Adriyanna Herdener and Wilfredo Rivera were arrested for child abuse after they admitted to washing out the mouth of their 8-year-old daughter with soap for swearing.
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Category: Bizarre
While we recently discussed criticism of the evolving “nanny state” in England, it appears that Canada may also have a degree of runaway paternalistic regulations. Truck driver Brad Weber, 44, was fined recently for smoking in his workplace. Of course, his workplace is the cab of his truck, which he owns and operates alone.
Continue reading “Canadian Trucker Fined for Smoking in a Workplace: His Own Truck”
Aaron R. Klein, 24, of Brookfield, Wisconsin may spend a number of years in prison for what began as an unpaid bar bill. Klein was unable to pay his bar tab and agreed to leave his cellphone as security at the bar. When the bartender opened the phone to find Klein’s telephone number, he discovered child pornography.
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First there was Al Qaeda, then Swine Flu, and . . . now that you think you are over the worst of it . . . here come the Gnome Nazis.
South Carolina police have charged a 15-year-old boy with the serious offense of throwing a deadly missile at a moving car. The missile was a burrito. Driver John Addie says that a hard object (possibly a bottle) hit his car before the burrito came through his window.
Continue reading “Burrito Bomb: South Carolina Charges Teen with Throwing Deadly Missile at Car”
Detroit has long held the reputation as one of the worst run cities in the nation, particularly with its top politicians continually the subject of corruption scandals and criminal indictments, here. Now, an internal report has revealed that the city spent more than $18.5 million on an in-car computer system that is so poorly designed and used that investigators found that “its most common use today is a platform to play solitaire.”
It appears that Oregon police take fish murder more seriously than Texas police. We previously saw how police declined to charge a woman who fried and ate her ex-husband’s pet fish, here. Now, Donald Earl Fite III has pleaded guilty to stabbing Sarah Harris’ pet betta (Siamese fighting) fish, DeLorean, to death when she (inexplicably) declined to resume her relationship with him. DeLorean was found at the crime scene on the wooden floor with a knife in its back.
Continue reading “The Scales of Justice: Oregon Man Pleads Guilty to Fish Murder”
The same week as the horrendous story of a six-year-old cub scout being suspended and sent to reform school for bringing his cub scout mess kit to eat lunch (here), New York educators have added another ridiculous case out of the “zero tolerance” madness gripping schools. Matthew Whalen is a 17-year-old senior at Lansingburgh High School who has just completed basic training to be a soldier. He kept a 2-inch keychain pocketknife locked in his car with other camping equipment. When the school learned about the knife, they suspended him and, when he appealed, they added 15 days for the Eagle Scout.
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Thanks to one of my torts students, we have another interesting “dram shop” case. In New Jersey, Christine Mancision has filed a lawsuit after she was hurt by the drunken brother of the bride, Mary Graeber, at a wedding. James Graeber apparently is well named. He grabbed Mancision on the dance floor and ultimately knocked her down, causing her to break her wrist and requiring the insertion of a metal plate to reconstruct the wrist. However, she is not just suing Graeber but Hyatt Hotels Corp. for another $1 million in damages under New Jersey’s “dram shop” law.
Continue reading “The Wedding Crasher: Women Sues Bride’s Brother and Hyatt for Fall at Wedding”
As anyone who has taken my torts class can attest, I collect bizarre torts cases, often falling body cases and res ipsa loquitur cases. One appears to have gotten away a few years ago that a current student just sent in. Charles Everson Jr. and his wife Linda barely escaped injury when a cow fell out of the sky and landed on the hood of their moving minivan. What is most amazing is that I can actually top this story in the airborne bovine category.
Continue reading “Question of the Day: Are Farmers Liable for Cows Falling From Great Heights?”
The bill is in for Orly Taitz, the California lawyer leading the “Birther” litigation: $20,000 for sanctionable conduct. U.S. District Court Judge Clay Land previously issued a stern warning to attorney Orly Taitz and others in the so-called “birther” campaign: do not file another such “frivolous” lawsuit or you will face sanctions. Land threw out the lawsuit filed on behalf of Capt. Connie Rhodes who is an Army surgeon challenging her deployment orders due to President Barack Obama’s alleged ineligibility to serve as President. Land (a Bush appointee) noted that “[u]nlike in ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ simply saying something is so does not make it so.” In the most recent order, Land said that Taitz’s conduct “borders on delusional.”
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There is an important decision out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit where the conviction of Laval Farmer was overturned due to the prosecutors’ repeated use of his nickname “murder.” After all, his nickname is not “Attempted Murder” Farmer, which is what he was tried for. My only regret is that he was not represented by Richard “Racehorse” Haynes so that the prosecutors could have told the jury not to let “a race horse clear murder.”
Continue reading “Murder, She Spoke: Court Overturns Convictions Due to Prosecutors Use of Defendant’s Nickname “Murder””
School officials in Newark, Delaware have given the nation another example of mindless “zero-tolerance” abuse. In this case, officials suspended 6-year-old Zachary Christie because the boy brought his new cub scout camping utensils to school to eat his lunch. Because the utensil had a small knife, he was suspended and ordered to spend the next 45 days in the district’s reform school.
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Nicolas Cage has been hit by a lien for over $6,257,005 in unpaid income tax for 2007. It is not known if the IRS has started digging near Mount Rushmore.
Continue reading “National Treasure: Nicolas Cage Owes IRS Over $6 Million”
Richard Strandlof lived a life of distinction. He spoke to children and the media as a survivor first of the attack on the Pentagon on 9/11 and then survived a roadside bomb that killed four fellow Marines. He will now add a further distinction as a defendant in a rare “stolen valor” prosecution after his claims of service were proven false.