Jon Andrew Meyer Jr. could be the poster boy for gun control. Meyer is responsible for shooting a little girl with an assault rifle. His defense? He was using the assault rifle as a crutch when it released a burst of fire into the ceiling and killed 5-year-old Alysa Bobbitt of Shady Cove and wounded apartment resident Karen Hancock.
Category: Bizarre
After an Asiana Airlines passenger jet crashed and burned at San Francisco International Airport on July 6, 2013, a Bay Area TV station published what it claims were the names of the pilots, including Captain Sum Ting Wong, Wi Tu Low, Ho Lee Fuk, and Band Ding Ow. Unbelievably, as shown below, no one at KTVU-TV picked up on the joke and the anchor read the names in all seriousness. It turns out that a summer intern with the National Transportation Safety Board was the culprit in passing along the names. Now, Asiana is suing the station for injury to its reputation, a novel claim that could raise questions over not just the fact of injury but the degree of injury in such a prank.
Some New York drivers were startled when they saw a man waving his arms, honking his horn and flashing a silver badge in a frantic effort to get them to pull over in traffic.
Even more surprising was the person suspected of doing it: a respected New York City and Westchester rabbi.
Rabbi Alfredo Borodowski, 49, clearly does not like people driving slow or cutting him off. Unlike other road rages, however, Borodowski has been arrested for allegedly impersonating a police officer to pull over offending drivers in his Camry. He would allegedly flash a badge and scream “Police! Police! Pull Over! in order to scream at drivers. To his credit, he appears to pulled over Goyum (non-Jewish) and non-Goyum drivers alike without prejudice in what could be a new reality series, “Road Rabbi: Life In The Fast Lane.”
As I mentioned in today’s column, the prosecution team of Angela Corey in the Zimmerman case have been accused of repeated prosecutorial abuse in the withholding of evidence from the defense. Circuit Judge Debra Nelson seemed intent on the most recent charge of withholding text messages to want to avoid the issue, but she earlier held a sanctions hearing with the testimony of the man who brought the violation to the attention of the defense: IT director Ben Kruidbos. Corey has been widely criticized for over-charging the case by experts, including an article out today, and her team was widely criticized for putting on a weak case for prosecution. Now, before Nelson has ruled on her office’s withholding of evidence, Corey has fired Kruidbos. His termination before a ruling on the alleged prosecutorial abuse only strengthens his claims as a whistleblower and throws the ethics of Corey and her office in great question.
Kimberly Dawn Bynum, 31, has found not just love but a criminal defense according to her lawyers. Bynum was facing charges of having a sexual relations with a former student from November 2011. The student was 17 at the time. However, her counsel recently told the court that she had married the student and was now living outside the country. The charges were promptly dropped.
Remember the case of the Iowa Supreme Court upholding the firing of a dental assistant because she was too attractive for her boss to resist? The Iowa Supreme Court ruled in December that a dentist did not commit gender discrimination in firing an attractive female employee, Melissa Nelson, at the request of a jealous wife. After a national outcry, the Court surprised many by suddenly vacating its earlier decision and taking back the case. Many hoped the court would discard its prior opinion. Think again. The Court has issued a new opinion with the same conclusion and ramping up its prior holding.
MSNBC has been criticized for becoming as an extension of the Obama White House in the way that Fox News was criticized as being an extension of the Bush White House. Recently, however, many have been alarmed by the degree of blind loyalty shown the president with hosts siding with the White House against press rights and attacking figures like Snowden. This open letter to Snowden by Melissa Harris-Perry however surprises as the host assures him that the Obama Administration will guarantee his rights if only he will return. This follows such scenes as a MSNBC commentator defending the Administration’s attack on press freedom but calling Holder the “Moses of Our Time.”
by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
I wasn’t going to do a column this weekend for a variety of reasons. However, I saw this video this morning and wanted to share it. As a kid, I spent one summer immersed in playing with a yo-yo. The physics of the thing was a very satisfying distraction. However, my brief fling is nothing compared to the lifelong passion for the toy found by the Japanese performance artist known as Black. This TED talk begins with him explaining how he came to acquire his skills and an interesting story of perseverance. It is followed by a demonstration that is just pure fun to watch. Without further comment, I present Black and his moment of Zen . . .
~submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
Judge Brenda Branch in Halifax County, N.C., was not satisfied with simply sentencing Tonie Marie King, 21, for drunk and disorderly. So Branch sentenced her to write an essay entitled “How a Lady Should Behave in Public.” As with most shaming or novel sentences, Branch was instantly a national celebrity receiving praise from people for caring enough to fashion her own brand of justice. I am not one of them. As many of you know, I have long been a critic of such sentencing where judges seem to merge law and entertainment to the thrill of citizens. Judges are not appointed or elected to instruct women on being ladies like some Miss Manners issuing advice from a criminal docket.
This is HD 189733b, which is the latest planet to be spied by the Hubble Space Telescope. It is like many planets except for one fascinating feature: it’s blue.
We have another Saudi royal on the criminal docket. The latest family member of the House of Saud was arrested in Santa Ana for human trafficking where a Kenyan woman gave a familiar account of domestic workers in Saudi Arabia. She said that her passport was taken and she was forced to work 16 hours a day, seven days a week for virtually no money. Meshael Alayban, 42, is one of the wives of Saudi Prince Abdulrahman bin Nasser bin Abdulaziz al Saud.
Continue reading “Saudi Princess Charged With Human Trafficking in California”
As the federal and state governments continue to shutdown or curtail core educational, environmental, and scientific programs due to lack of money, the disclosures of unspeakable waste continue to mount in Afghanistan and Iraq with no appearance of accountability or abatement. Indeed, for years, the media has reported billions of lost or wasted funds, including money disappearing into the corrupt government circles of leaders in the countries. Yet, Congress would prefer to debate Planned Parenthood or global warming grants. Consider the latest outrage. The U.S. military spent $34 million to build a huge headquarters for the Marines in Afghanistan with a theater, special operations rooms and other amenities. The problem that various people including the Marine commander were saying that it was not needed and would not be used. Now it is likely to be demolished, unused and unoccupied. There was the bridge to nowhere and now we have the building for no one.
We have previously discussed such bizarre and distasteful items like Hitler wine. Now you can have Hitler Chicken with your Hitler Pinot Noir. A new line of fried chicken restaurants have opened in Thailand. The owner was said to think it was a catchy title and “a good image.” Kentucky Fried Chicken however did not and threatened legal action. The restaurant is reportedly changing its name to “H-ler” to accommodate critics. Somehow I don’t think that that will quite suffice.
Continue reading “Would You Like Mein Chianti With Your Hitler Chicken?”
Lawyer Christopher Kirby certainly had quite a night when he appeared to represent the East Ramapo School District at a simple school board meeting. By the end of the evening, Kirby was leaving just before the arrival of police, a community was in full uproar, and his firm was terminated from further representation of the District. How can things get that bad, you ask? It started with a smirk.
The medical staff at St. Joseph’s Hospital Center in Syracuse, New York may have committed the ultimate act of malpractice in 2009 — a litany of errors that culminated in doctors wrongly pronouncing her dead and preparing to harvest her organs when Caroline Burns, 41, suddenly opened her eyes. What is equally troubling is that the hospital was fined just $6000 and never called to account in a court of law. Burns committed suicide a few years later in 2011. It is not clear why she or her family chose not to sue (also some reports have her name as Colleen Burns).