LEAD STORY -- TMI

Kansas lawyer Dennis Hawver was disbarred in November for his comically bad (24 separate deficiencies) defense of double-murder suspect Phillip Cheatham in 2005 (which led to a new trial for Cheatham). Hawver had admitted to the jury that his client was a "shooter of people" (a previous manslaughter conviction) who, as an "experience(d)" criminal would never have left that third victim alive with multiple gunshot wounds. A confident Hawver had virtually invited the jury to execute "whoever" the killer was. (At a September hearing to keep his license, he dressed as Thomas Jefferson, banging the lectern and shouting, as reverse psychology, "I am incompetent!" -- leading the blog Lowering the Bar to muse that by then, the argument was wholly unnecessary.) Cheatham told the Topeka Capital-Journal that Hawver is "a good dude (but) just in over his head." [Topeka Capital-Journal, 11-14-2014] [Lowering the Bar, 9-18-2014]

Arrested in October for burglary of a Kohl's department store in Alhambra, California: Ms. Josephine Crook, 49. Passed away on Oct. 15 in Marietta, Georgia: Ms. Ida Gbye, 81. Arrested in October and charged with stabbing two men in Regina, Saskatchewan: Ms. Danielle Knife, 24. Charged in Mississauga, Ontario, in October with sexually assaulting three male patients: psychologist Dr. Vincent Hung Lo. Arrested in November in Gainesville, Florida, on sexual assault charges but then exonerated three days later when accuser Jeremy Foster was caught lying: Mr. Phuc Kieu, 58. [KNBC-TV (Los Angeles), 10-26-2014] [Marietta Daily Journal, 10-23-2014] [CTV News (Regina), 10-16-2014] [The Star (Toronto), 10-7-2014] [First Coast News (Jacksonville), 11-26-2014]

-- The Creative Class: To spark interest in the new leisure center opening in spring 2015 in Selby in North Yorkshire, England, the management company WLCT sponsored a contest to name the center, with the prize a year's free membership. On Nov. 5, General Manager Paul Hirst announced that Steve Wadsworth was the winner, proclaiming, "Well done to Steve on winning the competition." The winning entry: "Selby Leisure Centre." [Selby District Council press release, 11-5-2014]

-- A German woman who identifies herself only as "Anna Konda" described to Vice Media in October her Female Fight Club in Berlin, now three years old, for women to test themselves in all-out wrestling matches. While some are fetish-motivated dominants, others display no particular sexuality -- like Anna herself, who, she admits, simply likes to "crush" men's and women's skulls between her massive thighs. Anna says she is a product of East Germany's cliched development of tough, muscular female athletes. [Vice.com, 10-20-2014]

-- Those Frightening Alabama Schools: (1) In October, a mother charged that officials at E.R. Dickson School in Mobile, Alabama, first detained her daughter, 5, for pointing a crayon at another student as if it were a gun, and then pressured the girl to sign a paper promising not to kill anyone or commit suicide. "What is suicide, Mommy?" the girl asked when her parents arrived. (2) In a 2010 incident at Sparkman Middle School near Huntsville, Alabama, an administrator coaxed a special-needs girl, 14, into a boys' bathroom to "bait" a 16-year-old boy who had previous sexual misconduct issues into committing a prosecutable offense -- and then failed to protect the girl. (The girl's family sued and won a summary judgment, but the school board appealed, and in September 2014 the U.S. Justice Department formally endorsed the family's lawsuit.) [WPMI-TV (Mobile), 10-10-2014] [Al.com (Huntsville), 9-18-2014]

-- The West Briton newspaper reported in October that a darts team composed of blind men was ready for its inaugural match at an inn in Grampound, England, sponsored by the St. Austell Bay Rotary Club. The inn's landlord acknowledged that the game-room door would be closed "just in case" a dart strays off course. (The blind darters would be aided by string attached to the bull's eye that they could feel for guidance.) [West Briton (Truro), 10-21-2014]

Twice in September, police in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, reported that women had complained of a motorist who would stop female strangers on the street to tell them jokes about blond women. The jokes were not sexual, but still made the women "uncomfortable." A high school girl told her mother of a similar episode. Based on a license plate number, police visited the man at home, and he agreed to stop. [Patch.com (North Kingstown), 9-12-2014]

-- In some developing countries, a sex "strike" organized by women is often the only hopeful tactic for convincing husbands and lovers to take grievances seriously. However, in November, Mr. Nderitu Njoka, head of a Global Men Empowerment Network in Nairobi, Kenya, announced that his organization would commence a "sex boycott" for five days, denying men's "services" to their wives -- to protest "tyrannical" female domination. According to Njoka, hundreds of Kenyan men are physically assaulted by females every year (including at least 100 whose wives vengefully castrate them). (Referring to a notorious U.S. incident, Njoka offered support to the singer Jay Z after he was punched by his sister-in-law Solange Knowles.) [Washington Post, 11-14-2014]

-- First, Do Harm: In November, according to the deputy police commissioner in Calcutta, India, a group of student doctors at Nilratan Sarkar Medical College cornered, beat, maimed and eventually killed a man they suspected of rummaging through their belongings and stealing their mobile phones. The incident followed a series of phone and laptop thefts, and some of the enraged medical students slashed the man's genitals before leaving him to die. [Agence France-Presse via BBC News, 11-17-2014]

Despite a 70-year-old U.S. Supreme Court decision to the contrary, six states still have laws exempting parents from homicide charges when they deny a child life-saving medical care because they trust no remedy except prayer. Even among those states, all of the deaths since 1994 under those circumstances have occurred in Idaho, where (according to a November report by Vocativ.com) no prosecutor seems willing to put a trust-in-God parent before a jury. Children in Idaho have died when simple medical treatments were available (e.g., insulin and fluids for Type I diabetes). Neighboring Oregon, by contrast, now vigorously prosecutes parents who let their children die, including a 13-year-old girl's parents convicted in November in Albany, Oregon. [Vocativ.com, 11-17-2014]

Police in Murfreesboro, North Carolina, announced in November that they had intercepted a shipment of 30 pounds of marijuana that had been loosely packaged and shipped from California by U.S. Mail, and an investigation was underway with arrests expected. Police Chief Darrell Rowe told WTKR-TV that the scent of the packages was so vivid that, even though he had summoned the department's K-9 unit, "the dog kind of looked at us (as if to say), 'Do you really need me for this?'" [WTKR-TV (Hampton Roads, Va.), 11-11-2014]

(1) Most recent drunk driver to hit a pedestrian with the victim's body then lodging in the windshield -- and the driver's traveling on, seemingly oblivious: Marcos Ortega, 33, in Ocean Township, New Jersey, in November (whose 66-year-old victim did not survive). (2) Most recent report of birds in the wild consuming fermenting berries -- and then comically crashing into trees and making goofy-looking landings: Bohemian waxwings in Canada's Yukon, in November (where the Environment Yukon organization set up an "avian drunk tank"). [WPVI-TV (Philadelphia), 11-12-2014] [Canadian Broadcasting Corp. News, 11-17-2014]

Arrested recently and awaiting trial for murder: Jason Wayne Autry, Holladay, Tennessee (April); Dennis Wayne Brooks, Robertsville, Missouri (November); Jimmy Wayne Estes, Charlotte, North Carolina (June); Jestin Wayne Hooker, Lubbock, Texas (July); Walter Wayne Howard, Portland, Oregon (November, for 1988 cold case); John Wayne Mackay, James City County, Virginia (indicted January); Thomas Wayne Martin, Huntsville, Alabama (indicted November). Convicted of murder: Allen Wayne Densen Morgan, Munford, Alabama (June); Darrell Wayne Frederick, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma (November). Sentenced for murder: Gregory Wayne Hill, Sydney, Australia (June); Stephen Wayne Jamieson, Sydney, Australia (November); Christopher Wayne Robin, Beaumont, Texas (March). Execution for murder imminent, pending clemency hearing: Robert Wayne Holsey, Baldwin County, Georgia (November). [Autry: The Tennessean, 4-30-2014] [Brooks: Sullivan Independent News (Sullivan, Mo.), 11-25-2014] [Estes: Charlotte Observer, 6-17-2014] [Hooker: KJTV (Lubbock), 8-26-2014] [Howard: KOIN-TV (Portland, Ore.), 11-13-2014] [Mackay: [Williamsburg Yorktown Daily, 1-16-2014] [Martin: Al.com (Huntsville), 11-7-2014] [Morgan: CBS News, 4-15-2014] [Frederick: The Oklahoman, 11-12-2014] [Hill: Sydney Morning Herald, 7-31-2014] [Jamieson: The Age (Melbourne), 11-25-2014] [Robin: Beaumont Enterprise, 3-19-2014] [Holsey: WMGT-TV (Atlanta), 11-25-2014]

Thanks This Week to Harry Thompson, Chris Krehbiel, Charles Congre, Chuck Hamilton, Jane Meadus and Scott McDaniel, and to the News of the Weird Senior Advisors (Jenny T. Beatty, Paul Di Filippo, Ginger Katz, Joe Littrell, Matt Mirapaul, Paul Music, Karl Olson, and Jim Sweeney) and Board of Editorial Advisors (Tom Barker, Paul Blumstein, Harry Farkas, Sam Gaines, Herb Jue, Emory Kimbrough, Scott Langill, Bob McCabe, Steve Miller, Christopher Nalty, Mark Neunder, Sandy Pearlman, Bob Pert, Larry Ellis Reed, Peter Smagorinsky, Rob Snyder, Stephen Taylor, Bruce Townley and Jerry Whittle).

(Read more weird news at www.WeirdUniverse.net; send items to WeirdNews@earthlink.net, and P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, FL 33679.)

Indonesia's holy "Sex Mountain" on the island of Java is still performing its incomprehensible function of making Muslims feel prosperous and optimistic if they have intercourse with strangers, as reported in November by Australia's "SBS Dateline" TV program. A reporter journeyed to Mount Kemukus (near the heavily populated Surakarta) to observe the mass adultery whose origin dates to the 16th century. Otherwise-devout pilgrims pray, bathe and pair off with other worshippers (repeating the ritual seven times, 35 days apart) to bring themselves the good life -- except that the sex must be with people other than their spouses. Clerics generally denounce the Kemukus experience, but more so since prostitutes (collecting "offerings") are lately so plentiful at the site. [SBS, 11-18-2014]

-- Comprehensive Pentagon studies of America's nuclear missile infrastructure released in November (following disturbing reports of readiness failures) included the revelation that nuclear warheads had to be attached with a particular wrench, even though the Air Force owned only one with which to service 450 missiles housed at three bases. Consequently, one official told The New York Times, "They started FedExing the one tool" back and forth. No one had checked in years, he said, "to see if new tools were being made" -- typical of maintenance problems that had "been around so long that no one reported them anymore." [New York Times, 11-13-2014]

-- Autumn Canceled: London's Daily Telegraph reported in November that a gardener hired by the House of Commons had spent a day pulling color-changing leaves from trees on the Westminster Palace grounds -- because it would be more cost-effective than to rake them up after they fell. The gardener (whose name sounds right out of a James Bond adventure -- "Annabel Honeybun") said she had 145 trees to service. (A local environmentalist lamented denying autumn visitors "one of the few pleasures at this time of year." [Daily Telegraph, 11-14-2014]

Various cogs in South Korea's national machinery paused briefly on Nov. 13 so as not to distract the nation's high-school-age kids, as 650,000 of them were sitting for the decisive university entrance exams (which are several levels more important than the SATs or ACTs for American students). Large companies and government agencies told employees to commute later in the morning -- to keep traffic lighter for students traveling to the 1,257 test centers -- and "no-fly" zones reduced noise during the 40-minute period in which students tested aurally on the English language. [Daily Telegraph, 11-13-2014]

-- "Santa Muerte" (Our Lady of the Holy Death) might be described as a cynic's unauthorized byproduct of Roman Catholicism currently festering in drug-cartel-roiled Mexico and Central America and is, according to Vice Media, "the world's fastest growing" religion. "Saint Death" first appeared only 12 years ago, in the Mexico City barrio of Tepito, and is now a first line of protection for worshippers in danger zones. (Almost 80,000 Mexicans have been killed in drug-related violence since 2006, Vice reported.) Said an author who has studied the religion, "People feel more comfortable asking (Santa Muerte) for favors they probably shouldn't ask a Catholic saint for." [Vice.com, 11-13-2014]

-- Pope Francis ordered an investigation in October of the Italian Riviera diocese of Bishop Mario Oliveri, 70, who is known for giving "second chances" to wayward priests from across the country. Reports had surfaced that, among Mario's priests was one who openly published nude selfies on Facebook, another caught publicly flirting with the wife of a port captain, another dismissed from a cruise ship for molesting passengers, and another revealed to have a full-body "tribal" tattoo that he had exhibited while posing with the tattoo artist in the local newspaper. The manager of a church charity in the diocese estimated that about half of the bishop's 175 priests were delinquents. [Daily Telegraph (London), 10-25-2014]

(1) Mmmm, Omelets! A crash of three tractor-trailers on Interstate 24 near Chattanooga, Tennessee, on Nov. 9 left a pileup of one truck's load of eggs, another's pallets of cheese, and the other's boxes of meat. (2) "Drunken Trombone-Playing Clown Fires Gun From Garage, Police Say" (an Oct. 21 story on MLive.com from Grand Traverse County, Michigan, also reported that the man was wearing camo pants). [Times Free Press (Chattanooga), 11-9-2014] [MLive.com (Grand Rapids), 10-21-2014]

Parrots and Snakes: A November story from Leigh-on-Sea, England, reported that a Senegal parrot (apparently feeling restive with its owners on holiday) managed to pick two locks on its cage and fly away. The second lock had been installed as insurance after an earlier lock-picking escape. Also, a missing African gray parrot was returned to its Torrance, California, owner in October after a hiatus -- in which the parrot had learned to speak Spanish. On the other hand, a hungry 5-foot-long black rat snake in Verona, Pennsylvania, had to be saved by surgery after it failed to distinguish between chicken eggs in a coop (tasty) and a nearby ceramic egg (life-threatening organ failure). [BBC News, 11-10-2014] [Daily Telegraph (London), 10-14-2014] [KDKA-TV (Pittsburgh), 8-13-2014]

-- Just Possibly Racist: One of the questions offered in testing by the Charlotte-Mecklenburg (North Carolina) school district for high school biology in November sought students' understanding of dominant and recessive genes with this puzzle: "LaShamanda has a heterozygous big bootie, the dominant trait. Her man Fontavius has a small bootie which is recessive. They get married and have a baby named LaPrincess. What is the probability that LaPrincess will inherit her mama's big bootie?" (Charlotte TV station WBTV was unable to confirm that the school system created the question, even though the question was apparently distributed with other system materials.) [WBTV, 11-14-2014]

-- Summer "comfort food" season is an opportunity for imaginative (and shameless) chefs to take caloric overload to the next level, annually extending themselves to build the sweetest (and, generally, the least heart-friendly) concoctions imaginable. Hence, Deep-Fried Candy Corn (in a base of crescent rolls) made its debut this year, along with the Double Donut burger (two beef patties piled with cheese and bacon between "buns" of glazed donuts (1,996 calories and 53 grams of saturated fat). [Grubstreet.com via Huffington Post, 10-22-2014] [Crawley News (Queensway, England), 11-12-2014]

-- Cry for Help: Mr. Jenya Bolotov, 26, a Russian, became an Internet sensation in November (on Facebook, YouTube and several news sites) by releasing photographs showing a seven-year obsession with modifying his face to resemble that of a platypus. He has stretched eight parts of his face to effect a duck-billed look, with holes on the sides of his nostrils and plugs extending his lips. "I can eat, talk and speak on the phone like everyone else," he insisted, but is happier now that he can "live differently." (Some Internet commenters complained that, while Bolotov's face is certainly "creepy," they cannot quite conjure up "platypus" from the look.) [Metro.co.uk, 11-18-2014)]

After consulting with the FBI, military and state law-enforcement and security agencies, the sheriff of Dickson County, Tennessee, concluded that his only option to rescue his departmental records database from malicious malware was to pay a $500 ransom to the creators of the CryptoWall "trojan," which had attacked and encrypted his files. A total of 72,000 files, including witness statements and other evidence in criminal cases, was temporarily inaccessible after a department computer user clicked on the wrong part of a screen in late October. (PC World reported in August that within the pervious six months, CryptoWall's developers were estimated to have "earned" $1 million in "ransoms.") [WTVF (Nashville), 11-12-2014] [PC World, 8-29-2014]

In the U.S.'s fourth reported case, a state issued a driver's license even though the applicant was photographed wearing a colander (as a "religious covering," the only "hats" legally permitted in such photos). Jessica Steinhauser said the motor vehicles office in Hurricane, Utah, simply shrugged at her affiliation with the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (created in 2005 to offer the proposition that God's existence is no better "proven" than the FSM's). [Associated Press via KOVR-TV (Sacramento, Calif.), 11-18-2014]

Thanks This Week to Bruce Leiserowitz and Ken Thompson, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

(Read more weird news at www.WeirdUniverse.net; send items to WeirdNews@earthlink.net, and P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, FL 33679.)

November is tax-publicizing season in Finland, where, starkly unlike America, the government releases all individuals' tax records to help build public support for the country's vast welfare state. Thus, reported Foreign Policy magazine, Finnish society gets a "yearly dose of schadenfreude" ... "opening the door for a media frenzy of gossip, boasting and fingerpointing" about "fair share" and who's more worthy. A few, however, proudly pay high Finnish taxes as a "badge of patriotism," rejecting common tax shelters. "We've received a lot of help from society," said one homegrown (and wealthy) entrepreneur, "and now it is our turn to pay back." [Foreign Policy, 11-5-2014]

-- Steve Soifer, CEO of an international support group for people with "shy bladders," excoriated DirecTV in November for its series of commercials featuring Rob Lowe, whose "awkward" character in one ad stands at a urinal and says, "Fact: I can't go with other people in the room." Soifer says the ad ridicules a serious problem -- and compared it to "making fun" of a man missing an arm or leg. [Associated Press via New York Daily News, 11-4-2014]

-- The Power of One Sensitive Soul: (1) Lt. Col. Sherwood Baker was turned away from Adams High School in Rochester, Michigan, in September by a guard who said a school official sent word that Baker was not allowed in to discuss his daughter's class schedule until he changed to civilian clothes -- because "a student" might be offended by his military uniform. (The Rochester school superintendent later apologized.) (2) The British Embassy in Washington, D.C., apologized twice in August, first a tongue-in-cheek "apology" for England's War of 1812 attack on the White House and then for making that "apology" in the first place -- because of a backlash on Twitter from Americans complaining the jokey "apology" was "offensive." [Daily Mail (London), 9-11-2014] [Sky News (London), 8-25-2014]

-- David Van Vleet asked for certain supposedly public records in Tacoma, Washington, and was forced into federal court when the city turned him down. Van Vleet wanted data from the city licenses of strip club employees (dancers' stage and real names, date of birth, etc.) so that he could pray for them individually, by name, to make his appeals more effective. (In October, Judge Ronald Leighton denied Van Vleet a temporary restraining order against the city.) [KING-TV (Seattle), 10-23-2014]

-- The Washington, D.C., restaurant Second State recently added an accessory to its bar menu -- "hand-cut rock," i.e., "artisanal" ice, for $1 extra (but free in premium drinks). The local supplier Favourite Ice assures that its frozen water contains no calcium to cloud it and, with a heavy-duty band-saw blade, "hand-cuts" 200-to-300-pound blocks into the cubes that ultimately wind up in the glass. A Favourite Ice founder said his frozen water resists drink-weakening longer than ordinary cubes do. [NPR, 10-21-2014]

Daniela Liverani, 24, of Edinburgh, Scotland, and British singer Katie Melua recently survived inadvertent, grotesque ordeals hosting, respectively, a three-inch leech and a spider. The leech had found its way into Liverani's nose during an Asian backpacking trip and had poked part-way out several times (though Liverani had assumed it was a nosebleed clot and "sniffed (it) back up"). When she finally saw a doctor in October, she said, the leech played peek-a-boo for a half-hour until the doctor grabbed it with tweezers. Melua's tiny spider apparently lived in her ear for a week, creating a constant "rustling" noise until her doctor vacuumed it out. She guessed that it came in through old earbud headphones on an airline flight. (Her spokesperson said the singer had no hard feelings and had released the spider into her garden.) [Daily Record (London), 10-12-2014] [The Guardian (London), 11-2-2014]

-- The law finally caught up, partially, to squatter Darrell Beatty in September, as he was charged with grand larceny for forging a deed to a home owned by Jennifer Merin, 70, in Laurelton, New York. However, he bailed out of jail on Oct. 22 and immediately returned to the house. In fact, Beatty's two sons had remained "at home" even while Beatty was locked up. The home has been in Merin's family since 1930. "Mind-boggling," she said. [New York Daily News, 11-4-2014]

-- The Law Works in Strange Ways: (1) The Gothamist news site reported in October that bicyclist John Roemer, who was rear-ended by a driver in Brooklyn in May (and whose intensive-care bill was paid by the driver's insurance company), is now being sued by the driver in small claims court for $2,000 damage to her car. (2) In November, a civil court in Lindau, Germany, ordered Rory Gray to pay Dr. Daniel Ubani for calling Ubani "an animal" (for having injected Gray's father with 10 times a drug's safe dose in 2008, which led to his death). The court found the epithet unwarranted and ordered Gray to help pay Ubani's legal expenses. [The Gothamist, 10-16-2014] [BBC News, 11-7-2014]

-- The owner of the world's largest corn maze (63 acres), at Cool Patch Pumpkins in Dixon, California, told Sacramento's KOVR-TV in October that "several" times this season, visitors have called 911 to come get them out of the maze. Said owner Matt Cooley, "When it's dark, all you see is corn." (Also, two months earlier, an emergency crew in Braintree, England, was forced to use special equipment to find and rescue an elderly woman who had fallen while inside the 10-acre Blake House Craft Centre maze.) [KOVR-TV, 10-30-2014] [Essex Chronicle, 8-20-2014]

-- Cliches Come to Life: (1) In a $460,000 police-brutality settlement with the city of Birmingham, Alabama, in October, plaintiff Anthony Warren will receive $1,000, with the rest going to his lawyers. (The un-angelic Anthony is serving 20 years for running over an officer during a high-speed car chase in 2008; he took a beating once officers caught him.) (2) Condemned California inmate Steven Homick, 74, finally took his last breath on Nov. 5 -- more than 29 years after committing the two murders that put him on death row. However, Homick died of natural causes (the 65th condemned California man to go that way in the last 35 years). [Reuters, 10-22-2014] [Associated Press via KPIX-TV (San Francisco), 11-5-2014]

(1) "Dwarf Stripper Gets Bride Pregnant on Her (Bachelorette) Night" (an October report from the LasCincoDelDia website in Spain after the husband was surprised that "his" wedding-night consummation resulted in a baby born with dwarfism). (2) "Man's 'Drugs Test Trick' Foiled by Pregnancy" (a November report from Egypt's Al-Yawm al-Sabi website on a male bus driver who tried to game a drug test by using his wife's urine, only to inadvertently discover that he would soon become a father). [Daily Telegraph (London), 10-13-2014] [BBC News, 11-4-2014]

Employees of the Marshalls department store in Longmont, Colorado, said they had been hearing noises but were unable to locate the source for several days until finally, on Nov. 10, they summoned firefighters, who tore out an interior wall and freed a weak, injured Paul Felyk, 35, who had been trapped between that wall and an exterior wall after falling through the roof. A scrawled note near him was three days old. Burglary charges were filed against Felyk, who has a substantial rap sheet. [KDVR-TV (Denver), 11-14-2014]

The desert sands of the Arabian Peninsula are fine-grained and smooth -- unable to be used in manufacturing or, especially, the concrete industry, which is crucial to the massive upscale developments in Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and other countries. Nor does desert sand work for beach restoration in the United States and other areas -- because it blows away so easily. The resultant "sand crisis," with various countries bidding against Middle Easterners for the Earth's sea sand (described in a November New York Times essay), sounds much more severe than the first time News of the Weird mentioned (in 2007) how relatively easy it is, contrary to cliche, to sell sand to Arabs. [New York Times, 11-4-2014]

Thanks This Week to Elaine Weiss, Peter Burkholder, Gary Goldberg, Charles Hamilton, Jim Weber, and Russell Bell, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

(Read more weird news at www.WeirdUniverse.net; send items to WeirdNews@earthlink.net, and P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, FL 33679.)