November 23, 2011
How can Law and Order make a story out of an Amish schism?
This violent beard shaving gang is going to be harder than the boy-on-Rumspringa-comes-to-the-big-city episode.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:32 PM
October 18, 2011
For once, the "medieval" search on Google News works
Teen girl forced to wear armor, fight stepfather with wooden sword
Future Law and Order story?
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:03 AM | Comments (0)
October 8, 2011
News of the Euphemistic Understatement.
PITTSBURGH -- A 17-year-old Pittsburgh boy has been charged after police said he shot at his grandmother near a Homewood funeral home where his great grandfather was being viewed.. . .
Marvin Anderson, of Spriggs and Watson Funeral Home, explained what he saw.
"Her grandson was being very disrespectful," Anderson said. "She asked him to leave and upon leaving when they got to parking lot, he said a few choice words to her and started shooting at her."The suspect's father said his son does not have a good relationship with his grandmother.
Richard said the boy "got a little bit distraught and made a bad choice." He's charged with aggravated assault, a weapons charge and other crimes.
Disrespectful. Choice words. Bad choices. Really?
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 9:30 AM
October 3, 2011
Amanda Knox, waiting for another verdict
Poor Amanda Knox, the American student accused and convicted of murdering her British roommate while they were both studying in Italy. My general opinion of the Italian justice system is not very high -- and in this case it is even lower.
The whole system is highly politicized and incredibly prosecutor-driven, and like the usual Continental system, there is no assumption of innocence until proven guilty. Knox was certainly tried and found guilty in the Italian press. I have very little confidence this appeal will free her.
The strangest thing I've read about the case is the epilogue to a true-crime book, The Monster of Florence, by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezi.
Il Mostro di Firenze is the Son of Sam of Italy -- a serial killer who, between 1968 and 1985, stalked lovers' lanes around Florence and shot smoochers in the head. Preston got interested in the case when he moved to Florence to write a novel set in the Renaissance; he met Spezi, an Italian journalist who had covered the Mostro case from the beginning. As they re-interviewed old contacts of Spezi and began pushing further suddenly Spezi came under investigation by the Mostro prosecutor (if I could find my copy I'd find his name!) and Spezi is jailed for obstruction of justice and perhaps being an original accomplice of il Mostro (Italian society and judicial procedures are rife with conspiracy theory). Preston leaves Italy on the advice of friends that he is next on the arrest list.
In the epilogue to the 2008 The Monster of Florence, Preston explains that the prosecutor who lit into Spezi and was on his trail was from Perugia -- where he was prosecuting Amanda Knox.
This particular prosecutor seems (according to Preston) to suffer from the conspiracy theory subspecies "it's Satanists!" He was always finding Satanic connections for il Mostro, and he started off his prosecution of Knox with dope and Satanism. Honest.
So, I'm not too sanguine.
Oh - I found Preston's short version of the whole book in an Atlantic article -- you have to get to page 5 to find the prosecutor, Giuliano Mignini. It's well-worth reading if you're interested in Italian justice.
further:
Looks like she's acquitted. I hope it sticks!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:01 AM
August 16, 2011
Drowning in an Elevator?
Talk about a nightmarish way to go! One step down from snakes on a plane.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:53 AM | Comments (2)
July 1, 2011
News of the Ick!
City inspectors pass a pool that was so murky they didn't spot the dead body in the deep end!
And the body was found by a couple who jumped the fence for a romantic late night swim!
And the newspaper interviews people who must have gone swimming in the pool while the body was there -- and they're still showering repeatedly!
File this one under "Future Law and Order Stories."
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:22 AM | Comments (1)
October 29, 2010
Art crime all over
A 2 meter statue of Aphrodite? Let's bury it in the back yard until market conditions are right!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 5:30 PM | Comments (0)
September 8, 2010
Death by HAY BALE?
Somehow I think this will NOT be a future Law & Order episode.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:21 AM
July 16, 2010
The Importance of Serifs
Really. Listen to what I tell you.
via Lucius Septimius
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:17 AM
February 17, 2010
Tales of the Weird
Amy Bishop is one serial killer who isn't drawing out many of the "s/he was always so nice and quiet, we didn't see this coming" kind of comment. Read this story from the Boston Globe.
via Kathy Shaidle.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:19 AM
October 15, 2009
Call in Goren and Eames! The Sweat Lodge death might have been murder!
Really! Rip that one from the headlines!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:54 PM
August 22, 2009
Remember the body in the suitcase I blogged about earlier in the week?
This one? They had to identify the poor girl by the serial numbers on her breast implants. The man arrested has appeared (sort of) on TWO reality TV shows. O tempora, o mores!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:01 AM
July 26, 2009
I understand a friendly game of poker . . .
. . . but how desperate to gamble do you have to be to engage in canary fighting? I don't think Law'n'Order will rip this from the headlines - no one would believe it.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 11:19 PM
July 22, 2009
Keeping Corpses
Not exactly true love, like "A Rose for Emily."
I think it's cashing the Social Security checks that undercuts the love angle.
A judge sentenced the leader of a religious sect to 2 years in prison Wednesday for hiding an elderly follower's rotting body on a toilet for weeks.Alan Bushey, 59, of Necedah, kept Magdeline Alvina Middlesworth's corpse on the toilet of another follower, Tammy Lewis, for two months last spring. Middlesworth, 90, moved to Necedah from Washington state in 2005 to join Bushey's sect, the Order of the Divine Will.
Prosecutors said Bushey kept the body hidden so he could collect Middlesworth's Social Security checks and annuities. Bushey's attorney, Thomas Steinman, argued that Bushey thought God would bring Middlesworth back to life.
"A miracle like that is part of the Christian faith," Steinman said. "He truly believed she would come back from the dead."
Bushey appeared at the hearing in a black cassock with a crucifix around his neck. He told Juneau County Circuit Court Judge John Roemer Jr. that he should have known God would raise Middlesworth from the dead without his involvement.
"I should have called the coroner and leave the supernatural to God," Bushey said.
Roemer, who called the case "horrific," said living with a rotting corpse devastated Lewis' daughter, now 16, and son, now 14. District Attorney Scott Southworth said they had to use a bucket in a closet for a toilet. Bushey told them that a demon was making the body decay and that they weren't praying hard enough to bring Middlesworth back to life, Southworth added.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:27 PM | Comments (2)
June 17, 2009
Harvard Homicides through the ages
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:20 PM | Comments (0)
June 8, 2009
Art theft Squad and Murder!
Combining two of my interests, art theft and Law and Order, the Los Angeles police arrest one of their own art theft specialists for murder! I expect the L&O version ripped from this headline shortly.
Even better:
Last week, undercover officers surreptitiously trailed Lazarus as she did errands one day, waiting until she discarded a coffee cup, straw or something else with her saliva on it, Beck said.
And it was a match!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:19 AM
March 13, 2009
Not a high point in the annals of crime
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:53 AM
January 7, 2009
A future Law and Order story for your New Year!
Investigators believe Gordon Stewart, 74, died as a result of dehydration, after becoming unable to find his way out of the mass of carrier bags, boxes, old furniture and other junk.Police had to call in a specialist diving team because the smell from the house, Broughton, Buckinghamshire, was so overpowering.
The team of divers is the twist that makes the story something special.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:22 AM | Comments (1)
November 17, 2008
This is no "Rose for Emily"
Talk about news of the weird! I look forward to the Law & Order version:
A woman accused of helping her religious leader hide a decaying corpse on her toilet so they could continue collecting her Social Security was convicted of a misdemeanor in a deal for her to testify against the leader, a prosecutor said Monday. (my emphasis)
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 6:19 PM | Comments (0)
October 10, 2008
Talk about a surprise party - the guest of honor was dead
No, he didn't drop dead with surprise, either.
German police have discovered the body of a man who lay dead in his apartment for almost a year without being missed, Aalen authorities said Thursday.Last month, a group of his acquaintances had hoped to surprise him for his birthday, but they were not concerned when he didn't answer the door. The man, who would have turned 42, was known to be gone for months at a time in the Middle East.
I guess they felt guilty about not having done anything for him since his last birthday?
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:22 AM | Comments (0)
August 29, 2008
You know those movies where a hand transplant leads to murder? What about a HEART?
Police say heart transplant teen plotted murder
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 5:15 PM | Comments (0)
May 16, 2008
Ripped from the headlines!
Chemist gets life for hubby's acid vat murder. Her big mistake? Getting found out before the body dissolved. Ick.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 5:27 PM
October 12, 2007
"Write what you know!" "Learn by doing!"
These mantras of modern education kill another innocent.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:50 AM | Comments (0)
October 10, 2007
Talk about Mean Girls!
Category: Future Law & Order Stories:
In playgrounds and in preschools across the U.S., parenting has become a competitive sport. Taking their children's success as a sign of their own, mothers often go to extremes to win them entree into the "right" programs and cliques. But could the increasingly high social stakes ever drive a mother to commit murder? Consider what's happened, more than once, in Japan . . . As Mie Taniguchi sped along a deserted country road one Friday in February of 2006, she felt tired and spent. For the past few nights, the 34-year-old had been unable to sleep as she struggled with her feelings of loneliness. As happens with many women in Japan, Taniguchi's only friends were the mothers at her daughter's kindergarten-but recently, they had been distant, and she felt bitterly excluded. Now, she was afraid they would reject her 5-year-old daughter, too.This morning, it was Taniguchi's turn to drive her daughter and two of her classmates to their kindergarten in Nagahama. In the backseat, Wakana Taketomo and Jin Sano sat quietly, staring sleepily out the window. Taniguchi mistook their silence for a deliberate snub of her daughter. That idea pushed her over the edge.
Hitting the brakes, Taniguchi pulled off the road, reached into her handbag, and drew out a thin-bladed fish knife. As the children screamed in horror, she launched a frenzied attack, stabbing Wakana 19 times and Jin 13 times. Ignoring her daughter's terrified pleas, Taniguchi dumped Wakana on the side of the road and threw Jin into an irrigation ditch. When a passerby discovered them 30 minutes later, the children were alive but just barely-Wakana was declared dead at 9:45 a.m., and Jin died a few hours later.
Well, it's Japan, but they can rip it from the headlines enough to fit what I read about preschool admission in NYC.
From Marie Claire, via Mickey Kaus.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 11:58 AM
August 8, 2007
The pursuit of authenticity - Raw Milk division
The lengths some people will go for the Authentic never ceases to amaze me. Perhaps I really am a post-modernist? Or maybe I'm a believer in the Englightenment Project of Science (and Pasteurization)? I dunno, but it seems to me that as the number of raw milk consumers passes some tipping point there will be lots and lots of death. Ever heard of brucellosis? Let's not assume that all the raw milk producers are angels of mercy who take perfect care of their herds - some of the same people who are skeptical about government regulation of what we drink are likely to be skeptical about government regulation of their animals.
I give it a year before there's a Law & Order episode about a rogue dairy farmer and food poisoning among the Greenmarket set.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:56 AM
July 19, 2007
Yet Another Face of Evil
LONG BEACH, California (AP) -- A mother charged with driving her 14-year-old son and six other juveniles to a skate park so they could attack another teenager pleaded not guilty Tuesday to murder. art.daley.ap.jpgEva Daley is being held on $1 million bail.
Police said Eva Daley knew her son and the others planned to kill Jose Cano when she drove them to the park June 26. Cano, 13, died of stab wounds. Police said he had previously been involved in a dispute with the youths.
Filed under Future Law & Order Stories.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 9:48 AM
February 25, 2007
Ripped from the headlines...
Who will Law'n'Order cast as the psychic housewife who stabbed her psychotherapist husband - a man she'd met when she was 14 and his patient? Goodness!
This is my favorite part:
Under cross-examination from his mother, Adam Polk said she was "bonkers" and "cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs," referring to a breakfast cereal catch phrase. Friday, he told his mother that he did not know if he would ever be able to forgive her."If he were here today, he would want you to find the best head doctor in the business and get help," he said.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:36 AM
November 25, 2006
Yeah. Right.
I can't wait to see the Law & Order version of this story - woman adjusting television plug tumbles behind bookcase and is found two weeks later because of the odor.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 10:02 PM
January 30, 2006
Locked Room Mystery in the Indonesian Consulate in NYC
Future episode of Law and Order? Even the neighbors think so:
Residents of the block were less sanguine. "I thought they were filming for an episode of 'Law and Order,' " Michelle Brilliant, who lives next door, said as she emerged with her daughter, Aza Hougie, 3, carrying a Snow White umbrella into the light drizzle of an overcast day.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:24 AM
October 31, 2005
Crime and Realestate in NYC
The lackadaisical vetting stands out even more considering that the building went so far as to create a "canine interview committee" in 1999 to screen potential newcomers' pets. "We don't want to be tyrants," Mr. Kissel was quoted as saying in an article about the policy change that ran in The Times in January 2000. "But this is your worst fear; you get somebody in the building and their dog turns out to be a nightmare."Mr. Kissel was an embezzler who stole $4.7 million from the co-op.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 11:07 PM
August 17, 2005
Future Law & Order Episode Here
Former child actor ties wealthy couple to anchor and throws them overboard.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:51 AM
May 25, 2005
Two Favorite Genres Collide - Murder Mystery and Blogging
This is beyond creepy. Read this blog entry. Then this newspaper article. Blogging about your own murdereer!
And Patterico thinks about how to Law'n'Orderize this story!
via the Volokh Conspiracy
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:45 AM
May 10, 2005
Chimerism: News of the Science Weird
Now have I seen a Law'n'Order episode like this? Someone having two blood types because he absorbed his twin in utero? Ick! Weirdness! Go read!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:51 AM
May 6, 2005
Lover in the Closet. Literally.
The woman told the court that she had been having an affair with Rafael DeJesus Rocha-Perez, 35, a man she only knew as Christian, and allowed him to secretly sleep in a closet in her home for about a month. She said she met Rocha-Perez on July 4 after going downtown to see the annual fireworks display.I have a hard time imagining an apartment big enough in New York for Law'n'Order to pull this story off.Jeffrey Freeman, according to police, found Rocha-Perez after following the sound of snoring to the 2-by-8-foot closet in the couple's Mountain View home.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 8:52 AM
April 26, 2005
E-ZPass and Big Brother
When will people figure out what they're giving up in exchange for convenience? In this instance:
The review compared E-ZPass records with payroll records, and found that some in the unit had made fraudulent overtime claims, coming to work late, leaving early and claiming to conduct surveillances of suspect officers that they never carried out, the officials said. The captain and some supervisors were accused of failing to properly oversee those under their command.Within 2 years of Georgia 400 installing something like the E-ZPass system there was a high-profile divorce case in which one side's attorney subpoenaed the other side's records and proved that the tale of how late he was leaving work wasn't true.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 7:01 AM
April 24, 2005
Adding a New Category: Future Law & Order Stories
Since this is at least the second time since the January re-design that I've blogged on the topic, I'm creating a new category -- Future Law & Order Stories.
Read it and wonder -- did he get away with it the first time, or is this a cruel coincidence?
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 9:21 AM
March 22, 2005
Yeah, yeah, "Stranger than Fiction"
People, that is. Here's a New York Times article about people who WANT to have limbs amputated. The article talks about the attempts of psychiatrists to come up with a good name for the situation and the pros and cons of getting it included in the D.S.M. The main doctor interviewed compares this to gender identity disorder -- and the rationalization of a Scottish surgeon who is "helping" people with the problem sounds analogous to early surgical sex changes:
"The Hippocratic oath says first do your patients no harm," he said in the film "Whole." But maybe the real harm, he said, is to refuse to treat such a patient, "leaving him in a state of permanent mental torment," when all it would take for him "to live a satisfied and happy life" would be to amputate.
The Columbia university psychiatrist, after all, suggests that the surgery doesn't cure the underlying problem. He doesn't seem to have proved that it doesn't, but nothing the surgeon says suggests that he has anything other than anecdotal amputation satisfaction to prove his point.
Oh, well. It'll be a while before insurance covers this one, I think.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 9:19 AM
March 18, 2005
Shoddy Work
Stories like this one about the K-State English professor who killed his wife suggest to me that we need to stress more exacting research skills.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at 12:35 AM