his head wounds, Salmon said.

[She] was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, and authorities said she was being held without bond because the charge stemmed from a domestic dispute.

So this homeless man in Lancaster, Ohio got burned by a taser. And I mean literally "burned." Per the Lancaster Eagle Gazette,

Officers said they spotted a man -- later identified as [Mr. Daniel C.] Wood -- allegedly placing the end of a can in his mouth then running away.

Wood faces charges of assaulting a police officer, resisting arrest and abusing harmful intoxicants. His bond is $5,000.

.

I love my car, or so I thought until I read this story. As reported by krqe.com:

An Albuquerque man faces indecent exposure charges after police say children saw him simulating a sex act with his car in a grocery store parking lot.

Danny Brawner, 46, was indicted on two counts of aggravated indecent exposure and one count of indecent exposure for the July 28 incident in the parking lot of the Smith's Food and Drug store on 101 Coors Blvd. NW, according to a news release from Bernalillo County District Attorney Kari Brandenburg's office.

Witnesses told police they saw Brawner "humping" his car's trunk while swinging his arms in the air and shouting. His pants were around his ankles, witnesses said.

An officer said he found Brawner asleep next to his car. The officer woke him up and arrested him. The officer said Brawner appeared to be intoxicated.

Two children saw the alleged sex act, which is why Brawner faces the aggravated indecent exposure charges. They're fourth-degree felonies.

If convicted on all counts, Brawner could be sentenced to serve up to four years in prison and attend mandatory counseling.

If convicted of the aggravated indecent exposure charge, under New Mexico law, Brawner would have to register as a sex offender.

So this dude is riding his bike in St. Charles Parish (in Louisiana) with a 3-foot-long alligator around his neck. And yes, it was alive. Per the Times-Picayune, when the police approached 38-year-old Terron Ingram and the gator ...

Ingram dropped the reptile and his bike and ran off, but was apprehended a few blocks away.

Alligator Control Officer Kenny Schmill said he released it into the marsh near Bayou Gauche.

Ingram ... was booked with a variety of charges, including cruelty to animals by abandonment, resisting arrest and possession of drug paraphernalia. He was being held on $15,000 bond.

Just when you thought you'd heard it all - an illegal songbird fighting operation! As reported by Fox61 in Connecticut:

Multiple state law enforcement agencies busted up a bird fighting ring in the town of Shelton Sunday morning. However the birds involved are known more for their voice than violence.

Police confiscated nearly 150 songbirds- canaries and saffron finches- from a home at 176 Ripton Road. Police say the birds were being prepared to fight. The raid was led by Shelton Police with help from the Department of Agriculture and officers from Bridgeport, Ansonia, Fairfield, and State Police departments.

"They have a cage in the middle that's set up like a ring, where the two will go into one cage and fight." said Shelton Police Sergeant Robert Kozlowsky. "It's looking like animal cruelty and illegal gambling. They [officers] have found a large amount of currency also at this scene."

Animal control officers were seen carrying cages upon cages filled with birds from the residence. According to a relative, the homeowner claimed to be collecting the birds to breed and sell. Neighbors who witnessed the raid were surprised at both the multi-agency response and the unorthodox nature of the bird fighting.

"Am I being punk'd?" asked neighbor John Coniglio, referring to a television show famous for playing pranks on celebrities. "I mean, this is crazy. I've never heard of a canary ring. I can't picture little canaries with razor blades taped to their feet or anything."

The raid christened 19 jailbirds along with $8,000 cash.

This man didn't walk into Walgreens with no stinkin' pocket knife. No, it's the Powell Doctrine (remember, overwhelming force?) or nothing. Per The Denver Post:

A 19-year-old Denver man wielding a samurai sword is suspected of holding up a pharmacy Tuesday night in Glendale.

The robber jumped a counter at the Walgreens at 360 S. Colorado Blvd. and threatened employees with a 30-inch long samurai sword, police said.

The robber ran off with a cache of the painkiller Oxycontin but was chased down by police about 100 yards away.

Okay so the guy had a knife, but it was a butter knife. And the motel clerk didn't think much of it either. Per the Rapid City Journal [South Dakota]:

The front desk clerk told police a man pointed a butter knife at her and asked her for money. When she refused, the man left the hotel, walking west, police said.

The clerk gave police a detailed description of the man. Police searched the area, and about 7 p.m., an officer noticed a man matching the description of the robber standing outside an apartment in the 900 block of Fillmore Street, just north of the hotel. Police recovered a knife they believe was used in the attempted robbery.

Police arrested Robert Lee McKinney, 34, of Rapid City. He has been charged with first-degree robbery and is in custody at Pennington County Jail.

First-degree robbery is a class 2 felony with a maximum penalty upon conviction of 25 years imprisonment and a $50,000 fine.

What's a person to do when his boarding housemate's violin playing has been driving him insane for three years? Per The Courier Mail:

The man approached the violin player, snapped the bow and threw it out the window of the Lutwyche residence.

He said he had been listening to him play it badly for three years and finally had a "brain snap and couldn't listen to it any longer".

He was put on a good behaviour bond in Brisbane Magistrates Court and ordered to replace the bow.

An interesting question, and not an academic one, for identical twins Gavin and Rhys Higgins, and for the alleged victim, Darryl Churchill. Per the Daily Mail:

Darryl Churchill had claimed that one of the twins set upon him after a dispute over a game of pool which he had refereed.

He told the court he was 'punched and kicked' and needed an operation to fix his nose after the alleged attack, but could not tell which brother was responsible because they look so alike.

... walked free today after a jury took less than a hour to acquit them over [the] rugby club altercation.

The jubilant pair were found not guilty of one charge each of assault causing actual bodily harm at a birthday party at their local rugby club.

Gavin said: 'Me and my brother always seem to get dragged into trouble because we look alike. People are always mixing us up.

BFWI? Breast-feeding while intoxicated. And yes, at least in Grand Forks, North Dakota it is - and it's a felony. As reported by the Grand Forks Herald:

A Grand Forks mother who police say was “extremely intoxicated” while breast-feeding her 6-week-old pleaded guilty to child neglect Tuesday.

Officers responded to an unrelated call at a Grand Forks residence in the early morning of Feb. 13 and saw 26-year-old Stacey Anvarinia slurring her speech and breastfeeding, prosecutor Meredith Larson told the judge.

Citing a police report, Larson said officers were concerned about the infant’s welfare, so they called Altru Hospital and were told that breast-feeding while intoxicated was not good for the child.

“Ms. Anvarinia was notified of that, and she continued to make attempts to breast-feed,” Larson said.

Talk about a petty crime. Per newsok.com (The Oklahoman):

Roger Hamilton told police he was sitting on a bus station bench, preparing to put mayonnaise on his 76-cent bologna and cheese sandwich, when a man wearing headphones began staring at him. Hamilton, 24, told police he asked the man if he could help him, but the man punched him in the mouth and snatched his sandwich. When police arrived Wednesday at the Hudson Street bus station, they found Hamilton with a swollen lip and bloody face. Hamilton described him as a black man in his 30s.

If you are one of those folks who refuses to carry a cell phone, I seriously doubt that this story will change your mind. But for those who carry them religiously (me?), and feel strange if we don't have them, vindication! Check out this story from the Atlanta Journal Constitution:

The robber came in the door of the Beverage Mart liquor store in Roswell, waving a big, black hunting knife.

He wanted the money in the knapsack. Now!

He lunged at the clerk, Joseph Wescott, 59, who leaned back to get away from that 10-inch gleaming blade. The knife hit the cell phone in Wescott’s breast pocket instead.

That bought time. Time enough for Wescott to reach for the Glock .40 he kept under the counter.

It was Monday night, about 8:30 p.m., and that’s when accused robber, Carlos Jeanpierre, 24, of Atlanta, realized this might be the end.

He ran for the door, but not before Wescott got off a round, hitting him in the side. The bullet went in the right side and lodged in the left side of the abdomen.

Wescott ... is the father of a Roswell Police officer. The son had bought his dad both the gun and the phone, Wescott said.

Texas Inmate George Morgan filed a habeas petition, which the state moved to dismiss. This didn't sit well with Mr. Morgan. So he wrote a note to assistant U.S. attorney Susan San Miguel on toilet paper. What did the note say? As reported by Courthouse News Service:

"Dear Susan, Please use this to wipe your ass, that argument was a bunch of shit! You[rs] Truly, George Morgan."

One of Miguel's co-workers returned the note to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, where Morgan is incarcerated.

Morgan was charged with using vulgar language and was punished with a loss of 15 days of credit earned for good behavior.

Judge Jolly acknowledged that prisoners have certain First Amendment rights, but said those rights are restricted by the state's interest in rehabilitating the prisoner.

"Morgan's note demonstrated a completely unjustified disrespect for authority, expressed in the most unacceptably vulgar form, which would be offensive in mainstream society," Jolly wrote.

"It would not be tolerated from a peer member of the bar, and would not be tolerated from a pro se litigant in the free setting."

So this man and his son (the Estays) were cruising down an Idaho highway when they saw their car ... being driven by someone else. They say they thought it was stolen. Nope. Turns out it was being repossessed (by the Lyles). A car chase ensued. Per kpvi.com:

When the cars pulled over, Estay admits to slashing the tires so it couldn't get away. His son is said to have attacked Landon Lyle. Estay is said to have stabbed Amy Lyle, but today any actual "stabbing" was disputed. Estay says it was an accident when he was approached from behind while slashing the tires. And both parties today did agree the injury was more of a slight laceration.

Peter Estay today called himself a victim, and in many ways, he now is. Because after a bizarre twist of revenge two months ago, Landon Lyle was arrested for shooting his gun into Estay's home, with Estay's wife inside.

So while this two-year saga could've drawn to a close with Monday's sentencing, it is still far from over. Lyle is now charged with second degree attempted murder.

Honestly, I'm not a Kohl's guy either. But some people get really excited about shopping there ...

A man from Oconomowoc, accused of fondling himself in a department store, was charged Monday with one count of Lewd and Lascivious Behavior.

According to the criminal complaint, Daniel Wagner, 38, was seen masturbating in a Kohl's Department store on St. Paul Ave. in April.

Wagner was also charged with Disorderly Conduct. If convicted, he faces up to a year in prison.

If you blamed your mom for severing your pinky, would you sue her? A contractor in New Jersey did. As reported at NorthJersey.com:

In 2006, John P. Garrity was installing hardwood floors for his mother, Nancy, when the accident occurred, according to court papers. While working with a miter saw in her garage, Nancy came up behind John and tapped him on his right shoulder. In depositions, John Garrity said that when he quickly turned around, his finger slipped into the saw’s path and severed his pinky.

Sort of. A 17-year-old Washington student stood before his class and presented his essay on why marijuana should be legalized. And? Oh no you didn't... Per The News Tribune:

At the end of his speech ... [he] pulled out a joint, lit it and smoked away. Then he ate the remains.

For that he got a quick escort to the school office and then a ride to Remann Hall juvenile jail.

The boy ... was arrested on suspicion of unlawful drug possession, a misdemeanor.

It should go without saying that every kid ought to hear "the talk" from his parents. But a 42-year-old British dad apparently wanted to go the extra mile for his 14-year-old son - by hooking him up (sorry) with a prostitute! Alas, the woman dad approached was ... a cop! And, of course, now dad is ashamed.

The father's barrister Matthew Smith said: "There is a thorough sense of shame the defendant feels.

What you were doing that night was to expose your 14-year-old son to a prostitute because you didn't know she was a police officer.

You have a duty of care to your son and that is to look after his moral welfare not, as you might think, to break him into the ways of sex through a prostitute.

Judge Jonathan Teare said he was not sending the father to prison because of his previous excellent character and that he believed he did not mean any harm to his son.

Mr. Smith added that the boy would be allowed to continue to live with his father.

[dad] will be placed on the sex offenders register for five years.

Warning: Do not read this right before, or after, eating, because it's really, really gross. Okay, here it goes, per The Standard, "China's Business Newspaper"

A domestic helper has appeared in court accused of trying to injure her employer by mixing her menstrual blood in a pot of vegetables she was cooking.

In some Southeast Asian cultures menstrual blood is thought to have special magical powers.

Prosecutor Vincent Lee gave a statement to the court in which the Indonesian maid admitted under caution to mixing the blood with the vegetables in the belief that it would make her employer, surnamed Mok, "more amicable and less picky."

Mok [the employer] peered through the kitchen door and saw the helper acting suspiciously. She entered the kitchen and found the accused throwing something into the trash bin.

When Mok checked, she allegedly found blood clot-like substances mixed with the vegetables and water in the cooking pan.

She later discovered a used sanitary napkin in the bin and called the police.

Last year, a court in Saudi Arabia sentenced two Asian domestic helpers to four months in prison and 250 lashes each for contaminating the tea of their employer with urine and menstrual blood.

In December 2007, another Indonesian domestic helper in Hong Kong added urine to the drinking water of her employer and his family.

She believed it would make the family treat her better. It was discovered after the family noticed a difference in the taste of the water. The maid was jailed for three months on a charge of "administering poison or other destructive or noxious things with intent to injure."

Check out the new $20 coin! What do you mean there is no new $20 coin? But that guy said ... Per The Patriot News:

State police are looking for a man who passed a fake $20 coin at an ice cream parlor in Williams Township, Dauphin County. Police said the man, described as white, short and stocky, with black curly hair, used the coin Friday evening to purchase ice cream at Willow Tree Ice Cream. After the suspect convinced the owner of the shop the coin was a new issue that was just entering circulation, the owner gave the man change.

Police said the man left in a teal Dodge Caravan registered to Mervin M. Horst of Newmanstown, Pa. Anyone with information on the whereabouts of Horst is asked to contact state police at Lykens at 717-362-8700.

Okay, so it would be his 8th strike. But really, do you want to send a 31-year-old man away for life for stealing a laptop and a tv? As reported by kfor.com:

Brew is always on the move at Pope Distributing in Enid, but beer wasn't what was on tap for a couple of criminals who recently paid Pope's an unwelcome visit and stole a television and laptop computer.

Officers arrested 31-year-old Conan Carson, who is now charged with second-degree burglary. Come to find, he has seven previous felony convictions and because of his lengthy criminal history, Carson could face life behind bars.

So this woman (no, that's not her, but I could you resist using that picture?) crashed her car and refused a breathalyzer test. For her crime, she was sentenced to 80 hours of community service. Apparently nobody anticipated that she would show up for the community service in 4-inch heels. She was sent back to court, as the boots were deemed a health and safety hazard. What do you think should happen? Here are excerpts of the story from The Daily Mail:

Debbie Stallard was told she couldn't do the manual work because her boots were a health and safety hazard.

The 47-year-old, from Paignton in Devon, claimed she was unable to wear flat shoes for medical reasons. 'Since I was a little girl I have only been able to walk on the balls of my feet. Even my slippers have two and a half inch heels.

'The long and the short of it is that I can't wear flat shoes because of a medical condition I have had since I was a child. 'It's health and safety gone mad. I was made to feel stupid'.

The mother-of-two had been sentenced to 80 hours community service after she was convicted of damaging a vehicle and failing to provide a specimen of breath.

Within 10 days she arrived at the probation service's community payback workshop in Torquay but was told her towering boots would be unsuitable for 'the vigorous work ahead'.

The probation service took her back to court last Friday asking that the community service order be revoked and replaced with another punishment.

Judges have adjourned the case until more detailed medical reports are made available.

Probation officer Heidi Randle said: 'She attended on the date required but was sent away because she was wearing heels. 'We tried to contact the GP [General Practitioner] in this case and received a letter which was non-committal and does not say anything specific about wearing flats.

'It is a non-NHS [National Health Service] matter and, for a fee, he would write a more detailed report'.

Ms Stallard's solicitor John Darby said: 'My client has always lived on her toes. 'She has always worn heels and in her last job had to sign a disclaimer so she could wear high heels to work. She can't walk in flats.'

A spokesman for the Probation Service said: 'We take the health and safety legislation for offenders very seriously. 'Ms Stallard was offered protective footwear but refused to comply. We had no option but to return the order to court for magistrates to re-sentence as they see fit.'

I don't even know if that's a real drink. But I do know that I don't expect the dude working at Starbucks to be packing heat. Such was the case at a Washington, DC Starbucks (at 16th and U Streets, NW), as reported by myfoxdc.com. How do we know he was packing? Because he shot himself in the leg! "... while customers and co-workers were close by[!]" I'm guessing that will serve to stimulate much more than anything Starbucks has to offer. The dude, who is doing okay, didn't have a permit for the gun, and was charged. Here's the source.

Hey man, I just find the news. I don't make this stuff up. I'm not sure I could. Darin Cassler of Burlington, Vermont was arrested for starting a pillow fight, albeit a large one. As reported by The Burlington Free Press:

The pillow pugilism broke out Friday afternoon on Church Street and involved perhaps 50 people, according to a video organizers posted on the social-networking site Facebook. The “fight” wrapped up in less than two minutes, and then a police officer strolled up to the scrum, removed Cassler from the crowd and led him away by the left arm, according to the video.

[Cpl. Paul] Glynn issued Cassler a citation for disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of 60 days in jail and $500 in fines. The statute requires a person to have acted with “intent to cause public inconvenience, or annoyance or recklessly creating a risk thereof” by engaging in “fighting or in violent, tumultuous or threatening behavior,” making “unreasonable” noise, using “abusive or obscene language” in public, disturbing a legal assembly or meeting, or obstructing vehicle or pedestrian traffic.

Forget about flying first class. Men may soon be asking for "Martz" class. Why? Pilot Martz was flying a helicopter while receiving oral sex from a porn actress! How do we know this? It's on video! ("The video shows the woman disrobing before engaging Martz in a sex act while the San Diego landscape is passing by the [ahem] cockpit windows," as reported by the San Diego Union-Tribune.)

In his defense (in filings relating to his pilot's license) Martz "... said ... that the video showed he had his hands on the flight controls while receiving oral sex." Shazam! I guess if you're going to fight it, you have to offer something up. So what happened?

[The] judge has upheld the revocation of the license ...

[He] ... will have to reapply for his license next year when the revocation ends.

Martz is a commercial pilot with a history of FAA violations, including two license suspensions and two revocations going back to the 1980s.

Lawyers for the federal agency argued Martz's conduct was careless and reckless. His attention was diverted from flying; the woman's position prevented him from reaching flight controls; and she could have caused him physical harm that would have precluded him from operating the helicopter, according to Ian Gregor, an FAA spokesman.

Um, yes, they can. The end? Not necessarily. "Martz can appeal the ruling to the NTSB."

You know the expression "throwing money out the window?" How about "money to burn?" Well, a man in Taiwan DID BOTH, and was arrested and "charged with public endangerment and destruction of currency," as reported by news.com.au.

The man tossed the bills [$1 million Taiwan ($30,000 US)] from a taxi in a crowded part of Taichung city on Sunday as people stopped to pick up the cash, Changhua police official Lin Shih-ming said.

He is believed to have thrown heaps more money on an earlier road trip starting in the capital Taipei.

The man also burned about T$400,000 and had two more sacks of cash ...

"... apparently [from] the proceeds of a property sale ..."

What do you do when your kid steps in poop? Here's what one woman did, as reported by UPI:

[Norwalk, Connecticut] City Attorney M. Jeffry Spahr said Kelly DeBrocky of Mahopac, N.Y., filed suit against the city April 7, seeking $100 compensation for her child's ruined shoes and tickets for Maritime Aquarium -- which the mother said her family had to leave early because of the incident -- The (Stamford, Conn.) Advocate reported Thursday.

"I had to read it twice," Spahr said. "Immediately, what I did was say, 'You're not going to believe this one.' It was hilarious. What are these people thinking about? Just when you think you've heard it all."

DeBrocky defended he suit. "I was just really skeeved, I thought the whole thing was disgusting," she said. "We had to pay for admission to the aquarium and my son had no shoes and it made the entire experience awful."

"The official response is her claim is denied and poop happens," said Spahr.

If I titled the post "Vanessa Bryant, Vanessa Bryant ...." would you know who I was talking about? No. But like Prince, Shaq, and Magic, everybody knows who Kobe is. Now they're also going to know a little more about his wife Vanessa, thanks to a lawsuit filed by the couple's former housekeeper, Maria Jimenez, for wrongful termination, among other things. Here are a few of the allegations from the Complaint:

Among other abusive comments, Vanessa called Maria "lazy," "slow," "dumb,""a fucking liar" and "fucking shit." [expletives inserted]

On another occasion, Vanessa derided Maria after Maria said she needed to see a doctor but the Bryants had not paid for her medical insurance. "You're a fucking liar," Vanessa said. [expletive inserted]

On the final incident, Vanessa screamed at Maria for putting an expensive blouse in the Bryants' clothes washer. Then Vanessa demanded that Maria put her hand in a bag of dog feces to retrieve the price tag for the blouse.

Nobody likes a noisy neighbor. What if you lived next to a bar that cranked out music - outside - from 9 p.m. - 3 a.m., from 5 speakers, nonstop? Such was the fate of some folks in Barcelona, Spain. As reported at canada.com:

A court in Barcelona said three persons living near the city's Donegal pub "developed depressive anxiety syndrome that needed medical treatment" due to the noise ...

Ironically, I've often read that one of the hardest things to get used to in prison is ... the constant noise.

Perhaps the Apple iTouch has been out so long that it's no longer "hot." A 15-year-old Ohio boy would beg to differ. Seems he bought an iTouch in November 2008. As alleged in the Complaint filed in Federal Court in Ohio:

On December 4, 2008 ...Plaintiff ... was sitting at his desk with his Apple iTouch in the off position in his pant’s pocket. [He] heard a loud pop and immediately felt a burning sensation on his leg.

[He] stood up and realized his Apple iTouch had exploded and caught on fire in his pocket.

[He] immediately ran to the bathroom and took off his burning pants with the assistance of a friend. [Give that kid a, uh... Zune.] The Apple iTouch had burned through [his]pants pocket and melted through his Nylon/Spandex underwear, burning his leg. [He had second degree burns.]

What else would you put in a mail slot on a door other than a letter? A penis, or course. Such was the case with Mr. Bryan Owens. And it wasn't easy. As reported in The Sun:

Prosecutor Paul Caulfield said: “He had adapted the draft excluder to make a hole wide enough for him to stick his penis through so others could see it.

Owens was originally cautioned for the offence last September when a woman spotted him flashing his member on her way to work.

Despite the warning he was then collared doing the same thing a month later.

Like many shoppers before him, Mr. Walter Tessier walked into a grocery store (in Amsterdam, New York) and bought a lobster. He later returned to the store claiming that the lobster was bad, and exchanged it for a bag of king crab legs. So whatsamatta? Just this: the lobster shell was empty! As reported by The Times Union:

When confronted, the man with a passion for seafood ran from the store with the bag of crab legs in hand, they said.

Deputies said they caught up with him at his home only to discover that he had already eaten the crab legs.

Tessier was charged with petit larceny and given an appearance ticket to return to court at a later date.

How come nothing this exciting ever happened in my school? If they didn't already know about prostitutes, students at the Western Intermediate School in Bellefontaine, Ohio now do, courtesy of fourth grade teacher Amber Carter. And yes, "Amber" is her real name. As reported by The Columbus Dispatch:

The principal tried yesterday to tell a class of fourth-graders why their teacher was arrested just after lunch Tuesday and hauled to jail.

She couldn't tell them that Amber Carter, a 13-year employee of the Bellefontaine City School District, had been arrested in an apparent sex sting at the local Super 8 Motel just after noon Tuesday.

This guy must have had some seriously sore feet. As reported by the South Florida Sun Sentinel:

The allure of foot relief may have been too much for a thief who held off a Wal-Mart guard with a pen knife as he fled with a stolen tube of foot cream, the Broward Sheriff's Office said Wednesday.

The man entered the store at 10:10 a.m., grabbed a $9 tube of foot cream and hid it on his person, a sheriff's report said.

As he left the store, a guard tried to stop him. The thief brandished a pen knife and threatened to cut the guard if he didn't keep away.

The thief got into a powder blue, mid-1980s Chevrolet Monte Carlo with another man at the wheel and fled.

Sorry to disappoint a certain segment of you Juicers, but it's nothing sexual. It's actually criminal. As reported by The West Australian, a man broke into a butcher shop and stole a frozen chicken. He then took that chicken to a cafe, where he allegedly used it to try to smash the cafe's window.

It probably won't surprise you that this is how he was caught:

The alleged thief was forced to call emergency services after he was injured [a minor wrist injury] using the chook [chicken] and some rocks to try to get into the cafe ...

Can you imagine a man's feet smelling so bad that he got kicked out of a university? It's true, and Teunis Tenbrook has been fighting getting the boot (sorry) FOR 10 YEARS! Exactly how a case like this can take 10 years is a mystery to me, but whatever Mr. Tenbrook did, it worked. As reported by UPI:

A judge ruled to allow Teunis Tenbrook, who was banned from attending classes at Erasmus University in Rotterdam after administrators said his foot odor was distracting to professors and students, to resume his education at the school after a 10-year lapse, The Sun reported Tuesday.

The judge said professors and students would "just have to hold their noses and bear it" if the smell of Tenbrook's feet bothers them in the future.

Apparently, a severed foot is worth less than $100, at least in St. Lucie County, Florida. As reported tcpalm.com:

The St. Lucie County Fire District firefighter accused of absconding with a portion of a man’s leg from an Interstate 95 crash scene last year was arrested Monday on a misdemeanor theft charge, a Florida Highway Patrol spokesman said.

FHP officials on Monday arrested Economou, of the 500 block of Aster Road, on a second-degree petit theft charge, which is punishable by up to 60 days in jail, in connection with the incident. The warrant lists the value of Lambert’s foot at less than $100.

[She] wanted the remains to help train her cadaver dog.

Economou ... “repeatedly stated” to co-workers, including supervisors, she got permission from a deputy chief to take the foot, but he denied it.

No! I told you not to tell me that! As reported by The Cincinnati Enquirer:

The 88-year-old Blue Ash woman arrested after refusing to give a 13-year-old neighborhood boy his football back after it landed in her yard has sued the youth's parents, alleging emotional distress.

The suit contends that members of the Tanis household "have thrown objects against the side of Ms. Jester's house, into her gardens and onto her porch."

The Tanises and their minor children "regularly and without permission" enter Jester's yard to retrieve footballs and other play items that have been "carelessly tossed" onto her property, the suit adds.

This one is bizarre, even to the Juice. Shaun Michael Burke has been charged with seriously beating a woman with a rubber dildo (wrapped in duct tape) while he robbed her house. The police also suspect that her dog bit Mr. Burke - for the last time. He has also been charged with killing the dog by duct-taping it to a tree (causing asphyxiation). Mr. Burke is in deep shit if the blood in the dogs mouth turns out to be his. (The attacker was wearing a leather mask.) Click here to read the full story in the Daily Mercury.

Certainly nobody (save some of the cheaters) would argue that it's wrong to cheat on your spouse. Likewise, just about everybody (save a few vengeful souls) would argue that Rajni Narayan, of Adelaides, Australia, went too far when she "... set fire to her husband's genitals..." As reported by the Press Trust of India:

An Indian-born Australian woman who allegedly set fire to her husband's genitals suspecting his fidelity has appeared in a local court with fresh charges of murder slapped against her.

Rajni Narayan, 44, who allegedly murdered her husband, in a bizarre manner by torching his genitals which set her Cleveland Avenue townhouse in Adelaides ablaze had later told her neighbourers "it's just a penis I wanted to burn I didn't mean this to happen" Narayan who suspected her husband of having an affair told the neighbours, "I am a jealous wife, his penis should belong to me, I just wanted to burn his penis so it belongs to me and no one else."

Narayan was remanded to police custody until Friday and had to undergo a Psychological assessment as prosecutor said that her engineer husband Satish was asleep in their double-storey house when his wife set his genitals on fire after dousing them with methylated spirit on Dec 8 last, Adelaide Now reported.

The blaze reduced to rubble the couple's USD 700,000 house and also damaged neighbouring houses. Satish Narayan, 47, succumbed to his burns in hospital last week, the paper said. After being produced before the local magistrate here the public prosecutor said the charges against the widow had been upgraded to murder.

Does it really matter if "Pig-pig" is a pig or hog? Turns out it does. As reported by The Tacoma News Tribune:

A pig named Pig-pig was at the center of a courtroom drama this spring in Tacoma Municipal Court. The weighty legal question: How much wood could a woodchuck chuck?

Seriously, the question for the learned legal scholars: Is a pig a hog?

The saga began back in 2006 when a Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department inspector told Judson Morris III he was not permitted to keep a hog at his house within the City of Tacoma. Chapter 5.32 of the Tacoma Municipal Code forbids it.

Morris fought the charge, and his public defender successfully argued that the swine at Morris’ house was not a hog, and therefore not subject to the city ordinance.

It was, he said, a Vietnamese pot-bellied pig. The city rules don’t say anything about pigs, the attorney argued.

The judge dismissed the case, but the city appealed to Pierce County Superior Court. A judge there reversed the dismissal and ordered the case sent back to Tacoma Municipal Court.

A jury trial is scheduled for Jan. 14. Seriously.

If you fancy a little weed with your milk delivery, you could have had it, for a little while. As reported by The Belfast Telegraph:

An OAP milkman supplied cannabis to pensioners to ward off their aches and pains, a court heard today.

Robert Holding, 72, delivered the drug - which he kept in an egg box - while doing his daily milk round. Burnley Crown Court heard that he had 17 customers and built up his trade through "word of mouth".

Judge Beverley Lunt said Holding said in his police statement that the cannabis "was for elderly people who had aches and pains". Philip Holden, for the defence, said Holding's customers "were of a certain age" and he built up his clientele through "word of mouth".

Mr Holden said it was a "somewhat bizarre case".

Holding, of Fair View Road, Burnley, Lancashire, pleaded guilty to supplying cannabis resin, a Class C drug, between April 1 and July 18 this year. He also admitted possessing cannabis resin on July 17. The case was adjourned for a pre-sentence report. Holding was released on bail and will be sentenced at Burnley Crown Court on February 6.

Judge Lunt warned him: "You must understand these are serious offences and in my judgment the likely outcome is an immediate custodial sentence."

Seriously, what do you expect when you burglarize a haunted house? That the spirits are just going to let you waltz out the door with their otherworldly possessions? I don't think so. As reported by the AP, out of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia:

A news report says a burglar who broke into a house claims he was held captive by a "supernatural figure" for three days without food and water. Police official Abdul Marlik Hakim Johar told The Star newspaper the house's owners found the 36-year-old man fatigued and dehydrated when they returned from vacation Thursday. He says they called an ambulance to take him to a hospital. The man told police that every time he tried to escape, a "supernatural figure" shoved him to the ground. Abdul Marlik could not immediately be reached and other police officials declined to comment.

So here's what Joseph Decker, of Hughestown, Pennsylvania, had on the back window of his truck:

IF YOU'RE IN AMERICA & CAN'T SPEAK ENGLISH GET THE FUCK OUT!

"Some people give me thumbs up, they say, 'Yeah, that's the way it's supposed to be.' Some people say, 'Oh, that's stupid you shouldn't have that on there.' Everybody has an opinion," Decker said Tuesday.

[Mr. Decker] was recently cited by Hughestown police for disorderly conduct because of the "obscene language" on his truck. He's fighting that charge.

Dawn Herb of Scranton was charged for swearing at her overflowing toilet. People outside heard her. A judge ruled Herb's First Amendment right to free speech was violated. She won a settlement of $19,000.

Dyller said he also won a settlement of $19,000 for a man from Larksville charged with swearing at police.

Come crunch time, I guess we all occasionally make the wrong decision. This would appear to be just such an occasion. As reported by The Naples Daily News:

When caught red handed with a pair of stolen $16 earrings, Naples police say a Golden Gate teen turned to drastic measures to get rid of the evidence — he drank them.

Police say Colburn was caught shoplifting the glamorous $16 jewelry by JCPenney loss prevention officer Leonardo D. Gonzalez just after 1 p.m. on Saturday. Gonzalez watched as Colburn selected a pair of earrings from the jewelry department, took them out of the box and placed them into a bottle of vitamin water, police said.

Colburn then left the store without paying for the earrings, reports said.

Gonzalez confronted Colburn about the earrings, and began escorting him back to the JCPenney loss prevention office. It was then, police said, that Colburn gulped down the rest of the vitamin water, earrings and all.

When police arrived, Colburn was arrested and transported to NCH Downtown Naples Hospital for an X-ray. On the X-ray image, the earrings were observed inside Colburn, police said.

I would say "only in America," but this happened in Scotland, pursuant to European human rights laws.... Seems that in some Scottish prisons, for a number of years, the prisoners had to "slop out" (clean out) their own toilets. And? Per the Daily Record:

The slopping-out bonanza began in 2004 when knife-wielding mugger Robert Napier used European human rights law to win a court case against the prison service.

A drug dealer used his s2000 compensation payout for "slopping out" in jail to buy heroin to sell to his pals.

The taxpayers' money allowed scheming junkie Joseph Torano to get a discount on the drugs by buying in bulk.

Police raided the house after a tip-off. Hannah Kennedy, prosecuting, said Torano appeared from a bedroom in his underwear and a wrap of heroin fell out of his boxer shorts.

Detectives saw something in his mouth, which turned out to be another package of drugs, and a full body search uncovered a third stash.

"The SNP Scottish government will end slopping out and clean up the mess these administrations have created."

Um, a douchebag. Yeah, I'm sure I wouldn't be too thrilled if I were featured in a book called "Hot Chicks With Douchebags." As reported by RadarOnline, Mr. Michael Manelli was pissed enough to file a lawsuit against the publisher and Mr. Jay Louis, the author of the book and the creator of the website www.hotchickswithdouchebags.com, for including him in the book.

The lawsuit includes claims for libel, negligent infliction of emotional distress, intentional infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, and loss of goodwill. Click here for the RadarOnline story, which includes a link to the Complaint filed in Clark County, Nevada.

How can I be so sure? Because, in that bathroom, for several months, was the body of a deceased 90-year-old woman. Seems that Alan Bushey, the leader of a religious group called the Order of the Divine Will (6 members!) told member Tammy Lewis (yes, it was her bathroom), that Ms. Middlesworth (the deceased, and also a sect member) would rise from the dead. In the meantime, Ms. Lewis was cashing Ms. Middlesworth's Social Security checks! And did I mention that her 12 and 15 year-old kids were living in the house with her?

So what happened to Ms. Lewis? She was facing all kinds of charges, including felonies, but will only have to serve 7 days in jail. Everyone agrees that she was under Mr. Bushey's spell. I think he'll be doing considerably more time. Click here to read more (a fair amount).

A 1-year-old boy was waiting for a relative to pick him up at the police station in Schererville, Indiana because his mom was busted for drunk driving. So his dad drove to the station to get him, only he was drunk too, and was also busted for drunk driving. So his grandparents came to get him and ... yup, they had been drinking too! But, per the AP, grandma, who had been driving, wasn't legally drunk, "so officers escorted them home with the child." On the drinking front anyway, hopefully the apple won't be anywhere near the tree...

Actually, it would be "bugnapper." As reported in The South Asian Post:

SILIGURI, India - A Czech national who was sentenced to three years imprisonment by a court for collecting rare insects from a national park in Darjeeling has fled India after jumping bail. Entomologist Emil Kuchera left India by crossing the country's border with Nepal on Oct 21, the police said. Kuchera left behind his passport that was in the custody of Darjeeling Chief Judicial Magistrate. Kuchera had been arrested under the Wildlife Protection Act on June 22 near Singalila National Park, for collecting rare insects like beetles, butterflies and moths without permission.

It was a bad idea, and it didn't end well. Per the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

Witnesses told township police that [Jay Matthew] Tokar [age 46] was flying his glider dangerously close to children playing soccer in the area.

They also told police Tokar was yelling at people on the golf course and trying to spit on them.

[Witness] Mark J. Gazi told police that Tokar flew the glider so close that at times Gazi could have touched Tokar with his golf club.

...a search warrant served Aug. 28 for Tokar's medical records revealed his blood-alcohol level was 0.151 percent and he had taken benzodiazepines before the crash. A motorist is considered intoxicated in this state with a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 percent.

According to the criminal complaint, after Tokar's plane struck the cable lines, one of the lines jumped off the pulley system and struck witness James Troutman, injuring him in the left leg.

... crashed his aircraft in the Cobblestone-St. Ives housing plan in Hempfield. It snagged a tree, spun out of control and dropped about 60 feet to the ground.

Tokar was not injured in that crash.

Just when you thought you'd heard them all... Check out this excuse for speeding, as reported in The Local:

A woman from southern Sweden has lost her bid to have a speeding fine overturned on the grounds that she was suffering from diarrhea at the time of the offence.

The 49-year-old woman from Trelleborg explained to the local district court that she was experiencing stomach problems when she was pulled over for driving 86 kilometres per hour in a 70 km/h zone.

A situation can only be classed as an emergency if somebody's life is in danger or if a driver hits the gas in an attempt to prevent a serious crime.

As the woman's desire to get home to her toilet did not fit into either category, the court ordered her to pay the speeding fine.

Would you rather pay your $7.45 Waffle House tab, or spend the weekend in jail? A 66-year-old Florida woman chose the latter, perhaps because she didn't have $7.45. Perhaps because she's ornery. Or maybe she's mentally ill? Maybe she was lit (she placed her order around 3:45 a.m.). Or maybe some combination of the above ... Regardless, per the TCPalm:

O'Neill finished ... and then left, telling the Waffle House employee she was going across the street to see a friend but would return shortly.

The Waffle House worker notified authorities after O'Neill, of the 100 block of Maple Street, refused to settle the bill.

When police arrived, an officer told O'Neill to pay up or go to jail.

O'Neill, who faces a defrauding an innkeeper charge, was released Monday from the St. Lucie County Jail on her own recognizance, a jail official said.

Why would one think that this young South Carolinian dislikes cats? Per The Post and Courier:

He admitted to killing eight cats — slitting the throats of six kittens and bashing in the skulls of two adult felines.

In addition to eight counts of ill-treatment of animals, Campbell faced a harassment charge stemming from threatening telephone calls and profanity-laced e-mails directed at his ex-girlfriend, then 15.

... the ex-girlfriend's mother, enumerated the horrors her family had observed during nine months they knew Campbell: squirrels killed by the dozens, ducks driven over with a pickup, a cat killed with a shotgun.

After weighing both sides [you can read the entire article - and there's a lot more - by clicking here], Circuit Judge Markley Dennis imposed a sentence not to exceed five years in the state's Youthful Offender program on one ill-treatment charge. That included 90 days of boot-camp-style shock incarceration, followed by supervised monitoring.

On a second charge, Dennis handed down five more years of probation to take effect after the Youthful Offender program.

James Ramsey, a kindly Scottish granddad, bought a hamster for his grandkids. A few days later, it died. So Mr. Ramsey returned to the same pet store and bought a bird. Soon thereafter, the bird joined the hamster in pet heaven. As President Bush said in Nashville, Tennessee on September 17, 2002:

"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."

[He] was traced through DNA found in the store.

It is not yet known what motivated a 45-year-old woman to drive her car into the courthouse doors. Whatever it was, though, it's likely the same thing that motivated her to then back up her car, and ram into the doors again... and again ... and again! Per the Journal Pioneer:

When police arrived on the scene the woman had backed up a fourth time and rammed her car through the doors again, this time ending up inside the building.

Officers raced in and placed blocks under the vehicle tires.

The woman, allegedly still had her foot on the gas and was attempting to drive even further into the building.

Unlike the incident in yesterday's post, I don't have any problem with this shocker in Ypsilanti, Michigan. As reported at mlive.com,

Ypsilanti Police Sgt. Deric Gress said police were called to the scene at 4:10 a.m. on a report of a man chasing a woman outside an apartment complex. When police arrived, the man stripped his clothes off. He had what appeared to a knife in one hand, police said, and he asked police to kill him, then quickly changed the subject.

Officers ordered the man to lie on the ground, but he instead went toward an officer, who fired the stun gun at him. The man fell and let go of what officers had thought was a knife; it turned out to be a large pen.

The man pulled one of the Taser probes from his body, then ran toward a female bystander, whom he grabbed. Police ordered the 24-year-old Ypsilanti man to the ground again, but he ran off, so police used the Taser a second time and were able to bring him under to control.

I might have to add a separate category for foot fetishes. (Click here and here for more foot fetish entries.) As reported by CBS3 in Philadelphia:

An alleged foot fetish bandit is due in court for a preliminary hearing following a series of bizarre attacks in Philadelphia.

Richard Casey, 47, has been charged with multiple counts of aggravated indecent assault, robbery and related offenses for the group of incidents that took place between November 2006 and January 2007.

In many of the attacks, police said Casey would allegedly demand money from his victims at gunpoint before removing their shoes and fondling or kissing their feet.

Authorities said Casey has a lengthy criminal history that includes arrests on charges of robbery and sexual assault.

A fart. Yes, the police charged Clarksburg, West Virginia resident Jose Antonio Cruz with battery for farting on a policeman! As reported in the Charleston Daily Mail:

South Charleston police said they were fingerprinting Cruz at police headquarters Tuesday when Cruz moved near Patrolman T.E. Parsons, lifted his leg and passed gas "loudly" on the officer, according to a criminal complaint.

Cruz then waved the air in the direction of Parsons, who was preparing a breath test machine nearby.

"The gas was very odorous and created contact of an insulting or provoking nature with Patrolman Parsons," the complaint said.

Cruz acknowledged passing gas, but said he didn't move his chair toward the officer nor aim gas at the patrolman. He said he had an upset stomach at the time, but police denied his request to go to the bathroom when he first arrived at the station.

"I couldn't hold it no more,'' he said.

Usually nothing. But there are exceptions. Per the Chicago Tribune:

A DeKalb lawyer was suspended for 15 months Thursday for arranging to have a female client perform nude dances for him in exchange for credit on her legal fees, a state commission said.

The relationship began in 2001 at Heartbreakers, a Compton, Ill., strip club where, after Erwin talked to an exotic dancer, both realized they had talked to each other over the telephone about some pending legal matters, according to the commission's report of the allegations.

So this woman, Briana "don't make me pounce on you" Pouncy, told her live-in boyfriend Joseph Boykins to do the dishes. He didn't. When she came home to a sink full of dirty dishes, it was on. They argued, and she told Mr. Boykins to leave. When he refused, it got ugly. Per the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

... police say she bit her boyfriend, broke a picture frame across his face [causing visible cuts] and swung at him with a sword ...

If it sounds really crazy, it's usually true. As reported by the Los Angeles Times:

A 28-year-old man pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor count of animal cruelty in a bizarre New Year's Eve incident in which he leaped off the San Diego-Coronado Bridge with an Oceanside police dog biting his arm. The dog died in the fall.

Cory Nathaniel Byron also pleaded guilty Wednesday to felony counts of drunk driving and evading arrest. The incident began with Byron being chased for 45 miles by Oceanside police along Interstate 5. When he stopped on the bridge, a police dog named Stryker was sent to subdue him.

Byron, who has two previous drunk driving convictions, suffered a collapsed lung and other injuries. He faces four years in prison when sentenced Oct. 29 in Vista Superior Court.

Our purse snatcher in Port St. Lucie, Florida, was a male cross-dresser, and apparently not a very good one. Why? He left his fake breast at the scene of the crime! And it was made with a condom filled with water, stuffed in a sock! The cops are dusting the condom for prints, and are doing DNA testing on 2 hairs they found on the sock. Here's a description of our man, as reported by tcpalm.com:

The assailant wore a short jean skirt, tube top and white flip-flops, weighs 130 to 140 pounds and is of thin build. He sported shoulder-length hair with maroon hair attachments in a dreadlocks style.

How can a burp lead to an arrest? Here's how, as reported by The Australian:

A 19-year-old man who allegedly burped in the face of administrative staff at a north Queensland police station has been charged with being a public nuisance.

Innisfail District Police Inspector David Tucker said the man from Tully was at the local police station on Monday when he allegedly burped twice in a female worker's face.

"He was then asked to burp away from staff which resulted in him swearing, raising his voice and using obscene language," Insp Tucker said.

"The public nuisance charge relates to his language and aggressive behaviour and not the burping.

"This type of behaviour will not be tolerated to staff at police stations."

Insp Tucker said the man was due to face Tully Magistrates Court on September 18.

Darren Mirren, age 16, had an interview scheduled with a commercial cleaning company. He didn't show. When they called him, he said he didn't know how to find the office. So they rescheduled the interview. Again he didn't show. Prepare yourself for this: He didn't get the job! OMG. Can you believe it? So, naturally, Darren ... sued! He filed an age discrimination claim with the Employment Tribunal in Glasgow, Scotland. And he ... lost. How is Darren taking it? As reported by The Scotsman:

Last night the teenager, who is still unemployed, was adamant he was in the right. "It wasn't my fault. I was unable to get there because they didn't give me any directions.

" "I felt it was discrimination because of my age."

Remember that post about the woman who refused to return the "obscene" library book she checked out? (Hint: It was yesterday's post.) So do you think she returned the book, or was sent to jail? Wrong. Neither. The city (Lewiston, Maine) decided not to pursue the matter any further. Why? As reported in The Sun Journal:

[City Administrator Jim] Bennett .. said that proceeding with that kind of legal action [having Ms. Karkos put in jail] would have accomplished nothing. Putting the matter to rest, he said, is in the best interest of the city. It saves money that would need to be spent to pursue the case in court, he said, and will keep Lewiston from becoming the epicenter of the debate over decency in publications.

Karkos said she would have been happy to see it go further. By dismissing the matter, she said, the city is trying to make the issue go away.

"They didn't do me any favors," Karkos said Friday night. "They knew what they were doing. They were protecting themselves."

Maine resident JoAn Karkos said she'll take jail. And it's not because she likes the book, "It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex and Sexual Health." It's because "she claims [it] violates the city's obscenity ordinance," per The Sun Journal. What she's doing is just "civil disobedience." It's not working.

After Karkos' actions were picked up by the media, the library received eight copies of the sexual education book from people around the country, including parents and concerned educators, [Lewiston Public Library Director Rick] Speer said.

That's what Heidi Dalibor, of Grafton, Wisconsin did. The result? After ignoring letters from the library and a court notice, per The News Graphic:

Still, the last thing she expected was a knock on her door by Grafton police.

"They showed me a warrant they had for my arrest," said Dalibor, 20. "They said they had to cuff me and I said, Are you serious? "

And then, on a sunny summer morning, she did the perp walk through her Arapaho Avenue neighborhood, where most families knew her as the girl who used to baby-sit their kids.

Things must not be going well if you get to a place where you need to return a box of condoms for a refund. And, when the clerk won't give you a refund, you call 911, claiming that you were robbed. As reported in the North Jersey Record,

Kadien Jackson, 21, of Blauvelt, N.Y., told police he made the bogus report to help him get his money back. Instead, he was charged with making a false report -- a crime that carries prison time upon conviction.

Okay, this not a new case, but it's too wacky to omit on that basis. The waitresses at the Panama City Beach Hooters were told that whoever sold the most beer would get a new Toyota. As reported by the AP,

[Hooters waitress Jodee] Berry, 27, won a beer sales contest in last May at the Panama City Beach Hooters. She believed she had won a new Toyota car.

She was blindfolded and led to the restaurant parking lot, but when the blindfold was removed, she found she was the winner of a toy Yoda Star Wars doll.

"She's satisfied with it," said [her] attorney, David Noll. He did say that Berry can now go to a local car dealership and "pick out whatever type of Toyota she wants."

In Hamburg, Iowa, the owner of Shotgun Geniez was charged with violating obscenity laws after a 17-year-old danced nude there. The defense? It's not a strip club. It's a theater, and is therefore exempt from Iowa's obscenity laws. The result? As reported in The Omaha World-Herald:

"The evidence proved beyond a reasonable doubt Shotgun Geniez is primarily a strip club that features nude dancing. The transparent efforts to appear to be a museum or art center are not convincing. Calling a business a theater does not make it so."

"Shotgun Geniez, nevertheless, meets the ordinary definition of theater."

The judge noted that the club has a raised stage with special lighting, chairs and tables arranged for people to watch the stage, and a dressing area for performers.

130 MPH on a motorcycle! As if that's not bad enough, per Sky News,

[Christopher O'Donovan] led police on a 23-mile high speed chase across the Wiltshire countryside, racing through villages and tracks and along several A-roads.

Witnesses say up to 17 police vehicles pursued O'Donovan before the police helicopter took over the chase.

He was eventually arrested after returning home.

In 2002 motorcyclist Lee Beddis was caught on a speed camera travelling at 155mph. He was sentenced to 180 hours community punishment and a 12 month ban. Drivers on the A465 in Wales said they saw a 'blur' as he passed, and a traffic officer said the pressure from the bike shook his patrol car.

The following year Andrew Osborne was jailed for 28 days after overtaking a lorry at 157mph on an A-road near Buckingham.

Admittedly being a rocker is not your average profession. So, you would expect that, come tax time, they would claim some unusual business expenses, right? What about booze? Yup. As reported by UPI, a Swedish rocker ...

tried to claim that because rockers drink a lot as part of their jobs, he should be allowed to import 12 gallons of spirits, 16 gallons of wine and 300 beers into Sweden without having to pay hefty import duties.

"I … drink a great deal more than the average Swede. I'm a singer in a rock band and whiskey is a part of it."

... and never toss a lighter to someone who has just doused himself with gasoline. Because if you do, charges of assisting suicide might await you, as they did a 30-year-old South Korean man. His girlfriend's distraught ex poured gasoline on himself, then stopped the couple, and threatened to kill himself. As reported by Reuters,

The defendant then threw him a lighter, saying: "Go ahead and kill yourself."

The appeal court ruled that the fact the ex-lover had given his own cigarettes and lighter to a friend so they would not get damaged by the petrol and had not left a will showed he had not planned to commit suicide.

A 16-year-old Indiana boy had a 15-inch video screen in the rear window of his car. And he was driving around, playing porn on it! He was busted, and appealed the conviction. The ruling? The Indiana Court of Appeals upheld the conviction. As explained by police Sgt. Paul Thompson:

People have to be responsible for what's on those screens. We had a situation where someone had a pornographic video that was visible to people outside the vehicle. Indiana has laws that protect children from obscene matter.

Let's just say that, suddenly, I'm much happier with "John." The name? "Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii." Really. Per the Taranaki Daily News:

[Family Court Judge Rob Murfitt] was so worried about the effect on the girl [who was the subject of a custody hearing] he ordered her to be temporarily placed under the guardianship of the court so a suitable name could be chosen.

Number 16 Bus Shelter

Benson and Hedges (twins)

Violence

Midnight Chardonnay

Fish and Chips (yes, twins)

Yeah Detroit

Spiral Cicada

Kaos

Fat Boy

Cinderella Beauty Blossom

Twisty Poi

Keenan Got Lucky

Sex Fruit

Said the Judge:

While the ideal of seeking a unique name could not be criticised "these parents have failed in exercising the first and important task of parenthood". He said it was not "a time to be frivolous or to create a hurdle for their child's future life."

Why does the New Zealand government have any say in what people name their kids?

Section 18 of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1995 allows the Registrar to refuse registration if:

(a) it might cause offence to a reasonable person; or

(b) it is unreasonably long; or

(c) without justification, it is, includes, or resembles, an official title or rank.

Here's the source.

Posted by John Mesirow | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Juice Drops , Odd Cases

At least that's how Gaylon Linn Murphy drew it up. As reported by The LA Times:

Murphy, 52, apologized for his actions, which began when he tore a hole in his Gucci jeans during a visit to a Home Depot store. He then attempted to claim the retail price of the jeans, valued at between $500 and $1,500, from both the building supply store and a local restaurant where he had dined. The double-dipping attempt was uncovered by an Irvine detective.

"It was wrong. It wasn't intentional, but it happened, and I paid for it." Not intentional?!

So Peter Lees had recently broken up with his girlfriend, Gaile Stevens. She didn't take it well. Per the Ledbury Reporter, Mr. Lees was hosting a Pagan wedding party at his house when Ms. Stevens made an appearance. Per Mr. Lees:

She was dressed as a comedy cleaning woman with rubber gloves and a broom and there was the most bizarre stuff coming out of her mouth. She was pushing people around.

She was going around in a threatening manner. I've never known her act like this before.

"The person I saw was absolutely scary like she was possessed by the Devil. There was a tattoo on her face and she was up on the bed howling and hissing."

"It was not her. It was not my friend. It was some possessed person."

She then beckoned [him] for an embrace ...

"I bent towards her. She spun and hooked her teeth into my ear. Two teeth went into my lobe and shredded it."

The missing part of his ear was never found and [Ms. Stevens] ran off into the woods.

If you're Mr. James Dowdy, a long time. Per the Belleville News-Democrat:

In 1993, Dowdy received a three-year-prison sentence for attempted burglary after police caught him with a bag of stolen socks.

[In 1997] ... Dowdy was sentenced to six-years in prison for breaking into another woman's home and stealing socks...

In 2004, Dowdy, received a seven-year prison sentence after he pleaded guilty to walking into a female neighbor's home and taking her socks.

Dowdy ... was charged with residential burglary, a class X felony. He's accused of stealing a pair of socks early Monday morning from a victim's basement.

Actually in the United Kingdom, what Americans call potato chips, they call "crisps." The burning question before a UK High Court judge was: Are Pringles "crisps" or not? Why is this important? Because if they are crisps, they get taxed at 17.5%! If not, they are exempt from the tax, as is most other food. So what was the decision?

Judge Justice Warren said Pringles' "unnatural shape", distinctive tube packaging, and non-potato ingredients meant that the snack could not be classified as a crisp.

The ruling yesterday pointed out that Pringles – who are most famous for their irritatingly catch adverts "once you pop, you can't stop" – contain corn flour, wheat starch, maltodextrin, emulsifier, rice flour and dextrose, and just 42 per cent potato content.

If you ask a Los Alamos, New Mexico man named Variable, a lot. Variable wanted to change his name to Fuck Censorship. But Bernalillo County Judge Nan Nash refused his requested. So Variable appealed. The Court of Appeals ... denied it. Why? Per WTOPnews.com:

The man has the right to call himself whatever he wants, unless there's fraud or misrepresentation involved, the judges said.

But once he seeks court approval for a name change, the court has the authority to turn him down on several grounds, including if the name is offensive to common decency and good taste, the judges ruled.

North Pole, Alaska (really) resident Wyatt Lewis got an unusual DUI. As reported by the Anchorage Daily News, here's how fellow North Pole resident Anne Sterle described it:

"I was woken at about 1 in the morning by hearing a lawn mower outside my window," Sterle said. "And it scared the heck out of me, because my husband was out of town.

"The first thing that went through my mind was someone was stealing our mower. And then I thought, wait a minute, we don't have a riding mower."

There was a chase, reaching speeds up to 5 mph.

The trooper followed Lewis for about 200 yards, according to a report in the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. The trooper turned on his lights and siren. Lewis kept on mowing.

The trooper "was too embarrassed to call it a pursuit over the airwaves," spokeswoman Megan Peters said.

Hey, don't shoot the messenger. A man named God Lucky Howard was busted in Tampa, Florida for selling cocaine. And the charges include selling drugs near a church... Click here for the source.

Just like the McDonald's coffee case (PLEASE click here to read the incredible truth about that case, not the BS put out by business groups and the insurance companies), I'm sure that, though the facts are bizarre, Mr. Mustapha's injuries are real and quite serious. Here's what happened, per canada.com:

Mustapha came to Canada from Lebanon in 1976 when he was 16 years old. A decade later, a Culligan Canada representative convinced him to keep a cooler of water in his home, which he was told was particularly beneficial for pregnant women and children. The family bought into the idea in a big way - keeping only Culligan water in their home for the next 15 years.

That all changed in 2001 after the fly incident. Mustapha said he could not get it out of his mind. He said he felt nauseous and suffered abdominal pain. He started avoided all things having to do with water - even drinking it and taking showers. He sought psychological treatment and medication.

"He pictures flies walking on animal feces or rotten food and then being in his supposedly pure drinking water," [Trial] Justice John Brockenshire, of the Ontario Superior Court, wrote in his 2005 ruling. While acknowledging the reaction seemed to be "objectively bizarre," Brockenshire stressed that Mustapha's obsession with cleanliness and predisposed aversion to insects explained his disorder.

"I conclude that the loss suffered by the plaintiff was too remote to be reasonably foreseen and that consequently, he cannot recover damages from the defendant," Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote in the 9-0 ruling.

As a result of this diet, you've gone from 413 pounds to 308 pounds in 8 months. Awesome, right? Not according to much-lighter Broderick Lloyd Laswell. Not only is he not pleased, he filed suit against the responsible parties - his jailers in Benton County, Arkansas (the Sheriff and the Jail Captain). Here are some of his complaints, as reported in The Northwest Arkansas Morning News:

"There are noticeable differences on the size of biscuits and cakes, as well as the sides," according to Laswell, who also wants hot meals to be served from the jail's kitchen.

"On several occasions I have started to do some exercising and my vision went blurry and I felt like I was going to pass out," Laswell wrote in his complaint. "About an hour after each meal my stomach starts to hurt and growl. I feel hungry again."

"If we are in a small pod all day do next to nothing for physical exercise we should not lose weight," according to Laswell. "The only reason we lost weight in here is because we are literally are being starved to death."

For 57-year-old truck driver Mohamed Nor of Malaysia, 3 wives and 18 kids (ages 4 to 34) are not enough. So he is seeking the permission of the Syrariah High Court to marry a fourth women. And guess who has consented to the marriage? Wives 1,2 and 3. Said Judge Shaikh Ahmad, per the New Straits Times:

“I find it rather strange because since becoming a (syariah) judge, this is the first time where all three wives not only allow their husband to marry another woman but are very supportive of it,” he said during the hearing of Mohamed Nor’s application.

Dude (Horace Bordelon) robs a bank in California, the same one he robbed 7 years earlier. His defense? As reported in The San Francisco Chronicle:

He robbed the bank only so he could return to the routine of prison life, so he didn't actually intend to steal any money.

So here's what David Aston, married (but not for long) father of two, likes to do in his spare time, as reported by the Oxford Mail:

Oxford Crown Court heard Aston twice stripped naked from the waist downwards, crouched on all fours on a towel in woodland near Bicester and encouraged four girls to kick him in the groin until he could no longer handle the pain.

This particular fetish is not one I have come across before.

I found this a bizarre case. The description of predator is not ill-founded and the overwhelming probability is you are going to go to prison.

I don't think Michael Spillman, Jr., of Mansfield, Ohio, will be stealing anything anytime soon. He was at the home of Jacqueline Champion and Bernard Demuth when they left for a funeral. When they came home, Spillman was gone, and so was $2,200 in gaming equipment. As reported in The Mansfield News-Journal:

"[Ms. Champion] got onto his MySpace page and invited him to a cookout," the detective said. "Their plan was to call the police so we could arrest him."

After leading Spillman to the basement, Demuth reportedly clubbed him in the back of the head with a leather-covered baton, causing his head to split open. Parrella said Spillman required six staples to close the wound. The suspects reportedly beat and kicked Spillman for some time, breaking his arm.

Daniel Ranallo can tell you, because he did it in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania, and got busted. As described by Judge Pursel, per The Morning Call:

This is a bizarre case where the defendant was wandering around with a gun looking for someone and firing the gun in a public place.

So maybe it's only a little strange that 65-year-old Tad Gunter is living with his 85-year-old mother, Margery Gunter. Actually, it's really nice if he's taking care of her. What do you think, nice or strange?

Margery Gunter told deputies that her son, Tad Gunter, has been acting weird for the past month, according to an arrest report. She told deputies that her son sits in the living room and fondles himself sexually five times a day in front of her.

A witness, Ruel Montez, grabbed Margery Gunter, brought her to the kitchen and locked the door. Tad Gunter began yelling and throwing things around the room, reports said.

When a deputy arrived, Tad Gunter told him to leave, put his hand on the deputy’s chest and pushed him, authorities said. During a confrontation, the deputy pushed Tad Gunter to the floor. When he tried to get up while swinging his arms and kicking his legs, the deputy drew his Taser.

When Tad Gunter attempted to kick the deputy, the deputy deployed his Taser, striking him with a five-second jolt. During the struggle the deputy gave Gunter two more five-second jolts until one of the Taser’s probes fell out, report said.

When Gunter continued to struggle, the deputy delivered two three-second shocks by placing the Taser against his calf, the Sheriff’s Office reported.

After he was handcuffed Tad Gunter apologized for his behavior.

Actually, "hot" and "warm" revenge didn't work out too well either for David Alan Hawkins, who had the misfortune of trying to develop a condominium project when the Savings and Loan crisis hit in the 1980s. He lost his financing, and the project, with the collapse of Queen City Savings and Loan. And, as reported by the Seattle Times:

To add insult to injury, Hawkins won a $3.5 million jury verdict against the S&L, only to have it stripped from him by a judge over a technicality — a move that outraged the jurors who had awarded him the money, according to court documents and news accounts from the time.

For years, Hawkins sought justice, using increasingly confrontational and bizarre tactics that included placing invalid liens on the homes of those he blamed — including bankers, judges and lawyers — and filing so many lawsuits that he was banned from filing documents in King County in 1994.

Hawkins and Skeins set up a fake title-insurance company and convinced lenders that they held legitimate liens on the homes of their victims. An Atlanta lender gave them more than $1.5 million for the sale of homes belonging to a state appeals court judge and a bank executive ...

... the men were arrested in 2006 after a judge's wife questioned a real-estate appraiser who showed up at her home one day, according to court documents.

So no matter what happens, the lesbians win! Actually, that's not true. The Lesbians might win. What the hell am I talking about? Three Greek women who live on the island of Lesbos filed suit against the Homosexual and Lesbian Community of Greece, per the AP, claiming that its name "insults the identity" of the people of Lesbos.

Please! Even assuming the Lesbians defeat the lesbians, what about the other, um, BILLIONS OF PEOPLE who will still use the word "lesbian" as a synonym for a gay woman? What's next, Lesbos v. Rest of World? Ladies, you can't unring the bell. You can't put the genie back in the bottle. (Help. Any more trite phrases to express this?)

So said Plaintiff's attorney Rob Serafinowicz in a case now being tried in the Waterbury Superior Court in Connecticut. The case involves allegations by Neil Perrotti that, when he was 17 years-old, former Middlebury First Selectman Edward B. St. John sexually assaulted him. As reported in the Hartford Advocate:

[Serafinowicz asked] Judge Jane S. Scholl to force St. John to submit to a photograph of his penis, fully aroused.

Serafinowicz explained that the photograph was crucial to his case because Perrotti, in a statement he gave to State Police about the alleged incident, claimed that St. John’s penis bent to the left when aroused.

“It would seem Mr. St. John would want to do this to set the record straight,” said Serafinowicz without a hint of sarcasm.

Serafinowicz also offered to drop the whole matter if St. John would just admit that his penis is bent when in a state of arousal. “Then this is moot.”

Continue reading "Bent Penis Is Key To Case?" »

Yes, this is the subject of a lawsuit in Arizona. Nathan Thinnes sold his house to Glenn Melton, who bought it for his daughter, Kelly Zegers. Thinnes did not disclose that his neighbor was a REAL problem. When Melton discovered this, he asked Thinnes to take the house back, which he refused to do. An added twist, both seller Thinnes and buyer Melton are in the real estate business! So why is the neighbor a problem? As reported in The Arizona Republic:

One day, Melton's wife went to visit Zegers and witnessed the neighbor's behavior firsthand. When she called police to ask if there were any complaints, the officer found so many that he asked if the address was an apartment complex.

Melton learned that the neighbor had called 911 hundreds of times, saying that people were breaking in, or that her sister was shooting poison at their elderly mother's legs. Once, she met police at the door while holding a shotgun.

And just days before closing the house sale, the former owner called the police after he and his dog were pelted with potatoes the neighbor was throwing at unseen intruders in the oleander bushes between the two yards.

[After the shotgun encounter] the neighbor was handcuffed and taken away in a squad car and stayed away until after Zegers moved in.

"She screams and yells at people that are passing by," Melton said. "When my daughter's in the backyard, the neighbor's yelling at her and making verbal threats."

At least, don't fall asleep in Melissa Nadeau's class. Why not? Just ask Vinicios Robacher, a 15-year-old student in Danbury, Connecticut. When Vinicios crashed, Ms. Nadeau allegedly awoke him by slamming [the palm of] her hand down on his desk so hard that it injured his left eardrum! The boy's parents have filed papers with the Danbury town clerk, as the AP reported, which is "a prelude to a lawsuit." Here's the source.

A fella in Palo Pinto County Texas, known as "Bayou Bob," has been arrested for selling alcohol without a license. Not just any alcohol, mind you, but vodka with a rattlesnake in every bottle. It helps that Bob Popplewell is a rattlesnake rancher. When the police raided his ranch, they found 429 bottles of vodka with snakes in them. Bob's defense? It's an "ancient Asian elixir" that's medicinal, so it's not bootlegging.

How did he get busted? A complaint prompted an undercover buy. Who complained? Bayou Bob thinks it's the "tree-huggers." Why? Per the Star-Telegram:

Popplewell got crosswise with animal-rights groups last year when he shipped thousands of turtles to Asia, where turtle meat is considered a delicacy. He said the same "tree-hugging" activists are now pressuring the TABC to go after him.

Actually, Dayton, Ohio resident Tony Henderson only thought the woman he propositioned was a prostitute. Actually, she was a police officer. So what happened that fateful night in April 2006? As reported by the Court of Appeals of Ohio, Dayton Police officer Dyan Briggs was working as a prostitution decoy. She testified that

Mr. Henderson asked me if I was working, to which I replied I was. Mr. Henderson then stated, come on, and motions for me to follow him back across the street ... And I said what do you want. And he said I want to make love. And I said, okay, you want to have sex. What do I get. He said what do you get. I said, yeah, what do I get.

"He's like man, you sound like a cop. [Walk away, dude. Walk away.] I was like I'm not a cop. And he's like, well, I got some candy. [Doh!] And I said you have candy. And he said, yeah, I got candy. And I said what kind of candy do you have. He said bubble gum. I said what flavor. He said bubble gum. I said is it grape or what. And he said it's strawberry. I said is it sugarless.

"And he's like, fuck you. And I said, you offered me candy. And at that point Detective St. Clair drove up in his car and I believe he placed Mr. Henderson in a set of handcuffs."

I asked Mr. Henderson why he asked her, being Officer Briggs, for sex, and Mr. Henderson replied because she's a whore. And I asked why did you offer her bubble gum for sex, and Mr. Henderson replied because I have no money."

Continue reading "What Happens If You Offer Gum To A Prostitute?" »

Nor would you want to be, because many folks have died with lower blood-alcohol levels. Would it surprise you if a fraternity was involved? Or pledges? Five hours of drinking? Me either. Pledges to Beta Theta Pi at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania kicked off the pledging season with a bang. The brothers made sure of that. As reported in The Brown and White, the school's paper:

After dinner, all members of the pledge class were taken into the party room and offered shots of Old Crow whiskey for about one and a half to two hours. They were then taken into the chapter room and given champagne to drink out of the "loving cup," which is a ritual at the fraternity, according to a police affidavit.

What happened to the brothers? Per The Brown and White:

The hospitalizations, along with 14 citations for alcohol-related offenses that night resulted in Beta Theta Pi fraternity being suspended by both the university and its national headquarters. Of the 14 citations, 11 were given to freshmen for underage drinking.

Following the incident, Beta President, Andrew Edmonds, '09, was charged with one count of furnishing alcohol to a person who is under 21. As president, he is responsible for activities that occur at the fraternity.

So Sheila Brooks of Indianapolis put her one and three-year-old children in a tub with 9 inches of water and left the room to get some clothes. Per The Indianapolis Star:

"Daesheana [Brooks' seven-year-old daughter] stated that they were in her mother's bedroom watching American Idol on TV for several minutes and her mother suddenly stated that she forgot and left the two youngest children in the tub," Officer Gustavia Dodson wrote in the report.

Brooks told Daesheana to take the children out of the tub, police said. Daesheana found Sirius submerged and called for her mother.

Damn! As reported by the AP:

A man fighting with his girlfriend clung to a car roof and punched her through the window as she drove more than a mile on a busy road, hitting several other cars, police said.

Both were hurt in the brawl Saturday and were arrested, police Sgt. Manfredo Figueroa said.

The man, William Kremer, apparently jumped onto the car and held on as girlfriend Stacey Sperrazza wove along Route 202 with the car's air bag inflated, police said. She eventually stopped the car and hit him with it, police said.

Sperrazza, 37, of Stony Point, was arrested on a felony charge of reckless endangerment. Kremer, 42, of Haverstraw, was arrested on a misdemeanor assault charge.

He was treated for a foot injury, she for eye and head wounds, police said.

If nothing else, that's gotta bring some seriously bad karma. As reported by the AP,

Police [in Rogers, Arkansas] are conducting an internal investigation into an allegation that a lieutenant used his stun gun to shock a cow and shared a videotape of the incident with other department employees.

Police Chief Steve Helms said Tuesday the inquiry began after he received a complaint from the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. A letter dated Feb. 11 from PETA representative Stephanie Bell complained that Lt. David Mitchell filmed himself using the electronic stun device on the cow.

Bell said in the letter that Mitchell distributed the video as a joke among friends and co-workers and she notes that animal cruelty is a misdemeanor crime in Arkansas.

Helms didn't immediately return a call for comment on Wednesday. City Attorney Ben Lipscomb said Tuesday that the alleged incident happened 2 1/2 years ago, which would be beyond the statute of limitations for misdemeanors. Lipscomb said there would be no point in pursuing a criminal investigation.

Helms said a captain in the department will conduct the investigation and Mitchell will remain on regular duty.

Yup, according to a Staten Island judge. As reported by the AP:

The ruling this week lets stand charges that a 16-year-old broke the law when she sent friend requests on the social networking site to a woman and her two daughters.

Criminal Court Judge Matthew A. Sciarrino Jr. ruled that even though MySpace users can ignore, deny or block friend requests, "that request was still a contact, and no contact was allowed" by the temporary order of protection.

The defendant is charged with misdemeanor second-degree criminal contempt; a trial date has not been set. Her attorney has declined comment.

So this 52-year-old dude was growing pot in the loft of a house he owned with a 59-year-old woman. She dropped by the house to tell him to kill the weed. An argument ensued, after which she tried to tear down the wall that partitioned off the weed room. Uh oh. The dude [the couple is not identified "for legal reasons" per the Bundaberg NewsMail] went ballistic.

The woman testified that he grabbed her from behind and "... picked her up and dangled her over the loft's staircase before throwing her down the stairs."

"All of a sudden my body was looking down (from the top of the stairs). I was terrified," the woman told court. "He smashed my body with full force down the stairs. There was nothing I could do."

While outside she was allegedly punched several times and made to wait for hours before the man carried her by wheelbarrow to his car. The man then allegedly drove her to the Bundaberg Courthouse and made her wait in the car before taking her to the hospital.

Anthony Rentas, husband of Attorney Kathy Brewer Rentas, was sentenced to 90 days house arrest for violating his probation. Call it a hunch, but I don't think Ms. Rentas was thanking Assistant U.S. Attorney Jenifer Keene when she shook her hand after the hearing. Here's what went down, as reported by the AP (and brought to the Juice's attention by Ms. Cindy Hill):

A court security officer reported that Brewer Rentas shook Keene's hand so forcefully that the prosecutor's arm was nearly ripped out of its socket.

"With Keene in hand, Brewer made an upward, then a quick downward motion and pulled Keene toward the ground moving her forward, almost causing Keene to fall to the ground," Deputy U.S. Marshall Robert Kremenik Jr. wrote in an arrest report.

Brewer Rentas spent a night in jail and was freed Friday on $100,000 bail. She was ordered to stay away from Keene and undergo a psychological evaluation to determine whether she needs counseling.

Especially if you're doing it with a random nude body and your ex-girlfriend's head. Rustan Ang now knows this. As reported in the Philippine Daily Inquirer:

The Court of Appeals has affirmed a four-year prison term, P100,000 fine ($2,470 U.S.) and mandatory psychiatric treatment for a man who threatened to spread a pornographic picture with his ex-girlfriend's face on it after she rebuffed his attempts to rekindle their relationship.

... On June 5, 2005, Ang sent her a picture through her cell phone of a nude woman with her legs apart. The face was hers. The day before, Ang, who is married, asked her to be his textmate but she refused.She said her face was apparently lifted from a photo taken with Ang when they visited Baguio during their three-month relationship.

Ang warned her in a subsequent text message that it would be easy to post the pornographic picture on the internet, and asked if she wanted him to send more lewd pictures of her.

I think Representative Borris Miles will have a tough time explaining this (as reported by The Houston Chronicle):

... in December ... Miles crashed a party at the posh St. Regis Hotel. Party host David Harris said a drunken Miles shocked guests with loud, profane language before planting a Godfather-style "kiss of death" on his cheeks [and tried to grab his groin, per Mr. Harris], handing him a pistol and declaring,"You don't know what I'm capable of doing."

After proclaiming himself a "gangsta," Miles then allegedly kissed a female guest on the lips while her husband was away from the table.

Prosecutors are scrutinizing the episode. Meanwhile, the female recipient of Miles' unsolicited smooch filed a lawsuit seeking $1 million in damages and demanding the lawmaker be tested for HIV. A hearing is set for Feb. 15.

Posted by John Mesirow | Permalink | Email This Post

Posted In: Odd Cases

What would you do if your dog ate the food off your plate? Me and Devin Shane Calhoun, well sir, we'd shoot him. (Note to PETA, truly, I like dogs.) As for Mr. Calhoun, of Conifer Colorado, he definitely does not. As reported by UPI:

A Conifer, Colo., man faces up to 18 months in jail and a $5,000 fine after he pleaded guilty to shooting a dog for taking food from his plate.

A spokeswoman for the Jefferson County District Attorney's Office said Devin Shane Calhoun pleaded guilty to animal cruelty and prohibited use of a weapon, the Denver Post reported Tuesday.

Court documents quoted family members as saying Calhoun became enraged after the family dog, Lucky, took food from his plate while the man was outside. He then took the dog outside and shot him.

Lucky survived his gunshot wound. Calhoun is scheduled to be sentenced on March 12.

Sorry, no f-bombs. But, here's a little tale courtesy of John Browning of The Southeast Texas Record:

Father Luis Alfredo Rios of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Crystal Lake, Ill., was sued for making a "wrongful sermon" by one of his parishioners, Angel Llarona. Llarona left two voicemail messages for Father Rios complaining about the quality of his sermonizing.

The next Sunday, Father Rios allegedly played the voicemails for the congregation, and commented on Llaroma's effectiveness as someone in charge of religious education for the parish. The priest allegedly asked the congregants "what should we do, should we send him to hell or to another parish?" Now, Mr. Llarona wants at least $50,000.

Since the First Amendment precludes judges from inquiring into religious doctrine or belief, only a few courts have taken on such "wrongful sermon" cases.

In 2004, a New Mexico court rejected defamation claims against a priest who denounced the deceased at a funeral service. The judge wryly noted that churches have been "talking about sending people to hell for many a year. People aren't shocked by it."

Yes, electricity and sex occasionally cross paths, but this is insane. Toby Taylor (37) and his wife Kirsten Taylor (29) of York County, Pennsylvania apparently used a live electrical cord to sexually stimulate each other (according to Mr. Taylor). This time, though, the shock ended up giving Ms. Taylor a heart attack and killing her. Mr. Taylor was charged with involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment, and is free on $100,000 bail.

The German police pulled this guy over and gave him a breath test. The results? Ten times the legal limit! So they busted him for driving while intoxicated, right? Nope. He was riding down the road in his wheelchair! Was he charged? As reported in The Fayettesville Observer:

Police said that because the man was technically traveling as a pedestrian, he could not be charged with a driving offense.

“It’s not like we can impound his wheelchair,” the spokesman said. “But he is facing some sort of punishment. It’s just not clear yet what exactly that will be.”

If Alexander Yermilov is saying this, you should listen. If not, you might find yourself on the business end of an ax. As reported by UPI:

Prosecutors said a man in the Chita region of Russia killed two friends he found dismembering his pet dog so they could prepare a meal.

The regional branch of the Prosecutor General's Office said Alexander Yermilov took an ax to his friends whom he found butchering his Great Dane when he returned to his home in Natsigun in December, The Moscow Times reported Thursday.

After Yermilov struck Irina Maryasova and Nikolai Sedunov several times, killing them on the spot, he called the police and confessed, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said the reason why the two killed the dog or wanted to eat it was unknown.

Oregon elementary school teacher Elizabeth Lucinda Logan picked the wrong way to supplement her income. She stole a student's coat and sold it on eBay! As reported in the Hillsboro Argus, Judge Marco Hernandez called her behavior "bizarre."

He said it didn't make sense that someone of her intelligence would testify she immediately tried to get the coat back from the online auction site when she found out the coat might belong to a third-grade girl.

"As if it was lost in cyberspace somewhere," Hernandez said. "A teacher with a master's degree and 20 year's experience doesn't do that. She says 'let's go find the owner now and return it.'

"Your concern wasn't to return the coat to the correct owner, but to protect your record on eBay."

Judge Marco Hernandez ordered Elizabeth Lucinda Logan, 42, to perform 150 hours of community service over the next six months and serve 18 months of probation. She must also pay a little over $1,300 in court costs, fines and restitution. She is not to use online auctions during the probation period.

What did Canadian elementary school teacher Maria Pantalone do that resulted in her pleading guilty to assaulting a 12-year-old boy? Hint #1: She threw something at him. Hint #2: It was brown. Need another hint? Hint #3: It smells really, really bad. Yes, it was feces! And the kid was not even one of her students! Why did she do it? "I couldn't take it anymore. It was total, total frustration," she testified, as reported in the Toronto Star. The punishment? Zippy. No fine or jail time. She was suspended, but with pay. Her future as a teacher remains uncertain. Yes, there are several nagging questions: Where did she get the human feces? What could the kid possibly have done to drive her to do it? We're unlikely to find out because there is a publication ban to protect the minor's identity. Damn! Here's the article.

How's that? In 1988, Rhode Islander Paul Greider cracked Michael Trainor's skull. As a result, Trainor suffered permanent hearing loss. Although Greider escaped jail time (he got probation), in the civil suit, he was ordered to pay Trainor $1.5 million. The court ordered him to pay $400/month, which he hasn't been doing. He now owes almost $5 million! So the judge gave Greider a chance to catch up, ordering him to pay $3,000 to Trainor within 60 days (and $1,000 to his lawyer). Think he did it? Nope. 30 days in the hole, said the judge. Said Trainor's lawyer:

He got away without jail for the crime, but now he’s going to jail because he won’t pay the civil judgment imposed as a result of his crime. That’s a bizarre individual.

You live in Georgia, and you Lose a City Council election (the right to be in the run-off, actually) to a transgender candidate. Naturally (if you're Georgia Fuller, anyway), you sue for fraud. One small problem, Loser lady, City Coucil Member Michelle Bruce IS AN INCUMBENT. Doh! This doesn't stop Fuller from arguing that, as she calls him, "Michael Bruce," has an unfair advantage running as a woman! We're talking about a town of 12,000 people, which Michelle has been serving for 4 years! Said Michelle:

I'm Michelle. I'm the same Michelle they elected four years ago. They're just distracting the voters from the issues. Everybody in my district knows me, everyone in Riverdale knows me. I've done a real good job representing the people. I am for the people.

So is a 19th century mummified Maori head art or not? A museum in Rouen, France tried to return a Maori head to New Zealand. Guess who stopped them? The French Ministry of Culture! Who are you with? I'm with the Rouen officials who said, as reported in the International Herald Tribune, that:

...the Maori head is a body part, not a work of art, and that according to France's bioethics law it must be returned to its place of origin. "This object reflects the barbaric trafficking in body parts, the belief that another race was inferior to ours," said Catherine Morin-Desailly, the deputy mayor for culture and a senator, who proposed the return of the head. "It belongs to the heritage of humanity, not in storage somewhere in a museum."

Why not? Because she put them there! She reported that someone had drawn a swastika on her door FIVE times in one week. Before she was busted, what did the 18-year-old George Washington University freshman have to say about the incidents? As reported on NBC4.com:

[She] called it a bad joke gone too far. She said she is not scared, but after five incidents in a week, she said she wants it to stop.

The victim said she has only been on campus since August but has already developed a close-knit group of friends who have helped her through this.

These are 2 stone-cold dudes. Back in April 2004, Michael Lee Davis held a 17-year-old dog named Gizmo - like a football - and Chad Crawford kicked him. Gizmo died.

Crawford just went on trial. Do you think he was convicted of a felony or a misdemeanor? A misdemeanor! The crime he was convicted of - aggravated cruelty to an animal - is now a felony, but it wasn't in 2004. Incredibly, on the charge of intentionally killing an animal (a felony), the jury was deadlocked! Crawford will be sentenced on November 30th. Davis will be tried at a later date. For a story about a stone-cold British cat-kicker, click here.

Tru Dat. And exactly how did New York firefighters Michael Izzo and Richard Capece get caught setting a firehouse door on fire by pouring gasoline on it? By a surveillance camera! Either one of them is really stupid (the one who used to work at that firehouse!), or the surveillance camera was recently installed. Both men were charged with arson, and suspended without pay.

Maybe Christen Comer's lawyer read my prior post about the successful use of the "sleepwalking" defense by a killer. As reported in The Hamilton Journal-News:

[The victim, Chelsea] Rose testified she and Comer met at Hill Station Bar in the early morning hours of July 7, 2006. They went to Comer's apartment where they watched movies, read poetry and continued to drink until they fell asleep about 1 p.m.

Rose testified that when she woke up, Comer was on top of her growling like an animal and choking her. She said she struggled and gouged his eye, and Comer began biting her.

So Matt McChesney, a School Resource officer at a middle school in Mesa County Colorado, is just strolling the hall in his body armor. His WHAT? The school resource officer needs body armor? This is my first question at back-to-school night.

Anyway, at least one eighth-grade boy knows where the body armor stops, and the body begins. We know this because the kid stopped in front of McChesney, and drilled him - real hard - right below the armor-line. Said Mr. McChesney in his report:

This was not an accidental bump in the hallway. This deliberate punch was delivered with considerable force which knocked the breath out of my lungs.

Fifty-year old Jim Nelson had been living in a tent outside a ski resort in British Columbia. After fasting for 60 days to attain spiritual perfection, he bagged it, and went into town. When he reached an upscale home, he threw a rock through the window and made himself at home. In Court, here's what Mr. Nelson admitted to (in addition to breaking into the house):

He opened the presents looking for chocolates, raided the fridge and cupboards searching for delicacies, pigged out on cups of tea, chili, cream cheese and tortillas. He then puked and defecated in plastic bags before slipping into a stupor and curling up on the floor.

Your actions were disgusting and foul, certainly so far as the homeowner is concerned. But that kind of action in and of itself presents to me clear evidence that your mind was extremely troubled and that you should not be found guilty.

His name: Robert Brett-Deans. But, when asked by the judge to confirm his name, Brett-Deans replied:

Hang on, I have had a name change. I said this the last time we was here. For future reference, I have changed my name to The Jason.

I'm serious about everything I do. I am also a wizard of the Round Table and I am a master manipulator. In other words, I can do magic.

There will be no white flag going up on my ship and I will also help you all so I can put your minds at rest. I'm not playing games with you all. I do not play games.

In mythical terms, be careful in everything that you might do because you might just find yourselves opening Pandora's box and, as you might know, the only thing left in the box was hope.

What? You've never heard of "kick the kitty?" Perhaps that's because it was only recently invented by Nicola Collinson. To see how it's played, though, you'll need her cell phone because she made a video of herself doing it on her phone! Or, perhaps you know one of the people she sent her video to, one of whom sent it to the RSPCA.

What was in the video? Just Nicole picking up a kitten, throwing it into the air like a ball, and then drop-kicking it. And if that's not bad enough, she chased it down and punched it, and drop-kicked it again! Can you can guess her defense? She said she was drunk (I believe that) and doesn't remember anything (bullshit). Here's how the prosecutor described it:

This is what can only be described as a quite wicked case. It was only a kitten and it came (to her) looking for affection. It was suggested that at some stage it might have scratched (her) and that all this happened is really quite shocking.

This defendant took hold of the kitten and drop-kicked it, as if it were a rugby ball. The kitten got to it's feet and went away and it was chased by the defendant who picked it up again and brought it back and did the same thing again. Not only was it drop-kicked but it was also punched.

It was absolutely deliberate, there can be no suggestion it was accidental. And what makes this all the worse is that someone was making a video on a phone camera. You hear laughing and joking.

The video was then sent round to various friends bragging about what happened. But one person was so incensed that they sent a copy to the RSPCA who were able to track who made it.

Having looked at that video of what you did we seriously considered custody. It is appalling that any human can do such a thing to another animal. It is unthinkable and no excuses can be accepted. But we are going to ask for reports in the community band [? no clue]. We feel you are desperately in need of help.

I think it's safe to say that Ilinois Junior High School Special Education Teacher Patrick E. McCarthy won't be teaching again for quite some time, if ever. As reported in the Daily Herald, here's what he's been up to just this school year:

In one incident, McCarthy threw cookies and called a 12-year-old an obscenity after the student took a treat without asking, [Assistant State's Attorney] Palac told Cook County Judge Kay Marie Hanlon.

In another instance, Palac said, McCarthy became agitated with a non-verbal 12-year-old and shoved him face-first into a metal cabinet.

Another time, she said, he made a child put on a weighted vest and jump for 40 minutes straight on a trampoline, forcing him to keep going even when he began crying. The boy had bruises on his legs afterward, Palac said. His parents told police he later had a seizure.

McCarthy also tied a student to his chair with a jump rope, Palac said. The child was able to wriggle free, but McCarthy later got behind him, crisscrossed his arms, squeezed his cheeks and shoved his body against a wall, pressing his own body up against him, Palac said.

... [allegedly] during a service, and flashes a gun. Old Wendell Hollingsworth's alleged cohort, Ms. Smith, walked around the church with a bag, collecting the parishioners money and other valuables. Ms. Smith pleaded guilty, and got 7 years - 6 for the robbery, and 1 more for old Wendell's gun. Quite the crew. Now when Wendell was in court the other day ...

in a wheelchair, he started kicking his lawyer, to the extent that a deputy zapped him with a taser. Should have read his jacket more closely. Back in '92, Wendell popped his lawyer, to the tune of 8 stitches. Restraints anyone? Or maybe his next lawyer ought to consider a preemptive pop, just to establish who's going to be doing the poppin' from now on.

I could not make this shit up! [Sorry.] A priest in Morganfield, Kentucky is suing Shithead's owner and the city for allowing the dog to be buried near a veteran's memorial. It's not the name that upsets Father Gerald Baker: "What are we saluting? A flagpole with a monument to the dog? It's offensive. Any Christian, any American should understand why this is offensive."

Shithead's owner, Judy Hagan, (an American, and maybe a Christian too!) feels otherwise: "What right does he have to come to this town and put somebody else down for something they have done that he knows nothing about. It's not a disgrace. I didn't do it for a disgrace. If that's the way people wanna take it, then that's their problem."

Said Father Baker: "This woman in her arrogance and her ignorance, demanding she has the right do this? Well we'll just see." Yes, we will. You'd think this just happened, right? Nope. Shithead was laid to rest, with the city's permission, in 1999. You can read more in a FirstCoastNews.com article here.

Peeping Tom Dennis Sanders did his time (for secretly videotaping a woman and a teenage girl in their bedrooms and bathrooms), now he wants his porn back! When he was busted in San Rafael, California in 2002, in addition to seizing the illegal materials, police also seized 500 legal porn videos, and 250 legal magazines. Sanders, who was just released, asked for his collection back. Nope, said the police. So Sanders lawyered up, and sued the city. According to his lawyer, the videotapes alone are worth more than $10,000. Sweet fancy moses! The Judge said he would have to review each tape in Chambers before making a decision. Okay, I made that last part up. The matter is currently pending in the Marin County Superior Court.

Kathleen Jennings, age 19, is getting hosed. This young lady is no reprobate. She is a Cub Scout leader who works with disabled children! And she is an A student, and is studying math at Manchester University. She's never been in any trouble before. She is now, and here's why: While riding the train, she put the tips of her flip-flops on the unoccupied seat in front of her. Said the big bad railway man: "Are you comfortable?" She immediately put her feet down. Not good enough.

Ms. Jennings was charged with “wilfully interfering with the comfort or convenience” of other rail passengers. Actually, I'd say that's what the railway man did. Just to reinforce the kind of young lady we're talking about, this was her reaction upon being charged:

I was crying my eyes out. I am not the sort of person who would do anything wrong. I have never been in trouble before and, working with children, I do not want a criminal record.

And Ms. Jennings is not alone. Since the "no feet on the seats" policy was implemented in February 2007, the company operating the trains, Merseyrail, has taken about 250 people to court! Mercy! (You can read more here.) And if you want to read about another scofflaw who was busted under this 120-year-old rule, click here.

Kuo Rong-hui has done a lot of jail time. There's only one problem - he's not a criminal! So why would Kuo plead guilty, numerous times, to all these crimes? And then serve jail time for the crimes? In two words, money and hemophelia. See, Kuo would take the fall for payoffs from the real perps. Then, once in jail, he would reveal that he is a hemopheliac, and the authorities would release him! Seems the prisons didn't want to pay the $1,800 in meds required to treat Kuo's hemophelia.

The scheme unraveled when Kuo tried to take the hit for a co-defendant, and the Judge became suspicious. Interesting career path, huh? You can read more here.

This poor woman, Philly family court Judge Lisa Richette, is really having a tough time. At right is her son, Lawrence Richette, who was arrested for assaulting his 78-year-old mother. Yup, that's Lawrence on the right there, letting it all hang out. Said Mr. Richette: "This is what I think of TV news."

As for Judge Richette, here are a few other incidents she's been on the receiving end of:

While sitting in her car last August, she was punched by a woman who said the Judge hit her vehicle (which Judge Richette denied).

A purse snatcher punched her and knoced her down in January 2005.

She was beaten and robbed in February 1987.

Hawaiian mom Ijeva Matavele had not been pleased when her 14-year-old daughter failed 2 classes. The girl agreed to get tutoring, and things ... did not improve. As reported in the Honolulu Advertiser by Ken Kobayashi:

The daughter... skipped tutoring classes and hung out with friends. On the day her report card was due, the daughter — even though she was reminded by the mother to bring it home — said she forgot it at school, but eventually disclosed her grades included four C's, one D and one incomplete.

When the mother demanded to know why the grades hadn't improved, the daughter refused to answer. The mother then grabbed a plastic backpack containing a school folder and jacket and hit the daughter on the left arm as the girl tried to block the blow.

The daughter disclosed she had not been going to tutoring. When the mother demanded to know where she had gone instead, the girl refused to answer, prompting the mother to hit her with a plastic hanger about five times.

When the girl said she had been hanging out with friends, the mother felt deceived, got a small car brush and hit the daughter on the top of the left hand and on the knuckles with a plastic handle of a tool.

Continue reading "You Do Not Want To Bring Home A Bad Report Card To This Woman" »

Regular Juice visitors will recall this story, and this one too, about folks who claimed to have done things in their sleep. To read about a series of crimes alleged to have been committed while the perpetrator was sleeping, click here. You will be amazed at the crimes, and the results of the use of the automatism defense.

Lindsay Smith, a senior banker in the UK, was accused of cheating during a golf match, and was suspended from the Nairn Golf Club for a year. Of course, a decision of such tremendous importance was not made lightly. Evidence was presented to the appropriate committee at The Club. Declining to appear in person, Mr. Smith instead presented his side - that is, HIS LAWYER DID, in writing.

In an attempt to clear his name, which instead smeared it around the world, Mr. Smith took his suspension to court, claiming that it breached "the rules of natural justice." Cruel, cruel world. The court ruled that proper procedures were followed. Case closed. Oh, and Mr. Smith has been accused of cheating in a similar fashion twice before (no, not the hand wedge, but after marking his ball on the green, placing it closer to the hole than it had been). He came this close from losing his job, too. That would have given him plenty of time to practice his putting. You'll find the rest of the story here.

So, back in 2001, Canadian Waddah Mustapha saw a fly in a bottle of water THAT HE DID NOT DRINK FROM. Nevertheless, Mustapha claimed that he was so traumatized by the event that:

The fear of flies he developed killed his sex life.

He has nightmares about flies.

He lost his sense of humor.

Drinking coffee is difficult because it contains ... WATER!

Getting in the shower makes him anxious.

Old Mr. Mustapha sued Culligan of Canada, who bottled the water, and .......... won! $341,775 (Canadian). Not so fast, though. Culligan appealed and won. But wait, Mustapha appealed and .... won! The Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Mustapha may appeal to have his damages reinstated. You can read more here. And if you're thinking about the McDonald's coffee case, that was REAL.

An English teacher (a teacher in England, that is) was fired, she claimed, because she is a Wiccan (a self-described "white witch"). But her boss says it was because of her poor attendance record. The teacher, Ms. De La Rosa, was hired to cover for sick teachers. Only one problem - she was off 21.5 days during her first 6 months on the job. And according to her boss, her attendance rate was 20%, equivalent to working one day a week during the school year. Her boss also said she had to bring in someone to cover for the coverer!

What do you think the unemployment tribunal decided? We'll never know, because the matter was settled after the hearing. You can read more, including Ms. De La Rosa's side of the story, here and here.

This is the case of an unbelievable prick, and an incredibly vulnerable, naive victim. Scotland resident John Irvine, a 63-year-old married man, is a retired car mechanic. He managed to convince a 38-year-old Portuguese woman, through 50 e-mails that he translated into Portuguese on the internet, that he was an agent for the English Secret Police. He then convinced her that her family in Portugal would be killed if she didn't follow the orders in the e-mails - to engage in sex acts with Irvine. He also told her, through the e-mails, that she would be killed if she tried to leave Scotland.

She considered suicide, but instead went to the police, who charged Irvine with multiple counts of rape. His defense? It was a game, and she knew it. Irvine pleaded guilty to repeated indecent assault. He will be sentenced next month.

Yes, I'm afraid it's true, much to the dismay of British Royal Navy Chaplain Mark Sharpe. So horrified was the chaplain by the "offensive and illegal" porn DVDs he says were shown on the ship, and all that sex talk, that he left the ship just 2 weeks into his training course. (continued below) He didn't go quietly though. He claimed that he had to leave the navy due to sexual harassment and religious discrimination. And he wanted money. And he got it! The Royal Navy settled with him, and admitted that Mr. Sharpe was exposed to a degree of sexual harassment. You can read more here.

Yup. As Miami Herald reporter Fred Grimm so artfully described it:

Jenne, as sheriff and chief jailer in Broward County, has launched a crackdown on self-abusing miscreants. It's no longer enough to warn hairy-palmed drooling deviants that self-indulgence risks stunted growth, blindness, sallow skin, slackened jaws, amnesia, shrunken testicles, impotence and, for Catholics in particular, eternal damnation. Jenne wants jail time.

Canadian Arnold Sanderson worked at a dairy plant for 12 years, and left the job 20 years ago. Ever since, he has held a grudge against several former co-workers, who he accused of tormenting him and "teasing, pranks, that sort of thing." Sanderson became so obsessed with his former co-workers, especially Shawn Smith, that he never recovered. Since leaving the dairy, he has not had a full-time job.

In a nod to the more than 200 million guns in the U.S., ten years after he left the dairy, Sanderson said "if I lived in the States, I would be up for murder." Well, the NRA ("Guns don't kill people, people kill people.") must just love this case.

Last year, Sanderson was taking his dog to the veterinarian when he happened to see Smith out jogging. Sanderson crossed into oncoming traffic, drove up on the sidewalk, and struck and killed Smith.

Sanderson plead guilty, and was sentenced to life in prison, though he is eligible for parole in 10 years. (To read more, click here.)

Truth. The Atwoods owned their Louisiana home outright since 1968. It was tax exempt, but that changed. Only problem is, the couple's address changed when a 911 system was put in place. So the $1.63 tax bill sent to them in 1996 was returned to the Sheriff's Office, which put the house up for auction at a tax sale, and sold it for $1.63, plus 10 cents interest, and $125 in court costs. All this, despite the fact that the Atwoods are right there in the phone book!

This all happens without the Atwoods even knowing about it! They had a $90,000 offer for the house in 2002, but couldn't sell it because of litigation surrounding the tax sale. (The Atwoods are trying to get it nullified.) Then Katrina hit, causing serious damage to the house. Well, the Atwoods won at the trial level, and on appeal, but the case is being appealed to the Louisiana Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Ms. Atwood lives in a FEMA trailer in front of the house, while her 71-year-old husband, who is on a respirator, lives with relatives. They didn't have insurance, and don't qualify for programs to fix the house because they don't have clear title. $1.63!!! If you want to read more, click here.

I read this story and thought, hmmm, this sounds familiar. In a nutshell, 25-year-old Illinois resident Louis Peacock told his 69-year-old dad he was possessed by demons, and that he wanted his dad to kill him, and then cut off his head! So Louis took the pills, and when dad couldn't find a bat, he conked Louis on the head with a crow bar. This woke Louis up! He then told dad to leave. Dad did - and went to the police. Louis lived, denied that the whole thing ever happened ("A" for loyalty, anyway), and wouldn't allow photographs of his injuries to be taken.

Meanwhile, dad plead guilty to aggravated battery, with a 30-day jail sentence, 30 months conditional release, and court costs. Not so fast, said Judge James Stewart, to dad's lawyer:

This kind of behavior is so bizarre. Your client is nuts and needs a mental health evaluation.

From the case of Salinero v. Pon, 124 Cal.App.3d 120, 177 Cal. Rptr. 204 (1981):

The owner of a six-story apartment building hired an independent contractor, the plaintiff's employer, to wash the windows of the building. No safety devices - from which window washers could be suspended - had been installed on the building. So the owner and the contractor agreed that the windows would be washed by means of a ladder extended over the edge of the roof from which the workers would be suspended in a boatswain's chair secured to the roof by a weighted sand bag. Brilliant! While the plaintiff was suspended in the chair some 35-40 feet above the ground, a fellow worker mistakenly removed the sand bag anchoring the plaintiff's chair, causing him to fall and suffer injury.

lost!

For real. MCA Records put out a song called "Barbie Girl."(If you haven't heard the song, lucky you. Not only does it SUCK, it becomes stuck in your head.) Anyway, it doesnt' paint poor little Barbie in the best light, so Mattel sued MCA for using Barbie's name without permission. MCA then agreed to place the following language on the album: the song is "social commentary and not created or approved by the makers of the doll."

MCA's response: fuhgeddaboutit. "It's akin to a bank robber handing a note of apology to a teller during a heist. It neither diminshes the severity of the crime nor does it make it legal." MCA's response? Not pleased with Matell's use of the words "bank robber," "heist," "crime," or "theft," they countersued for defamation!

The Judge ultimately found for MCA Records, and offered this little nugget: "The parties are advised to chill." The case is Mattel v. MCA Records, 296 F.3d 894 (9th Cir. 2002).