| Rescue Effort Suspended after Mine Blast |
[Apr. 6th, 2010|01:50 pm] |
Death Toll Reaches 25
MONTCOAL, W.Va. — The death toll from a blast at a coal mine here rose to 25 on Tuesday, federal safety officials said, making it the worst mining accident in the United States in 25 years.
Four miners were missing, and officials said it was likely they had also been killed in the explosion on Monday.
A recovery operation was called off early Tuesday morning because high levels of methane gas made the mine unsafe for rescuers. Workers bore holes into the mine to try to get more oxygen inside, an effort that was not expected to be completed for hours.
“The bodies will not be recovered until the mine is ventilated,” Ronald L. Wooten, the state’s mine health safety director, said at a news conference Tuesday.
The accident was the worst in an American mine since Dec. 19, 1984, when 27 workers died in a fire at the Wilberg Mine in Orangeville, Utah, and it came just four years after federal regulators overhauled mine safety laws. That overhaul, the first in over three decades, came after 19 miners died in a series of accidents in West Virginia and Kentucky — including one that brought criminal charges against a subsidiary of the Massey Energy Company, based in Virginia, the owner of the mine where Monday’s explosion took place.
( Read more... ) |
|
|
| Forced Catheterization Used In DUI Case |
[Sep. 4th, 2009|01:07 pm] |
LAWRENCEBURG, Ind. -- An Indiana man has filed a lawsuit claiming that police forcibly withdrew blood and urine from his body during a drunken driving arrest, WLWT-TV reported.
According to the suit, police arrested Jamie Lockard, 53, on suspicion of drunken driving in March.
A Breathalyzer test showed he was under the legal limit, but Officer Brian Miller doubted the findings.
Lockard and his attorney claim in the suit that police took him to Dearborn County Hospital and forced him to submit to a urine and blood test.
Police said they obtained a warrant, but Lockard's attorney said his client was shackled to a gurney and had a catheter inserted against his will.
"It has to be executed reasonably," said attorney Doug Garner. "No one would say this is reasonable behavior. It's reprehensible that anyone could think that this is appropriate."
The blood test showed that Lockard's blood-alcohol level did not exceed Indiana's legal limit, police said.
Garner said the police officer did not apologize, but instead charged Lockard with obstruction of justice.
"He took it too far. He thought he could do whatever to me," Lockard said.
The suit names the Lawrenceburg police department and Dearborn County Hospital, in addition to Miller and Dr. Ronald Cheek.
"I would hate for this to happen to someone else," Lockard said. "It was the most humiliating thing that has ever happened to me, ever." |
|
|
| Man Eats Feces, Stops Trial |
[Sep. 4th, 2009|10:13 am] |
James Orr put an immediate halt to his criminal trial Wednesday when he squeezed the contents of his colostomy bag onto the table in front of him and ate it.
"There was what appeared to be feces on the table and on the floor," assistant Hamilton County prosecutor David Prem said.
Prem was prosecuting Orr, 66, for robbery and kidnapping. The trial, without a jury before Common Pleas Court Judge Ethna Cooper, began last week but continued today.
A witness had just taken the stand in the case Wednesday when Norm Aubin, Orr's attorney, said Orr leaned into him and asked if Aubin had anything to eat.
A shocked Aubin said he didn't. Orr then said he was hungry and asked for food. Aubin ignored him.
That's when Orr made a spectacle of taking his colostomy bag, worn on the outside of his body to collect his waste, and placing it on the table. He then squeezed it and looked to be eating it.
"It appeared he was eating his own (feces) at the table," Aubin said.
The Sheriff's deputy in the room shouted "What are you doing?" and then cuffed Orr and rushed him out of the courtroom.
The Sheriff's office later reported there was feces on Orr's lips, beard, hands and the defense table where he was sitting.
The judge suggested the courtroom had become a biohazard area and closed it for cleaning, continuing Orr's trial until next week.
Prem admitted he almost vomited up while watching Orr's antics but suspects they were done with a purpose.
"He's a con man. He has over 50 aliases and has convictions in Ohio and New York for thefts and robberies," Prem said.
"He's done just about everything a person can do to avoid justice. He feigned (mental) incompetence" leading up to this trial, Prem said.
Orr was ordered to trial after court mental health workers deemed him mentally sound and a faker.
"I'm completely convinced his whole goal here is to cause as much mayhem as he can," Prem said of Orr.
Aubin will have jail workers again check Orr's mental health before continuing the trial Wednesday.
No additional charges were filed against Orr after Wednesday's courtroom activity.
Orr was being tried for robbery and kidnapping charges after officials said Orr and a partner tried to get money, in a ruse, from a woman buying food at a Silverton Chinese restaurant. When the woman wasn't fooled, Orr is accused of pulling a gun on her - with her three children in the car outside - and taking her to a bank where she was forced to withdraw $1,000 and give it to Orr. He faces more than 60 years in prison on those charges.
[ SOURCE ] |
|
|
| SC man charged with having sex with horse |
[Jul. 29th, 2009|10:19 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  exhausted | ] |
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - A South Carolina man was charged with having sex with a horse after the animal's owner caught the act on videotape, then staked out the stable and caught him at shotgun point, authorities said Wednesday.
( Buggery! ) |
|
|
| My Kinda Party |
[Jul. 23rd, 2009|05:28 am] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | 21740 | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  amused | ] |
| [ | music |
| | Cypress Hill - Hits from the Bong | ] |
Oh hai... HAS ANYONE SEEN MY $70,000 WORTH OF BEER?!?
The Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Department reports that thieves stole two tractor trailers and made off with $70,000 worth of beer. The tractor-trailers belonged to K&N Trucking, located at 8205 E. Adamo Drive. The report was made Tuesday, July 21, 2009 at 7:00 a.m. When workers arrived for their morning shift, they discovered the two tractor-trailers, packed with beer were gone.
One trailer contained 1,260 six packs of Corona Extra beer. The second trailer contained 990 six packs of Corona and 990 six packs of Modella Especial beer. At approximately 5:00 p.m. Tuesday, July 21, 2009, deputies answered a call and found the two cabs abandoned at a vacant lot. They were emptied. The trailers are still missing. They are a white Lufkin model cargo trailer and a white Wabash model cargo trailer.
If you have any information regarding the missing beer or tractor-trailer cabs, please call the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office at 813-247-8200. |
|
|
| Burn, Baby, Burn! |
[Jul. 15th, 2009|10:21 pm] |
I-75 in Michigan is ON FIRE.
SOURCES
I-75 in Hazel Park is shut down following a gasoline tanker explosion in the Detroit suburb.
Advertisement
Lt. Shannon Sims of the Michigan State Police Metro North Post in Oak Park said early details were vague. Police weren’t sure what sort of material the truck was hauling or whether anyone was injured or killed in the wreck.
"Until they get that fire out, it’s going to be hard for us to get in there and determine what happened and how many vehicles may have been involved,” Sims said.
Sims confirmed it appeared the heat from the tanker blast and fire led the 9 Mile overpass above northbound I-75 to collapse.
I-75 is shut down in both directions. Sims said State Police were working to set up alternate routes and get drivers caught it extensive jams off the freeway.
The Michigan Department of Transportation said both ramps from both directions of I-696 to southbound I-75 were closed. It appeared traffic was being diverted off I-75 at I-696 and 8 Mile Road.
“Thankfully this didn’t happen during rush hour traffic,” Sims said.
It wasn’t clear when either direction of I-75 would reopen. If the damage is extensive enough to extend repairs for days or more, it will make for an enormous traffic mess. That section of I-75 carries an average of more than 160,000 vehicles a day, according to state traffic counts.
Alternate routes would include the Lodge Freeway and surface streets including Woodward, Dequindre, John R and other nearby north-south routes. It also could push additional traffic onto I-94 in Detroit and the east-side suburbs.
Radio station WWJ-AM says an overpass at the crash site collapsed after the tanker and a tractor-trailer collided about 8:30 p.m.
The station says several other vehicles were involved in the crash 10 miles north of downtown Detroit.
An estimated 2,000 DTE customers are without power because of blown circuits, Lorie Kessler, a spokeswoman for the utility company said Wednesday night.
Witnesses say flames and black, billowing plumes of smoke are reaching 150 to 200 feet into the air and gas that has reached the sewers along the freeway also has caught fire.
[http://www.freep.com/article/20090715/NEWS03/90715083/Tanker-fire-closes-I-75--overpass-collapses] |
|
|
| Fireman kills dogs for cheap vacation |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|02:05 pm] |
A Columbus firefighter admits that he took his two dogs to the basement, tied them up and blasted them with a rifle so he and a girlfriend could vacation without paying to board the animals.
"He said chunks of concrete were flying everywhere," Assistant Franklin County Prosecutor Heather Robinson said.
"I think it was the thrill of the kill for him. He has shown no remorse for this."
Firefighter David P. Santuomo, 43, pleaded guilty yesterday to two counts of animal cruelty and one count of possession of a criminal tool -- for taping a 2-liter plastic bottle onto the gun as a makeshift silencer.
( Read more... )
Hale agreed to allow him to serve his jail time in 10-day stints over two years.
Defense attorney Sam Shamansky said Santuomo will obey Hale's order to file a formal apology with a national firefighters magazine and with a letter to readers of The Dispatch.
"This was an isolated event not to be repeated and totally out of character for him," Shamansky said after the hearing. "He is extremely remorseful."
In the courtroom, Santuomo raised a middle finger to the reporters assembled to cover his case.
[SOURCE] |
|
|
| Web Slows After Jackson's Death |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|02:04 pm] |
Web slows after Jackson's death
By Maggie Shiels
Technology reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley
The internet suffered a number of slowdowns as people the world over rushed to verify accounts of Michael Jackson's death.
Search giant Google confirmed to the BBC that when the news first broke it feared it was under attack.
Millions of people who searched for the star's name on Google News were greeted with an error page.
It warned users "your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application".
( Read more... )
Keynote Systems reported that its monitoring showed performance problems for the web sites of AOL, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and Yahoo.
Beginning at 2.30PM Pacific "the average speed for downloading news sites doubled from less than four seconds to almost nine seconds," said Shawn White, Keynote's director of external operations.
He told Data Center Knowledge that "during the same period, the average availability of sites on the index dropped from almost 100% to 86%".
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/technology/8120324.stm |
|
|
| Box of chips pays for prostitution in Oklahoma City |
[Jun. 24th, 2009|11:19 am] |
BY JOHNNY JOHNSON
Published: June 24, 2009
A woman pleaded no contest last week to prostitution charges, accused of agreeing to be paid for services with a box of chips by a man who said he was a Frito-Lay employee.
Lahoma Sue Smith, 36, was ordered to pay a fine of $1,142 in municipal court from charges from a February arrest.
According to the police report, undercover officers noticed Smith "trying to catch a date” by flashing her headlights at SE 33 and Robinson. Officers said they followed Smith’s car and found her with her blouse open and found a man in the passenger seat pulling his pants up.
The man told police he was having marital problems and knew he could pick up a prostitute there.
Smith told police the man told her he was looking for company but he didn’t have any money, so she agreed to be paid with a $30 case of Frito-Lay chips he had in the back of his car.
When asked if she had ever been arrested for prostitution, Smith told police "Yes. Two or three times,” authorities said.
Smith was arrested on complaints of prostitution and suspicion of driving with a suspended license. The man was not arrested.
http://www.newsok.com/feed/box-of-chips-pays-for-prostitution-in-oklahoma-city/article/3380255?custom_click=pod_headline_news |
|
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif?v=92.2){kind=small}
bizarre_stories