Fun_People Archive
8 Apr
N O' T W

Date: Thu,  8 Apr 93 14:24:57 PDT
To: Fun_People
Subject: N O' T W

 From: bostic@vangogh.CS.Berkeley.EDU (Keith Bostic)
 From: Bill Wisner <wisner@well.sf.ca.us>

News O' The Weird

Circuit Judge Michael Hocking came under fire in Detroit in January after
he gave a rapist the minimum 18-month term, citing "mitigating" factors. 
Among them: The man helped his victim off the floor, and he did not so
much use force as wear her down by persistence.
--
A California appeals court upheld a $100,000 award to the estate of Wesley
Wilkins from Wilkins' former lover, Lillie Siplin.  Siplin had invited
Wilkins to her mountain cabin in 1985 to have sex, but, found the trial
court, failed to warn Wilkins that her husband was a violent man.  Siplin's
husband broke in and stabbed Wilkins 17 times.  As she was taking Wilkins
to the hospital, she mentioned that her husband had acted this way several
times.
--
A Laguna Beach traffic commissioner dismissed a man's speeding ticket in
October because the arresting officer's motorcycle was blue and white,
violating a state law requiring police vehicles to be black and white
or just white.
--
News anchors Tsitsi Vera and Noreen Welch were suspended for three months
in Harare by the government-run Zimbabwe Broadcasting Co. in December for
giggling uncontrollably while reporting the story of a woman whose
newborn baby fell through the toilet of a train onto the track below.
--
Henry County, Ga., jail inmate Mackey Junior Pope, 28, was apprehended
in February after an escape attempt.  Using a smuggled-in gun, he got the
drop on four guards, locked them in a cell, and then crept along a hallway
toward the front of the building.  However, Pope had neglected to take
the guards' walkie-talkies, and the front desk guards were waiting for him.
--
According to a recent study by University of California at Irvine
researchers, violent criminals have five times as much of the metal
manganese in their hair as do law-abiding citizens.  The researchers
have no explanation but seem confident that the metal is a symptom rather
than a cause of the violent behavior.
--
In 1975, the Federal Communications Commission considered, then denied, a
formal request from two citizens to investigate religious broadcasters'
alleged abuses of reserved "educational" radio channels, but the rumor
persisted that the FCC would kick religion off the air.  In December
1992, noting that it had now received more than 21 million letters over 17
years from parishioners urging it to keep its hands off religious
broadcasting, the FCC issued its annual admonition that the public
disregard the rumor.
--
The current Albuquerque Yellow Pages ad for the law firm of Gaddy,
Rakes & Hall, which specializes in personal injury litigation, contains
a typo: "Representing the Seriously Insured" (should be "Seriously
Injured").

© 1993 Peter Langston