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We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.

Jim Wells’ gay comments are none of the police’s business

Northern Ireland Health Minister Jim Wells has resigned? Why? Well, there was that comment her made, the one about gays and paedos:

“You don’t bring a child up in a homosexual relationship. That a child is far more likely to be abused and neglected….”

Ignorant balls, of course. But that’s not why Mr Wells has resigned. As he says:

“As many people are aware I have been focused on helping my wife during her fight for life. Those who know my family and I, know the last three months have been the toughest of our lives as we watched my wife, Grace, suffer two successive strokes and battle through major heart surgery. However, as she now faces further challenges I have come to the point where I am no longer able to continue my ministerial duties and give Grace the attention she deserves.”

Fair enough. But about his words linking child abuse and being gay… Well, on that he says:

“I accept that one line of what I said caused offence and deep concern. I regret having wrongly made that remark about abuse and I’m sorry those words were uttered. The comment did not reflect my view nor that of my party.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 27th, April 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment


Lord Janner: Liberal Democrat councillor Frank Beck and police sirens

janner

 

Lord Janner: a look at reporting on the allegations of a Westminster peadophile cover-up.

The Daily Mail (page 10): “Janner’s thak you note to detective who was forced to drop case by bosses”

We hear from retired detective Kelvyn Ashby.

The policeman who led the original investigation into Janner in the early 1990s spoke yesterday of how he was ‘gutted’ after orders to drop the case came ‘from the very top’.

That’s 14 or 15 years of being “gutted”.

Retired Detective Inspector Kelvyn Ashby, of Leicestershire Police, said his team uncovered evidence supporting allegations that the then-Leicester MP used his home and a hotel to abuse a teenage boy. He said he and fellow investigator Mick Creedon, now Chief Constable of Derbyshire Police, were prevented from arresting Janner.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 27th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)


Watch Rhapsody In Blue: Ex Cops Smoking Weed

ex cops smoking weed

Ex-cops smoking weed is what it says on the tin.

Anyone want to do a British version?

Posted: 27th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Katie Hopkins V New Labour: human cockroaches v the human virus

When Katie Hopkins called migrants “cockraoches” in her Sun column, she was compared to Hitler by many, including UN high commissioner for human rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein of Jordan.

James Delingpole takes a look:

Over the weekend, you may have noticed, Katie Hopkins was trending on Twitter yet again – this time because of a piece she’d written in The Sun in which she’d upset the Offenderati by using the word “cockroaches” in the context of the boatloads of hapless, parched, pitiable migrants now fleeing Libya. At this point you’re obliged tactically to distance yourself from Hopkins by noting how distasteful you too find her appalling choice of words. But I’m not going to, for several reasons, the first being that that it was so devastatingly effective.

It is. It got attention.

Of course, referring to people as parasites is nothing new. After all former environment minister Michael Meacher:

“The lesson is that if we continue with activities which destroy our environment and undermine the conditions for our own survival, we are the virus.”

Meacher is the Labour MP For Oldham West & Royton. Hopkins is unelected.

Posted: 26th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Lord Janner: Official Secrets mean only the dead can talk

Lord Greville Janner: a round-up of media reporting on the Labour peer mired in the story of Westminster peados.

Mail on Sunday: “Let’s hear Janner facts”

What are they, then? The Mail has already cited Lord Janner’s “victims” – not alleged vitims. So. The facts:

Now that the Crown Prosecution Service has admitted that Lord Janner could have been charged with serious sexual offences when he was fit to plead, calls for him to face a special hearing of the case against him in open court are, rightly, increasing.

He could have faced a trial if he had been ordered to years ago – back when historical sex abuse was not the hot story it is today. But he wasn’t. And coulds and ifs are not facts.

Peter Wanless, the head of the NSPCC, has added his powerful voice to the clamour for the allegations to be considered at a ‘trial of facts’ in which his accusers would be heard, though he would not need to take part, or face the risk of conviction.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 26th, April 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment


Newspaper corection of the week: The Halesowen News’ shop for kleptomaniacs

Newspaper corection of the week: The Halesowen News’ story on Twig Fields and her newly-opened vintage clothing store The Walk-In Wardrobe in Cradley Heath, contained an error:

Newspaper corection of the week: The Halesowen News'

Posted: 26th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Liverpool keep Jordan Henderson but will Nivea stick by their man?

Jordan Henderson Nivea

 

Jordan Henderson has penned a new five-year deal to play for Liverpool. Good news for Liverpool fans. And at £100,0o0-a-week, it’s good news for Henderson, who will just be able to afford a season ticket at top-flight boxing. (Tickets for the Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao’s fight are yours for £100,000 each. It makes £60 to watch your team play Arsenal at the Emirates look like a steal.)

Writing in the Times, Giles Smith wonders if Henderson is going to re-sign for another of his clients: Nivea.

…a deal that has already yielded comedy gold. Indeed, if there was a Bafta for Best Look To Camera By A Footballer In A Narrative-Based Commercial (and now there should be), Henderson would have swept it away for a lifetime.

It is a cracker:

 

 

But what does it all mean for men? It’s the decline of man: the steady emasculation of our role models.

Posted: 25th, April 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports, The Consumer | Comment


Lord Janner: DPP, FGM and shuffling across the carpet to genital abuse

DPP Janner

 

Lord Janner: a look at reporting on the Labout peer in the news.

The Sun: “CRONY PROSECUTOR”

DPP worked at same firm as peado rap Lord she let off

It’s about Ms Alison Saunders, the head of the Crown Prosection service. The Sun says she “started her career” at 1 Garden Court Chamebers  – where Janner…was a top QC.”

Thsi is an “exclusive”. Well, it is to anyone who has never read the Saunders CV or other news sources days ago.

The upper echelons of the judiciary are incestuous places.

Daily Telegraph: “CPS chief’s husbands is member of ‘tax loophole’ film investment scheme”

The knives are out for Director of Public Prosecutions boss Saunders.

Neil Saunders, whose wife is the Director of Public Prosecutions, is a member of a controversial scheme being investigated by the taxman, The Telegraph can disclose.

A lecture from the Daily Telegraph on the wrongs of legally exploiting tax loopholes might make you roll your eyes, but is it valid?

Neil Saunders, a defence barrister, is listed by Companies House as a member of a film industry investment scheme which is being pursued by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC).

How are the husband’s tax affairs relevant to Sauncders’ decicion not to send Janner to court? We’re not told. It’s just out there. As are these facts:

• DPP Alison Saunders took legal advice on Greville Janner from former colleague of his son
• DPP Alison Saunders spent £7,000 on business class flights while CPS headed towards crisis

The Press Gazette: “‘Eight officers stormed into my bedroom shouting Met Police’: Reporter’s three-year ordeal ‘for writing story about a fox'”

As well as looking at what cases Saunders did not think fit for court, it’s worth looking what what cases she has approved.

The Sun’s online news editor Vince Soodin has has condemned the Met Police for turning Operation Elveden into “a probe into unauthorised leaks to journalists – whether they were paid for or not”.

Soodin, along with former News of the World reporter Lucy Panton, was officially cleared at the Old Bailey yesterday – nearly three years after his initial arrest.

Good.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph today, Soodin, 40, said Operation Elveden has been “pursued without any sense of proportion” by the Metropolitan Police commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe and Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders – who he said “must resign”.

On his 7 August 2012 arrest, Soodin wrote: “I was set to go the London Olympics; instead I was woken – at 6.06am – by my doorbell. I was confronted by eight police officers; detectives stormed past me into my bedroom, waking my girlfriend, who was unaware I had gone to the front door, shouting ‘Met Police’ before I was allowed to explain to her what was happening. We were in shock.

“Officers bagged up our computers. Seized our belongings. They went through our clothes and underwear, personal diaries, everything. Almost anything connected to my job was tagged and taken. They still have my Sun contract of employment – as though this is damning evidence that I am a criminal.

“Detectives stood over us as we dressed. Then I was taken away from my girlfriend and thrown into a cell at a north London police station before being questioned by two detectives.”

Snodin then nails Saunders.

“Set alongside the Lord Janner scandal and February’s ludicrous prosecution of a doctor – on charges of female genital mutilation – who had stitched up a woman bleeding after childbirth, Operation Elveden has destroyed confidence in the Crown Prosecution Service under Alison Saunders. There is only one proper course of action now. She must resign.”

The FGM show trial was a disaster for the CPS. It was a victory for the jury which found Dr Dhanuson Dharmasena not guilty of carrying out female genital mutilation on a newly delivered young mother. Another man was cleared of abetting Dr Dharmasena. Both men was used to showcase the authorities’ commitment to combatting FGM.

But what of calling for someone to lose their job? Is that fair?

The Indepedent: “Lord Janner: How the Director of Public Prosecutions should have handled the Labour peer”

In hindsight:

What most angers her critics is that after taking the trouble to consult widely on the decision, Saunders has chosen to deny Janner’s alleged victims any chance of having their day in court.

What angers her critics is that Saunders came to the conclusion they didn’t want.

Lord Janner’s mental capacity – he is in the advanced stages of Alzheimer’s – is not in question.

It is the question. It is very much the question. And many have sought to answer it. If Lord Janner was well, he would be charged with 14 indecent assaults on a male under 16 between 1969 and 1988; two indecent assaults between 1984 and 1988; four counts of buggery of a male under 16 between 1972 and 1987; and two counts of buggery between 1977 and 1988.

…she seemed to perfectly understand what is at stake by deciding not to prosecute. Saunders explained: “There has been considerable public interest, and media coverage, of the fact of the investigations including identifying Lord Janner as the subject of them. Indeed, concern has been expressed publicly of a cover-up.”

And she went on: “The allegations that have been made against Lord Janner are extremely serious. Those who have made them are, entirely understandably, vociferous in urging the taking of action against Lord Janner.”

But what Saunders woefully failed to address was the possibility of a trial on the facts alone, so that the victims would at least have their allegations tested in a court of law. It would have required Lord Janner to be charged and then for the judge to officially rule that, although he was unfit to plead, a jury could still hear the issues.

No. She did not fail to address that. As David Pannick QC explains:

The critics have also referred to cases under the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act 1964 where a criminal court does decide the truth of allegations against a person suffering from a mental incapacity. But, as confirmed by the Court of Appeal in a judgment, R v Wells, in January, such cases are heard, despite the mental incapacity, because consideration is being given to imposing a hospital order or a supervision order on the defendant for reasons of public protection, or because treatment is required, and it is in the defendant’s interest that the facts are found before such an intrusive order is made. In the present case, and as the DPP has explained, the medical evidence is again unequivocal that Lord Janner poses no current threat to anyone.

Of course the decision is disappointing to the complainants. But the criminal process does not exist to give a platform for the making of allegations against a defendant who is incapable of defending himself. The gravity of the allegations makes it especially appropriate to protect such a defendant from unfairness, particularly when he denied the allegations in the past while able to do so.

The Indy goes on:

This would have been highly unusual, and may have broken new legal ground, but this is a highly unusual case in which the police and CPS have failed three times to do their job.

Saunders’ inability to anticipate the political backlash left her badly exposed.

So. Justice should be dictated by fear of the public mood?

Sir Clive Loader, Leicestershire Police and Crime Commissioner, described the decision as ‘not just wrong’ but ‘wholly perverse’ and ‘contrary to any notion of natural justice’.

The police are now on the side of the angels.

Daily Mail: “The rape of justice: Damning new evidence of Labour peer Lord Janner’s child sex abuse covered up by police and social workers for over 20 years”

Police and social workers were told more than 20 years ago that the peer took a vulnerable boy to Labour Party offices and Parliament before molesting him in his marital bed.

What did the caring. child-friendly police do back then?

A ten-page witness statement details the alleged victim’s harrowing ordeal at the hands of Janner. But all references to the politician were removed from the child’s social services file, according to legal papers obtained by the Mail.

A children’s home manager told bosses she feared he was having sex with the child but her concerns were ‘swept under the carpet’. The scale of the cover-up helps explains how the former Labour MP repeatedly escaped justice.

Over to Guy Adams, who dramatises the story:

The middle of the night at a large family home in one of North London’s most genteel residential neighbourhoods. In one of the upstairs bedrooms, a teenage boy lies awake. It’s eerily quiet, and he’s a long, long way from the children’s institution that has in recent years been home. The house is dark and shadowy. Scary, even. He feels frightened, confused and very much alone.

But this boy is not alone. In the gloom, he picks out an unmistakable figure shuffling across the carpet. It’s the middle-aged father-of-three who owns this house where he is staying…

With sickening inevitability, this vulnerable and frightened child, who only recently reached his 14th birthday, is then subjected to a sexual assault. ‘He touched my penis and asked me to touch his. He then simulated sex with me as I could feel his penis rubbing against my body, but after a while he got up from the bed and went out of the room. I must have fallen asleep, because when I awoke it was morning.’

This attack, carried out in December 1974, is one of several described in chilling detail in a ten-page witness statement prepared several years later by a firm of Leicester solicitors called Greene D’Sa. According to the document, which was passed to me this week, it marked the start of an abusive ‘full sexual relationship’ that endured almost two years.

The attack was also the culination of a lengthy grooming process which had begun when the boy’s abuser, a high-profile MP, visited a secondary school in his Leicester constituency. That MP was Greville Janner, then 46, a Labour backbencher…

Titilated? The story then alleges who knew of Janner and the boy:

It tells how his relationship with Janner was known to everyone, from his friends, to his social worker, children’s home manager and the then-director of Leicester’s social services. Yet nothing was done to stop it….

In a second, 1993 witness statement, again passed to me this week, the same boy recalls in 1989 and 1991 meeting detectives investigating a historic paedophile ring said to have included Janner. The relatively junior police investigators were apparently convinced that this man had, indeed, been ‘buggered by Greville Janner’ during childhood. ‘They needed me to include that information in my statement before they could arrest Janner,’ it notes.
But, soon afterwards, the two junior detectives were forced to drop their investigation into the MP, apparently at the behest of senior figures within the Leicestershire constabulary.

The boy isn’t the only person to make this claim. Indeed, his 1993 statement appears to confirm a similar version of events made public last year by one of those two officers, Mick Creedon.

Should you wonder about the veracity of Mr Creedon’s recollection, it is illuminating to learn that he is now Chief Constable of Derbyshire.

Mr Creedon deneis any wrong doing. Lord Grevillw Jannwr and his family deny any wrongdoing.

Right now all we have are stories.

Leicester Mercury: “Alleged child sexual abuse victim will seek review of decision not to prosecute Greville Janner”

A man who alleges he was sexually abused by former Leicester MP Greville Janner says he will seek a review of the decision not to put the politician on trial. Paul Miller claims 86-year-old Lord Janner abused him when he was nine years old during a school trip to the House of Commons.

Mr Miller, 52, from Aylestone, said he had not yet received her letter, but would both seek a review and take up the offer to meet Ms Saunders…

He said: “I will meet her, but she had better pin her ears back because I am an angry man. I will tell her face to face she has got this wrong, and I will be asking for the review. I don’t think I will be the only one.”

Ms Saunders has stood by her decision not to try Lord Janner, despite saying there was enough evidence to bring charges against him in relation to 22 alleged offences between 1969 and 1998.

She said there was evidence that could have seen him charged in 1991, 2002 and 2007, but now he was suffering from dementia so severe he was unfit to stand trial.

Such are the facts…

Posted: 25th, April 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment


Beyond parody with Katie Hopkins: Royal UN Offical tells British media that free speech has its limits

Katie Hopkins compares migrants to ‘cockroaches in her outrageous-to-deadline Sun newspaper column. And the UN high commissioner for human rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein of Jordan, says:

“The Nazi media described people their masters wanted to eliminate as rats and cockroaches. This type of language is clearly inflammatory and unacceptable, especially in a national newspaper. The Sun’s editors took an editorial decision to publish this article, and – if it is found in breach of the law – should be held responsible along with the author.”

And on he went:

“This vicious verbal assault on migrants and asylum seekers in the UK tabloid press has continued unchallenged under the law for far too long. I am an unswerving advocate of freedom of expression, which is guaranteed under Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), but it is not absolute.”

But me no buts. You cannot be unswerving in support of free speech and then say it has limits.

“The commissioner also accused the Daily Express of seeking to whip up anti-foreigner prejudice. To give just one glimpse of the scale of the problem, back in 2003 the Daily Express ran 22 negative front pages stories about asylum seekers and refugees in a single 31-day period…. Asylum seekers and migrants have, day after day, for years on end, been linked to rape, murder, diseases such as HIV and TB, theft, and almost every conceivable crime and misdemeanour imaginable in front-page articles and two-page spreads, in cartoons, editorials, even on the sports pages of almost all the UK’s national tabloid newspapers. History has shown us time and again the dangers of demonising foreigners and minorities, and it is extraordinary and deeply shameful to see these types of tactics being used in a variety of countries, simply because racism and xenophobia are so easy to arouse in order to win votes or sell newspapers.”

So sayeth the UN about free speech and its limits. Current members of the UN Human Rights Council include, for example, such bastions of equality and free speech as  Saudi Arabia and Gabon, where the state-run media regulatory agency, the National Communications Council, suspended three newspapers in 2013, one of them a satirical work.

 

Posted: 24th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


President Reagan shootist John Hinckley wants to be free, join a band and date his new girlfriend

 

resident Ronald Reagan Waves To Onlookers Moments Before An Assassination Attempt By John Hinckley Jr March 30, 1981 By The Washington Hilton In Washington Dc.James Brady Is Visible Third From The Left.

resident Ronald Reagan Waves To Onlookers Moments Before An Assassination Attempt By John Hinckley Jr March 30, 1981 By The Washington Hilton In Washington Dc.James Brady Is Visible Third From The Left.

 

John Hinckley, 59, the man who in 1981 shot President Ronald Reagan and three other men (Jim Brady was shot in the head), wants to be in a band. Hinckley has been living in a psychiatric hospital ever since he was found not guilty by reason of insanity to the shooting. (He did it to woo actress Jodie Foster.)

Now that Hinkley has a more accesible lover and has been out for extended periods without trying to murder anyone – for 17 days each month since 2013, Hinkley stays at his aged mother’s home in Williamsburg, Virginia – he wants his freedom.

 

Police and Secret Service agents diving to protect American President Ronald Reagan amid a panicked crowd during an assassination attempt by John Hinckley Junior outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, Washington, DC.

Police and Secret Service agents diving to protect American President Ronald Reagan amid a panicked crowd during an assassination attempt by John Hinckley Junior outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, Washington, DC.

 

At Hinkley’s latest appeal, lawyer Barry Wm. Levine, told U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman in Washington:

“The psychosis and major depression that made Mr. Hinckley dangerous in 1981 have been in full and stable remission for over two full decades. There is no dispute that Mr. Hinckley is clinically ready for the next step in treatment, which is convalescent leave.”

 

Screen shot 2015-04-24 at 19.10.15

 

The Associated Press adds:

Dr. Giorgi-Guarnieri testified Friday during court hearings that will ultimately determine whether and under which conditions John Hinckley Jr. will be allowed to live full time outside a mental hospital. Giorgi-Guarnieri says Hinckley should be allowed to start the band but not perform publicly.

Who’d want to join that band?

Spotter: Steve Silberman]

Posted: 24th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Happy endings: watch China’s banned funeral strippers honour the dead (photos)

“Show me the stiff,” say the funeral strippers hired to dancer at funeral in China. “We”ll let you know if he’s really dead.” In parts of China and Taiwan, respect for the dead and the quality of the deceased’s afterlife is measured in what crowd the corpse can attract. And if a few naked dancers can add to the throng, so much the better.

It is the ultimate happy ending.

But not everyone approves of turning on the turned off. The Wall Street Journal says China is looking to ban the shows. One stripping ensemble were rounded up and jailed for 15 days. The women were charged with “corrupting the social atmosphere” and each fined $11,300.

 

 

Photos:

 

funeral strippers 5

Image 1 of 6

 

 

 

 

Spotter: The Week

Posted: 24th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


‘Teacher with benefits’ Brianne Altice admits sex with three students

brianne altice

 

What is about women and sex abuse? In Davis County, Utah, Brianne Altice has admitted to shagging three students ages 16 to 18.

The official term for her crime is “forcible sexual abuse”. (The 18-year-old called Altice “a teacher with benefits”.)

Altice’s crimes include sodomy and broadcasting naked pics on social media.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 24th, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Lord Janner is accused of a ‘lifetime of noncing’ in The Sun

Rod Liddle has few words to say about Lord Janner, the Labour peer accused of sexually abusing children. Janner won’t be standing trial for alleged offences because the judiciary say his dementia is so far advanced he won’t understand what’s going on in court. Janner, 86, denies any wrongdoing.

So. Here’s Liddle in the Sun:

 

Lord Janner

 

As we say, Lord Janner denies any wrongdoing. But will he reply to the Sun’s article..?

 

 

Posted: 23rd, April 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment


Earth Day co-founder killed girlfriend and buried her in Styrofoam

Ira Einhorn

 

Earth Day was co-founded by Ira Einhorn, who was master of ceremonies at the first Earth Day in 1970. The man nicknamed ‘The Unicorn’ is in prison, serving a life tarrif for murdering his ex-lover Holly Maddux.

 

Crowds gather by a George Washington statue in Union Square for Earth Day celebrations, New York City, April 22, 1970.

Crowds gather by a George Washington statue in Union Square for Earth Day celebrations, New York City, April 22, 1970.

 

In 1977, Maddux left Einhorn and moved to New York in 1977. One day she returned:

And so on Sept. 9, 1977, Maddux went back to the apartment that she and Einhorn had shared in Philadelphia to collect her things, and was never seen again. When Philadelphia police questioned Einhorn about her mysterious disappearance several weeks later, he claimed that she had gone out to the neighborhood co-op to buy some tofu and sprouts and never returned. [The hippie version of daddy going out for cigarettes, I guess.]

It wasn’t until 18 months later that investigators searched Einhorn’s apartment after one of his neighbors complained that a reddish-brown, foul-smelling liquid was leaking from the ceiling directly below Einhorn’s bedroom closet. Inside the closet, police found Maddux’s beaten and partially mummified body stuffed into a trunk that had also been packed with Styrofoam, air fresheners and newspapers.

The tree trunk we get. But the founder of Earth Day used Styrofoam…

 

onvicted murderer Ira Einhorn is seen in this file photograph when he was arrested in 1979 for the murder of his former girlfriend Holly Maddux. Einhorn has been extradited back to the U.S. from his home in France for the crime. He was convicted in absentia in 1993 for the murder and was returned to the U.S. from France only after the U.S. government agreed not to pursue the death penalty in Einhorn''s retrial. (Photo by Getty Images)

onvicted murderer Ira Einhorn is seen in this file photograph when he was arrested in 1979 for the murder of his former girlfriend Holly Maddux. Einhorn has been extradited back to the U.S. from his home in France for the crime. He was convicted in absentia in 1993 for the murder and was returned to the U.S. from France only after the U.S. government agreed not to pursue the death penalty in Einhorn”s retrial. (Photo by Getty Images)

 

 

1: A police identification photograph shows Ira Einhorn July 20, 2001 at Pennsylvania''s maximum-security prison at Graterford, Pa. Einhorn was seized in France while at home and arrested and transported under armed guard to a plane that flew him to the United States. He was apprehended to stand trial in the U.S. for the 1978 murder of Holly Maddux. He had previously been convicted of the crime 'in absentia' but in order to satisfy a French legal requirement he will be tried again in the United States. (Photo by Getty Images)

1: A police identification photograph shows Ira Einhorn July 20, 2001 at Pennsylvania”s maximum-security prison at Graterford, Pa. Einhorn was seized in France while at home and arrested and transported under armed guard to a plane that flew him to the United States. He was apprehended to stand trial in the U.S. for the 1978 murder of Holly Maddux. He had previously been convicted of the crime ‘in absentia’ but in order to satisfy a French legal requirement he will be tried again in the United States. (Photo by Getty Images)

 

The killer went on the lam for 23 years. He wound uyp in Europe. When Einhorn was extradited to the US and tried he said Maddux “had been killed by CIA agents who framed him for the crime because he knew too much about the agency’s paranormal military research.”

The State would have allow such exposure, so Einhorn was sent down.

Spotter: Forward

Posted: 23rd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)


Dash Cam video of Marana Arizona Police cruiser running over suspect

death_race_2000_poster_03

 

With bullets in short supply (Americans buy just 12 billion bullets a year), US police forces have taken to apprehending perps in less traditional fashion.

The caption below this video says:

Police officer Michael Rapiejko used his cruiser to run over suspect Mario Valencia in Marana Arizona. According to police chief Terry Rozema that decision probably saved the suspects life.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 23rd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Denmark outlaw bestiality: animal sex tourists see pet brothels closed

animal brothel
In Denmark bestiality is now banned. The country’s MPs voted  91-75 in favour of a ban. Five abstained.

This bill amends a previous ban on intercourse that harms animals. This new ban covers all animal-human intercourse. It is now assumed that the animal is always suffering.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 23rd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Watch drunk-driving bikini-clad grandma take police sobriety test as grandson waits in car

bikini gran

 

To Florida, where Paricia Ebel, 49, has been busted for alleged drunk-driving. Ebel, was taking her 10-year-old son home after a day at the pool out when she crashed her BMW into a car stopped at a red light.

WINK News reports that though no-one was seriously hurt, police thought it wise to test Ebel for signs of booze. At one point Ebel, still dressed in a bikini, was aked if she could stand on one leg. She said  she “couldn’t do that on a good day.” She then failed a few other sobriety tests, none of which involved buttoning a cardigan, identifying whathisname from that show on the telly or working out the remote control.

Grandma was arrested and released on bail.

 

Spotter: New York Daily News

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Watch the video that plays inside the lifts at the new World Trade Center building

The video as you ride up the lifts inside the new World Trade Center affords you a timelapse view of the changing New York skyline. You even get a glimpse of the doomed north tower:

 

The New York Times reports:

There would have been no way around Sept. 11, 2001, said David W. Checketts, the chairman and chief executive of Legends Hospitality, the company chosen by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in 2013 to operate the three-level observatory.

“The event is certainly a key part of history,” he said. “We did not think you could ignore it. Having it appear in the year it did and disappear in the year it did was the respectful way of addressing the fact that it was part of the landscape.” Two World Trade Center, the site of the original observatory, is also visible.

Spotter: New York Times 

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Belle Gibson doesn’t have cancer: magnetic therapists can be wrong

belle gibson

 

Belle Gibson does not have brain cancer. She never did. Belle Gibson is a “wellness blogger” who is very well indeed.

Gibson launched a global “lifestyle and wellness” business on the back of claims that her brain tumour was cured by natural therapies and vegetables. Now she says:

In an interview with The Australian Women’s Weekly, Ms Gibson was asked if she had, or ever had cancer. “No. None of it’s true,” she told the magazine.

So. What about the money she’s earned? Says Belle:

“I don’t want forgiveness. I just think [speaking out] was the responsible thing to do. Above anything, I would like people to say, ‘OK, she’s human.’”

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Modern sex: long lost brother and sister meet on Tinder

Tinder sex brother and sister

After 16 years apart a brother and sister have been reunited on Tinder, the dating app. He looked at her. She looked at him. Thoughts turned to sex. Then they discovered they were siblings. But this isn’t Motherwell, so nothing sexual happened.

Via Mic reports:

De Vries, now 24, eventually moved back to the Netherlands for school, and in March, like any other young adult, joined Tinder and started swiping.

“The first time I swiped her profile I had absolutely no idea… To be honest, it hasn’t been on my mind in the past few years after Maarten, my brother, and I finished a failed search for Josephine a few years ago.”

And yet he happened to swipe right, assuming Egberts was just a nice stranger. So de Vries started talking to her like anyone else. “In our first conversation I was actually flirting with her so the conversation was very superficial,” he said.

And then…

“In our next conversation, I started to get some clues and figured she might actually be my sister. This kind of shocked me, so I decided not to contact her for a few days.”

But after the shock and physical attraction had been given time to cool off, they have met.

Meanwhile…in Motherwell

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment


Dad wins rights in turkey baster pregnancy trial

turkey baster

 

Here’s a cautionary tale for anyone seeking to get pregnant via the turkey baster method. Meet Robert Boardwine. He wants custody of his child. The Associated Press reports on the friends who fell out over what to name their giblet:

According to the court, Joyce Rosemary Bruce wanted to have a child she could raise on her own. Boardwine supplied the sperm in a plastic container. Bruce transferred it to a turkey baster, which she used to inseminate herself.

Bruce argued that Boardwine had no parental rights under the state’s assisted conception law. But the appeals court said Tuesday that the law applies only to pregnancies resulting from the use of medical technology, and the use of a common kitchen implement at home doesn’t qualify.

That baster is effective, but it’s no high-tech device.

Meanwhile, we wonder what Thanksgiving will be like for a with a child feuding parents and a weird empathy with the roasted bird…

Spotter: The Washington Post 

 

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Marijuana activists fly De Blasio 420 banner one day too late

pot banner

 

Hats off to Animal New York and Josh Simenhoff for flying a pro-marijuana banner over Manhattan.  The legend referenced New Mayor Bill de Blasio, whose own history of toking weed never did his career any harm, and a banner ordering the mayor to “get off the pot” and quit.

The banner was due to fly earlier but because of bad weather the launch date was put back to 4/20. But that date came and went. So. The banner flew on 4/21.

Still. It was fun, as AnimalNY reports:

And so on April 21, three months after we intended it to, our tongue-in-cheek, pro-cannabis banner finally hit the Manhattan skyline. After all of the back-and-forth, it was still worth it. “I did this in the pursuit of happiness and I’m proud to be an American,” said Simenhoff. Ditto for us. Also, legalize weed.

Because weed never did Blasio ever harm, nor any of his politico pals, like Barack Obama, David Cameron, Bill Clinton (who took weed by osmosis), Michael Bloomberg, Andrew Cuomo and George W. Bush. Unless, of course, it made them nuts..?

Posted: 22nd, April 2015 | In: Photojournalism, Reviews | Comment


There’s a gay version of Hooters called Tallywackers

tallywackers

 

America is all about equlity. There’s even a gay version of tits-in-vests chain Hooters. It’s not called Cooters (blame Old Mr Anorak for that arcane suggestion), Knobs or Gonads. It’s called… Tallywackers. And if you answer this ad on Craigslist., who can be catching a chill in Dallas’ “Newest and most exciting place to be”.

Tallywackers are looking for “bartenders, servers, cooks, bus boys, and hosts”.

Maybe when you’re there you can ask who came up with that name and if they were listening to this at the time. Pass the banana a la mode, big boy:

 

 

Spotter: Eater

Posted: 21st, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment


Florida Grandpa’s obituary asks you not to vote for Hillary Clinton

Grandpa is dead. Larry Upright’s dying wish is that you do not vote for Hilary Clinton:

 

grandaddy

 

Spotter: Witleysfuneralhome.com

Posted: 21st, April 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment (1)


Pulitzer Prize winner gives up journalism for better paid job in publicity

 Daily Breeze’s Rob KuzniaFancy a career in journalism? Before taking the plunge, speak with the Daily Breeze’s Rob Kuznia. He won the Pulitzer Prize alongside Rebecca Kimitchand Frank Suraci stories on corruption in the Torrance, California school district. (Winnings: $10,000.) He’ll tell you that he’s now working as a publicist.

The LA Observed notes:

We should note that Kuznia left the Breeze and journalism last year and is currently a publicist in the communications department of USC Shoah Foundation. I spoke with him this afternoon and he admitted to a twinge of regret at no longer being a journalist, but he said it was too difficult to make ends meet at the newspaper while renting in the LA area.

So. About that career in journalism…

Posted: 21st, April 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment