-- Singer Wayne Newton was sued in District Court on Aug. 6 by a mother and daughter over an incident involving a monkey that took place in October 2017 at Newton's home in Las Vegas, where the daughter was an invited guest, according to court documents. Genevieve Urena, a minor, was touring the home when Newton's pet monkey, Boo, "without any provocation ... attacked and bit Ms. Urena, causing injury to her body as well as emotional distress," the suit claims, according to KVVU TV. The Urenas assert that Newton "had a duty to exercise due care" and should have known that Boo had a tendency to attack. They are seeking $15,000 in damages. [KVVU, 8/8/2019]

-- In Perth, Australia, two pig farmers face jail time after illegally importing Danish pig semen in shampoo bottles. The Guardian reported that Torben Soerensen and Henning Laue, of GD Pork, were sentenced to three years and two years in prison, respectively, after pleading guilty to breaching quarantine and biosecurity laws by bringing in the contraband numerous times between 2009 and 2017 to be used in GD Pork's artificial breeding program. Australian agriculture minister Bridget McKenzie said, "GD Pork imported the semen illegally in an attempt to get an unfair advantage over its competitors, through new genetics." Western Australian Farmers Federation spokesperson Jessica Wallace called the acts "selfish": "How extremely disappointing." GD Pork also was fined $500,000. [The Guardian, 8/13/2019]

Thank You, I Think?

The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported on Aug. 11 that in the overnight hours, more than 50 old-style television sets had been deposited on the front porches of homes in Henrico County, Virginia. Henrico Police Lt. Matt Pecka said the culprits were caught on several doorbell cameras, with one of the videos showing a person wearing TV-shaped headgear while dropping off the TV. Even more puzzling, a similar phenomenon happened last year in nearby Glen Allen, where 20 sets were left on porches. Pecka said the only crime that might have been committed is illegal dumping: "We don't believe there's any reason for the community to be alarmed." [Richmond Times-Dispatch, 8/11/2019]

Bright Idea

A Twitter user known only as "Dorothy," 15, was banned from her phone by her mom in early August after becoming distracted while cooking and starting a fire, but that didn't stop her, reported The Guardian. First she tweeted from a Nintendo 3DS gaming device, but Mom caught on quickly and posted that the account would be shut down. The next day, Dorothy tweeted from her Wii U, assuring followers that while Mom was at work, she'd be looking for her phone. Finally, on Aug. 8, with no other options left, Dorothy reached out to Twitter from an unlikely source: her family's LG smart refrigerator. "I am talking to my fridge what the heck my Mom confiscated all of my electronics again," she posted. The post went viral, even prompting LG to tweet about it with the hashtag #FreeDorothy. [The Guardian, 8/13/2019]

Scary

Cambodian farmer Sum Bora, 28, is lucky to be alive after spending almost four days wedged between boulders in the jungle northwest of Phnom Penh. On Aug. 4, as Bora was collecting bat guano for use as fertilizer, he slipped while trying to retrieve the flashlight he had dropped down a crevice, The Washington Post reported. After three days, his brother found him and alerted authorities, who worked about 10 hours to free Bora from the hollow where he was trapped. He was transported to a local hospital. [Washington Post, 8/7/2019]

Least Competent Criminal

Larry Adams, 61, of Daytona Beach, Florida, came out swinging late on Aug. 12, complaining that neighbors were playing their music too loudly in the parking lot of their apartment complex. Adams emerged from his apartment threatening to shoot them and brandishing nunchucks, which he then hit himself in the head with. Police officers responding to a 911 call told WOLF-Fox 35 that Adams also sprayed everyone with roach repellent, causing them to cough and their skin to burn. "We not even roaches, so why are we getting sprayed with roach spray for?" wondered neighbor Cici Sylvester. Adams, sporting a goose egg on his forehead, was charged with aggravated battery with a deadly weapon. [Fox 35, 8/13/2019]

True Love

For 68 years, Francis and Rosemary Klontz of Sacramento, California, have not just shared the ups and downs of marriage and family. They've cemented their bond by coordinating their outfits -- every day! -- for almost seven decades. Francis lets his wife pick out his clothes each morning: "She just lays it out for me, and I don't have to worry about a thing!" he told KOVR TV. The couple also sing together, performing at church, hospitals and around the house. They started dating in junior high school in Auburn, Washington, and the dressing alike custom started when Rosemary's mother bought them matching shirts. "We've been matching ever since," Rosemary said. [KOVR, 8/12/2019]

Government in Action

What a relief! The U.S. Department of Transportation announced on Aug. 8 that miniature horses are cleared to fly in all cabins of commercial planes as emotional support and service animals. The agency called "dogs, cats and miniature horses" the "most commonly recognized service animals," Fox News reported. However, other organizations, including the Association of Flight Attendants, have urged a tightening of rules about the animals because of "rampant abuse" of service animal designations. Apparently, the DOT said "neiiiighhhh" to that. [Fox News, 8/15/2019]

Oops!

A Gwinnett County (Georgia) medical examiner has resigned after wildly misinterpreting the cause of death for 61-year-old Ray Neal of Lawrenceville, who died on July 21. Despite reports by police and witnesses of large amounts of blood on the floor and walls at scene, investigator Shannon Byers initially ruled Neal had died of natural causes. But when his body arrived at the funeral home, employees discovered a hole in his neck, Fox 5 News reported, and Neal was returned to the morgue for an autopsy, which revealed he had been stabbed several times. Police are now investigating the death as a murder. [Fox 5, 7/27/2019]

The Devil Is in the Details

Was there or was there not a clown? And what exactly is "fancy dress"? In the early hours of July 26, The Guardian reported, a "mass brawl" broke out in a buffet area of the P&O cruise ship Britannia, which was bound from Bergen, Norway, to Southampton, England. Witnesses told staff that the fight started when one passenger became angry that another was wearing a clown outfit, because they had specifically booked a cruise with no fancy dress. Another witness said the clown had crashed a black-tie party. But P&O later said in a statement there was no clown, and Hampshire police confirmed: "There is no information to suggest that a clown or anyone wearing fancy dress was involved in this incident." A number of passengers were injured in the brawl by flying furniture and plates, and two passengers were arrested, then later released. [The Guardian, 7/28/2019]

Compelling Explanation

Fanny Alida Beerepoot and her brother, Rembertus Cornelis Beerepoot, Christian missionaries in Tasmania, were ordered by the supreme court there to pay $2.3 million to the Australian Taxation Office on July 17 after failing to remit the estimated $930,000 in income taxes and other charges they owed in 2017. The Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported the dispute stems from the Beerepoots' contention that taxation "goes against God's will." Representing themselves, the siblings explained they had paid income taxes prior to 2011, but then came to realize that "the law of Almighty God is the supreme law of this land," and "transferring our allegiance from God to the Commonwealth would mean rebelling against God." Also in 2017, the family's property in Mole Creek was seized after they refused to pay property taxes on it for seven years. [ABC, 7/17/2019]

Lake Worth, Florida, homeowner Phil Fraumeni emerged from his house on July 19 to find a white Tesla not only parked on his lawn, but tethered to an outlet on his house, charging the car's battery. Fraumeni told WPBF he waited a couple of hours, then called police. The car was not stolen, and police were able to contact the owner, who showed up around noon and told Fraumeni he had been visiting friends in the neighborhood when the battery died around midnight. Fraumeni declined to press charges (pun intended) and did not ask for reimbursement for the 12 hours of electricity the car used. [WPBF, 7/23/2019]

Recent Alarming Headline

Alex Bonilla, 49, took revenge to an extreme on the man he told police he had caught cheating with his wife in May, according to WCJB. On July 14, Gilchrist County (Florida) Sheriff's deputies said, Bonilla entered a house in the town of Bell, firing a gunshot and forcing a man inside into a bedroom, where he tied the man up and, using scissors, cut off his penis, which he ran away with. Later that day, deputies arrested Bonilla at his place of employment; his bond was set at $1.25 million. The family of the victim declined to comment, but said through the sheriff's office the victim was doing well medically. [WCJB, 7/17/2019]

T(winning)

Keep up with us here: On Aug. 1, identical twin brothers Andy and Chad Baker of Nashville, Tennessee, were on their way to the annual Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio, in their identical blue Tesla Model 3s, when an Ohio state trooper pulled them both over for having identical license plates, reading "SUBJ TO." The brothers patiently explained to the officer that the plates are, in fact, different: In one, "TO" is spelled with a zero, and in the other, it's spelled with a capital O. "Nobody likes getting pulled over by police, we were both nervous, but it's a great story and we will tell it all weekend," Andy told Fox8. [Fox8, 8/1/2019]

Can't Stand the Heat

-- It's been a hot summer in Europe. Among those suffering was an unnamed 66-year-old military veteran in the small southeastern French town of Les Arcs-sur-Argens, who had been complaining for several weeks to his landlady, Maryse Malin, 71, about the lack of air conditioning in his villa. That may have been why, the Local reported, he shot the "sweet, kind and caring lady" three times, killing her. Malin had agreed to install air conditioning but told the tenant it couldn't be done until October. [The Local, 8/1/2019]

-- Two men in Antwerp, Belgium, felt the heat on July 24 when they accidentally got locked in a shipping container full of cocaine in the huge port there, reported AFP. That day, temperatures reached a record high of 104 degrees Fahrenheit, stifling the 24- and 25-year-old, who had entered the container "to remove drugs," according to prosecutors. As the mercury rose, they desperately called a police emergency number and when police finally found them two hours later, they gratefully gave themselves up. Port workers were videoed pouring water over the pair to try to lower their body temperatures. [AFP, 7/25/2019]

Going to Extremes

Kim Gordon, 55, vanished on Feb. 25, according to his 17-year-old son, after going for a nighttime swim at Monastery Beach in Monterey, California, an area with a deadly reputation sometimes called "Mortuary Beach." The Associated Press reported that police searched for three days before learning the Scotsman from Edinburgh, also known as Kim Vincent Avis, faced 24 charges of rape in Scotland, which made them suspicious about the story. "When that came up, we start to wonder if this is a hoax," said Monterey County sheriff's Capt. John Thornburg. Finally, on July 26, the U.S. Marshals Service announced it had caught up with Gordon in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he is now being held; the son had been returned to Scotland and will not be charged with filing a false report. [Associated Press, 7/27/2019]

Wait, What?

In a product expansion move that inspires one to shout, "Stay in your lane!" Oscar Meyer announced on Aug. 1 that it is entering the dessert category with the Ice Dog Sandwich -- an ice cream sandwich with cookie "buns" surrounding bits of candied hot dog meat and spicy mustard ice cream. United Press International reported that the company partnered with a New York ice cream company to create the confectionary treat. BONUS: French's announced the day before the creation of its own mustard-flavored ice cream together with Coolhaus. [UPI, 8/1/2019]

Least Competent Criminals

-- Police in Sydney, Australia, had a drug bust land in their laps on July 22, when an unnamed man slammed a van loaded with 600 pounds of methamphetamines into a patrol car parked outside a suburban police station. The car was empty at the time of the collision, Reuters reported. The van sped away from the scene, but police caught up with the 28-year-old driver an hour later and charged him with drug supply and negligent driving. The drugs had an estimated street value of about $140 million. [Reuters, 7/22/2019]

-- Michael Harrell, 54, strolled into a U.S. Bank in Cleveland on July 29 with a note demanding cash from a teller: "This is a robbery. Don't get nobody hurt." Unfortunately, according to WJW, he wrote the note on a document he had apparently received from the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles, which included his full name and address. The teller, who called Harrell by his first name after seeing it on the letter, gave him $206 and summoned police, who later arrested him. [WJW, 8/1/2019]

Sticking It to the (Recycling) Man

A man in southern Spain who is a serial mocker of recycling efforts was fined 45,000 euros ($50,000) and ordered to retrieve a refrigerator he tossed down a hillside in July. Spain's Guardia Civil identified the man from a Twitter video he posted of the refrigerator incident with the truck he used, and its license plate, clearly visible behind him, The Local reported. He could also be seen in a different video throwing a washing machine into the ravine in the same area. The truck was registered to a house-clearing company in Almeria, from which the man was promptly fired. In a tit for tat, officers later posted video of the man struggling to bring the refrigerator back up the hill. [The Local, 8/6/2019]

Rude Awakening

Alice Coleman, 61, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, hopped out of bed early on Aug. 5 to check on a fire alarm that was blaring outside her apartment. When she opened her door, 34-year-old Fitzroy Morton confronted her, brandishing a "big butcher knife," Coleman told WSVN. Morton told her, "No, mama. Everything gon' be all right," but Coleman set him straight: "Everything's not going to be all right. I'm not your mama. I don't know who you are. Get out of my house." Then she bit him, "... and I didn't even have my teeth in my mouth like now," she explained. Coleman ran out of the apartment, where Morton locked himself in, and called police from a neighbor's apartment. Morton was charged with three felonies, and Coleman is vowing to be more cautious: "I'll open my door with my Taser because I have one." [WSVN, 8/6/2019]

Force of Nature

As a storm rolled through Port Charlotte, Florida, on Aug. 4, Marylou Ward and her husband got an explosive surprise. Ward said she heard a "boom" that was the loudest noise she'd ever heard. "We smelled smoke and I looked outside," she told WINK News. Smoke was coming from her septic tank, but it was the indoor effect that really shocked them: Her master bedroom toilet was in hundreds of pieces. A plumber explained that a nearby lightning strike ignited methane gas that had built up in the pipes and septic tank, destroying not only the tank and the toilet, but the indoor plumbing as well. Fortunately, no one was hurt: "I'm just glad none of us were on the toilet," Ward said. [WINK News, 8/5/2019]

If you're trying to smuggle a half-kilo of cocaine through airport security, you might want to try harder than an unnamed middle-aged man from Colombia, who was detained in late June at Barcelona-El Prat airport in Spain, according to Spanish police. The man arrived at the airport on a flight from Bogota and seemed nervous -- and no wonder, what with a comically "oversized toupee" under his hat, Reuters reported. Spanish police searched him and found a bundle of cocaine, worth about $34,000, taped to his head. [Reuters via The Telegraph, 7/16/2019]

Precocious

Four Australian kids took running away from home to a new level on July 13 when they wrote a goodbye note and absconded with cash, fishing gear and an SUV belonging to one of their parents. The three boys and one girl, aged 10 to 14, left Rockhampton in Queensland and headed south to Grafton, a trip of more than 600 miles. Along the way, they twice bought gas without paying and survived a short police chase in New South Wales, which was terminated by the highway patrol "due to age of the driver and road conditions," Acting Police Inspector Darren Williams told Fox News. Around 10:30 p.m. on July 14, police finally caught up with the kids, who locked the doors and refused to exit the car. An officer broke a window with a baton to gain entry. The young thieves will be charged, but they couldn't be questioned until their parents showed up. [Fox News, 7/14/2019]

The Not-So-Friendly Skies

-- A Delta Airlines flight from Puerto Rico to New York was forced to return to San Juan on July 3 after Carlos Ramirez, 30, "became unruly," Reuters reported. "I am God!" Ramirez shouted, according to Puerto Rican police. "San Juan is going to disappear tomorrow. I came to save the world, and I am going to end terrorism." Flight attendants and passengers restrained the man until the plane could land, then Puerto Rico police took him into custody. The cockpit remained secure during the fracas. [Reuters, 7/3/2019]

-- In southwest London, as an unidentified man sunbathed in his backyard on June 30, he was startled by the body of another man that apparently fell from an airplane, landing just three feet away in his garden. Police believe the body was that of a stowaway on a Kenya Airways flight, who fell out as the plane lowered its wheels on the approach to Heathrow Airport, some 10 miles away. The resident "didn't even realize what it was to begin with. He was asleep and then there was a huge impact," a neighbor told Reuters. A Kenya Airways spokesperson said the 4,250-mile flight from Nairobi takes about nine hours, and upon arrival at Heathrow, workers found a bag, water and food in the plane's landing gear compartment. The stowaway has not been identified. [Reuters, 7/2/2019]

Crime Report

-- Police in Seguin, Texas, arrested Delissa Navonne Crayton, 47, on July 10 in her home after finding her mother's skeletal remains lying on the floor in one of the home's bedrooms, CNN reported. Investigators believe that Jacqueline Louise Crayton died in 2016 a few days after falling in her room and hitting her head. She would have been about 71 years old at the time of the fall, and officials charge her daughter did not "provide adequate assistance," resulting in the woman's death. The younger Crayton and her daughter, who at the time was under 15 years old, lived in other rooms of the house for about three years while the mother's body deteriorated. Crayton was charged with "injury to a child under 15 through recklessly, by omission, causing a serious mental deficiency, impairment or injury." Seguin police and Texas Rangers expect other charges to be filed. [CNN, 7/15/2019]

-- When Flagler County (Florida) Sheriff's officers pulled over Derick McKay, 36, for speeding on July 11, they noticed he seemed ... uncomfortable, and although the deputies smelled marijuana, he denied having anything illegal. But when McKay got to the police station (having been arrested for driving on a suspended license), he admitted that he did have some narcotics hidden between his buttocks. Indeed, Fox 43 reported, McKay produced more than a dozen small baggies, including: a baggie of crack, eight baggies of heroin, two baggies of Molly, a baggie of marijuana, 12 Lortab pills and 12 Oxycodone pills. [Fox 43, 7/15/2019]

Creepy Creepers Creeping People Out

Women -- and men -- in Claverham, Somerset, England, are watching their backs as they walk at night, thanks to a man wearing a rubbery "gimp suit" who has been approaching and chasing people, according to the BBC. On July 11, an unnamed woman in her 20s was "walking along with my torch and looked up to see someone charging at me in a full black rubbery suit," she told the news service. "He kept coming toward me and was touching his groin, grunting and breathing heavy." She pushed and screamed at the man, who turned and ran in the other direction. Avon and Somerset police have increased patrols in the area in order to identify the man responsible. [BBC, 7/14/2019]

Techno-Weird

The New York Post reported on July 14 that more than 4,000 Swedes have willingly had microchips implanted in their hands to replace credit cards and cash. The chips also help people monitor their health and can be programmed to allow access into buildings. Jowan Osterlund, a former body piercer who pioneered the chips, says the technology is safe. But British scientist Ben Libberton, based in Sweden, said he worries that people aren't considering the potential dangers, including the unwitting dissemination of data about a person. "Do I get a letter from my insurance company saying premiums are going up before I know I’m ill?" he wondered. [New York Post, 7/14/2019]

Bright Idea

Rapper, sports agent and self-proclaimed "Mr. Alabama" Kelvin James Dark, 37, of Talladega, Alabama, was arrested in Atlanta, Georgia, on July 10 after allegedly throwing multiple kilograms of suspected methamphetamine off a high-rise balcony onto a street below. In a press release titled "It's Raining Meth," the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said its agents were searching the property as part of a smuggling investigation when the drugs went overboard. Agents were able to recover the drugs, valued at an estimated $250,000, and also found two semi-automatic rifles, a handgun, marijuana valued at $60,000 and a "substantial" amount of cash, AL.com reported. Dark and 33-year-old Tiffany Peterson of Atlanta were arrested for trafficking meth and marijuana, among other charges. [AL.com, 7/14/2019]

Really, If You're Going to Get Drunk, Just Stay Home

Roger Bridenolph, 49, of Springdale, Arkansas, was arrested on July 15 after a puzzling series of events. First, Bridenolph verbally assaulted a cashier at a Dollar Tree store, then stole a box of Ore-Ida Bagel Bites, pushing a manager out of the way to get out of the store, according to an arrest report. When the manager followed him, KFSM reported, Bridenolph hit him in the head with the box of frozen snacks. Taking his show on the road, Bridenolph headed next door to a Wendy's restaurant, where he slapped a woman. When police arrived, they struggled to handcuff Bridenolph, but ultimately arrested him for robbery, second-degree assault, resisting arrest, public intoxication and disorderly conduct. [KFSM, 7/15/2019]

Ewwwww

This summer's "who's pooping in the pool?" mystery is taking place in the Buckingham Woods neighborhood pool in Macomb Township near Detroit. The serial offender has caused the pool to close several times, and the neighborhood association is taking action -- and taking names. "We are reviewing attendance logs and recorded video," a July 12 statement read, according to the Detroit Free Press. And the Macomb County Health Department is working with the pool to keep the water free of pathogens such as E. coli. Further, the association has hired a pool attendant to be on-site through the end of summer. (UPDATE: On July 18, the association announced the offending swimmer had been identified and banned, saying it is now "looking at the various options for restitution.") [Detroit Free Press, 7/16/2019]