Some days this job is like shooting fish in a barrel.
What days would those be, you ask.
Well my curious friend, days like the ones when some numbnuts walks in off the street and tries to rob a police station spring immediately to mind.
18-year-old Keithan Manuel's attempt went exactly as just about anyone but him would have expected, which means he's in jail now.
When reached for comment there, Manuel explained his actions thusly.
Manuel, in Dallas County Jail on several charges, including burglary, claims he visited the police station seeking information on a warrant, and was joking about the holdup, telling KTVT-TV, Dallas-Fort Worth, "I play like that all the time. I didn't think she would take it seriously."
Of course. You know how flippant those police types are about threats and crime.
Oh and Keithan, when somebody in that there jail tells you to be mindful of that whole soap thing. Yeah, that person isn't playing around the way you do.
Two Indiana parents are facing felony child neglect charges after they allegedly drove around with their respective children tied to the hood of a car with a yellow tow strap, police report.
The children--aged 4, 5, 6, and 7--were not harmed during the bizarre incident late yesterday afternoon in Fort Wayne.
The car’s driver, Aaron Stefanski, 29, is the biological father of three of the children. He was arrested on drunk driving and child neglect charges. Passenger Jessica Clark--the mother of the fourth child strapped to the vehicle--was busted for child neglect.
As was the case when last this happened, the kids were tied to the car not as some strange form of punishment, but rather because some drunken adults thought it'd be fun. Or as Stefanski explained it to the nice officer, "I thought they would like it."
Newsflash: Kids like alot of things they shouldn't. That's why adults exist. Well that and because without them there would be no more kids, but you see where I'm heading.
Oh, and this is nice.
A search of the vehicle turned up the tow strap and a "pink backpack that appeared to belong to a juvenile." The backpack contained "two 24oz Magnum cold beers."
No word on whether the beer also belonged to the juvenile, but my money's on yes. Come on, you know all of the screaming for help that would go with being tied to a hood for too long would really dry a kid out.
"Yikes," you're thinking to yourself. "Those poor girls! What sort of drunken maniac drives that far off the street and hits a couple of poor, innocent kids?"
The answer, I'm sorry to report, is nobody.
What that headline there fails to mention is that these two nimrods were tanning in the middle of the road, fell asleep and were driven over by a fellow who is reported to be a cousin of one of them.
The video at the link above should play automatically, which is nice since I am currently as bereft of words as these kids are of clue.
I realize that this is completely stupid and dangerous and that I might have to murder somebody who tried it with my kid especially given the condition they were in at the time, but the kid part of me still thinks it would be pretty awesome and fun.
The grandparents of a seven-year-old Florida girl were arrested yesterday after they allegedly got drunk and used their SUV to tow the child while she was seated in a plastic Hot Wheels car.
Paul Berloni, 49, and Belinda Jean Berloni, 47, were busted Sunday afternoon after a sheriff’s deputy spotted them pulling the girl’s toy car, which was attached to the SUV by a pair of dog leashes. The child, who was not injured, was only wearing a swimsuit “and had no protective gear on whatsoever,” according to a Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office report.
A deputy estimated that the Hot Wheels car was traveling between 5-10 miles per hour when a traffic stop was executed. Paul Berloni, who was driving the SUV, reeked of booze, had watery and bloodshot eyes, and his speech was “slowed and slurred.” When asked for his driver’s license, Berloni said that it was “revoked for 10 years for a DUI.”
Belinda Berloni was riding in the vehicle’s cargo area “with the rear hatch open cheering the child on as she was being pulled behind the vehicle.” Berloni--who a deputy noted was also drunk--stated that “it was dangerous to drag a child behind the vehicle,” but that “they were just having fun and had been doing this all day.”
If you're looking for some babysitting work, I have a funny feeling that a position may have just opened up.
Grandma and Grandpa have both been slapped with child cruelty charges, and Grandpa, as you might expect, also got dinged for drunk driving and driving with a suspended licence.
The only ones I don't remember ever hearing about are Robert Phillips and Joe Hunt, and Hunt is number 1 on the list for good reason. Astounding reason really, especially for a guy who is supposedly that bright.
Until you ponder it for half a second, drilling a hole in the floor of the apartment above a store you want to rob might seem like a good idea. You can drop down, take what you want and then hoist yourself up again. No alarm, no suspicious breaking in or hiding in the store until it closes. It's perfect.
Well...not so much, at least not in the case of young Nicholas Pellon here. Hey. Pellon, that kind of rhymes with felon. Just sayin'.
What our 25-year-old thefting friend failed to consider was...just about everything, come to think of it.
For starters, who do you suppose lives in one of those apartments right above the store? Sure he busted into the place next door to his to drill his entry hole, but still.
Ahh yes, the entry hole. It worked great as an entry hole, but it proved to be a poor exit since Pellon was unable to climb up the same rope he used to drop down. I shouldn't make too much fun since I was always shit at the rope climb too, but I was just bad at it in gym class. I never thought to plan a burglary that hinged on skills I didn't have.
Unable to use his escape hatch, he frantically ran around trying doors for a while before eventually finding a way out through the basement with $150 worth of cigarettes. All of this, as you may have already guessed, was captured on the store's security cameras, which he also mustn't have thought about.
Pellon was easy to identify from the videos because not only does he live in the same building as the store, but he's also a regular there and even has a tab with the owner. Not for much longer, I reckon.
Um...uh...er...Wholly freakin crap! What text message could possibly be more important than safely landing a 220 seat airbus, Mr. Pilot?
The problems aboard JQ57 began when the co-pilot, the first officer, switched off the autopilot on the 220-seat Airbus A320 to make preparations to land.
Somewhere between 2500 feet and 2000 feet, the captain's mobile phone started beeping with incoming text messages, and the captain twice did not respond to the co-pilot's requests.
The co-pilot looked over and saw the captain "preoccupied with his mobile phone", investigators said. The captain told investigators he was trying to unlock the phone to turn it off, after having forgotten to do so before take-off.
At 1000 feet, the co-pilot scanned the instruments and felt "something was not quite right" but could not spot what it was.
At this stage the captain still did not realise the landing gear had not been lowered, and neither pilot went through their landing checklist.
At 720 feet, a cockpit alert flashed and sounded to warn that the wheels still hadn't been lowered.
At 650 feet, the captain moved the undercarriage lever "instinctively" but then a "too low" ground-warning alarm sounded as the plane sunk through 500 feet, indicating the landing gear was not fully extended and locked.
The co-pilot was confused by the captain's action in lowering the wheels, as he was getting ready to do quite the opposite to abort the landing and re-ascend to the skies, investigators said.
Neither spoke to each other about their intentions.
At 392 feet, the crew aborted the landing and powered up the thrust.
At this time the pilots had lost track of their altitude, thinking they were much higher, at about 800 feet.
A further piloting error occurred, with the wrong flap setting during the ascent.
When the mistakes were recreated in a simulator, investigators determined there were two minutes of descent, from 2800 feet to 1000 feet, where the pilots failed to take any necessary actions, including putting the wheels down.
Thankfully things turned out ok and nobody was killed. But really, who does that? And why am I not seeing anything about a firing in here?
Get some help, man. You clearly have a text addiction problem.
Ug. Just...seriously. Say these kids are young all you want, but that's no excuse. Us smart ones had this train shit nailed down at the exact moment mom and dad taught us about looking both ways for cars. The thought process went a little something like this: Oh damn, those things move fast. Ok, I'll be sure not to fuck with them.
The video was taken on a stretch of CN rail line near 16th Avenue Public School in Richmond Hill, north of Toronto.
The CBC viewer captured two pieces of video, taken moments apart. They show two children, who appear to be no older than 12, playing a dangerous game with passing CN freight trains.
In the first video, one youngster "plays chicken" with an approaching train, stepping off the tracks seconds before it passes at high speed.
In the second piece of video, two children — including one from the first video — touch a slow-moving train as it passes in the opposite direction on an adjacent track.
If you click the link not only can you see the videos, but you can read all sorts of other mind boggling stupidity about how yes this shortcut is unsafe but I save 15 minutes by using it and yeah, let's keep hacking open the fence the train people keep fixing. surely there's no reason why they don't want us there.
If it weren't for the knowledge that some poor sap will have to clean your guts off the tracks and that it would slow down the days of innocent people when the trains have to stop, I'd wish death upon you all.
I'll admit it. I could stand to lose a few pounds. A few more than a few, to be completely honest. But if this is what I'd have to resort to to do it, I'll happily remain my jolly, slightly doughy self.
Brides-to-be looking to shed that final 10, 15 or 20 pounds in order to fit into their dream wedding gown have taken a controversial approach to crash dieting that involves inserting a feeding tube into their noses for up to 10 days for a quick fix to rapid weight loss.
The K-E diet, which boasts promises of shedding 20 pounds in 10 days, is an increasingly popular alternative to ordinary calorie-counting programs. The program has dieters inserting a feeding tube into their nose that runs to the stomach. They're fed a constant slow drip of protein and fat, mixed with water, which contains zero carbohydrates and totals 800 calories a day. Body fat is burned off through a process called ketosis, which leaves muscle intact, Dr. Oliver Di Pietro of Bay Harbor Islands, Fla., said.
Nope, doesn't sound unsafe at all. Not even the part where you're not hungry and don't eat for 10 days while you're traipsing around with your drip bag. Sure there are the small matters of feeling so lethargic that you can't go for a 30 minute walk, constipation due to lack of fibre and the warning that you shouldn't do this if you have kidney problems, but who cares as long as you look nice, right?
This sounds like a 1000 Ways To Die segment just waiting to happen. They wouldn't even have to write an annoying person backstory because we already have one. Seriously, just listen to this woman.
"I don't have all of the time on the planet just to focus an hour and a half a day to exercise so I came to the doctor, I saw the diet, and I said, 'You know what? Why not? Let me try it. So I decided to go ahead and give it a shot," she said.
Schnaider said she was never hungry throughout the 10 days she was on the K-E diet, but admits that it still wasn't easy.
"It was emotionally difficult, the 10 days of not eating," Schnaider said. "And sometimes I had to give excuses to people who were asking are you sick? And I was like, 'No, I'm not sick, I'm not dying, I'm fine.'
"I was tired. I didn't feel like exercising. The doctor told me that if you can compliment with walking for a half an hour on the beach, that would be great, but I didn't feel like doing that. I'm a very energetic person, but those days I was a little tired."
I don't know who I want to stab in the eye more after reading that, me or her.
Actually wait, it's definitely her. Her and anybody else willing to part with $1,500 for this. Those walks you're too drained for and not eating like shitcrap are much cheaper alternatives. And unless you get hit by a car or choke on something, they won't kill you, either.
This is exactly why you're supposed to study *before* the test and not *during* it!
An unidentified Milwaukee bank robber's day started out well. He got into the bank, got some cash and started to make his escape. Things went downhill dramatically when he ran into the path of a couple of police officers, but he wasn't about to let that stop him, at least not until they caught up to him a few blocks away.
Maybe he should go back to whatever store sold him that tome and see if they have any copies of "How To Dig My Dumb Ass Out of the Impossible Hole Your Last Book Buried Me In" lying around.
Ya know, in my old story about the blunder in the Croatian national anthem where an opera singer belted out a line about having a penis that was a mountain, I said that if something laughable happens during the singing of the national anthem, we should just laugh it off. Well, in the case of what happened to Kazakhstan, I take that all back.
You see, the organizers at the Arab Shooting Championships in Kuwait failed at research. I guess when they tried to look up the anthem for Kazakhstan, they found the spoof anthem that was in the movie "Borat". Thinking that was the real anthem, they had it at the ready if the country won a gold medal.
...
which it did
...
and they played the spoof anthem
...
and the good folks of Kazakhstan are justifiably angry.
Considering that my afternoon yesterday was highlighted by a distracted guy roaring out of a bank, ploughing into me, kicking me in the bad ankle and bending the hell out of my white cane as he fell on his face, it's kind of funny that the first thing I see when I start looking for post ideas again is the story of Bonnie Miller.
Miller, as so many do these days, decided it was just fine to walk around while texting. Unfortunately for her, her chosen path was the South Pier in St. Joseph, Michigan and her destination, whether she liked it or not, wound up being the lake at the end of it.
Police arrived on the scene about 9:30 PM Monday and pulled the 45-year-old woman to safety. Another woman had already jumped in to help, but it's not noted if she needed to be rescued as well.
Believe it or not, John Jardini isn't the first guy to try this particular pick-up trick. This sort of thing has happened before.At least twice, actually.
Jardini allegedly took $60 from a girl he confronted on Brownsville Road and Nobles Lane.
She had just gotten off a bus and was waiting for her mother.
After the robbery, Jardini called the woman on his cell phone twice, asking her if she had a boyfriend and if she wanted to go out with him.
Police got a search warrant for Jardini’s phone records and were on the verge of tracking him down, but then Jardini reportedly assaulted the same girl and her mother outside Zack’s Market on Brownville Road.
Obviously, the only one who ended up getting picked up that night was Jardini, by police who arrested him at the scene. Their date went so well they plan on keeping him around for a trial.
This site and many others are full of stories about dumb things criminals have posted on Facebook. It's gotten to the point where it's almost not weird or funny anymore, so we let a lot of them slip bye without comment.
But every now and then you run across a Steven Mulhall. A thief who's not content to go unmentioned and will seemingly take just about anything to make sure his name gets out there.
Mulhall was in court last month answering to some misdemeanour theft charges when he decided he'd snag himself a little souvenir to take home. His choice? The nameplate from the courtroom door of Judge Michael Orlando.
So proud was Mulhall of his new possession that he just had to get a picture of himself posing with it. And it's at this point where I announce that we can prove conclusively that stupid is in fact contagious. I don't know if Steven Mulhall has a Facebook page of his own, but his girlfriend does. And for reasons known only to them, her page quickly became that picture's new home. An anonymous tip later, the crime was solved and the county jail once again became Mulhall's new home.
His girlfriend hasn't been charged with anything yet and may not be, since there may be no way to prove that she did anything other than post a foolish photo of somebody else. Mulhall, on the other hand, is now facing felony charges. It would have been a misdemeanour, but because of his history, the theft of something valued at $40 is being treated much more seriously.
Next time, and there will be a next time, just write the judge's name down if remembering it is that important. And don't forget to bring your own paper so you don't have to snatch any. We'd hate to give off the vibe that you're a habitual offender.
Here's a post that most definitely needs itself a soundtrack.
36-Year-old Michael Harper has been sentenced to a year in prison for an attempted metal theft at a power substation in Leicester, England. But that's small potatoes compared to the sentence of life long disfigurement he received while the crime was in progress.
Remember how your mom and dad used to always tell you to make sure you go to the bathroom before you head out? Well, either Harper's family didn't get around to imparting that life lesson or he's a terrible listener. Whatever went wrong, he found himself faced with the when ya gotta go, ya gotta go reality at a most inopportune moment. Doing the only thing he could, he unzipped and let fly...right onto an electrical transformer.
2,000 Homes and businesses were left without power thanks to the subsequent explosion, and Harper was left burning on the floor by Richard Boyce, his ever so helpful accomplice.
for his part in the incident, Boyce was sentenced to 4 years. Not sure why the sentences were so much different, but perhaps there was a feeling that having his nuts grilled to a crisp was almost punishment enough for poor Mr. Harper.
There's not a whole lot more I can say about this, so if anybody needs me, I'll be wiping the tears out of my eyes and trying to pry my legs back open.
I may be wrong, but I always thought one of the first rules of the break and enter was make sure you have an easy way in so you don't end up like this kid.
Northern Ireland police say a passing patrol spotted the 17-year-old wrestling to free himself from a house's front door before sunrise Thursday. They say he had tried to reach the door's inner lock via the letterbox flap but his arm became hopelessly trapped.
Firefighters dismantled the door but left the letterbox clamped to the boy's arm until they reached a police station, where it was safely removed.
Police didn't release the boy's name because he hasn't yet been charged with a crime.
I post this mainly because I find it amusing and it fits in with what we do here, but also because any excuse to watch this video again is good enough for me.
It's always nice to hear stories of people with disabilities getting into new fields and breaking new ground. Well, maybe not always.
The Chevron clerk told police that 22-year old John Christopher Champion, who was wearing a Gators hat and Gators sweatshirt, had been going in and out of the store for several hours in his motorized wheelchair. Just before 10 p.m., the clerk said Champion piloted his chair behind the counter and demanded cash from the register as he brandished a pocket knife.
The 54-year old clerk said she fought back and in her struggle with Champion she stabbed him three times in the leg before he overpowered her. He then allegedly rolled out of the store with a 12-pack of beer and a roll of electrical tape.
but he didn't get far.
When police arrived, they didn't have to look too hard to find him. They caught up with him behind the store, where his wheelchair had gotten stuck in the sand. He was drinking one of the Bud Light Limes he admitted to taking in the heist. Interestingly, he admitted to stealing from the store, but not robbing it. Not sure how that one's going to hold up in court.
Champion also told police that he had encouraged the clerk to hit the alarm because nobody would arrest a handicapped person. He now has armed robbery and aggravated battery charges plus a stay in the Levy County jail that say different.
Let's just go right ahead and file this one under stuff you'll never ever catch me doing and stuff nobody should ever, ever try.
I sure hope this is fake, but so far I've found nothing to suggest it is. So since it's not, what you've just seen is a video of some dumbfuck shooting himself point blank in the gut with a 10MM Glock to test his bulletproof vest. Yes, really.
When you're on the run, little things you should remember to do are sometimes going to fall through the cracks. You're in a hurry, you're in a panic and people in that state sometimes forget things. But no matter what, you should always...always(!) make sure you have enough gas in the car to get you to where you need to be.
The Wyoming Highway Patrol said Tuesday that Richard Vincent of Prineville, Ore., was wanted in Georgia for violating parole on a murder and escape conviction.
Vincent called the Uinta (YOO'-ihn-tah) County Sheriff's Office who sent state troopers to help him out. When they learned that Vincent had an outstanding felony warrant from Atlanta, he was taken into custody.
So...this place sure has been hopping lately, eh? Yeah...about that. I'm sorry. Really, I am. But to be honest, it can't be helped, and I can't say when it's going to get better.
I don't want to get into a whole lot of specifics, so I'll leave it at this: There are a few things going on around here that are making dick jokes, bad music, random videos and stories about retarded people doing even more retardeder things seem much less important than usual. To those of you who know what's been happening, thanks for the support. To the rest of you, hang in there. We're not trying to be lazy asses, That's just how it's had to be for a while.
By the way, remind me never to have a sleep-related brain snap around the same time as a very stressful ongoing event. It doesn't end well, I'm finding.
Now...what can I tell you that you might not already know?
If you're Vince Russo, you most definitely do not know how cocksuckingly horrible you are at your job about 98% of the time. You may, however, be aware of the celebrations being thrown by wrestling fans upon hearing the news that you've finally been relieved of it. If anything was going to make me feel happy enough to write again at least for a moment, it's this.
"TNA and Vince Russo have mutually parted ways as of this week. The separation is amicable and professional. We are glad for the opportunity to have worked together and wish each other nothing but good luck and success in the future."
Here's to success meaning that he opens up another video store and stays away from the wrestling business he's helped ruin for good. Good riddance to whatever it is that books worse than bad rubbish.
If you're WWE, you have no idea how sad I am and how much I kind of hate you guys right now for taking the Funkasaurus away from me. He was different and he was fun, both things that your product mostly hasn't been in years. Oh well, at least we'll always have the memories.
Somebody call my mama!
If you're the Earl Witty responsible for running the RIDE program, you could, pending the results of the current investigation, soon learn that showing up to work while on the sauce might sound fun on paper, but really isn't all it's cracked up to be. Not very witty of you if I may say so, officer.
And finally, if you're lots of people, you might not know that the 6Dot Braille Labeler that Carin made mention of a while ago is out of the development stage and ready to be ordered! On the list of blind folk gadgets I'd like to own, this one ranks pretty high. I'm saying this sight unseen, by the way. Yes, I do hear you chuckling at that, sighted person. Carry on.
And for now, I think I'm going to make that everything. You all should be well and learned up now, I hope. We'll try to check in soon, whenever that is.
