The most recent edition of This Week New Albany — our local suburban newspaper — has a story about a road rage incident in our community and a warning from the police. The incident involved two cars stopped at an intersection. The drivers exchanged words — the police don’t know exactly what was said — [...]
Archive for the ‘crime’ Category
What To Do With A Road Rage Warning?
Posted in Columbus, crime, tagged Columbus, crime, Driving, Life, New Albany, News, Police, road rage, This Week New Albany on February 8, 2012 | 3 Comments »
Reasonable Expectations Of Privacy In A Digital Age
Posted in America, crime, Technology, tagged America, Cell Phones, crime, Criminal Justice, Fourth Amendment, Supreme Court, Technology, United States Constitution on January 25, 2012 | 1 Comment »
Earlier this week the Supreme Court decided an interesting case that begins what will be a long process of determining how the criminal justice protections of the Constitution apply to knotty issues raised by our increasingly linked-in, networked, mobile device-oriented age. The case raised the question of whether prosecutors could attach a GPS device to [...]
Should It Be Illegal To Drive And Talk (Or Text)?
Posted in America, crime, Politics, tagged America, Cell Phones, crime, Driving, National Transportation Safety Board, News, Politics, Texting on December 13, 2011 | 3 Comments »
Today the National Transportation Safety Board recommended a nationwide ban on the use of cell phones and texting devices while driving. The NTSB says it is a safety issue, because drivers who are talking or texting aren’t paying attention. The NTSB argues that distracted drivers caused more than 3,000 roadway fatalities last year. In fact, [...]
Ohio Gets Weirder And Weirder
Posted in crime, Ohio, tagged Amish, crime, Internet, Internet crime, Ohio on November 19, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Some weird stuff has happened in Ohio lately. It’s turned our normally boring state into the constant subject of strange news stories. Exotic animals have been set free to roam the countryside near Zanesville. An odd Amish cult that features beard-cutting as punishment has sprung up in northeastern Ohio. And now we learn that some [...]
Horror In State College
Posted in America, crime, sports, tagged America, crime, Jerry Sandusky, Penn State, sports on November 9, 2011 | 1 Comment »
The story told by the grand jury report on former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky is truly horrific. It is a terrible thing to read, and an even more terrible thing to contemplate, because it says deeply disturbing things about our society. Of course, the allegations of Sandusky’s wrongful interactions with underage boys are [...]
Police Intruders
Posted in America, crime, tagged America, Beverly, Boston, Car Theft, cars, crime, Police on October 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Here’s a curious story from Beverly, Massachusetts: police have been going into unlocked cars, leaving warnings about car theft, and then locking the cars. Beverly, a community on the north shore of the Massachusetts Bay near Boston, apparently has been experiencing a raft of thefts from parked cars. Many of the victimized cars have either [...]
Horror In Wild Ohio
Posted in crime, Ohio, tagged Bears, crime, Exotic animals, Lions, Ohio, Terry Thompson, Tigers, Wild animals on October 19, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Today’s story about exotic animals who were set free from a privately owned farm near Zanesville, Ohio and then had to be shot by Muskingum County sheriff’s deputies is horrific on many levels. For those who aren’t familiar with this awful story, a man named Terry Thompson kept dozens of exotic animals on his farm [...]
Masked Avengers, Pepper Spray, and High Heels
Posted in crime, Humor, tagged crime, Ghost, Humor, Phoenix Jones, Seattle, Superheros, Vigilantes on October 13, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Saturday night a self-proclaimed superhero named “Phoenix Jones,” who wears a black mask and one of those heavily muscled bodysuits, was patrolling Seattle’s streets with his faithful sidekick, Ghost. They say they saw a fight, ran toward a group of people, and a melee broke out. Members of the group claim Jones doused them with [...]
The Dutch Debate “Drug Tourism”
Posted in crime, Travel, World, tagged crime, Drug Tourism, Gambling, Liquor, Maastricht, Marijuana, the Netherlands, Travel, World on October 1, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
The Netherlands, with its decriminalization of “soft drugs” like marijuana, has long attracted tourists who are interested in sampling illicit substances. Now Maastricht, a Dutch city on the border with Germany and Belgium, is trying to crack down — in part — on “drug tourism,” and the country as a whole is trying to decide [...]
A Costly Solar Flame-Out (IV)
Posted in crime, Politics, tagged crime, House Energy and Commerce Committee, Politics, President Obama, Solyndra on September 23, 2011 | 2 Comments »
The Solyndra story — a tale of a company that got more than half a billion in federal loan guarantees as a showcase for green energy jobs, then plunged into bankruptcy — continues to unfold. Today there will be hearing before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, at which certain Solyndra executives have said they [...]
The Fresno State Food Stamp Fraudsters
Posted in crime, sports, tagged crime, Food Stamp Fraud, Food Stamps, Fresno State Bulldogs, Fresno State University, NCAA, sports, Welfare Fraud on September 13, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Technically, it is the Fresno State Bulldogs. In view of recent news stories, however, perhaps the team name should be changed to the Food Stamp Fraudsters — which has a nice bit of alliteration to it. According to reports, as many as two dozen Fresno State players are embroiled in a welfare fraud investigation involving a [...]
Gram Scam
Posted in crime, Family, Ohio, tagged crime, Family, Fraud, Fraudsters, Grandparents, Mike DeWine, Ohio, Scams, senior citizens on September 13, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Every grandkid knows that if they are in a pinch and really need money, they can always make a discreet withdrawal from the Bank of Grandma. Unfortunately, fraudsters have learned that same lesson and are using that knowledge to prey on the elderly and bilk them out of their retirement savings. Ohio Attorney General Mike [...]
Snakes In The Trousers
Posted in crime, Humor, tagged Airplanes, crime, Humor, Lacey Act, smuggling, Snakes, Tortoises on August 30, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Lately there have been a series of curious stories in the news about people trying to smuggle rare animals and birds by storing them on their persons. Such conduct violates the Lacey Act, which prohibits the smuggling of exotic animals. The weirdest attempt, in my view, was by a man in Miami who tried to [...]
When Rivalries Get Ugly
Posted in crime, sports, tagged Alcohol, crime, fighting, Oakland, Oakland Raiders, rivalries, San Francisco, San Francisco 49ers, sports, sports fans, violence on August 21, 2011 | 1 Comment »
The San Francisco 49ers played the Oakland Raiders last night. Although the two towns are separated only by the San Francisco Bay, they are fierce rivals. Last night’s game was marked by significant violence. Two guys were shot, and another guy was seriously beaten in a stadium bathroom. The story on the violence also features [...]