Reason Magazine
Daily Brickbats Archives: April 2008
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Rumors of a romance between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Alina Kabaeva, a former gymnast more than 30 years his junior, had been circulating in Moscow for months. But Moskovski Korrespondent was the first, and still the only Russian, newspaper to report the alleged affair. The newspaper's owner immediately closed the paper and forced its editor to resign.Criticism is a Crime
The Lawrence, Massachusetts, police department received three plaques in the mail honoring officers for being "corrupt." Chief John Romero, who was named on one of the plaques, had them dusted for fingerprints and notified the Boston postal inspector. Romero says the person who sent the plaques could face federal charges for using the U.S. Postal Service "to threaten, harass, or intimidate" the officers.Dead Again
Laura Todd has died several times over the past eight years. OK, the Nashville woman hasn't really died. The federal government just keeps declaring her dead because of a mix-up involving her Social Security number that the feds promised to fix eight years ago. At various times, she has been unable to refinance her house because government records showed she was dead, her bank closed her credit card account and the IRS has twice refused to process her tax returns.Bird Brains
At around 5 a.m. one morning a customer went to a Wal-Mart in Lynchburg, Virginia. The customer found the door locked and saw men walking inside with rifles and reported it to police. The police jumped into action, blocked off the entrances to the store for about an hour and pulled everyone inside out at gunpoint. Finally, someone was able to explain to them that managers had hired an exterminator to come shoot some birds that had taken up residence in the store.The Accidental Terrorist
In 1992, when Lino Nakwa was 12, he was kidnapped by the Sudanese People's Liberation Army and held captive for about a month. The U.S. government acknowledges Nakwa didn't voluntarily join the group. But it has designated the SPLA as a terrorist group. It says Nakwa received some "military-type training" while captive, so it has denied Nakwa's request for a green card.Stop Dogging Him
When Adam Carroll deployed to Iraq as part the Army's 101st Airborne Division, he asked his father to take care of his two dogs. Henry Carroll agreed, but he already had three dogs of his own. Cumberland County, North Carolina, officials say five dogs exceeds the legal limit. They've ordered the elder Carroll to get rid of two of the dogs.Afterschool Shooting
For 30 years, North Carolina's Wildlife Resources Commission has been holding marksmanship contests for high school students. Tradition apparently means little to East Wake High School principal Sebastian Shipp and area superintendent Danny Barnes. Less than a day before the school's marksmanship club was scheduled to compete in a regional contest, the officials barred the team from competing, negating months of practice by the students. The two cited school policy banning weapons at school and on school trips. "If we had more time, we could have done something about it," said team member Robert Lumley, which may explain why the officials stopped the team at the last minute.Actually, That's an MP3 Player in My Pocket
Darren Nixon had left work and had just gotten of the bus taking him home when police officers, accompanied by police dogs and pointing guns at him, demanded that he stop. It turns out that a woman had seen his MP3 player and had mistaken it for a gun. That's something the Staffordshire, England, police should have figured out when they searched him after stopping Nixon. Instead, they took him into custody, photographed him, took his fingerprints and a DNA sample, and interrogated him. A spokesman for the department says the officers acted properly. No word on whether Nixon's prints, DNA, and mug shot will remain in their files.Friendly Fire
Charles Sherman was sleeping in his apartment when San Bernardino County, California, sheriff's deputies set fire to him. He suffered second- and third-degree burns on his stomach and groin when a SWAT team tossed a flash-bang grenade through a window onto his bed. He had allowed law enforcement to search his one-room apartment a few days earlier, but they decided to return, in force, to search it again for evidence in a murder. Sherman was eventually charged with possession of bullets by a convicted felon based on that first, voluntary, search.Cut Back on the Sushi
Japanese men are about 10 percent heavier than they were 30 years ago, and Japanese women are packing on the pounds, too. So the government has ordered companies to reduce the number of overweight employees by 10 percent by 2012 and 25 percent by 2015. Those companies that can't cut the fat face surcharges of up to 10 percent on the contributions they make for elder care. The government has also required that everyone over 40 be tested annually for metabolic syndrome, a combination of factors linked to an increased risk of heart disease and diabetes.Don't Live in D.C.
If you live in the District of Columbia, you've got to register your car. Some people don't do that. So the D.C. police have stepped up enforcement of that law. Parking enforcement officers patrol the streets, looking for cars with out-of-district tags. When they find one, they record the tag number on a computer. If they spot it in the same area again within 30 days, they issue a warning to register the vehicle. If they find it a third time, they can ticket the car or even have it towed. But people who live outside the city say they've been ticketed while visiting friends or taking classes or even just going to nightclubs or restaurants.A Little Speck Will Screw You
Keith Brown was traveling home to the United Kingdom when he was stopped by a customs inspector at Dubai International Airport. An inspection found a speck of cannabis weighing just 0.003 grams on the sole of his shoe. Police arrested Brown for drug possession. A court found him guilty and sentenced him to four years in prison.
Close Enough for Law Enforcement
Seven years ago, a teenage girl was raped, and she described her attacker as "black, large and tall." So why did police recently arrest Mark Minick, a white, thin, short man? Britain's national DNA database linked him to a hair found on the girl while she was lying in a hospital bed. He says police told him they had airtight evidence against him, never mentioning he didn't come close to matching the description of the rapist. It turns out Minick worked at the hospital, moving beds, when the girl was taken there, and that's how his hair may have gotten on her. Prosecutors dropped charges against Minick at trial, after he had spent several months on house arrest.
Koffeeklatch
A financial consultant and a financial analyst decided to hold a business meeting at Starbucks. No problem. Except they were in Saudi Arabia's. And the consultant was a woman and the analyst was a man. The country's Islamic law requires unmarried men and women to be segregated in public. Saudi vice police arrested the woman, took her to jail, strip-searched her and forced her to sign a confession to being alone with a man.
Child Abuse
It's right there on seven-year-old Randy Castro's permanent record at school: "Sexual Touching Against Student, Offensive." Sexual touching? It turned out the boy slapped a girl on the bottom one day at his Prince William County School. School officials not only wrote him up, they called the police. Randy's mother, herself a teacher, says what he did was wrong, but she doesn't understand why they called the police. Nor, for that matter, does the mother of the girl he slapped. She said her daughter didn't like it but she quickly forgot about it. "We didn't pay attention to it, because we know it's just children playing around," the girl's mother said. "He didn't mean anything by it. I'm upset with the school."
At Least It Wasn't Glue
In Westminster, Colorado's Harris Park Elementary School, principal Chris Benisch suspended Eathan Harris for sniffing a Sharpie marker. Benisch claims the marker fumes could cause the eight-year-old to "become intoxicated." But a toxicologist with the Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center says it is nearly impossible for the fumes from a Sharpie to get someone high. Harris seems to know exactly why he was suspended. "It smelled good," Harris said. "They told me that's wrong."
Look, Don't Touch
In Spalding County, Georgia, seventh-grader Darius Allen brought a BB gun onto a school bus. He showed it to friends Alfred Burns and Andre Bussey, who touched the BB gun. When school officials found out, they not only expelled Allen, they suspended Burns and Bussey for a year and a half.
Rotten to the Core
Kate Badger faces up to six months in jail and an unlimited fine. Her crime? The Wolverhampton, England, woman is accused by local officials of tossing an apple core from her car onto the pavement.
Hold It
One bathroom for 1,300 students. That's the situation at Georgia's Fayette County High School. Following an alleged gang initiation beatdown in one of the school's bathrooms, officials closed all but one bathroom during classes. Now, a student who needs to go during class must go to the school office, ask permission, and then wait in line for a key to the one bathroom. Students complain that the bathrooms are often also locked during breaks between classes, when they are supposed to be open.
Thanks But No Thanks
The British government says Rogers Jean-Baptiste, who was born in St. Lucia, can't become a British citizen because he wasn't in the country five years ago on the date he applied for citizenship. Where was Jean-Baptiste back in 2003? In Germany, serving in the British Army. In fact, Jean-Baptiste served four years in the Army, including two tours in Iraq. And if he'd applied two days earlier, he'd have been approved for citizenship because his unit hadn't been shipped to Germany at that point. The government says he'll have to wait until 2011 to apply again for citizenship.
Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble
A blocked ditch sent water flooding through John and Margie Histed's £1 million home in England. They spent eight months and £250,000 fixing the place. But more than a year after the flood, they still can't go back in. Why? The ditch is still blocked, and it still sends water into the house. They can't unblock it because they've found a great crested newt, which is protected under British and European Union law, in the ditch. No one can legally capture it, kill it, or disturb its habitat.