NewsQuirks 717

Curses, Foiled Again

Seattle police arrested Kenneth Eric Roys, 18, for robbing a video store after he returned to the same store two weeks later. A clerk who had been on duty during the crime recognized him. When police arrived, they discovered that Roys was holding an empty, plastic videotape case containing a BB pistol.

Police in Colorado Springs, Colo., arrested Walter Cecil Goins and John Marshall, both 18, and accused them of robbing a motel office. Police followed footprints in the snow from the office to a nearby stairwell, where a police dog took over and led them to Room 421. After knocking and getting no answer, officers phoned the room and announced that the room was surrounded. The suspects surrendered. Detective Dale Fox told the Colorado Springs Gazette that he couldn't recall a case in which robbers held up the same place where they were staying.

Homeland Insecurity

Government and transportation leaders planning how to evacuate the Washington, D.C., area in the event of a terrorist attack admitted that it can't be done, at least not quickly and orderly. The reason, officials told the Washington Post, is that the region's road and transit network, already overburdened during a normal rush hour, can't handle a sudden surge. Pointing out that people trapped in traffic could be exposed to an airborne threat or other types of attacks, officials advised that instead of trying to flee or rush to their families, people prepare themselves to "shelter in place."

Keith Martin, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell's choice to head the state's Department of Homeland Security, resigned as managing editor and nightly news anchor of a Lancaster television station in 1990 after it was revealed he was consulting for an arms dealer that was illegally funneling weapons to Iraq. The Harrisburg Patriot-News reported that some of those weapons ended up being used against American soldiers during the Gulf War. At the time, Martin was also an officer in the Pennsylvania National Guard. After Rendell nominated him to the cabinet-level post, Martin called the controversy "a tempest in a teapot."

Instant Karma

After Raymond Poore, 43, was found dead on the floor of his mobile home in Winchester, Va., next to his 2-year-old Chinese Shar-Pei, police Capt. David Sobonya said that the construction worker was apparently beating the dog on the head with the butt of a rifle-shotgun when it discharged and shot him in the lower abdomen. Debbie Poore discovered her husband's body when she raced home after he called to say the dog had bitten him, and he was going to kill it.

Occupational Hazard

Crematorium workers in Sweden are increasingly at risk from explosions during cremations. The church newspaper Kyrkans Tidning reported that the blasts are sparked by undetected items such as heart pacemakers, whose batteries ignite in the intense heat, and silicone implants in women who had cosmetic breast surgery. But friends and relatives contribute to the problem by leaving such farewell tokens in coffins as bottles of alcohol, bullets and even fireworks.

Think No Evil

A technique that probes the brain to see if a suspect has specific knowledge of a crime has the potential to become a powerful weapon in national security, according to its inventor. Lawrence Farwell of Fairfield, Iowa, who founded Brain Fingerprinting Laboratories Inc. 12 years ago, explained that brain fingerprinting works by recording split-second spikes in electrical activity in the brain when it responds to something it recognizes. For example, a murder suspect who is shown a detail of the crime scene that only she or he would know would involuntarily register that knowledge, whereas a person who had never seen that crime scene would show no reaction.

Dental Plan from Hell