California activist Jonathan Frieman finally got his day in court in January, but a Marin County judge quickly rejected his argument that he is entitled to use the state's carpool lanes accompanied only by a sheath of corporate papers in the passenger seat. (During the 2012 Republican primaries, Mitt Romney famously asserted a corporation's general right under the law to be treated as a "person.") The judge decided that the state legislature's carpool law was intended only to reduce traffic clutter and that driving with no passenger except corporate papers was unrelated to that goal. Frieman told reporters that he had been carrying the papers around for years, hoping to be challenged. [San Francisco Chronicle, 1-8-2013]

-- The U.S. Congress may suffer dismal popularity ratings (less savory than head lice, according to one survey), but it is saintly compared to India's legislatures, which contain six accused rapists at the state level and two in the national parliament. Thirty-six local officials, as well, have been charged with sexual assault (according to India's Association for Democratic Reforms). In fact, the association reported in December that 162 of the lower house of Parliament's 552 members currently face criminal charges. The problem is compounded by India's notoriously paralyzed justice system, which practically ensures that the charges will be unresolved for years, if not decades. [Wall Street Journal, 12-30-2012]

-- Many Japanese men seem to reject smartphones in favor of a low-tech 2002 Fujitsu cellphone, according to a January Wall Street Journal dispatch -- because it can help philanderers keep their affairs from lovers' prying eyes. The phones lack sophisticated tracking features -- plus, a buried "privacy" mode gives off only stealth signals when lovers call and leaves no trace of calls, texts or emails. A senior executive for Fujitsu said, "If Tiger Woods had (this phone), he wouldn't have gotten in trouble." [Wall Street Journal, 1-11-2013]

-- China's national legislature passed a law in December to establish that people have a duty to visit their aged parents periodically. China's rapid urbanization has not developed nursing homes and similar facilities to keep pace with the population, and sponsors of the law said it would give the parents a legal right to sue their children for ignoring them. [Associated Press, 12-28-2012]

-- Redemption! Senior pastor Claude Gilliland III was forced to admit to his flock at the New Heart church in Cleburne, Texas, in January that he is a convicted sex offender and that he and his ex-wife had worked in the pornography industry. Gilliland, 54, served four years in prison in the 1990s for sexually assaulting his ex-wife, but in January was nonetheless defended by his congregation. "If we believe in the redemptive work of Christ," said one parishioner, "then this man is a miracle." (Gilliland believes he needs no redemption for the assault, for he was innocent of that -- but that he had done other bad things during that time that did require redemption.) [WFAA-TV (Dallas-Fort Worth), 1-6-2013]

-- God and Shoes: (1) "Prophet" Cindy Jacobs said in a January Internet broadcast that God has revealed Himself to her by mysteriously removing critical shortages in her life, such as her car's well-worn tires that just kept rolling. "I remember one time that I had a pair of shoes that I wore and wore and wore and wore and wore and it just -- for years, these shoes did not wear out." (2) Dublin, Ireland, inventor David Bonney recently decided to change the marketing of his new shoes to "Atheist Shoes." Two years earlier, he had started the business with the idea of selling "Christian" shoes that contained water in the soles so that wearers could walk on water. ["God Knows" videocast, 1-9-2013, via RawStory.com, 1-9-2013] [Irish Times, 12-8-2013]

-- Four days after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., officials at Public School 79 in New York City decided it would be a good time for a full-blown lockdown drill -- with no advance warning. Though P.S. 79 is a high school and not an elementary school, it is composed of about 300 students with special needs (autism, cerebral palsy, severe emotional disorders) who, with their teachers, were startled to hear the early- morning loudspeaker blaring, "Shooter (or, possibly, "intruder"), get out, get out, lockdown." One adult said it took her about five minutes to realize that it was only a drill. Still, said another, "It was probably the worst feeling I ever had in my life." [New York Times, 12-19-2012]

-- Neighborhood observers reported in December that the asbestos-removal "crew" working at the former YWCA in Middleburg Heights, Ohio, consisted merely of volunteer teenagers who are students at the local religious Buckeye Education School. State regulations require that asbestos (known to cause deadly respiratory illnesses) be handled only by certified contractors using hazardous-materials gear. Buckeye and other officials, while emphasizing that the students were volunteers, declined to say who authorized them to work. [WKYC-TV, 1-8-2013]

-- In November, Tokyo's Kenichi Ito, 29, bested his own Guinness World Record by a full second (down to 17.47 seconds) in the 100-meter dash -- on all fours. Ito runs like a Patas monkey, which he has long admired, and which (along with his self-described monkey-like face) inspired him nine years ago to take up "four-legged" running. He reported trouble only once, when he went to the mountains to train and was shot at by a hunter who mistook him for a wild boar. [The Guardian (London), 11-16-2012; Reuters, 4-18-2012]

Generally, clients are held to account for their lawyers' errors because the lawyers are their "agents," but death row inmates might be treated differently, for they usually do not select or pay for their lawyers -- and because the stakes are so high. Alabama, though, looks at the problem unsympathetically, according to a January New York Times report. When an Alabama death row inmate misses an appeals-filing deadline only because of his lawyer's error (in murder client Ronald Smith's case, only because lawyer C. Wade Johnson was an often-incapacitated methamphetamine addict), the client forgoes the appeal. The Smith case is currently before the U.S. Supreme Court. (Alabama also remains the only state in which judges overrule juries and impose the death penalty instead of life in prison.) [New York Times, 1-7-2013]

William Michael Martin, 45, was charged in January with burglary of the East Texas Medical Center in Lufkin, Texas, where he went apparently in search of women's underwear and employees' personal photos, which police said he used as masturbation aids. At his home, police discovered a cache of women's underwear and several beach balls, which officers learned from photos were so that Martin could put them under his clothing and pose as pregnant. [KTRE-TV (Lufkin) via Houston Press, 1-11-2013]

Benjamin Greene, 22, was charged in December with shoplifting a nude blow-up doll from a Spencer's Gifts store in Spartanburg, S.C., but on closer inspection, the doll was less than met the eye. It was one of the manufacturer's "Super Star Series" of dolls, suggesting resemblances to celebrities like Jessica Simpson and Lindsay Lohan, but which are apparently all the same generic plastic doll resembling no specific human. The packaging on Greene's $19.99 "Finally Mylie! Love Doll" suggests singer Miley Cyrus ("finally" presumably to honor Cyrus' having recently turned 18 and "legal"), but it, too, was the generic plastic doll. [The Smoking Gun, 12-13-2012]

(1) In December, the Illinois Times reported that emergency workers were called to a Springfield, Ill., church to rescue Father Tom Donovan, who said that he had been playing with a pair of handcuffs in the rectory and accidentally got stuck. He was also wearing "some sort of gag," according to the police report. The church told reporters that Father Donovan immediately went on administrative leave and was unable to answer questions. (2) Donald Blood III, 55, was charged with DUI in December in Dorset, Vt., after driving into a yard, thinking it was a parking lot. It was actually historic property: the 1852 home in which Bill Wilson, the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, was born and which is "a place of sanctuary where people can come to give thanks to God for their new lives." [Illinois Times (Springfield), 1-3-2013] [Associated Press via Yahoo News, 12-27-2012]

Thanks This Week to Peter Smagorinsky, Scott Huber, Neb Rodgers, and John McGaw, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

Perspective: A leading "adult" search engine reported in December that, over the last seven years, just two of the most popular Internet pornography websites it analyzes have been viewed 93 billion separate times, which averages to about 13 views for every person on Earth. Given the average viewing time of 11 minutes per visit, the search engine (PornWatchers.com) calculated that men (and a few women, of course) have spent about 1.2 million years watching pornography on just those two sites. Noted the search engine in its press release, "Say goodbye" to calling online porn a "niche." "It's in every living room on this planet." [Inquisitr.com, 12-19-2012, citing PornWatchers.com/blog/, updated 1-3-2013]

-- Almost-extinct vultures may be making a comeback within the Parsi community of Mumbai, India, after a pain reliever (diclofenac) nearly wiped it out. Parsis' Zoroastrian religion requires "natural" body disposals (no cremation or burial) of humans and cattle, and bodies have always been ritually laid out for the hungry birds, but the community has also come to rely on diclopfenac in hospitals and for cattle. When News of the Weird last mentioned the problems (in 2001), vultures were dying out from kidney damage caused by the drug, and bodies were piling up. (Parsis were exploring using solar panels to burn the corpses.) However, according to a November New York Times dispatch, clerics are reporting modest success in weaning Parsis off of diclofenac, and the vultures appear more plentiful. [New York Times, 11-30-2012]

-- "Washington State, Known for ...": When a man died of a perforated colon in 2005 in Enumclaw, Wash., while having sex with a horse (at what news reports suggested was a "bestiality farm"), the legislature passed the state's first anti-bestiality law, which was used in 2010 in another "farm" case, in Bellingham, 110 miles from Enumclaw. A British man had sex with several dogs on the property of Douglas Spink, who had allegedly arranged the trysts, and the man was convicted and deported, but Spink was not charged (though instead was re-imprisoned for an earlier crime). In November 2012, with Spink nearing release, prosecutors filed bestiality charges using evidence from 2010, involving "four stallions, seven large-breed male dogs" and "13 mice, each coated with a lubricant." According to the Bellingham Herald, Spink (acting as his own lawyer) denounced state officials and "the bigotry behind the (law)." [Bellingham Herald, 12-7-2012]

-- Least Competent Criminals: Peter Welsh, 32, and Dwayne Doolan, 31, weren't the first burglars to try breaking into a building by smashing through the adjoining basement wall, but they might be the clumsiest. Their target, on New Year's Eve, was Wrights Jewellers in Beaudesert, Australia, but trying to smash the front window failed, as did smashing the rear doors, which were actually those of another store. They finally settled on the basement option, but absentmindedly broke through the opposite-side wall and wound up in a KFC restaurant. (Undaunted, according to police, they robbed the KFC of about $2,600.) [Gold Coast Bulletin (Molendinar, Australia), 1-4-2013]

-- Once again, a public library has been sued for gently asking a patron to leave because his body odor was provoking complaints. George Stillman, 80, filed a $5.5 million lawsuit in October against the New York Public Library for feeling "humiliat(ed)" by the staff of the St. Agnes branch in Manhattan. Stillman said he views body odor (his and others') as mere "challenge(s) to the senses" and "a fact of life in the city." Actually, he had also denied that he had any body odor at all, but a New York Post reporter, interviewing him about the lawsuit, said she noted "a strong odor." [New York Post, 10-21-2012]

-- Drunk drivers often try to avoid hit-and-run charges by claiming that they did not realize they hit anything, but their odds drop if there is a dead pedestrian lodged in the windshield, as with Sherri Wilkins, 51, who was arrested in Torrance, Calif., in November, 2.3 miles from the crash scene, after other drivers finally persuaded her to stop. (Wilkins, it turned out, is a "rehabilitated" drug user who worked as a counselor at a Torrance drug treatment center and who claimed to have been sober for 11 years.) [Los Angeles Times, 11-27-2012]

-- Women's love-hate affairs with their shoes is the stuff of legends, but a Memphis, Tenn., podiatrist told Fox News in November of a recent increase in women deciding on what might be called the nuclear option -- "stiletto surgery" -- for horribly uncomfortable, yet irresistible, shoes. Either the shoe must go or the foot, and more are choosing the latter (or at least the pinky), to be removed or reduced by surgery. The Memphis doctor said he sees as many as 30 patients a month interested in the procedure. [Fox News, 11-20-2012]

-- Once again, a familiar, vexing legal question was tackled in New York City in December when Dr. Diana Williamson was sentenced to three years in prison after a conviction for defrauding Medicaid of $300,000 by writing bogus prescriptions. She had vigorously asserted "her" innocence, in that, she said, only one of her multiple personalities (uncontrollable by the others) had committed the crime. (The most memorable News of the Weird "dissociative identity disorder" case happened in 2002, when a Montana judge favored a woman by ruling that her spontaneous murder confession as one identity was inadmissible because one of her other identities had already "lawyered up" after a "Miranda" warning.) [New York Post, 12-19-2012]

-- Eileen Likness, 61, testified in November that she (like two other women reported in News of the Weird) believes that when she was shot point-blank by an ex-boyfriend in 2006 in Calgary, Alberta, her life was saved only because the 9mm bullet was slowed as it traveled through her breast implants. "(They) took the brunt of the force," she said at the trial of ex-boyfriend Frank Chora, who was eventually acquitted. [Reuters via Calgary Sun, 11-20-2012, 12-5-2012]

-- Wisconsin Circuit Court judge Tim Boyle is the most recent, in December, to attempt a solution to the intractable problem of deadbeat dads who continue to procreate even though unable to even modestly support the children they have had (usually with multiple mothers). Corey Curtis, 44, of Racine, was ordered not to father another child until he proves he can support the nine he has had (with six women). (Incarcerating Curtis, with only males, would likely prevent No. 10, but do nothing to help the first nine.) [The Smoking Gun, 12-5-2012]

-- In the most recent instance of a store's locks improperly working to give the appearance that a closed store was doing business, a Kroger supermarket in Goshen, Ind., was unintentionally wide-open on Thanksgiving evening -- with no employees (but with 24-hour lighting, as usual). Police on patrol noted that about a dozen customers were inside trying to use the self-checkout, but left quietly when informed that the store was closed. According to a police spokesperson, "(N)o one (attempted) to steal from the business." [WSBT-TV (South Bend, Ind.), 11-23-2012]

-- In December, the car-parts retailer AutoZone became the most recent employer to fire a worker for taking action widely admired -- but prohibited in the workplace because of the company's fear of liability. Devin McLean and his store manager in York County, Va., were herded into a back room by a gun-wielding holdup man and, being the only witnesses, understandably feared for their lives. However, McLean broke free, ran to his truck, and retrieved his gun. (He could have fled altogether but insisted that, morally, he could not abandon his colleague.) When McLean re-entered pointing his Glock 40, two things happened: (1) The robber fled, and (2) McLean became in violation of AutoZone's "zero tolerance" policy against employees bringing firearms into the store. Two days later, he was fired. [Fox News, 12-4-2012]

-- Whose Best Friend? In Westfield, Mass., in August, and near Eureka, Calif., in November, families of dog owners drowned trying to save their pooches, who had fallen into a lake and the ocean, respectively. The Massachusetts couple jumped out of their boat in Hampton Ponds State Park to retrieve their terrier, and the California couple and their son were swept out to sea after their dog wandered too deep into the surf to fetch a stick. Both dogs survived. [Hartford Courant, 8-21-2012] [Associated Press via New York Post, 11-26-2012]

Thanks This Week to John Swegan, Kathryn Wood, Russell Bell, Gerald Thomason, and Ken Vermette, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

"Fulton Jail Will Get Working Cell Locks," read the Dec. 19 Atlanta Journal-Constitution headline. The county commission serving Atlanta had finally voted to break a longstanding 3-3 tie that prevented buying new jailhouse locks -- even while knowing that inmates could jimmy the old ones at will and roam the facilities, threatening and assaulting suspects and guards. The three recalcitrant commissioners were being spiteful because a federal judge had ordered various improvements to the jail, costing $140 million so far, and the three vowed to spend no more. The 1,300 replacement locks will cost about $5 million -- but will not be installed right away. [Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 12-19-2012]

-- The Chinese fashion designer "Ms. Lv" told China Newsweek in November that her sales had "quintupled" since she began using her 72-year-old grandfather to model her clothing styles for girls. "(It's) helping my granddaughter," Liu Xianping said. "I'm very old," he said, and "I have nothing to lose." [China Newsweek via New York Daily News, 11-20-2012]

-- Challenging Business Plans: (1) British "medical illustrator" Emily Evans recently created eight pricy, bone china dinner plates emblazoned with the microscope images of tissue slides of the human liver, thyroid, esophagus and testicles ($60 per plate, $200 for a set of four). (2) In October, a shop in London's St. Bart's Pathology Museum ran a special sale of cupcakes as part of a sexually transmitted disease awareness campaign. Each pastry's icing was crafted to resemble the lesions, boils and warts of gonorrhea and other maladies. [Daily Mail (London), 12-13-2012] [The Sun (London), 10-22-2012]

-- Leading a "jerky renaissance" is Krave, a Sonoma, Calif., company creating nontraditional flavors such as turkey jerky and jerky flavored with basil citrus or lemon garlic. Actually, Krave points out, jerky is rich in protein, with low calories and fat (but with, admittedly, sky-high sodium) and could be reasonably pitched as a healthy snack. However, jerky's main obstacle (a Krave competitor's CEO told The Wall Street Journal in September) is "jerky shame," in which some male consumers remain mortified that their girlfriends might see them enjoying the snack. [Wall Street Journal, 9-26-2012]

-- Behold, the "McGyver" Spider: Biologist Phil Torres, working from the Tambopata national park in Peru, revealed in December that he had witnessed a tiny Cyclosa spider construct a replica of an eight-legged spider in a web made of leaves, debris and dead insects. Since the real spider was found nearby, Torres hypothesized that the wily arachnid had built a decoy to confuse predators. [News.com.au (Sydney, Australia), 12-19-2012]

-- Artist Maria Fernanda Cardoso, already known for her "circus" of performing fleas at Australia's Sydney Festival 10 years ago, has since become a legitimate academic expert on the sex organs of fleas and other insects. She debuted the Museum of Copulatory Organs last year near Sydney, teaching visitors such esoterica as: In many insect species, females are promiscuous; snails are hermaphrodites in which one shoots sperm "darts" that form rigid chastity-belt-like blockages on his mate; and a male flea copulates for eight hours straight (but only mates three times in his life). [Sydney Morning Herald, 4-21-2012]

A team of French researchers writing recently in the journal PLOS ONE described a species of European catfish, growing to a length of five feet, that feeds itself pigeons by lunging out of the water ("cat"-like) and snatching them, even if the leap carries it to shore. Like Argentinian killer whales, the catfish are able to remain on land for a few seconds while wriggling back into the water where they can enjoy their meal. The lead researcher said he filmed 54 catfish attacks, of which 15 were successful. [DiscoverMagazine.com, 12-5-2012]

Another "Airline-Pricing" Model: The Jiangdu District kindergarten recognizes that providing a quality education requires supporting the child emotionally as well as helping develop reading and other skills, and toward that end, it now requires teachers to hug each pupil twice a day -- provided that the parent has paid the monthly "hugging fee" of the equivalent of about $12.80. An education agency investigation is under way, according to a December Shanghai Daily report, but one teacher defended the trial program as boosting a child's confidence and establishing a "good mood" for learning. [Shanghai Daily, 12-12-2012]

-- First-World Crisis (I): Tufts University opened America's first animal obesity clinic at its veterinary hospital in North Grafton, Mass., in September, to supply nutrition information and to help owners develop weight-loss regimens for their pets. Without treatment, veterinarians told the Tufts Daily newspaper, pet obesity can lead to pancreatitis, joint disorders and skin disease. One of its first clients was a golden retriever (a breed known for its desire to run but also known for its adaptability to non-running lifestyles), who now requires $90 prescription dog food -- though the owner reports that his best friend has lost eight pounds and is thus almost halfway to his goal of 87. [Tufts Daily, 9-21-2012]

-- First-World Crisis (II): Researchers writing in the December issue of the journal Urology reported a "five-fold increase" over 10 years in emergency room visits for accidents caused by pubic-hair "grooming." Unsurprisingly, 83 percent of all injuries appeared to be shaving accidents, but only 56 percent of the patients were women, according to a summary of the research on MedicalXPress.com. [MedicalXPress.com, 12-17-2012]

-- Demarco Thomas, 30, was arrested in Tucson, Ariz., in November, as a drug courier for what the Arizona Daily Star called a "local cartel," after Thomas himself had called police the day before. Thomas feared being whacked by the cartel because he had come up $20,000 short in the latest delivery. According to police, Thomas brought money in suitcases from North Carolina to his Tucson contact -- except for a little bit that he had somehow "misplaced." A police search of Thomas revealed almost exactly $20,000 on his person, and Thomas, about to be arrested, allegedly asked officers if they would please write a note to the cartel informing them that police had merely seized the $20,000 -- and not that Thomas had tried to steal it. They declined. [Arizona Daily Star, 12-4-2012]

-- Prosecutor's Delight: (1) Police in Guntersville, Ala., suspected that Tara Hampton had resumed dealing drugs, in violation of a first-offender's program that had kept her out of jail, and they knocked on her door to ask about some evidence they had come across. According to the police report, when Hampton opened the door for them, she was absentmindedly holding a bag of crack in her hand. (2) William Cook Jr., 27, was arrested after a manager at a Wendy's restaurant in Rome, Ga., complained that Cook was acting strange and disturbing customers, and when police asked for his ID, he provided bogus information. In a search, officers found a note in his pocket, reading, "How Bill Cook intends to rob the Wendy's on Martha Berry and get away with it," followed by lists labeled "Plan A" and "Plan B." [WAFF-TV (Huntsville, Ala.), 12-10-2012] [Rome News-Tribune, 12-12-2012]

(1) Unlucky Gary Haines, 59, was arrested in December in Charlotte County, Fla., after he was spotted stealing a trailer by hitching it to his own truck and driving off with it. The "spotter" was the trailer's owner, David Zehntner, who was out flying in his private plane and happened to be passing over his property at the moment Haines was hitching up. He easily followed Haines from the air and called in Haines' destination to police. (2) Jason DeJesus, 36, and Chanelle Troedson, 33, who share an upscale 4,600 square-foot home (with pool and courts for playing tennis and beach volleyball) in Morgan Hill, Calif., were arrested in December and charged with luring a 50-year-old handyman to their home, forcibly detaining him, and requiring him to make various repairs for them over a six-hour period (before he managed to escape and notify police.) [WWSB-TV (Sarasota), 12-31-2012] [KPIX-TV (San Francisco), 12-5-2012]

Thanks This Week to Bill Bloxham, Bruce Hilpert, Michael Waugh, Tim Kirby, Grady Bautista, Cherie Marcus, Peter Smagorinsky, Beth Anne Wasdin, and Dick Sonier, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.