Archives for March 2012

First off, all of us here at the World News Center wish to pass our condolences along to the family of Yoda, the world’s ugliest dog, who passed away earlier this week. Fifteen years is a long time for a mutant chihuahua to live and Yoda seems to have done better than most. Even if its owners originally thought it was a rat. On the other end of the mortality scale we have the sad story of Germany’s Til Bunny, an ear-less rabbit who was crushed to death by a cameraman on its 17th day of life. The good news is that it was “a clean kill” according to the curator who was in charge of its well being. Speaking of the deceased, there is a growing phenomena of people who claim to be receiving emails from dead people. The emails have been duly scrutinized by a, self appointed, “paranormal expert” who avoided silly things like the scientific method and instead published a blog on the subject. If it’s on the internet it must be true. Right? Just like the computer that can read your mind. I figured that one out about two minutes after I saw it 15 years ago. Yet there are people who still stare slack jawed at their monitor and wonder how it’s done. And, yes, they are allowed to procreate and vote.

Of course not everything that people do with computers is benign. Just ask Anna Vargas who recently found out she has three husbands.

A New York City woman is trying to unwind an identity fraud in which someone used her birth certificate to arrange bogus marriages to at least three men from other countries.

Anna Vargas found out about the fraud when she applied for a marriage license in 2004 and was turned down on the grounds that she was already married.

One of her supposed husbands, from Ecuador, sued for divorce in 2009, before realizing she wasn’t the same person he wed in 1996.

A judge nullified two of the marriages in January. Vargas is still working to erase another one on New York’s Long Island.

Think about that for a second. This woman did nothing wrong, wants to do so something right and has been in court for almost eight years trying to accomplish that simple goal. She is, just FYI, still not married to the one guy she wanted to marry. Here’s hoping he has a very good sense of humor.

Of course, as police in Pennsylvania discovered, being legally married is no proof of sanity.

A Philadelphia family of four were taken into custody after allegedly stripping naked and praying in a parking lot at Upper Darby High School, authorities say.

Police Superintendent Michael Chitwood said Sarah Butler, 44, and her children, Joanne Butler, 23, Bessie Butler, 22, and 14-year-old son were arrested about 1 p.m. Friday after being found inside a parked van on the school grounds, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

Chitwood said the family had arrived at the school about 3 hours earlier to have her biological child released from school, the Delaware County Daily Times reported.

“Because she has no parental rights, school officials would not release the child and said she couldn’t take the child out of school,” Chitwood said. “They started singing religious songs and lay prone on the sidewalk at the entrance to the building.”

When school security ordered them to leave, they returned to the van and took off all their clothes, the Daily Times said.

“They disrobed between parked cars and were running around chanting prayers to Jesus,” Chitwood said. “They were running around the lot for 5 to 10 minutes. When police got there, they were in a van and locked their arms in defiant protest. They were chanting ‘Jesus is Lord.'”

The three adults were to be charged with defiant trespass, disorderly conduct and open lewdness, with the mother also expected to be charged with corruption of a minor, the Inquirer said. The teenager was placed with Children and Youth Services.

School Principal Chris Dormer called it a “rather bizarre incident” in an announcement made on the school’s Web site, the Daily Times reported.

Okay, seriously, what Bible are these people reading? And can the rest of us get a copy just so we can play along at home?

“Jesus loves Rihanna!”

“YEAH! Now she has to get naked!”

Come to think of it, I could learn to like that Bible.

Of course not all crazy naked people need Jesus to justify their behavior. Jason Russell, for example, seems to have decided that masturbating in public would be fun to do.

Jason Russell, the co-founder of Invisible Children, the advocacy group behind the “Kony 2012” viral video, was detained and taken by police to a medical facility for evaluation on Thursday morning after he was reported to be in his underwear, yelling incoherently and disrupting traffic in a San Diego neighborhood.

Law enforcement officials say there are no charges pending against Russell.

Lt. Andra Brown of the San Diego Police Department told The Huffington Post that a 33-year-old white male was not arrested but “transported to a local medical facility for evaluation and treatment.” She would not confirm the identity of the man involved in the incident, but various media outlets report that it was the 33-year-old Russell.

In a statement posted online, Ben Keesey, the CEO of Invisible Children, also confirmed that Russell had been involved in an incident: “The past two weeks have taken a severe emotional toll on all of us, Jason especially, and that toll manifested itself in an unfortunate incident yesterday. Jason’s passion and his work have done so much to help so many, and we are devastated to see him dealing with this personal health issue.”

According to the San Diego Police Department, officers responded to reports of a male in his underwear pounding his fists on the sidewalk and yelling incoherently, disrupting traffic in the Pacific Beach neighborhood of San Diego. Police said that one caller reported that the man was nude and could have been masturbating, but officers did not confirm that when they arrived.

Yes, there’s video via the link but I’m not going to post it here.

Mostly because I like avoiding lawyers. Of course, if they were Floridian lawyers I might risk it since they are clearly dumber than your average box of rocks.

They wore orange – and got fired for it.

So say four former employees of the Elizabeth R. Wellborn P.A. law firm in Deerfield Beach who were terminated after they came to work in orange shirts on Friday, the company’s pay day, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports.

They said they’ve worn orange shirts on pay days for the past few months so they would look like a group when they went out afterward for happy hour, the newspaper reported. Janice Doble, 50, of Sunrise said she was looking forward to the gathering after a busy week.

“Orange happens to be my favorite color. My patio is orange,” she told the paper. “My lipstick was orange today.”

Unfortunately for Doble and 13 other employees, an executive viewed things very differently. He told them that he understood there was a protest involving orange, and because they were all wearing the color, they were fired, the Sun Sentinel reported.

One person immediately denied being part of a protest and explained the happy hour connection, but after the law firm’s honchos discussed the matter outside the room, they returned and said everyone was fired, said Lou Erik Ambert, a litigation paralegal.

“There is no office policy against wearing orange shirts. We had no warning. We got no severance, no package, no nothing,” said Ambert, 31, of Coconut Creek. “I feel so violated.”

A spokeswoman for the firm said it had “no comment at this time,” according to the Sun Sentinel.

Yes, there are people who wore orange in protest. It was part of the Protestant Revolution in Ireland. Which, last I checked, had nothing to do with Florida. A state so insane that they allow children to believe that drinking bleach prevents AIDS. It does, just as a bullet through the brain can help prevent migraines.

Here, watch this cool video by my homie Tobias Stretch. It will make everything sane again.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.

First some facts you need to know. I am very good friends with Blago’s second cousin. In the tight knit Serbian community that is a very close family tie. Yesterday I was also pretty sick. These two facts collided and I was dragged to watch Blago issue his farewell address. I didn’t want to go but it was a rare chance to see history being made, so I bundled up and went. We got there about five minutes before his eminence emerged and caught the whole thing. As sick as I was the whole thing took on a kind of fever dream appeal. He talked about humility and then avoided showing any. He talked about prayer and then pointed out how he only prays for stuff that relates to him. He came one baby step away from saying the jury was comprised of idiots and that he would be exonerated. He talked about the law and mentioned a couple of times that he still didn’t think he broke it. He talked about his family and patently ignored how he, and only he, is responsible for their dilemma. He talked about all the wonderful things he did as governor and managed to reinforce the belief that his stint as an elected official was predicated on the “cool mom” principle.

Here’s how that works.

The cool mom allows her 13 year old son or daughter to hold beer parties in the basement. They can smoke too if they wish. The cool mom has all sorts of logic behind this decision – they’ll just do it somewhere else is the most common excuse – but rarely considers the implications. Blago was like that. He gave lots of cool stuff to the people of Illinois. Some, such as health care for women, were sorely needed. Others, such as free bus rides for seniors, had never been asked for. But the one thing they all had in common was that he made no provisions to pay for any of them. The RTA, CTA and Metra fare hikes are all due to him. The closing of many needed facilities are all due to him.

And, yes, I’m a Democrat. That does not make me clueless.

Let me tell you a story about the day Blago got arrested. My friend, and several other of his family members, held a bail party that night. They met at a local watering hole and set up an empty beer pitcher to collect donations. They drank, they laughed, they shared stories and, at the end of the night, they managed to collect under $10.00. They thought about it for a minute and then gave that money to the bartender, whom they’d been tipping anyway. They just figured it was the better cause.

CNN has a pretty solid look at the whole proceeding yesterday.

Crowded by sign-wielding supporters, former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich made what’s expected to be his final speech before he heads to Colorado to start a 14-year prison sentence on a corruption conviction.

“This is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do,” he told the crowd. “But this is the law and we follow the law.”

Blagojevich was convicted of corruption in June 2011 after a jury returned 17 guilty verdicts against him. Among other allegations, he was accused of trying to profit as he considered whom to appoint to take Barack Obama’s open Senate seat.

Blagojevich called his impending prison stint a “dark and hard journey,” and said he should have been more humble.

“We are so grateful and will never ever forget your kindness to us,” he told the crowd, which occasionally chanted slogans such as “Free our Governor.”

His wife, Patti, remained cinched under his arm, squeezing back tears as the former governor spoke outside his Chicago home.

“This, as bad as it is, is part of a long and hard journey that will only get worse before it gets better,” Blagojevich said, telling his wife that he loved her.

His prison stint begins Thursday.

“Governor Blagojevich has always stood up and stood tall. He hasn’t hid. And he has truly enjoyed being out in public. He never considered ‘sneaking’ out of Chicago and miss an opportunity to say goodbye,” his spokesman Glenn Selig said earlier.

“It’s difficult to put into words the challenges he and his family now face. But he draws strength from the incredible support he continues to receive from the people of Illinois and beyond.”

Blagojevich’s past statements have been noteworthy for their bluster, such as a defiant news conference in April 2010 when he called his accusers “liars” and “cowards” and directly challenged a prosecutor.

Blagojevich also accused U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of hiding taped evidence that would prove his innocence during that news conference.

“I challenge Mr. Fitzgerald… Why don’t you show up in court tomorrow and explain to everybody, explain to the whole world why you don’t want the tapes that you made played in court?” Blagojevich said to reporters at the time.

“I’ll be in court tomorrow. I hope you’re man enough to show up,” he added, referring to Fitzgerald.

Ah yes, the tapes. Here’s why they didn’t play them all; most of them were about nothing. The fact that he ordered Chinese or wished his wife happy birthday were not in contention. Had he limited himself to calls like that none of this would have happened.

But he didn’t.

The “f***ing golden” remark alone showed what he was all about. And that was relevant to the case. In fact it was the reason the FBI arrested him before he could commit an act. Had he actually sold the senate seat they would have been in the unenviable position of trying to unseat a U.S. Senator at the same time as they were trying to convict Blago. It would have been a logistical nightmare.

So they busted and, eventually, convicted our governor.

And that conviction helped Illinois secure the status of the third most corrupt state in the nation. It is not the type of competition where you want to shoot for #1.

Re-flex The Politics of Dancing by CeltiemamaListen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.

First off, for all of our male readers, Happy Man Day! You’ve earned it so don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Anyway, today we are going to take a look at the sensitive world around us. For example, we would never sell John Wilkes-Booth bobblehead bdolls at a Lincoln museum. Oh wait. Well, never mind, they’ve been removed.

In other sensitive news, a cop filed charges against his girlfriend for beating him with a Justin Bieber doll. No steak for him.

Speaking of cops, as you all know it is our ability to deal with others in an amicable and equitable way that sets us apart from the lower life forms. It is also our ability to see reason in chaos that allows us to progress. So, when we see a city finally cracking down on illegal drug sales we applaud their attempt to right a serious wrong.

Who am I kidding? We protest our inability to sell crack.

In most cities, residents would be happy if 30 people were arrested for selling crack, cocaine, marijuana and firearms in their neighborhood.

But not in Ferriday, La.

Instead, some residents in the neighborhood are livid, saying the arrests are making it harder for them to sell their own drugs.

“You have to realize, we don’t have no jobs around here or nothing,” Derrick Brown told KALB.com. “Every time we try to make a little something to get on our feet or try to feed our family they come kicking the doors in and knocking us back down again.”

All 30 arrests came Friday in Ferriday — a town of 3,723 people most famous for being the birthplace of rocker Jerry Lee Lewis — after a yearlong joint investigation called Delta Blues involving federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

The investigation, which targeted a local gang called the Sixth Street Boys, led to the seizure of 8 oz. of crack cocaine, a half kilo of powdered cocaine, 20 lbs. of marijuana, as well as firearms, currency and three vehicles, according to the Natchez Democrat.

Concordia Parish Sheriff Randy Maxwell told the Natchez Democrat that the operation was a huge success and that he was glad to see longtime dealers off the streets.

“It was a great success and the reason was because of the great cooperation with all of the agencies,” Maxwell said. “We got a lot of the big time players and longtime dealers in the parish.”

KALB.com reporter Brooke Buford said on air that she was surprised by Brown’s reaction to the bust, but former narcotics cop Neill Franklin, the executive director of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition said this is old news to anyone familiar with the drug war.

“[Brown] made so much sense,” Franklin told the Huffington Post. “This is an economic issue. In communities like these, there is no opportunity for employment or education. These people have to make money to buy food and pay bills. If there are no jobs, what do you expect they’ll do?” The LEAP organization works to advocate for effective drug policies.

Ferriday Mayor Glen McGlothin told The Huffington Post that Buford’s piece didn’t tell the full story, but adds, “I would like to think that’s because she is young.”

“There are lots of people who are happy about the drug bust, but they are people who believe in law and order and were scared because of all the drugs.”

He said that the people who are complaining that the only jobs available involve selling drugs don’t see that they are part of the problem. “I assume people would rather start businesses in areas where drugs aren’t being sold,” he said.

Robert Housman, who was assistant director for strategic planning in the White House drug czar’s office during the Clinton Administration, said the notion that selling drugs is the only option for Ferriday residents is “nonsense.”

“There have been studies on the economics of drug-buying,” Housman told The Huffington Post. “When you consider things like the risk and the costs of the drugs, you don’t make a lot of money. Most people who sell are not eking out a living, they’re merely supporting their own drug habit.”

Franklin said he believes that providing economic and education opportunities to people in poor neighborhoods is the key to reducing the drug trade, but Housman said drug-buying habits are the reasons there are fewer opportunities.

“People don’t want to open up businesses in neighborhoods like this,” he said. “But many of these people selling drugs do have good business minds and could succeed if they applied themselves.”

Amway anyone? Before they try and turn those nice people into sales reps they really need to help alleviate the many other problems that are besieging their city. If almost all your residents are dealing drugs that means the customers are coming from somewhere else.

Of course, while we claim that we want to be tough on crime we still cringe when we read about 9 year old kids who got tasered for ditching school.

An Ohio police officer says he used a stun gun twice on a 9-year-old who skipped school because the child refused to cooperate with his commands.

Details of the incident, which resulted in the shutdown of a village police force, were released Monday, The Columbus Dispatch reported. The Mount Sterling officer went to the boy’s home on a truancy complaint last week. He says the child’s mother warned the boy, who weighs between 200 and 250 pounds, to obey the officer or he’d be shocked.

According to a copy of the police report provided by the mayor’s office to msnbc.com, the officer wrote that the boy “dropped to the floor and became dead weight” and lay on his hands to prevent being handcuffed.

Wait? This kid weighs as much as me? At freaking 9? Didn’t his mom get the memo? Hot dogs cause butt cancer.

A billboard is bluntly telling Chicagoans that hot dogs cause “butt cancer” — and the hot dog industry is not amused.

The billboard is one of a series of ads being put up in major cities by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, or PCRM, urging people to stop eating hot dogs, which it says are a leading cause of colon and other cancers.

The National Hot Dog & Sausage Council — which you can find at the wonderful URL hot-dog.org — reacted immediately to the billboard, which went up recently on the Eisenhower Expressway.

Calling the ad “outrageous” and “inflammatory,” the trade group dismissed the PCRM as a “pseudo-medical animal rights group” bent on turning all Americans into vegans.

I guess the one thing we can do is thank God that racism is finally dead.

Oh hell, never mind. A clerk working at a Radio Shack issued a receipt for a refund to an African-American woman claiming she lived in Ghettohood USA.

That’s just outside of Dayton.

Receipts are supposed to prove that a customer bought an item at a store.

However, one Radio Shack employee allegedly gave a woman an additional message on her receipt: One calling her an “ugly itch” from “Ghettohood, USA.”

Shanae Lewis of Baltimore got the disturbing message on Monday when she went to a Radio Shack in nearby Montgomery County, Md., to buy a $20 cassette adapter for her car.

The county has a five-cent bag tax on top of sales tax that Lewis was unaware of, so, according to WUSA-TV, she went back and forth with the clerk before deciding not to buy the adapter at all.

She said what happened next is one of the worst examples of bad customer service anyone has ever seen, according to Consumerist.

It seems when the salesman gave Lewis back her money, he also gave her a receipt for the refund, at the bottom of which he apparently typed in “ugly itch, ghettohood, usa, tattoville, Maryland.”

The salesman reportedly claimed he was only kidding, but Lewis was, and remains, unamused.

“I was shocked more so than anything, and then I became angry,” she told WUSA-TV.

At first, she tried to complain to the store manager, who reportedly wanted nothing to do with her complaint, so Lewis contacted Radio Shack’s corporate office about the ordeal hopes the associate will be fired, WTVR reported.

A RadioShack official told WUSA that after seeing the story, it took “the strongest possible disciplinary actions,” but did not specify what they were.

In an email response to the station, RadioShack wrote: “Based on descriptions we’ve seen in the media, this incident obviously does not meet RadioShack’s expectations for customer service.”

It added, “The Company has made several attempts to contact the customer involved and offer her a personal apology. So far we’ve been unable to connect, although we have conveyed our regrets to another person in her household.”

Lewis may be able to forgive, but not forget. She said Radio Shack has lost a customer.

“I want nothing to do with Radio Shack ever again,” Shanae said.

Radio Shack continues to win friends the world over, just like on this site dedicated to people who will never set foot in one again.

They need a new PR company. Maybe the same one who works for the Jet Strip Strip Club which saved youth baseball in Los Angeles.

Little League baseball players from an unincorporated area of Los Angeles will reportedly get to play ball this season thanks to a charitable donation from the unlikeliest of donors.

Jet Strip, a gentlemen’s club in Lennox, has donated $1,200 to the Lennox Little League, which has been strapped for cash after the Lennox School District imposed some new regulations, according to the Daily Breeze.

A call to the district was not immediately returned.

The donation, along with those from other businesses, will allow 300 little leaguers to play at least one more season, but the league’s president, Roberto Aguirre, still isn’t optimistic about the long-term future of the league.

“It feels good to be from Lennox when people do stuff like that,” Aguirre said to the paper. “At the same time, the future is very scary for us, because [the donation] is a one-time deal.”

James Wallace, Jet Strip’s general manager, is also a 15-year member of the Lennox Coordinating Council, comparable to an unofficial city council of the community.

Wallace told the paper that he likes to keep the gentlemen’s club’s donations quiet.

“We don’t really like to brag about it,” he said.

The school board has also received donations of $1,000 and $600 from the little league in Westchester and the council, respectively.

But Aguirre told the paper that the bigger problem facing the league is the inability to sell food at games.

Citing health concerns, the K-8 district stopped the league from selling grilled foods, like hamburgers and hot dogs, though it has installed a drain, and a local non-profit, YouthBuild, has promised to build a snack bar for free.

“People don’t want candy, candy, candy – chips, chips, chips,” Aguirre said. “They want hamburgers, hot dogs and french fries.”

But raising the $65,000 necessary for materials to build a snack bar will be tough for a community that is economically depressed.

Lennox is a small, mile-by-mile community adjacent to Los Angeles International Airport that is so impoverished, the league offers families a payment plan so that some can afford the annual $85 it costs to play in the league.

“We’re looking up in the sky and hoping for something great,” Aguirre told the paper. “If this snack stand happens, it’s going to be the best thing that could happen for our league.”

You hear that Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine? People want freaking hot dogs. And they’ll gladly put up with a little butt cancer to save a little league team or two.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.

Florida is an interesting place. I have noted, on numerous occasions, that it is where the gene pool has gone to die. While crimes and idiocy happen everywhere they just seems to be more conspicuous in Florida. That being said, even a blind squirrel can find a nut once in a while so we must laud Florida when it has a good idea. Barbara Hijeck is reporting that Floridians are replacing flash mobs with cash mobs to support local businesses.

Flash mobs?

So yesterday.

Meet the Cash Mob.

The first cash mob is believed to have hit in Buffalo, NY then spread like an cash epidemic across the country.

Tampa’s Secret Cash Mob made its first hit last month at a boutique in Carrollwood where 40 mobsters armed themselves with at least $10 and showed up when the store opened to spend, spend, spend, reports WTSP News-10 in Tampa Bay.

On Friday, Feb. 10, 2012, Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett, along with an estimated 700-800 others from Knox and surrounding counties, took part in the first-ever Knox Cash Mob. The mob hit Emery’s 5 & 10 to show support for local small businesses.

You have to admit that this is an easy idea to duplicate and one that only has positive results. Someone will screw it up, I’m sure, but until then go for it.

Why am I so cynical, you ask, because this is a state that screws up beer.

After receiving a call, deputies found a 69-year-old woman with a swollen, cut and bruised face walking in the middle of a Dunnellon road, reports the Ocala Star-Banner.

She told the deputies that her hubby, Daniel Mofford, had been auguring with her over beer.

Deputies found Mofford, 55, asleep in the back of a pick-up truck that was parked in the back of a barn.

Yes, it’s a sad, sad truth: They’ll kill you for a beer in Florida.

In other beer related news in Florida

Palm Bay: Alan Tanguay was only 16-years-old when he reportedly stabbed his 58-year-old Palm Bay neighbor 37 times — just so he could steal $6 for a beer

Immokalee: Man savagely beaten for his beer

Kissimmee: Tiff over beer led to stabbing, deputies say

Remember Eduardo Adolfo Gonzalez?

He pleaded guilty for murdering a man over a spilled beer.

He was also charged with putting an apparent murder plot into motion from behind bars in an effort to kill witnesses to the spilled beer murder.

I really need say no more.

Let’s see, what else could they possibly screw up in Florida? How about getting run over by a car? How do you screw that up? Run yourself over.

A woman trying to retrieve her mail was run over by her own car Thursday in the suburban Boynton Beach community of Oakwood Lakes, Fla.

The car, an older model Oldsmobile Toronado was in reverse when Gilda Bartlett, 82, stepped out to fetch her mail on Thursday afternoon.

“The door was wide open and it hit her, it knocked her down,” Bartlett’s neighbor Bob Curcio told news channel WPTV.

According to the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s report, the woman was dragged backward for about 30 feet. Witnesses said Bartlett was hit several times by the car as it circled the pavement. Neighbors then dragged her to safety.

The vehicle continued in a circular motion, maintaining a speed of about 10-15 miles an hour. “It started making loops, this way, to the left, counterclockwise,” Curcio told WPTV. “It just kept on going.”

Firefighters and police responded, trying in vain to stop the car by flattening the tires.

“They tried the strip of nails and that didn’t work,” witness Tom Bilinski told WPTV.

Rammed by patrol car
Firefighter Jody Marlow tried to jump into the vehicle and stop it, but was thrown from the car and suffered minor injuries, the report said. The Oldsmobile was eventually stopped by a sheriff’s deputy, who rammed it with his patrol car.

Bartlett is in serious but stable condition at Delray Medical Center, according to the sheriff’s office.

Bartlett’s granddaughter told WPTV the woman had no broken bones, but she had a big cut on the back of her head that had to be stapled.

What else could these people screw up? Facebook. Seriously, I know it seems impossible but a … oh, just read this.

Steven Mulhall, 21, of Coral Springs, posted a photograph of himself holding a stolen nameplate, which was pried from the door of a Broward Circuit judge’s courtroom on his girlfriend’s Facebook account, according to arrest records, reports the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

“The nameplate is like only $40, not that big of a crime, but what an idiot. He puts it on Facebook,” said Broward County Sheriff Al Lamberti. “Here he is flaunting it on Facebook. He violated the terms of his parole by stealing, from a judge no less. He’s got multiple convictions for petty theft, so now this is a felony.”

But Bill, that’s just one loser, not a trend.

HA!

Sarasota: Facebook request gets man kicked off jury

Orange County: Mom sent death threats to 8th grader, deputies say

Charlotte County: Teen busted after taking pic on church roof for Facebook

Niceville: Report: Woman hacked into another person’s Facebook, send ‘provocative’ photos of ex

Lakeland: Facebook photo of stolen puppy leads to arrest

Tampa: Man posted Facebook photos of illegally killed animals, FWC says

Haines City: Man exchanged photos of illegally killed game with FWC

South Daytona: Accused fraudster taunts her victims with defiant photo on Facebook

Brooksville: Couple jailed after Facebook fracas

Palm Bay: In your face: Man arrested after fight over Facebook status

Florida Keys: Teen breaks into ICE agents’ cars, boasted on Facebook

Citrus County: Busted! Facebook photos nab deer slayers

And on and on it goes.

So there you have it, they had one good idea, that is destined to fail sooner rather than later and they have oranges.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.

Frank Burns, a character on the old TV show M*A*S*H, used to say “It’s nice to be nice to the nice.” Had he existed in real life you would have been pardoned had you beaten him to death with a hammer. In fact you would probably earn some award for helping cleanse the gene pool, without chlorine, of course. Obviously that’s due to the fact that Frank wasn’t really a nice guy. He used the guise of niceness to do not nice things. Such is not always the case. There are some people upon whom niceness is a mantle they carry honorably. I’m not just talking about the Mother Theresa’s of the world either. We all know people who genuinely try to make the world around them a little nicer. From cupcakes to smiles they share their niceness with you even on those days where you’d rather have a root canal. And, much to your continuing surprise, your world is a better place because of them. However, as noted above, some people wear niceness like a disguise. For example, Ms. Seattle – God there’s a resume builder, “Hmm, not qualified to work at Taco Bell but pretty enough to wear a tiara in public …” – has been forced to claim that her Tweet was taken out of context. Yes, she is really this stupid. Anyway, she Tweeted “Ugh can’t stand cold rainy Seattle and the annoying people.”

Why, yes, she did spell everything correctly.

Nevertheless, the nice people who crowned her Ms. Seattle seem to be less than thrilled. I can’t imagine why. The former Ms. Phoenix – I guess she travels from beauty pageant to beauty pageant filling her empty soul with baseless adulation – will still be allowed to compete in the Ms. Washington pageant.

So that’s nice.

But, today, we are going to look into the world of the genuinely nice. Like this guy who stole a professor’s computer but returned its contents.

A thief stole a university professor’s laptop, and then returned the contents on a USB memory stick. The professor, who teaches at Umeå University in northern Sweden, was devastated when his laptop, containing ten years of work, was stolen.

The professor had left his bag containing the laptop hidden behind a door in his apartment stairwell while he went into the building’s laundry room. When he emerged a short time later, the bag had gone. It was returned shortly after, without the laptop. However, a week after the theft, the professor received a USB stick containing all the documents – which would have taken several hours to download again.

It would have taken several hours to download if the professor had bothered to do so. I’m curious, since that amount of effort seemed to elude him, what he would have done had the thief not returned his documents?

Another thief, this one in Australia, was not to be outdone by that act of kindness. In fact, thanks to the theft of a cell phone, by the time he was done the world was actually a safer place.

Back in October 2011, a crook saw a car window that wasn’t rolled all the way up in a supermarket parking lot. The thief did what thieves do, stole two mobile phones and a wallet out of the vehicle. When he powered one of the phones on, he found child pornography images on it. The images disgusted him so much that he turned himself in to assist authorities with investigating the individual that he stole the items from. The investigation led to the arrest of a 46-year-old man.

Ballarat, Australia, magistrate Michelle Hodgson was blown away by the thief’s willingness to face charges, so that he could help bring down the man who had child pornography on his phone. She wanted the Good Samaritan thief to be publicly recognized for his deed.

The man was given one month in jail and a fine for his crimes, but his assistance led to bringing down a man who had committed a much greater crime.

You know something; I’d do a month in jail if it meant getting one more child-predator off the streets.

Of course, not every theft is about stealing your stuff. Sometimes it’s about someone securing a 10 year, no interest, loan that you didn’t realize you were sponsoring.

An unknown thief returned jewelry to its owner nearly ten years after stealing the items from a house in Saudi Arabia, saying in a letter he feels sorry for the theft and asking the owner to forgive him. The owner said he found the returned jewelry in a bag placed near the door which he opened in response to urgent knocking late night. He informed the police about the unknown bag, adding that when police opened the bag, he quickly recognized the jewelry as his.

“The thief left a letter in the bag saying he was sorry and asking the man to forgive him,” Sabq News said in a report from the western town of Taif. “He also said that he was in need when he stole the jewelry said he considered the gold as a trust returning to its owner.” The paper said the thief returned all the jewelry and “this means the man will make a big profit since gold prices have largely risen in 10 years.”

Ah yes, investment advice from a burglar, what could possibly be more useful than that?

There are, now more than ever, numerous stories about burglars who return the stolen items. The reason for this is simple; burglars now are just as likely to be down on their luck people as they are to be hardened criminals. Think Le Miserabe and not The Untouchables.

Even so, this next story is very nice.

A thief in Brazil who stole a car, returned it after the owner rang him up in the car and told the thief he was going through some financial difficulties. The butcher from Mauá in São Paulo called his own cell phone number after his car was stolen with his cell phone still inside. The thief answered and listened to the emotional man on the other side of the line. The butcher pleaded with him to return the $2250 car.

Not only did he pick up the phone, but he heard the owner’s emotional plea. The owner explained he was having financial problems and that the car was the only thing he had. The soft-hearted robber got emotional too and told him to go to a parking lot to get his car back.

So there you have it, several stories of nice people doing nice things in a nice way. Oh sure, there were those minor setbacks due to the robberies and so on, but still, all’s well that ends well as they say.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.