News Quirks

Curses, foiled again• Authorities thwarted a high school student’s plan to kill a classmate after he warned the intended victim on Facebook that he was bringing a gun to school to “pop” the boy. Several students saw the threat and alerted the school. Police arrested Thomas Braasch, 19, of Alsip, Ill. (Chicago Sun-Times) • Troy […]

Curses, foiled againAssistant manager Ariel Sinclair, 23, stole nearly $6,000 from a drug store’s lottery machine after using its fingerprint-recognition feature to unlock it, according to police in Virginia Beach, Va. “If you’re providing your fingerprint to access this machine, I have no idea how, in your mind, you’re thinking you’re going to get away […]

Curses, foiled againInvestigators concluded that Lucas Burke, 21, and Ethan Keeler, 20, broke into a landscaping business in Hopkinton, N.H., and tried to open a locked safe with an acetylene cutting torch. The safe was full of fireworks. “The whole thing went up and blew their bodies apart,” owner Thomas Komisarek said. (New Hampshire Union […]

 Curses, foiled againu  Police who broke up a dog-fighting ring in Florence County, S.C., apprehended fleeing suspect Edward Windham, 32, after one of the dogs involved “took him down,” according to Sheriff Kenney Boone. (Myrtle Beach’s WMBF-TV)u  Police who accused Joseph Reardon, 22, of robbing a crowded convenience store in Seabrook, N.H., said that he […]

Curses, foiled again• Philippine authorities charged Jeane Napoles, 23, with tax evasion after she posted pictures on social media documenting her lavish lifestyle, including one showing her bathing in money. “We follow the Internet,” Bureau of Internal Revenue chief Kim Henares said. “That is where we heard about her.” (Agence France-Presse) • Belgian authorities arrested […]

Curses, foiled againPolice accused three men of breaking into a home near Palatka, Fla., photographing its contents and then posting the pictures on Facebook, offering to sell any and all pictured items. When a potential buyer asked about a refrigerator, the men said to meet them at the house. A suspicious neighbor saw the men […]

Curses, foiled again• Samantha Ellen Ward, 24, presented a driver’s license and debit card to withdraw money from a bank in Boynton Beach, Fla., but the teller looked up the account, noted the license had been reported stolen and summoned police. Ward pointed to a Chevy Tahoe in the parking lot and told officers that […]

Curses, foiled againWhen an unidentified burglar entered a San Francisco bank through a ventilation shaft, he triggered a silent alarm. Police Chief Greg Suhr said that when officers responded, the 230-pound suspect fled to a nearby building and promptly fell through the roof into an apartment, where officers arrested him. (Associated Press) British police identified […]

Curses, foiled again• Police investigating break-ins at dozens of businesses in Montgomery County, Md., identified Andre Antonio Henry, 30, as their suspect in what authorities termed a one-person “crime wave” after finding his name on court documents that he apparently dropped at the scene of one of the burglaries. “Obviously, that’s a clue,” prosecutor Stephen […]

Curses, foiled againNew Zealand authorities nabbed a Vietnamese man at the Auckland airport trying to smuggle tropical fish into the country after they noticed his bulging pants pockets were leaking. Ministry of Primary Industries official Craig Hughes said the man explained that he was carrying water from the plane because he was thirsty, but subsequent […]

Curses, foiled again• While neighboring groups of campers at Scotland’s Loch Earn argued, Barry McCutcheon, 25, who was camping between them, asked them to calm down, prosecutor John Malpass told a Perth court, “and that wasn’t received kindly.” Then someone in one group yelled, “Bring the hatchets.” McCutcheon fled but was stabbed in the back […]

Curses, foiled againWhen two men showed a gun at a busy Chicago restaurant and announced a holdup, the owner asked them to come back in an hour when fewer customers would be around. After they agreed and left, the owner called police, who were waiting when Mario Garcia, 39, and Domingo Garcia-Hernandez, 28, returned and […]