`A Malaysian man was left perched atop a seven-meter (23-foot) billboard for nearly seven hours after an accomplice who was helping him steal its spotlight fled the scene, reports said.
His partner in crime ran off — carrying both the light and the ladder — when police spotted the pair in a southern Kuala Lumpur suburb early Sunday, the Star daily reported.
But he refused to come down, swinging at would-be rescuers with a steel rod during nearly seven hours of negotiations with authorities.’
`There is very little that sums up the record of the U.S. Congress in the Bush years better than a half-mad boy-addict put in charge of a federal commission on child exploitation. After all, if a hairy-necked, raincoat-clad freak like Rep. Mark Foley can get himself named co-chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, one can only wonder: What the hell else is going on in the corridors of Capitol Hill these days?
These past six years were more than just the most shameful, corrupt and incompetent period in the history of the American legislative branch. These were the years when the U.S. parliament became a historical punch line, a political obscenity on par with the court of Nero or Caligula — a stable of thieves and perverts who committed crimes rolling out of bed in the morning and did their very best to turn the mighty American empire into a debt-laden, despotic backwater, a Burkina Faso with cable.’
`The gunman who fatally shot three people in a law firm’s high-rise office before he was killed by police felt cheated over an invention, authorities said Saturday. [..]
Jackson, 59, told witnesses before he was shot that he had been cheated over a toilet he had invented for use in trucks, Police Superintendent Phil Cline said Saturday.
He was holding a hostage at gunpoint Friday when SWAT officers shot him from about 45 yards away, Cline said earlier. There were no negotiations and the hostage was unharmed, police said.’
`Three teenagers have been fined 3,000 Danish kroner (400 euros, 530 dollars) by a Greenland court for lassoing a polar bear in a stunt they said they carried out because they were bored, the court said. [..]
The incident took place in August 2004, when the quartet lassoed the bear before calling a hunter to kill it. Only three of the four appealed the lower court’s verdict.
Animal protection laws in Greenland, a semi-autonomous Danish territory in the North Atlantic, prohibit the capture of live animals in the wild.
The hunter was meanwhile fined 5,000 kroner for using an unauthorized rifle to put the animal down.’
`The pastor of a Mount Airy church accused of brandishing a gun as part of his sermon is free on bond after being charged with possession of a firearm by a felon. [..]
“I use parables,” he said. “Once I pretended to be a blind man with a cane, glasses and can with coins. Why didnt they arrest me for impersonating a blind man?”
Whitaker was arrested during church services Sunday. He was released Monday after posting a $20,000 bond.’
`A board member at the Melbourne Islamic school which recently expelled students for desecrating the Bible has been bashed by a man who claims he’s Jesus and who police fear is armed. [..]
Mr Mohandis told Southern Cross Broadcasting the man claimed to be Jesus.
He said security at the school would be increased.
“I still have scars to my head,” he said.’
`We have new information on the rape charges against a former Parker High School student. Seventeen-year-old Jerome Hunt faces 21 counts of rape and attempted rape. Each count carries up to 25 years in prison.
But Hunt’s lawyer Mike Butler claims the complaints came from fellow Parker wrestlers who were simply victims of a legitimate wrestling move. [..]
Hunt told investigators the accusations probably come from a wrestling move called a “butt drag” or “skinning,” which involves the wrestler placing pressure on the area of the rectum.
Hunt’s former assistant coach told investigators, “It’s not something illegal or not taught. It’s being taught all over.”‘
`Portland Police Spokesperson Brian Schmautz said shortly after 5:00 p.m. Friday night officers at the Northeast Precinct on NE Emerson St. got a call that someone had just hit one of their patrol cars, then backed up and hit it again. [..]
Klopf apparently told officers he was upset because he had been driving around on city streets at over 100 mph and no one ever pulled him over to give him a ticket.’
`A Cambodian man has been stabbed by a sex worker in a brawl, after he refused her request to wear a condom, police said Friday. Suon Da, 25, was knifed twice in the abdominal area by Sa Rida, a 24-year-old sex worker, during the fight at a brothel in Battambang province Wednesday, said Koam Roeuy, a deputy police chief from the area.
Koam Roeuy said Suon Da had paid Sa Rida $1.20 to have sex with her. But after Suon Da repeatedly refused to wear a condom, Sa Rida gave up and left the room.’
‘A Bishop is facing calls for his resignation after he allegedly spent a drunken night out and then claimed to parishioners that a head injury he suffered as a result was caused by a mugger.
The Right Reverend Tom Butler, Bishop of Southwark, reportedly staggered home from an embassy function and climbed into the back of a stranger’s Mercedes, where he started throwing an infant’s toys. He was pulled out but toppled over and suffered several head wounds. Asked to explain himself, he is claimed to have said: ‘I’m the Bishop of Southwark. It’s what I do.’ He then disappeared into the night but left in the car personal belongings including a cross, personal organiser and correspondence with the Home Office.’
The original story is here: Bishop of Southwark is mugged outside his frontdoor
`An Illinois man plotted to set off hand grenades at a Chicago-area shopping mall in a holiday season terror campaign that was thwarted by federal investigators. According to an FBI affidavit, Derrick Shareef, 22, told a confidential source that he wanted to “commit violent acts of jihad,” and spoke of killing judges and blowing up public buildings. A copy of the affidavit can be found below. Shareef told the snitch that he sought “to disrupt Christmas,” adding that, “I swear by Allah man, I’m down for it too, I’m down for the cause, I’m down to live for the cause and die for the cause, man.”‘
‘A teenager arrested for shoplifting had filled her pockets with so many items that her weighted-down pants dropped to her ankles as she tried to run out of the store, police said.
Cheyanne E. Dwiggins, 18, is accused of trying to steal several pieces of candy, kitchen utensils and a 15-ounce box of strawberry Nestle’s Nesquik from Bauer’s Market in Lapel, about 25 miles northeast of Indianapolis. [..]
Police found a potato peeler, ice cream scoop, a set of measuring spoons, two cake decorating gel tubes and six Rollo candy bars on Dwiggins. At the Madison County Jail, a deputy removed a can of Nesquik that Dwiggins had placed in her crotch, according to court documents.’
Same thing seemed to have happened elsewhere, but comes with pictures: Caught with her pants down.
`A woman staying at a northeast Georgia motel this week shot herself while trying to light a cigarette with a pistol she mistook for a cigarette lighter, police said.
Police said Olivia Hutcherson, 21, of Anderson, S.C., had been arrested for fighting at a Waffle House shortly before she shot herself in the hand with a .22-caliber pistol she had tried to use to light a cigarette. [..]
About 90 minutes earlier, Hutcherson had slapped a man in the face three times after she said he touched her inappropriately, according to police reports.
Five witnesses told police they never saw the man touch her.
“She stated that someone had grabbed her from behind and she turned and struck the first person she saw,” an officer wrote in the report.’
`A police officer in Longwood, Fla., accused of inappropriately touching a teen girl has been accused of sexual harassment before, Local 6 News has learned.
Officer Art Lews, 37, was arrested this week after a 14-year-old girl claimed he touched her inappropriately.
A report said the girl’s grandparents called police after they suspected the girl had sex with her boyfriend.
When Lewis arrived, he allegedly took the girl into another room and said he needed to perform an “exam” on her, police told Local 6 News.’
`A student activist who pounded a placard depicting the Prime Minister with water bombs has been accused of breaching terrorism laws.
Police investigated Jessica Moore, the president of the Wollongong University students’ association, after a caller to the national security hotline reported she had organised the protest in support of Hamas, the Palestinian party whose military wing is on a list of terrorist organisations.
But Ms Moore, an anti-war activist and member of the Socialist Alliance, said the protest was against homophobia and had nothing to do with Hamas. About 20 students had gathered on a university lawn where posters reading “Target homophobia. Take out the Libs”, were on display.’
`Garrett Anderson told a 911 dispatcher he arrived home to find his wife stabbed in her chest, a knife still beside her, and that he didn’t know what had happened, according to the tape released by police Tuesday.
Anderson placed the call shortly before midnight Nov. 21 from a pay phone a few blocks away from his east Mesa home.
When police arrived to the house, in the 1100 block of East Abilene Avenue, they found the front door open, Anderson’s wife, Chanel, dead, and the couple’s four children inside, safe. [..]
“I need an ambulance really quick to my house,” Anderson told dispatchers. “My wife’s hurt. She needs an ambulance. . . . She got stabbed, please hurry.”
When police asked how his wife got stabbed, Anderson replied, “I don’t know. I wasn’t home.”‘
`Two parents have filed a lawsuit alleging school officials failed to protect their daughters from sexual assault by another girl in their kindergarten class.
The lawsuit claims both girls were subjected to repeated sexual abuse by the third girl during nap periods and on a playground in the fall of 2005.
It says the assaults took place even though the abusive girl’s mother had warned a school official that her daughter had been a victim of sexual abuse and might be a threat to other children.’
`A Detroit-area man convicted of sodomizing a dog plans to appeal a ruling that he register as a sex offender after leaving prison.
Delbert John Holliday was sentenced yesterday to three and a half to 15 years in prison. The 35-year-old Eastpointe man pleaded guilty to sodomy and animal torture for an August incident with a pit bull at his brother’s house.
A Macomb County judge ordered Holliday to register with the state’s sex offender registry, though state law currently doesn’t specifically whether animal sodomizers should be on the list.’
`A house owned by Drake University has sustained some $50,000 damage in a bottle rocket war.
Four young men have been charged with reckless use of fire, a serious misdemeanor, punishable by up to a year in jail.
“They were playing around with fireworks like a lot of the rest of us have done at one time or another,” said Des Moines Police Detective Jack Kamerick. “They are all good kids. But if you’re going to have a bottle rocket war it would be a lot better to do it outside. It would still be illegal but at least you wouldn’t burn up a house.”‘
`When pigs fly, indeed. Kevin Pugh, 20, of Cedar Bluff, has been fined $279 for tossing a pig over the counter at the Holiday Inn Express in West Point on Nov. 12. Pugh pleaded guilty Tuesday in city court to a charge of disturbing the peace.
West Point Police Lt. Danny McCaskill has said Pugh didn’t know the employees of the hotel. There was no evidence intoxication was a factor.
No one was hurt, including the pig, officers said.
“This was the silliest thing I’ve ever seen,” McCaskill said. [..]
McCaskill said there have been four late-night incidents involving animal-tossing at West Point businesses. Twice a pig was tossed and two of the incidents involved possums.’
`Carjacked at knifepoint while pumping gas, a 75-year-old woman didn’t give in without a fight. Mary Gean Smyth opened the door of her sport utility vehicle and doused the assailant in gas.
“I’m sure he was burning like mad,” Smyth said of the Tuesday carjacking. “I mean, I drowned him right in the face.”
Police caught up to Smyth’s GMC Denali Envoy at a restaurant and arrested 52-year-old John Clay Stricker Jr., a transient with an address in the North Texas town of Lake Kiowa, Tyler police spokesman Don Martin said.
Smyth said police told her the suspect had apparently taken a shower because he had a bag with fuel-soaked clothes and a bar of soap, the Tyler Morning Telegraph reported in its Wednesday editions.’
`A thief used a hook and line not to snag fish, but to remove bags of cash from a bank’s night deposit box, police said.
Police would not say how much money they believe was taken, but think the thief made off with 11 deposit bags, Bloomington police Sgt. David Drake said. [..]
Authorities found the deposit box had been damaged, with one of the metal security pieces sheared off.
“It would’ve taken a lot of force to take that off,” Drake said.
Next to the piece of broken metal, police found a dowel rod with fishing line and a hook.
Drake said authorities believe whoever broke into the deposit box dangled the hook and line into the box and fished out the deposit bags, one by one.’
‘A South Carolina man is accused of driving a float in a local Christmas parade while intoxicated. Police in the City of Anderson arrested 42-year-old David Allen Rodgers Saturday after Rodgers passed another float along the parade route then sped past the parade finish line and ran a red light. The float was for a local dance studio and was full of adults and children, including his daughter. According to police, Rodgers he had an open container of alcohol in the truck used to pull the float. He now faces more than three-dozen charges, including DUI, kidnapping and assaulting an officer.’
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`A feud between two families in a remote Northern Territory community escalated when more than 200 people attacked each other with axes, spears and homemade swords overnight. [..]
The two families had agreed to meet with the intention of reaching a peaceful resolution to their problems.
About 200 people turned up for the meeting in the stifling December heat but as the two groups gathered, police said one began to “taunt and verbally abuse” the other.
“The opposing family responded physically,” police said.
“The situation escalated with police frantically trying to disarm young men of axes, spears and homemade swords.”‘
`A man who burned a dog to death in the oven of a house he was robbing has been sentenced to 15 years in prison, a prosecutor said.
Alexander Davis, 20, received a five-year sentence for aggravated animal cruelty and 10 years for burglary, Chatham County Assistant District Attorney Melanie Higgins said.
The dog’s owner, Angela DeLettre, came home in August 2005 to find an open back door, items missing and a kitchen sink overflowing with water. She found one of her dogs safe, but the other, a 1-year-old rat terrier, was missing.
Police later found the dead dog in the oven, which had been set to 400 degrees.
Police arrested Davis on an anonymous tip a few days later.’
`A father who gave his two daughters amphetamines to teach them about the dangers of drugs has been sentenced.
Colin Moyse, 50, of Gorleston, Norfolk, admitted to giving Class B amphetamines – known as Speed – to his daughters between December 2005 and January 2006.
He was given a conditional discharge of two years.
Norwich Crown Court heard that Moyse wanted his daughters, aged 13 and 12, to know what the drug tasted like in case somebody spiked their drinks.
Moyse, said to be “anti-drugs”, put some amphetamine on his fingertips and told the girls to taste it.’
`A Chinese construction company has been fined more than $A80,000 for building a highway through the Great Wall.
Parts of the Great Wall of China in Inner Mongolia have been blasted away to allow for a highway to be built.
The company responsible, Hongji Landbridge, was warned not to go ahead with construction.
According to government officials, it not only ignored the warnings but went on to demolish three nearby ancient villages.
As a result the company has been fined $A81,200.’
`A woman in Fulton County, Ga., who was angry with her boyfriend when the pair went to bed over the weekend, poured gasoline on his genitals and ignited a fire, according to police.
Fulton County police said Bobby Thompson and his girlfriend Cynthia Covington had a fight Saturday morning and Thompson went to bed. However, Covington was still upset, the report said.
Covington then allegedly poured gasoline between Thompson’s legs and ignited a fire. Covington also caught fire, the report said.
Both were transported to Grady Hospital’s burn unit.’
`A factory manager in east China has been arrested for using grease from swill, sewage, pesticides and recycled industrial oil to make lard for human consumption, state media said Monday in the country’s latest food scare.
Ying Fuming, a manager at the Fanchang Grease Factory in Taizhou, a city in Zhejiang province, sold the lard at half the price of other wholesalers while promising that his product met safety standards, the Shanghai Daily said. [..]
The Taizhou factory, which opened in September 2005, was ordered shut down but continued operating at night, the Shanghai Daily said. It sold its product to retailers across the country, who sold it to clients, including hotels and restaurants, it said.’
`A scout leader who set up a fake camp to lure boys to his home and abuse them has been jailed for nine months.
Alan Grant, 42, a former assistant commissioner, made parental consent forms for the bogus event. [..]
The court heard how Grant, who was area assistant commissioner for scouting in Perth and Kinross, lied to parents about a forthcoming scout camp he wanted their sons to attend.
Grant, who had more than 20 years’ involvement with the scouting movement as a volunteer, took two boys to his home, in St Madoes, and gave them alcohol before he abused them.’
