News & Blues 5/5

Good for a Mulligan

Janet Llewellyn, 66, died at a Scottish golf course after being hit
in the back of the head by a ball driven by her son-in-law. London’s Daily Mail
said Ronnie Battersby hit the victim with his tee shot on the 271-yard,
par-four third hole at Strathendrick Golf Club in Drymen.

Pre-Partum Follies

Police who said they caught Shanae Harston, 19, robbing a home in
Vallejo, Calif., added that while she was being arrested, she went into
labor. The Vallejo Times-Herald reported Harston was taken to a hospital, where she gave birth. 

A Craving to Avoid

Women who eat lots of licorice while they’re pregnant risk having
children with lower intelligence and more behavioral problems,
according to Scottish and Finnish researchers. The BBC News said the
team found that an ingredient of licorice might impair the placenta,
allowing high stress hormones from the mother to pass to the baby. The
study, published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, said
that as little as 3.5 ounces a week of pure licorice could affect fetal
brain development and lead to behavioral disorders. An earlier study
linked licorice consumption to shorter pregnancies.

Second-Amendment Follies

Chicago police arrested a 26-year-old man they say tried to shoot
his sister during an argument but accidentally shot their 47-year-old
mother in the leg instead. The Chicago Sun-Times reported the mother was hospitalized in good condition.

Safety Seat

Police in Albertville, Ala., stopped Jackie Denise Knott, 37, for
driving a minivan with a large cardboard box on top with her
13-year-old daughter inside. The Huntsville Times said Knott
told officers the child was riding on top because “the box was too big
to go inside the van, and she would be able to hold it down if she was
inside the box.” She added the girl wasn’t in any danger because Knott
had secured the box to the van with a coat hanger.

Flame Games

Chad Matthew Lever, 26, pleaded guilty to starting a fire that
killed his mother in Breinigsville, Pa. Investigators said Lever was
trying to get the woman’s cat in bed with her by flicking a lighter
under the bed but didn’t see the cat, so he headed downstairs to look
for it without realizing he had set the mattress on fire. His mother,
an invalid, yelled that the mattress was burning, but Lever couldn’t
get her out of the room and was overcome by smoke. Allentown’s Morning Call
reported Lever, who received two years’ probation, told detectives he
had played the lighter trick with the cat before, and usually the
flicker of the lighter scared it to jump onto the bed.

Kids Today

Police investigating a fire in Clearwater, Fla., that extensively
damaged a single-family home and sent homeowner Nancy Broadhead, 47, to
the hospital with serious burns arrested the woman’s 11-year-old
daughter and the daughter’s 15-year-old boyfriend, Jack Ault. They said
the kids doused the mother’s bed with gasoline while she slept,
plotting “to basically set the mom on fire and leave her to die,”
police official Beth Watts said. Watts identified the motive as
“teenage angst,” which escalated when the mom “confronted the daughter
about stealing some of her cigarettes.” The St. Petersburg Times
added that police charged Ault with stealing Broadhead’s car, which the
children fled in after the fire. “I thought I had seen everything,”
Pinellas-Pasco Chief Assistant State Attorney Bruce Bartlett told the
newspaper. “Just when you think you have, here comes along something
like this.”

When Guns Are Outlawed

Authorities in Okaloosa County, Fla., accused a 50-year-old woman of
battering her daughter in the face with her reading glasses. The arrest
report said the attack occurred while the two women were arguing over a
cigarette. 

In reporting the dismissal of weapons charges against John Mark Tillmann, 48, The Chronicle-Herald of Halifax, Nova Scotia, noted that authorities had also charged Tillmann with assaulting his elderly mother with a pencil.

Is There Anything Bacon Can’t Do?

Pregnant women could boost their baby’s intelligence by eating bacon
and eggs, according to University of North Carolina researchers. They
found that pork products and eggs contain a micronutrient, called
choline, which helps babies’ growing brains develop in the womb,
particularly in the areas linked to memory and recall. The findings
were reported in the Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology,
whose editor-in-chief, Dr. Gerald Weissmann, said, “We may never be
able to call bacon a health food with a straight face, but {similar
studies} are already making us rethink what we consider healthy and
unhealthy.”

Not-So-Merry Prankster

A 21-year-old man told Milwaukee police that he thought it would be
funny to play a practical joke on his 37-year-old mother by wearing a
ski mask, confronting her behind their home when she returned from
shopping and pretending to rob her. The mother pulled out a
.357-caliber revolver, however, and opened fire, wounding her son in
the groin. Police Sgt. Mark Stanmeyer said investigators are trying to
determine if the man really was pretending or actually tried to rob his
mother. 

Kicks Just Keep Getting Harder to Find

After a mother caught Ralph Conone, 68, hitting her two boys, ages 6
and 7, at a Wal-Mart store in Columbus, Ohio, he admitted to police
that he’d been punching children on the backs of their heads with his
keys in his fist for months. “He stated that he does this because of
the excitement of being able to do it and get away with it with the
parents right there,” police Sgt. John Hurst said. Conone explained
that he would wait until a parent wandered briefly out of sight of a
child before striking the child with his keys between his fingers. When
the child cried out, Conone would slip away unnoticed. 

What About the Mortgage Payment?

Sheriff’s investigators in Dodge County, Ga., said James Clarence
Davis and Sandra Davis, both 36, made their 14-year-old daughter
perform “sexual favors” for Wayne Bearden, 66, the manager of Shorty’s
Used Cars, so they wouldn’t have to make the $281 monthly payment on
their 1998 Dodge Caravan.

Puzzling Evidence

Police who raided the home of South African drug lord Fadwaan “Fat”
Murphy, 37, reported that while they were searching him, his strap-on
penis fell off. Charged with possessing stolen property, Murphy
disclosed at a bail hearing in a Cape Town magistrate’s court that he
was technically a hermaphrodite named Hilary. He explained he was born
with both male and female sexual organs but had surgery to remove the
female parts. “I stand firm as a man, as a husband and as a father,”
Murphy declared under oath, calling his condition “God’s decision.” He
noted that at least he hadn’t “been born with two heads.” After
Murphy’s admission, his mother said she tried to raise him as a girl,
but “he wanted to wear pants.” 

News and Blues is compiled from the nation’s press. To
contribute, submit original clippings, citing date and source, to
Roland Sweet in care of The New Times.