Strange News-Mass. woman's 1 cent debt paid in full

ATTLEBORO, Mass. – A 74-year-old blind woman's 1 cent debt to a Massachusetts city has been settled.

People from across the country called Attleboro City Hall on Tuesday offering to pay the 1 cent balance owed by Eileen Wilbur for an overdue water and sewer bill.

Antonio Viveiros, a former city councilor who does not know Wilbur, wrote a check for one penny. He says he was "irked" by the fact that the federal government can spend billions for bailouts, yet a senior citizen was threatened with a lien on her home over 1 cent.

Wilbur's daughter first noticed the letter that warned of a lien and a $48 penalty if the overdue bill was not paid by Dec. 10.

Mayor Kevin Dumas says the whole situation was blown out of proportion!

Gm Chrysler Merger News----Lingerie Bowl Pics----Lingerie Football----
Facebook-Pics----Political Roast----Lingerie Football Pics

Odd News-Body in car prompts inquiry - Driver says night of drinking turned bad

This is some strange news!
Knoxville - In the back of the Pontiac lay a bloody body. In the driver's seat sat a man with a tale of nighttime drinking gone bad.
For the Knox County Sheriff's Office, it was another killing.
Authorities are investigating how 26-year-old Marco Antonio Hernandez of Elkins Road ended up dead Thursday night in the back of a 1997 Firebird along westbound Interstate 640. More...

Gm Chrysler Merger News----Lingerie Bowl Pics----Lingerie Football----
Facebook-Pics----Political Roast----Lingerie Football Pics

Strange News-Boy makes rare recovery from rabies - Almost always fatal disease

Brazil - A 15-year-old boy in Brazil recovered from a normally deadly rabies infection, becoming one of a handful of survivors of the virus worldwide and the first in the country, the health ministry said on Friday. The teenager, who was bitten by a blood-sucking bat in the northeastern state of Pernambuco, was found to be clear of the virus after more than a month of hospital treatment using a combination of drugs. More...

Gm Chrysler Merger News----Lingerie Bowl Pics----Lingerie Football----
Facebook-Pics----Political Roast----Lingerie Football Pics

Strange Animal News-Jogger runs mile with rabid fox locked on her arm

PRESCOTT, Arizona - With a fox locked onto her arm, an Arizona jogger ran a mile to her car, where she was able to dislodge the animal, throw it into the trunk and drive to a Prescott hospital. The Yavapai County Sheriff's Office said the fox, which later attacked an animal control officer, tested positive for rabies. The unidentified Chino Valley resident told deputies she was on a trail Monday at the base of Granite Mountain when the fox attacked, biting her foot. The woman said she grabbed it by the neck when it went for her leg and it latched onto her arm. More...

Gm Chrysler Merger News----Myspace Pics----Songs For America----
Facebook-Pics----Political Roast----Lingerie Football Pics

Strange News:15 train robbers killed by poison gas

GUWAHATI, India (Reuters) - At least 15 Indian train robbers looking to steal diesel from a freight carriage died Saturday after inhaling poison gas stored in another tank they accidentally broke open, police said.

More...
A police patrol party said they found 30 other people lying unconscious on both sides of a forested train track in India's Assam state.

"We found many empty drums which they must have brought with them to fill with oil," a local police officer said by phone.

The train was earlier stopped by dozens of armed people who police believe were members of a gang which frequently steals crude oil from trains and pipelines carrying oil to refineries in the oil-rich state.

(Reporting by Biswajyoti Das; Editing by Bappa Majumdar)






Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News:Exotic Snakes, Venomous Spiders Found in Baby Toy Package

Sydney — U.S. and Australian authorities are investigating the smuggling of snakes and venomous spiders that were found in a parcel in Sydney, an official said Wednesday.


More...
Customs Service officers in Australia's biggest city discovered five harmless pythons and two dangerous South American tarantulas at the Sydney airport last week when they X-rayed a package that had been posted from the United States, Customs investigations manager Richard Janeczko said.

The creatures were later killed because they posed a quarantine risk, Janeczko said in the capital, Canberra.

Janeczko would not say from where in the United States the parcel — declared as baby toys and shirts — had been posted.

He said Australian officials based in Washington were communicating with U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials on a U.S. investigation into who had sent the parcel.

In Australia, charges were expected to be laid against at least one alleged importer after customs officers and police raided a Sydney home Tuesday and seized evidence, Janeczko said.

Importing snakes or spiders without a license can attract maximum penalties of 10 years in prison and a $92,000 fine.







Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange-Lamb-eating sea eagles upset Scottish farmers

Lamb-eating sea eagles upset Scottish farmers
LONDON (Reuters) - Sheep farmers in remote northwest Scotland are furious about a sea eagle reintroduction programme, saying the huge birds of prey are damaging their livelihoods by killing 200 lambs in the past year.

The Scottish Crofting Foundation said some crofts, small farms producing mainly lamb or beef, had seen lamb numbers fall over the past five years because of the sea eagles' diet.

More...
"It's come to the stage now that we have lost, in the whole peninsula, around 200 lambs and we believe this is solely due to the sea eagles," William Fraser, chairman of the Gairloch and Poolewe branch of the Crofting Foundation, told Reuters.

"In a few years time there'll be no sheep left on the hills," said Fraser, who owns a 4-acre croft with 150 sheep.

Conservation groups began gradually reintroducing sea eagles to parts of Scotland from 1975. Britain's largest bird of prey had become extinct there in the early 20th century.

The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) says the programme is an outstanding conservation success story.

Three breeding pairs live in Gairloch, where Fraser has his farm.

Fraser said the sea eagles -- which have a wing span of eight feet and can weigh eight kgs (18 lbs) when fully grown -- will snatch even year-old sheep.

The crofters will meet next week to discuss the problem but Fraser suggested the young eagle chicks could be taken out of their nests and taken elsewhere. It was up to the conservation groups to solve the problem, he said.

Scottish Natural Heritage, the Forestry Commission of Scotland and the RSPB, which jointly run the sea eagle reintroduction programme, were unconvinced by Fraser's estimate.

"The number (of lambs) that they are suggesting is extremely surprising to us," said RSPB spokesman James Reynolds.

Reynolds said that last week an RSPB team in Scotland examined a sea eagle nest on Gairloch and found their diet consisted largely of Fulmars, a sea bird, and quite large lamb bones, suggesting they were scavenged.

"We're working with the Scottish Crofting Foundation very closely on this issue," Reynolds said, adding that sea eagles generated about 1.5 million pounds ($2.8 million) a year in wildlife tourism for the island of Mull, where eight pairs live.

(Reporting by Golnar Motevalli; Editing by Ralph Boulton)


Share It, Post It, Email it!
Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News-Judge Orders Victim to Pay Back Thief

NEW HAVEN, Connecitcut - Mark Poveromo feels ripped off twice over. A judge ordered him to repay money he collected from a builder convicted of stealing from him — and told him to kick in the thief's attorney fees and court costs, too. Legal experts say the case, in which a criminal matter in Connecticut intersects a bankruptcy judgment filed in St. Louis, shows a need for Congress to revise the nation's bankruptcy laws to better treat people who are awarded money as part of a ruling in a criminal case. "This is an outrageous decision," said Anthony Sabino, a law professor at St. John's University and a bankruptcy expert. "I think it's a miscarriage of justice."
"I can't even begin to fathom it," Poveromo said. "Crime does pay."

More...
The case began in 2006, when Poveromo hired Mark R. Koch of Illinois for an $80,000 project to construct a building for his pet food business in Thomaston, Conn. Poveromo paid $39,500 up front, but Koch never did any work, according to court documents.

Poveromo filed a criminal complaint. Koch was convicted in Connecticut of first-degree larceny in April 2007 and ordered to pay restitution. Koch paid $25,000 and began monthly payments to Poveromo on the balance, but that's when the law turned on Poveromo.

Two months before his conviction, Koch filed for bankruptcy protection in St. Louis, halting any monetary claims against him. Poveromo says notices of the bankruptcy filing were sent to Poveromo's old business address and he didn't see them.

Koch then filed a complaint to the bankruptcy court accusing Poveromo of intentionally violating the stay on claims by having him arrested to collect on his debt.

Judge Charles Rendlen III agreed with the builder. In a ruling filed in December, and without hearing from Poveromo, Rendlen noted "the highly suspect timing" of Koch's arrest and conviction after filing for bankruptcy.

The judge said Poveromo intentionally violated the bankruptcy stay on claims by causing Koch's arrest to collect on the debt.

"Allowing a creditor to use the threat of incarceration on charges related to a prepetition debt undermines the most fundamental premise of bankruptcy law: the guarantee of equal treatment among creditors pursuant to the bankruptcy code," Rendlen wrote.

Rendlen ordered Poveromo to pay back the restitution Koch had given him as well as attorney's fees and costs.

Poveromo tried to challenge the ruling, but failed to get it overturned. The judge also rejected Poveromo's request to appear by telephone instead of traveling to St. Louis because he cares for his elderly sick parents.

"The inconvenience experienced by the defendant's parents does not outweigh the need of the court to observe the defendant in person as he gives his testimony, to allow the court to best weigh his credibility," Rendlen wrote.

Poveromo said he had to pay for airplane tickets to St. Louis for a hearing on the case and couldn't get a refund after Koch's attorney asked for a delay.

Poveromo said he reluctantly accepted a settlement reached a few weeks ago in which he was able to keep the nearly $28,000 Koch had given him but did not collect on the balance he was owed based on what the Connecticut court had ordered.

His attorney, Jeff Weisman, decried the ruling.

"I think it's an injustice to individuals who are victimized," Weisman said.

Koch's bankruptcy attorney, Robert Eggmann, declined to comment on the settlement and said the bankruptcy ruling speaks for itself.

Rendlen did not return a telephone message seeking comment. Court officials cited a policy that judges do not comment on their decisions.

Jack Williams, resident scholar at the American Bankruptcy Institute, said the case highlights an area of the law that Congress should fix by expanding the exception to the stay of bankruptcy claims in criminal cases so that criminal restitutions can go forward during bankruptcies. He said the ruling is not unusual in finding a violation of the stay, but said other judges may not have sanctioned Poveromo.

Bankruptcy attorney Stuart Hirshfield said he agreed with the ruling because a stay of claims is fundamental to bankruptcy cases and violations are dealt with severely. He also said when a party fails to appear, the judge has to rule on what is known and the judge believed there was adequate notice.

Sabino, the bankruptcy expert from St. John's, said problem lies primarily with the judge's interpretation of the law.

Poveromo said he has since hired another contractor to construct the building for his business. He said he's struggling after spending $10,000 on lawyers while business has slowed amid a weak economy, but is determined to persevere.

"It's tough times," Poveromo said. "I'm not going to let this criminal ruin my business."

Fox News..





Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News-Diabetic man mistaken for drunken driver and beaten

Strange News-Diabetic man mistaken for drunken driver and beaten

Michigan - A diabetic Detroit man was mistaken for a drunken driver by Allen Park and Dearborn police, and brutally beaten to the point that he had to have part of his brain surgically removed, the man’s wife and their attorney allege. Ernest Griglen, 59, has been comatose and on a ventilator since the June 15 incident, said attorney Arnold Reed of Farmington Hills.
Reed filed a lawsuit in federal court today against the Allen Park and Dearborn police departments and five officers on behalf of Griglen and his wife, Pamela Griglen. They’re seeking $20 million in damages.
More...
According to the complaint, Griglen was driving south on the Southfield Freeway when he suffered a hypoglycemic episode. The complaint says Griglen exited his vehicle in an effort to summon the Allen Park officer. Then he was pulled over by an Allen Park Police officer. Dearborn officers also arrived on the scene to assist, according to the court document.
The complaint alleges that police came in contact with Griglen’s insulin pump in Griglen’s stomach and diabetes equipment in his vehicle, but still threw him headfirst into the ground.

“A reasonably competent police officer properly trained in the use of force would not have beat, assaulted and battered” Griglen, the complaint says.

But police reports from Allen Park and Dearborn released Monday to the Free Press under a Freedom of Information Act request tell a different tale. In her account, Allen Park Officer Tracie Brown said she had to wrestle Griglen to the ground after a five-mile car chase and he became combative.

Brown wrote in her report that she noticed Griglen stopped his car at a green light in the middle of Southfield Road just south of Pinecrest. When she approached him, he yelled something about getting into a verbal argument with his wife. But when she told him to pull over to the side of the road so he wouldn’t cause an accident, he drove off, she wrote.

Brown said she called for back-up and turned on her lights and sirens when Griglen continued northbound on Southfield Road. When he finally pulled over just south of the Ford Road exit, Griglen put his hands on the hood and wouldn’t answer Brown when she asked him why he wouldn’t stop, she wrote. And when she told him to put his hands behind his back to be handcuffed and arrested for fleeing and eluding, he locked his arms then started to run when Dearborn Police back-up arrived, she said.

Officer Brown reported that she grabbed the back of Griglen’s shirt to stop him. Brown and two Dearborn officers then wrestled him to the ground, she reported.

In a report filed by Dearborn Police officers, they claimed they had to spray Griglen with pepper spray to force him to comply.

Once Griglen was handcuffed and picked off the ground, Officer Brown reported that she noticed the insulin pump going into the side of Griglen’s body, a bloody nose and a bump on his forehead where he hit the cement after being wrestled to the ground.

Griglen started to complain about police stopping him, speaking in slurred words, the reports states. That prompted a Breathalyzer field test that found no alcohol. Griglen told the police he wanted medical attention because he wasn’t feeling well, Officer Brown reported.

Police took Griglen to the hospital. Though the report does not state which hospital, Allen Park Police confirm it was Oakwood Dearborn.

At a news conference today, Pamela Griglen said she and her husband had gone to see “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” on June 15. They had popcorn, candy and soda as they watched the flick and then he dropped her off at Fairlane Mall in Dearborn. She said she didn’t know where Ernest Griglen was driving to next, but soon she found herself at Oakwood Hospital in Dearborn, where he was taken with head injuries.

“He said they beat him,” Pamela Griglen said, referring to Allen Park and Dearborn police officers. “He complained about his head.”

Since having brain surgery, Ernest Griglen has remained unconscious.

Allen Park Police Chief Dean Tamsen said today that city legal counsel advised him not to comment on the allegations.

“It’s a sad event for everybody involved,” Tamsen said this afternoon before the press conference.

Dearborn city spokeswoman Mary Laundroche, director of the Department of Public Information, declined to comment on officers’ actions.

“On the behalf of the city, we want to express concern for Mr. Griglen and his loved ones as they deal with his serious medical condition,” Laundroche said before the press conference. She also said the city had not received a copy of the lawsuit by this afternoon.

“It would be irresponsible to respond to a press conference held for dramatic purposes,” she added.





Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News-NYC's Anti-Smoking Weapon: Gross Matchbook Images

Strange News-NYC's Anti-Smoking Weapon: Gross Matchbook Images

NYC health dept hopes gruesome pictures on matchbooks get people to think twice about smoking

Before New Yorkers light up, the city health department wants them to have a look at the ravaged lungs, rotting gums and large tumors smoking can cause.

More...
Graphic images of such health problems are printed on a new line of matchbooks issued by the health department. Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden says they're designed to get New Yorkers to think twice about smoking.

The matchbook images are coupled with the words "Cigarettes Are Eating You Alive." The matchbooks are available free at 132 cigarette retailers around the city.

Assistant Commissioner Sarah Perl says the effort is a counterpoint to the billions of dollars the tobacco industry spends promoting smoking with images of healthy, beautiful people.

———

On the Net:

New York Department of Health and Mental Hygiene: http://www.nyc.gov/health





Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News-The man with no face - medical science offers new hope to face-eating tumor man

Warning---These pictures are disturbing!The man with no face - medical science offers new hope to face-eating tumor man
A victim of horrific facial disfigurement - known as "the man with no face" - has been given new hope by the advancement of medical science.

Jose Mestre, from Lisbon, Portugal, has been losing his face to a huge growth for the past 35 years, distorting it out of all recognition - and it's still growing.

The tumor on 51-year-old Jose's face is a collection of blood vessels that have expanded, producing a raised red area on the skin.
More...



Jose was born with a strawberry-coloured birthmark on his upper lip. At puberty it began growing, eventually smothering his lips, nose and one of his eyes. Now it is 33cm long and weighs 3kg.

But Jose's religious faith - as a Jehovah's Witness he refuses to accept a blood transfusion - has prevented him from having surgery to remove the growth.

Jose's rare condition was the subject of a Discovery Channel TV documentary 'The Man With No Face', part of the 'My Shocking Story' series.



It reveals how top medical experts in London have now held out hope of helping Jose, a well-known figure around the streets of Lisbon.

A leading British surgeon has offered to treat Jose using ultrasound waves to coagulate the blood before the operation.

This should remove the risk of heavy bleeding - satisfying his religious beliefs about blood transfusions in the process.

Dr Iain Hutchison, of St Bartholomew's in London, is confident an operation with a harmonic scalpel could make him look a lot more normal.

Discovery Channel said: "Surrounded by a loving family, it seems incredible that he has not been treated and his face was allowed to grow so big. However, through years of medical misinformation, some misdiagnosis, lack of finances, and reluctance to undergo treatment due to religious beliefs, the growth has continued to obliterate his face."

My Shocking Story follows Jose on a journey through Europe to seek medical advice for one last chance to stop his face from suffocating him.

In this journey of a lifetime he travels by train, via Paris, to Britain, to meet the top experts in London. He goes through a series of tests, consultations, and meets other patients with a similar affliction. In London he also spends time with his sister Guida and the rest of his family, enjoys being a tourist in London, while making the biggest decision of his life.

Jose's dream is to live a long and normal life. Following the showing of the Discovery documentary he continues to adhere to his 'no blood transfusion' religious principles. But he has agreed to go back to the London hospital in 2008, when doctors hope to carry out specialist surgery to begin removing parts of his tumor, without the need for blood transfusions.







Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics

Strange News:Thumbelina the world's smallest horse

Strange News:Thumbelina the world's smallest horse
She may be small, a mere 17 inches and weighing only 60 pounds. But she is all horse.

Born as a dwarf to a miniature horse, Thumbelina is officially the world’s smallest horse.

More...


She may never aspire to be a champion show-jumper – she is so tiny she would find it hard to jump over a bucket.

But these things matter little to the feisty Thumbelina, who has been officially recognized as the world’s smallest horse.

That title was conferred on her in 2006 when the five-year-old entered the Guinness Book of Records.

The real-life My Little Pony was born on an American farm to a couple who specialize in breeding miniature horses.

Normally these horses weight about 250lb and rise to a height of 34 inches when they are fully grown.

But from the day she was born it was clear that tiny Thumbelina would never grow to that size.

She weighed in at only 8lb – the size of a new-born baby - when she was born. Eventually she grew to just 60lb.

Her amazing size has been explained as dwarfism. This makes her a miniature of a miniature.

She may be a mini-horse, but small means beautiful as far as her owners, the Goessling family in Goose Creek farm in St. Louis, are concerned.

She likes to hang out with the cocker spaniels rather than the other horses on their 150-acre farm.

“When she was born, she was so small we thought she wasn’t going to make it. She looked very ill. We feared the worse.

“Because her legs are proportionally smaller than her body and her head, she has to wear orthopaedic fittings to straighten them out a lot of the time.

“But we love her and wouldn’t want her any other way,” said Michael Goessling, whose parents Kay and Paul bred the miniature horses.

She only measures up to the shins of the normal-sized horses in the paddock.

Michael’s parents have bred hundreds of miniature horses, but they have never had one as small as Thumbelina. She has become something of a celebrity in her home town in America.

She lives on a cup of grain and a handful of hay, served twice a day.

She is expected to live to the age of 17 years because of her size – normal horses live for about 35 years.

“She was just a complete fluke and we call her a mini mini. She is too precious to sell. I think my parents would sell me before they part with Thumbelina. She has that special Wow factor, which you only get when you see how small she really is,” said Michael.

While she has the ability to get pregnant and give birth, the Goessling family have decided not to allow this to happen.

There could be complications during the pregnancy, they believe, so it is better to avoid the risks. And also they don‘t feel it is right that the gene which creates dwarfism in horses be carried on through future generations.




Share It, Post It, Email it!

Funny Sarah Palin Videos----Pics For Myspace----Cute Pics