Saturday, August 29, 2009

Small Bits of News You Didn’t Know you Needed

How far would you go to save your job?
French factory workers are rejecting redundancy - by stripping in order to save their jobs.
Staff members at struggling boiler manufacturer Chaffoteaux et Maury in Brittany have dared to bare all for a nude calendar, in a desperate attempt to save 204 jobs from the axe.
The calendar features 13 naked men, with nothing to preserve their modesty bar strategically placed helmets and masks.
Workers have revealed they plan to spend the profit raised on a trip to Italy, where they will stage a protest at parent company Ariston Thermo Group.
Union representative Brigitte Coadic said: "Our aim is to show there are workers here who will do anything to save their jobs, even take their clothes off."
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Should have driven the Jaguar
An alleged drug dealer seemed to not only have made a costly mistake of running a red light Tuesday with drugs in the trunk, but driving a Chevy instead of his Jaguar.
Jonathan Walsh, 20, of Summerfield, told Sumter County Sheriff's deputies he thought he only had to yield for the red light while turning right, after they stopped him.
Walsh was jailed on possession of marijuana and drug trafficking charges after deputies said they found more than 300 grams of suspected marijuana and almost 170 grams of cocaine in the vehicle.
According to a sheriff's incident report, deputies stopped his blue Chevy car after it ran a red light while making a right turn onto Buenos Aires Road in the Lady Lake area.
While talking to officers, the report added, his 26-year-old Fruitland Park passenger spontaneously said that they didn't have any drugs in the car.
Deputies brought a K-9 to the vehicle, which allegedly smelled narcotics.
During a search, deputies found the bag of drugs in the trunk. The affidavit added that Walsh admitted the drugs were his, he sells them and knew they were in the car -- but he had forgotten the drugs were there.
He said if he had remembered, he would have driven his Jaguar instead, according to the report.
The report noted Walsh said he kept drugs in his car because of burglaries to his home.
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More drugs in the crotch area.....
Unzipped driver pulled over, pulls pipe out of her pants
An Okaloosa County Sheriff's Office deputy who had "recently had a conversation" with a woman driving without a license, saw her behind the wheel of a car again on July 10.
He stopped the car and asked her to get out, according to her arrest report. When she did, he noticed her pants were unzipped.
He asked if she had any weapons or narcotics on her person and she said she had a pipe in the front of her pants. She then reached in and produced a pipe that resembled a test tube and had a milky white substance in it.
The contents tested positive for cocaine, according to her arrest report.
The 22-year-old was charged with possession of paraphernalia and knowingly driving while her license was suspended or revoked.
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Judge blows steam because her coolness
Circuit Court Judge Marci Goodman was feeling cold and thought that others in her courtroom during a hearing were cold, too.
So she summoned two maintenance workers.
But the workers refused to come into her courtroom because one of them was still smarting from another recent encounter during which the judge dressed him down over the chilly courtroom.
So the judge really lost her cool.
Goodman ordered a Santa Rosa County deputy working security at the Milton courthouse to "tell them I'll threaten them with jail," according to an audio recording from the hearing.
Then she blew more hot air. She ordered the workers held in an adjacent room.
She said she had wanted the workers to "see how cold it was."
"I did not see it as a detention, per se," she said
Maintenance supervisor Thad Allen arrived, and Goodman asked if the air conditioning could be shut down.
"Sure we can," Allen said. "Can you turn my people loose?"
"Sure we can, as soon as you get it shut off," Goodman responded. She added, "Let them just sit in there and freeze like the rest of us."
The workers were released after about 20 minutes.
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Man keyed car because it was parked in handicapped spot
A 71-year-old man with no legs is accused of scratching a Nissan parked in a handicapped space at a Walmart Super Center, apparently thinking the Nissan driver was abusing the parking privilege, according to a police spokesman and a report released Thursday.
The 39-year-old victim on Wednesday told an employee at the Walmart that she was picking up her handicapped mother. She was gone for about 30 minutes, and reportedly noticed someone had keyed the driver's side of the 2009 Nissan Altima.
A check of the surveillance system reportedly showed a legless man in a motorized wheel chair come out of a white van.
The man "powered his wheel chair across the parking lot to where (the victim's) car was parked . . . and came from the front to the rear of the driver's side," a report shows.
Stopped while exiting the store, Keith Brian Berry, 71, apologized for the "most stupidest thing" he's ever done. He said "people always abuse the handicapped parking when they are not handicapped."
Berry apologized to the victim, saying he didn't think of the possibility her mother could be handicapped. The Nissan had a handicapped decal hanging from the rear-view mirror.
Berry, of the 3400 block of Bromeliad Court, was issued a notice to appear in court Sept. 23 on a criminal mischief charge. Berry was told he could be arrested for trespassing if he returns to Walmart.

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Cheating husband's faked kidnapping leads to $4,000 manhunt
Wikler Moran-Mora texted his wife to say he had been kidnapped and wouldn't be let go until he gave his captors money.
His worried wife called law enforcement.
He texted her again, saying, "Don't call, take it easy, they said they will let me go," and "Everything is alright, I'll be home soon," a Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office report states.
After a full-scale manhunt, deputies tracked him down. Turns out, it was a hoax – Moran-Mora faked his kidnapping so he could cheat on his wife, sheriff's spokesman J.D. Callaway said.
The incident began shortly after midnight Wednesday. About 6 a.m. Wednesday, Moran-Mora, 38, of Tampa, was arrested and charged with giving a false report to law enforcement. He has been released on $500 bail.
Twenty deputies — including canine units — searched for Moran-Mora on Wednesday morning.
Deputies traced Moran-Mora through his cell phone and found him at a 7-Eleven on West Waters Avenue. He told deputies he is a church elder for a Seventh Day Adventist church and had sent his wife the texts even though he had never been in danger.
Moran-Mora declined to comment today other than to say the situation with his wife has been resolved. His wife said she had nothing to do with what happened but confirmed she received text messages from him.
Callaway said the search cost $4,000.
"Thank God we didn't have a legitimate emergency that would have required those resources," he said.

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Bear climbs ladder, escapes skate park

Steep concrete sides kept animal trapped until officials helped out
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