Small Bits of News You Didn’t Know you Needed

NYC man spends $7,500 to fight $115 parking ticket
A retired New York City man says he's spent $7,500 fighting a $115 parking ticket because he's got "nothing else to do."
Former electrical hardware firm vice president Simon Belsky says he was erroneously ticketed two years ago. The 63-year-old says the ticket cites his van for blocking a Brooklyn fire hydrant even though the only hydrant on the street was down the block.
The November 2006 fine has ballooned from $115 to about $200 with penalties.
Belsky was in court last week and is due back Feb. 2. He says if he wins he'll file a civil suit against the city to recover the $7,500 he's spent on legal work. He says if any compensation is awarded he'll donate it to educational programs.
.

Blood alcohol tester charged in Nevada with DUI
A contract worker for Carson City, Nevada sheriff's department is accused of driving drunk to a jail to test a suspect's blood alcohol content.
Fifty-three-year-old Kathleen Cherry told a Carson City sheriff's deputy who smelled alcohol on her breath that she had one margarita before driving Friday night.
She's accused of failing field sobriety tests and registering a blood alcohol content over the state's legal limit of 0.08 percent.
Cherry is a phlebotomist, trained to draw blood for lab tests. She was booked on a misdemeanor drunken driving charge, and her bail was set at more than $1,000.
She declined to comment.

.
Holiday bell ringer gets bah-humbug treatment
Man tells Salvation Army volunteer bell ringer what needs to done with that bell
Many people give loose change to the Salvation Army volunteers posted outside shopping centers this time of year ringing bells and keeping watch over their red kettles.
Gerald Warner had this offering: "If you don't stop ringing that bell, I am going to shove it up your ass," he told a volunteer outside Kmart on U.S. 19 Thursday evening, according to a Pasco Sheriff's Office report.
Warner, who is 47 and homeless, was also cursing at customers who were coming and going, the Sheriff's Office said.
A deputy arrested him on a charge of disorderly intoxication. When they arrived at the jail in Land O'Lakes, Warner refused to get out of the patrol car, which led to another charge of resisting arrest without violence.
.
Woman arrested after a smoke
Police say a Muncie Indiana woman was arrested after asking a state trooper whether she could smoke -- and then lit up a marijuana joint.
Thirty-two-year-old Honesty Knight was a passenger in a vehicle that Trooper Eric Perkins pulled over for a traffic violation early Friday. While the trooper was talking to the driver, Knight obtained the trooper's permission to smoke. Police say Perkins then asked to see the cigarette, which contained marijuana, not tobacco.
Knight faces a preliminary charge of possession of paraphernalia. She was released from jail on bond, but couldn't be located for comment because no home telephone number was listed in her name.
.
Suspect in Dunkin' Donuts robberies barks like a dog at judge
The man accused of being the shotgun-wielding robber in a two-county string of Dunkin' Donuts robberies repeatedly barked like a dog at a county judge this afternoon during a court hearing.
"I would suggest you take this more seriously," Judge John Hurley told James Herard, 19, who replied "ruff" several times. Herard barked again after Hurley explained his rights as a criminal defendant. "I'm going to consider your bark as an acknowledgment of what I just told you," the judge said.
Herard, of Lauderhill, has been at the Broward County Jail, held without bond. Hurley, expressing concern that Herard might try to intimidate witnesses, ordered that Herard be denied telephone privileges while he awaits trial.
.