Crime Scene

Combine joyride ends with felony charge

What is it with drunks stealing – and crashing – heavy machinery?

The latest comes from Osage, Iowa, where a man with a few too many in him thought it wise to get behind the wheel of a combine.

For those of you (like me) not familiar, a combine is “a machine that combines the tasks of harvesting, threshing and cleaning grain crops.”

Thanks, Wikipedia!

Anyway, drinking and combining don’t mix, as this dude proves. After cruising through a few yards, he literally plowed into a garage.

His charges include third-degree theft and criminal mischief, both felonies.

Read the whole story from the Mitchell County Press-News.

Man tries to trade pot for McDonald's

Maybe he should have just gone for the Dollar Menu.

Police say Shawn Alexander Pannullo (left), 27, pulled into a Vero Beach McDonald's early Monday and tried to trade marijuana for food, TCPalm.com reports.

No word on what he ordered or if he left with any food.

But after the cashier called police, Pannullo's night ended with an arrest.

A deputy found Pannullo with marijuana in his car and arrested him for possession of cannabis.

Hey, you, get out of my house!

There is plenty of talk these days that people in the real estate industry are crooks.

In this case, it’s not hype – but it has nothing to do with sub-prime mortgages.

According to Newsday, a Long Island man claiming to be an agent rented out a home, collecting $2,000 from the family.

Two weeks later, the home’s owner showed up – completely oblivious that the house had been rented out.

The “realtor” has been charged with grand larceny and fraud.

Drunk finds warm bed -- in wrong home

There is rip-roarin' drunk, and then there's rip-roarin' drunk.

A 50-year-old Maryland man was the latter on Sept. 27.

A Montgomery County man -- who had lost his job three weeks earlier -- went on a bender that night.

Turns out, he got off the bus eight miles too early, and stumbled into a home that was not his.

The house belonged Bob and Joanne Breiner -- who returned home from dinner to find the guy sound asleep in their bed.

When police arrived, they shook him awake. His response, according to the Washington Post: "What are you doing in my house?"

They're not pressing charges, even though the man took something that didn't belong to him -- a crab cake from the family's fridge.

Killer chef cooks lover's leg

If British cooking was snubbed before, I can't imagine this story is going to help matters.

"A gay chef has murdered his lover, cut out part of his leg, seasoned it with herbs and fried it," The UK Daily Mail reported.

Chef Anthony Morley, 35, a one-time Mr. Gay UK, took a bite out of Damian Oldfield's (left, bottom) thigh before turning himself in to police.

Oldfield died from 20 stab wounds before Morley cooked and ate his leg.

The two had exchanged text messages ("Try me...I'm not your average poof," Oldfield wrote) and had drinks at a bar before going to Morley's Leeds apartment, police said.

Morley used two kitchen knives to stab Oldfield. Afterward, Morley told police he was acting in self-defense.

*Thanks to South Florida MenuPages blog for the tip.

Lamberti goes hard-core for abuse victims

Over on the mothership, I've got a story about a joint PSA from the Broward Sheriff's Office and Women in Distress.

As I mentioned in the story, the video is graphic, to say the least.

Do these types of messages make an impact?

Check it out, judge for yourself -- and feel free to comment.

Simpson jury foreman speaks to The Herald (UPDATED)

We were the first (and, so far, only) media outlet to interview one of the jurors who convicted O.J. Simpson and a co-defendant of armed robbery and kidnapping this weekend in Las Vegas.

I spoke with Paul Connelly, the jury foreman, on Saturday afternoon about the case, the closed-door deliberations and the verdict.

We'll be posting the story and the exclusive interview later tonight at MiamiHerald.com. (UPDATE: Here it is.)

A snippet: Connelly said jurors debated Simpson's role first, reaching unanimous guilty decisions on each count, before finding the same conclusions for co-defendant C.J. Stewart.

They decided to press on through the night Friday because they were close to a verdict and did not want to risk having a juror be tainted or not show up if deliberations carried over the next day.

"That's not to say we rushed it," Connelly told The Miami Herald. "We wanted to make dang sure in our
hearts that the verdict was pertaining to the charges and evidence and laws in this case."

I bet you would

Our Mug Shot of the Week comes courtesy of the ever-reliable Smoking Gun.

This guy (name unknown) is a convicted Florida sex offender who was picked up this week for failing to report to officials, as required by law.

Nice T-shirt, bud.

No love? I'll show you -- er, me

Admit it fellas, you can relate to Jonathon Guabello.

He's the Fort Myers man charged with threatening violence and firing a weapon in an occupied.

Why has he been charged, you ask?

Because after a night at the bar with his honey, he wanted to -- ahem -- make a night of it.

Alas, his 24-year-old live-in girlfriend demurred.

His response: firing two shots -- into his own arm -- before passing out in the oven.

Read the whole story, courtesy of the News-Press.

Missing Atlanta pooch pops up in St. Pete

Score one for Big Brother…Or at least Big Kennel.

A golden retriever that went missing from his Atlanta home last Christmas surfaced in St. Petersburg last week.

And thanks to a microchip imbedded in his neck, Pepper the pooch has been reunited with his family.

According to the Tampa Tribune, Jay Geltman spotted Pepper in front of his (Tampa) Bay-area travel agency last week.

The chip led the “wet, filthy, dirty, flea-invested” mutt to Elizabeth Carter, who last saw Pepper nine months ago.

How he ended up nearly 500 miles south is anyone’s guess.

Aside: If I’m ever given the choice (presumably by a judge) between a Lo-Jack and a microchip implant, I’ll take the chip everyday and twice on Sunday.

The ankle bracelet is just too tough to accessorize.