Granny's forgotten lotto ticket nets $2,000,000

Posted Tue May 26, 2009 6:49pm AEST
Updated Wed May 27, 2009 7:17am AEST

The grandmother says she has no plans for a spending spree (ABC News: Gary Rivett)

A New South Wales south coast grandmother has had an unexpected $2 million windfall from a lottery ticket left forgotten for four years.

The 73-year-old, who has not been named, recently came across the unregistered ticket in an envelope of other unchecked tickets in a dressing table drawer.

She says she had left it a further two weeks and was not going to worry about it.

"My husband said to me that it would be too old to check," she said.

"But I took the ticket to the agent and they put me on the phone to someone from NSW Lotteries who told me it was worth $2 million."

The retired dairy farmer says she went limp and could not tell her husband the good news until they had left the shop.

However she says she has no plans for a spending spree despite not having much while growing up and some lean times on the farm.

"We will use the money to help the family down the track but they don't know we've won," she said.

"They'll find out when we leave this world."

Fake 'no parking' signs fool Tarpon Springs police, who write 233 tickets near Tarpon Turtle restaurant

By Demorris A. Lee, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Thursday, May 28, 2009

FAKE: The signs installed by developer Mike Bronson were mounted on round poles and had no city sticker on the back of them.
[DEMORRIS A. LEE | Times]

TARPON SPRINGS ­— Police blame a local developer for installing "no parking" signs around a popular city restaurant that resulted in 233 tickets being written in a two-year span.

At the same time, acting Tarpon Springs police Chief Robert Kochen acknowledged his department's failure to properly handle the matter in 2007.

"We messed up," Kochen said. "We did not look at this thing like we should have."

In a 23-page report released this week, Kochen said developer Mike Bronson admitted recently to installing the signs along the city's right of way after initially denying it.

"Mike Bronson advised that back around April of 2006 he installed all of the 22 signs due to the parking problems caused by customers of the Tarpon Turtle," Kochen wrote in the report.

Bronson could not be reached for comment.

The investigation was prompted by Commissioner Peter Dalacos, who recently had concerns about how the situation was handled in 2007 during an ongoing dispute over noise and parking at Jack Willie's Tarpon Turtle.

"I'm glad Mr. Bronson admitted to the act and the Police Department has been very proactive in this matter," Dalacos said. "I still have concerns about what action we can take to, at a minimum, have Mr. Bronson reimburse those tickets that were paid."

The report says criminal charges against Bronson would not be feasible at this time, but makes no mention of other possible penalties.

The signs installed by Bronson were mounted on round poles and had no city sticker on the back of them. The city's authorized signs are mounted on galvanized U-shaped poles with holes.

"The Police Department's patrol officers were doing their job and they had no reason (at the time) to believe any of these signs may have been unauthorized by the city," Kochen said.

Tarpon Springs is now working with the Pinellas County Clerk of the Circuit Courts to identify any outstanding parking ticket warrants that may have been issued for nonpayment. The city wants those tickets purged from the system. The city also wants to see if it can "remedy (or reimburse) the fine amounts that have been charged for the tickets."

The parking tickets were $20, with $15 going to the city and $5 going a fund that supports school crossing guards.

During a City Commission meeting earlier this month, Don Alvino, the owner of the Tarpon Turtle, alleged that Bronson was using the "no parking" signs to harass his customers.

Alvino and Bronson were business partners with Alvino initially leasing the Tarpon Turtle from Bronson with a five-month option to buy. In September 2006, Alvino exercised the option and purchased the restaurant for $3.4 million.

Since that time, Alvino says, Bronson has been out to destroy his business.

The investigation of the parking signs led Kochen to conclude that the city made several missteps.

In May 2007, Alvino had a meeting with the head of the city's code enforcement, Ed Hayden, about complaints being lodged against the restaurant. In that meeting, it was learned that the signs were fake.

During the investigation, Bronson told police he received permission from Sgt. Allen Mackenzie, who at the time handled all traffic-related matters involving signs and traffic studies.

Mackenzie, who retired from the department on Feb. 14, 2007, said he had no such conversation with Bronson, the report said.

Bronson was ordered to remove the signs in May 2007, but code enforcement officials never documented the incident and they never followed up.

"Apparently some signs were removed back in May of 2007 at the request of code enforcement, but the issue was not fully resolved because the signs remain there today," Kochen wrote in his report.

"Although I believe Officer Hayden was acting with good intentions, he did make some mistakes in this matter."

Kochen said a traffic study is currently being conducted to see where signs will actually be placed in the area.

For safety reasons, Kochen asked Bronson to leave his illegal signs up until a determination is made for the placement of city signs.

Officers were told not to write tickets in the area until the study is complete. Kochen said the matter will be completed quickly.

But the decision to keep the illegal signs up incensed Alvino, whose business was limited to 177 seats and weekend-only outdoor entertainment at a recent City Commission meeting.

"The city is not pro-small business," he said. "They already have taken away the number of seats I can have, they took away my ability to have outdoor entertainment during the week and now they are depriving me of on-street parking, even though they know the signs are illegal. It just doesn't make sense."

[Last modified: May 28, 2009 12:17 PM]

Aloha man calls 9-1-1 over botched fast-food order

John Snell

The Oregonian

Wednesday May 27, 2009, 3:30 PM

ALOHA - For most folks it's not a dilemma. Given a choice between "a day without sunshine" and a day without jail time, most people will skip the orange juice and stay out of jail.

But Raibin Raof Osman isn't most people. The 20-year-old Aloha man had a sleep-over at the Washington County Jail on Memorial Day after calling 9-1-1 to complain that McDonald's left out a box of orange juice from his drive-thru order.

Osman was booked Monday night on accusations of improper use of 9-1-1. He bailed out Tuesday. The offense is a Class B misdemeanor punishable in Oregon by up to six months in jail and a fine of $2,500.

May 27, 2009 12:59 pm US/Central

Woman Having 'Bad Day' Tries To Run Over Customer

MATTAPAN, Mass. (CBS) ?

 This image from surveillance video shows the black SUV to the right just before it slammed into the gas station.

A woman who told a witness she was "having a bad day" may have taken her frustration out on a gas station.

Police say the woman used her black SUV as a weapon, nearly hitting people and then repeatedly ramming her vehicle into a Mobil Service Station, reported CBS station WBZ-TV in Boston. 

Police are searching for the woman who they say pulled into the service station parking lot as a pedestrian was walking by. The pedestrian claims the woman drove too close and words were exchanged between the two. That's when the driver tried to run the pedestrian over twice by smashing her SUV into the building, police say.

"I just couldn't believe it was happening. I mean from an argument to that - I just couldn't believe it was happening," said gas station owner Stacey Thomas. "Then when she started hitting the building I was like 'what is going on?'"

Police say the woman was driving a black Pontiac Aztec with Georgia license plates. The SUV has significant front end damage.

The same gas station was robbed at gunpoint three weeks ago.

Link to Video:

http://cbs2chicago.com/watercooler/bad.day.crash.2.1021098.html

Va. man pleads guilty to robbing a S.C. bank after boasting of crime on

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- A man who confessed to robbing a South Carolina bank in a message posted on MySpace has pleaded guilty. Federal prosecutors said Thursday that 27-year-old Joseph Northington of Roanoke, Va., will be sentenced later for using a firearm during a crime of violence.

Authorities said Northington robbed a bank in North Augusta of almost $4,000 in January while visiting a friend, who called investigators after seeing surveillance pictures of Northington.

Prosecutors said before his arrest, Northington posted a message to his MySpace account reading: "On tha run for robbin a bank Love all of yall."

Northington faces seven years to life in prison. His attorney did not return a phone call Thursday.

Northington's MySpace page is still up, his status listed as "wanted."

Woman  wins $13m with 10-month-old Lotto ticket

Four Bodies Found In Vacant Funeral Home

"What in the world is a body still doing in this building?" Burrell thought when he saw a body bag on a table inside the former Serenity Gardens Funeral Home, 934 E. 21st Ave.

He notified Lake County Coroner David J. Pastrick, who arrived Tuesday morning with a crew to investigate the scene.

They found four bodies, including one in the bag, one in a corrugated burial box and two in caskets.

Pastrick believes they could have been there since 2006, when the Indiana State Board of Funeral and Cemetery Services revoked the business license for Serenity owner Darryl Cammack.

"They are unidentifiable," Pastrick said of the remains.

Cammack, who lost his funeral home license in Illinois in 2003, had been sanctioned by the Indiana board in 2005 after at least eight customers filed complaints against him.

"That building has been vacant since I started coming over to that church in Gary in 2005," Burrell said.

His church bought the building at a tax sale and intends to renovate it.

"We have lots of plans and goals we want to pursue," Burrell said. The church now is located next door to their proposed new site.

Gary police are working with state agencies in the investigation.

Lake County Commissioner Roosevelt Allen, who was chairman of the state board in 2005, said Cammack could be charged with breaking several laws.

Pastrick said he doesn't know the origin of the bodies, but believes if the deceased were local, he would have been contacted by relatives about a delay in burial.

"I can't even imagine a funeral director doing something like this. This is my field. It's unbelievable," Pastrick said.

Bodies found in closed funeral home

Rev. Reginald Burrell thought that when he and deacons from Northlake Church of Christ went to visit their newly purchased building, the former Serenity Funeral Gardens at 934 E. 21st Ave, Gary, that they'd be alone. They weren't. Four bodies were discovered. Lake County Coroner David Pastrick said the bodies could have been there since 2006. The bodies, which had no identification, were removed by coroner's office personnel Tursday.

Lake County Chief Deputy Coroner Jeff Wells waits before a body is removed from a casket in the garage of the former Serenity Gardens Funeral Chapel in Gary.   (Stephanie Dowell/Post-Tribune

Store Clerk Gives Robber Own Money

Hicham Raache
Times Record

Wednesday, May 27, 2009 9:19 AM CDT

Fort Smith police investigated two store robberies Monday night and early Tuesday morning, including one in which a clerk gave the suspect his own money to buy insulin.

Police were first dispatched to E-Z Mart at 3411 Country Club Ave., which has been robbed frequently in the past, concerning a near-robbery that resulted in the clerk giving the suspect his own money to help the man purchase insulin, according to a police report.

The clerk told police that at around 10:45 p.m. he was outside the store when a black male he did not know approached him and told him he needed something from inside the store. He said the man appeared to be 20 to 30 years old, 5 feet, 7 inches tall, about 125 pounds and wearing a dark colored “bucket hat,” a blue and white horizontally striped shirt and long, baggy blue denim shorts, according to the report.

Once inside the store, the clerk said, the man lifted his shirt slightly, revealing what appeared to be the tan colored grip of a handgun secured by his waistband. The clerk said the suspect told him, “I hate to do this, but I need $40 from the cash register,” according to the report.

The clerk said he asked the man to show him the gun and told him that he could not give him the money from the register because the money was not his to give. The suspect, he said, then told him that he needed the money to buy insulin. He said he reasoned with the suspect, explaining to him that the money was the store’s and that he, the suspect, would go to jail if he took the money. The clerk told the suspect that instead he would give him the $40 from his own pocket. The suspect thanked the clerk, shook his hand and said he would come back to see him. The suspect left as another customer came in, the report states.

About two hours later, Fort Smith police were dispatched to Jet Away, 3638 Midland Blvd., in response to another robbery. The store employee who called police said that a black male wearing a black shirt, blue denim shorts and a blue bandanna, robbed the store armed with what appeared to be a .22-caliber rifle, according to a police report.

The Jet Away clerk told police that he noticed the suspect after he had stepped out of the food preparation area. The suspect, he said, pointed the rifle at him and demanded money from the register, according to the report.

The suspect fled the store with a black plastic sack filled with the store’s money. He was seen heading north toward Spradling Avenue, the report states.

Sgt. Levi Risley of the Fort Smith Police Department said the robberies are not believed to be connected.

Police say Pa. woman frustrated at teenage son fires warning shot near his feet

UK’s Longest Married Couple Celebrate 81st Anniversary

Stoner dog smells out illegal crop

Tuesday, May 26, 2009 » 05:13am

A British dog's accidental drug use has helped police uncover a cannabis factory.

Holly the West Highland terrier began behaving oddly, according to her owner Valerie Baily.

'She just wouldn't wake up in the mornings, and she was having about 12 hours sleep at night. I had an awful job to get her up.'

It turned out the house next door was being used to cultivate more than 200 cannabis plants.

It was rigged up so fumes from the cannabis operation would go out of a chimney, but air vents, which were located at about the same height as Holly's nose, were left open.

Holly also seemed to have developed a case of the munchies.

'She had her own breakfast, and if the other dog hadn't eaten his, she'd was in eating his as well,' say Mrs Baily.

Investigating officer PC Tim Emery says the police are still searching for the people responsible for the illegal factory.

http://www.abduzeedo.com/40-amazing-3d-art-pieces