[eggplant43]

Posted on Thu, Jan. 16, 2003



Macon police on lunch break discover meth lab in fiery car

By Sharon E. Crawford
Telegraph Staff Writer

Two Macon police officers responding to a car fire got suspicious when three people refused to leave the burning car.

They ended up charging the three with running a rolling methamphetamine lab and manufacturing the dangerous drug inside the car.

Officers had to pull the suspects - two men and a woman - out of the car, police spokeswoman Melanie Hofmann said. In the vehicle, officers said, they found a working methamphetamine lab and chemicals used to make the drug.

Police believe the three were cooking methamphetamine when several fires broke out in the back seat of the car, Hofmann said. The parking lot of Flash Foods on Gray Highway looked more like a decontamination site than a crime scene as Macon police and fire officials stripped and hosed down the suspects.

John Thomas Rodger, 40, of 20 Briggberry Road, Macon; Anthony Scott Chairmont, 22, of 4160 Buena Vista; and Stephanie Lynn O'Neal, 22, of 4348 Ayers Road, each were charged with manufacturing methamphetamines. Rodger was also charged with giving false information to police and possession of methamphetamines.

All three suspects were hosed down and then taken to The Medical Center of Central Georgia, where they were thoroughly washed again, Hofmann said. The suspects were washed because they were considered toxic. They were being held Wednesday evening at the Bibb County Law Enforcement Center.

Officers Doug LeCompte and Verdelle Grant were eating lunch at Arby's on Gray Highway when they saw smoke coming from a vehicle parked next door and went to investigate.

"(The suspects) wouldn't get out," LeCompte said. "We finally had to pull them out ... and we stomped out the fires."

Rodger, who was sitting in the back seat, suffered minor facial injuries, LeCompte said. He was treated at the scene for his injuries.

Investigators said the fires likely started while Rodger was scraping red phosphate off matches. Police found chemicals used to make methamphetamines in the back seat and in the trunk of the car, LeCompte said.

"They were actually making the drug when the fires started," Hofmann said. "This is the most dangerous way to make the drug because of the incinerating possibilities."

Methamphetamine is an illegal drug used to stimulate the central nervous system. It can be smoked, snorted, injected or taken orally, and is usually found in a pill form, capsules, powder and chunks.

Most of the ingredients used to make methamphetamines can be found at local hardware or grocery stores, Hofmann said.

The drug increases the heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature and rate of breathing; it dilates the pupils and produces euphoria, increased alertness, a sense of increased energy and tremors. High doses or chronic use have been associated with increased nervousness, irritability and paranoia.

Hofmann said Macon and Bibb County law enforcement authorities have seen an increase of methamphetamine labs in the last several years. In most cases, the labs are located inside houses or storage units.

"The rolling labs are more dangerous because of the possibility of explosions," Hofmann said.



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[n2gun]

FRANCE
Monster squid latches onto French yacht
Posted Fri, 17 Jan 2003

A French yacht taking part in the Jules Verne round-the-world sailing trophy has been attacked by a giant squid in the mid-Atlantic, its skipper announced by radio-link.

Veteran yachtsman Oliver de Kersauson, at the helm of the trimaran Geronimo, said the boat was hit by strange vibrations on Sunday, so he sent a crew member below deck to try to identify what was wrong.

"Suddenly he saw something moving," de Kersauson said. "It was tentacles.

"The squid was pulling really hard, so we put the boat about and when we came to a stop the tentacles let go. We saw it behind the boat — and it was enormous. I have been sailing for 40 years, and I have never seen the like," he said.

Crew member Didier Ragault, who spotted the creature through a port-hole said "the tentacles were as thick as my arm wearing an oil-skin, and I immediately thought of the damage it could do.

"When we saw it behind the boat it must have been seven, eight or nine metres long," he said.

The giant squid, Architeuthis dux, is the world's largest invertebrate and can reach 18 metres in length, but it is also highly elusive, with only about 250 sightings officially recorded — most of them of dead animals on beaches.

The creature used to feature in numerous maritime stories and legends about attacks on ships — notably in Verne's own '20 000 Leagues Under The Sea'.

[eggplant43]

January 21, 2003



Icy intruder: Ice chunk smashes through home’s roof

By CATHY REDFERN

Sentinel STAFF WRITER

SANTA CRUZ — A chunk of ice that apparently fell from an airplane bathroom crashed through the roof of a Santa Cruz home, landing in a teenager’s bedroom.

Monique Zesati, 13, was a few feet away when the basketball-sized chunk landed with a thud on her favorite sweatshirt about 9 p.m. Sunday. The crash scattered fluffy insulation, black roof tar and other debris all over her room.

Her mother, Holly, was also in the room of their Caledonia Street home.

"There was just this huge bang and a ball of blue ice fell through the roof," Holly Zesati said. "We didn’t know what to think."

The ice was large enough and fast enough to be deadly, said Battalion Chief John Lucchesi of the Santa Cruz Fire Department.

"It probably would have killed her (if it had hit her)," he said.

Firefighters came to the home Sunday night, and told the family to stay out of the room. The ice was put in a bucket but hadn’t completely melted Monday afternoon.

A frustrated Holly Zesati spent hours Monday trying to find out what it was before finally reaching the Federal Aviation Administration, which told her it was probably from a plane bathroom.

But earlier Monday, someone from the Zesati family thought the FAA said it could be composed of a hazardous chemical, so they called firefighters again, and a specially trained unit removed the ice and debris, including some carpet.

A field test revealed it was nontoxic, Lucchesi said, and they believe it most likely hailed from an airliner.

And Jerry Johnston of the FAA said in his 12 years there, it is the fourth report of such waste falling from a plane.

"It does on occasion, happen, so that would be my guess," he said. "Where else would it come from?"

That ice contains the same chemical used for motor home toilets, alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride, he said.

He was not sure whether it was harmful.

"I wouldn’t touch it because of what it is," said Johnston, who works in the FAA’s Western Region Emergency Operations Center. "It’s disgusting, come on."

Lucchesi called it a freak incident, but one that could have had fatal results.

"You hear about his stuff back on the East Coast, but in Santa Cruz?" he said. "We will probably never know conclusively where it came from."

The FAA is attempting to track the incident to a specific plane.

"We’ll pull the radar tapes and try to track it down," Johnston said.

Holly Zesati would like to know how it happened.

"I’m glad everyone is OK," she said, "but I would like to get to the bottom of this plane stuff."

Her husband, Gus, said an emergency dispatcher asked him if he had been drinking when he told her a chunk of bluish ice had crashed through the roof.

"Nobody gets it," he said, shaking his head.


Contact Cathy Redfern at credfern@santa-cruz.com.



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You can find this story online at:
http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/arc...es/01local.htm

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[eggplant43]

TACOMA: Attacker stops assault when victim begins to pray
Stacey Mulick; The News Tribune

A man who was trying to sexually assault a South Tacoma woman early Friday stopped his attack when she started praying, Tacoma police reported.

Officers have not reported an arrest in the attack. It appeared the woman didn't know her attacker, police reported.


The woman went inside her apartment in the 5500 block of Cheyenne Loop Road about 5:30 a.m. after smoking a cigarette.


As she started to change clothes in her bedroom, the woman noticed a man standing in the doorway. He threatened her and ordered her to take off her underwear. She said no.


The man pushed her onto the bed and began to assault her, police said.


The woman pushed her attacker back and said repeatedly, "Please, God. Please, God, no. God, please, no."


The man stood up and asked the woman if she was a Christian. When she said yes, he zipped up his pants, apologized and shook her hand, police said.


As the man walked out of the bedroom, he turned and told the woman to lock her door. He then left the apartment, police said.


The woman described her attacker as black, about 25, 5 feet 10 inches tall and weighing 160 pounds. He had brown eyes and wore his black hair in a ponytail.


The man wore a dark blue baseball hat, a black jacket with white lining and dark green pants.



Stacey Mulick, The News Tribune

[angelize56]

Posted: 10:49 a.m. EST January 23, 2003

SHANGHAI, China -- Two people have reportedly been killed after falling out of an airplane as it prepared to land in China.

China's state-run news agency says two people described as foreigners climbed out of the luggage hold -- and then toppled out of the plane's undercarriage, landing on a house.

The news agency cites a preliminary police investigation.

The Air France plane was arriving in Shanghai from Paris. It's not clear if anyone on the ground was injured.

[plschwartz]

from a post by n2gun few days ago

Two women accused of growing marijuana in their homes made so much money they bought three neighboring houses so they could grow more plants, prosecutors allege.

But investigators learned of their activities last summer when a bank teller called police to say that the women's cash deposits smelled like marijuana.

In documents made public Monday, prosecutors contend Kathleen Jenny and Virginia Erickson were the brains behind the $1 million pot growing operation that began in 1994 in their basements.

The women, both 59, agreed last week to plead guilty to money laundering, authorities said. They face up to six years in prison, instead of the mandatory 10-year federal prison term.

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Question: if the bank clerk smelled dope on the money, how could the women be accused of moneylaundering?

[n2gun]

A better question. How did the teller know what marijuana smelled like?

LOL who doesn't know what it smells like? I sure miss the taste!

[plschwartz]

Vroom... it's the Cruise-missile vacuum cleaner

AFP[ THURSDAY, JANUARY 23, 2003 11:28:51 AM ]

PARIS: South Korean scientists have adapted a navigation system from cruise missiles to build a robot vacuum cleaner that can find its way around a room day or night, New Scientist reports in next Saturday's issue.

Robot cleaners usually keep track of their position by measuring how far their wheels have turned. But if the wheels slip on a parquet floor or on carpet pile, the cleaner gets confused.

The patented device built by researchers at Samsung gets around this by placing a video camera and infrared detector on top of the cleaner, giving it normal and infrared vision of the room.

The robot's computer continually compares this picture with a wide-angle photograph of the room in its memory.

The system is "just like that of a cruise missile, which compares pictures of the terrain it is supposed to fly over with images from onboard cameras," the British weekly said.

[plschwartz]

From a Singapore paper The Strait Times
FOREIGN MATTERS
What Bush should have said after Sept 11 but didn't

The following is a speech that United States President George W. Bush should have given in the immediate aftermath of the Sept 11 attacks, but didn't.

By Janadas Devan

MY FELLOW Americans, the rubble that was once the World Trade Centre teaches us two lessons: Culture matters; government matters. Let me explain.

The people who flew those planes that crashed into the twin towers weren't born wanting to do that.

Terrorism is no more a peculiarly Arabic or Muslim instinct than the Holocaust was coded in the Germanic or Christian gene, or the Rape of Nanking in the Japanese or Buddhist one.

Aberrations and distortions in any culture can pervert human beings into beastly replicas of themselves. Failed cultures flew those planes.

And that is precisely what most of these societies, with some significant exceptions - Malaysia comes to mind - have become: bankrupt societies. Their politics are bankrupt, their economies are bankrupt, their intellectual cultures are bankrupt.

In place of Salah al-Din Yusuf (or Saladin) we have uninspiring leaders. In place of the riches and glories of the Abbasids, the Almohads, the Almoravids and the Mughals, we have the hovels of Cairo and Damascus, Beirut and Lahore.

And in place of Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd - known to Western philosophy as Avicenna and Averroes - we have 10,000 fire-breathing preachers spewing hatred and venom.

I'll give you just one statistic to illustrate the intellectual poverty. All of Egypt, this ancient cradle of civilisations, produces just 350 books a year. Just one university press in America produces more.

REALISE THE SIZE OF THE VOID

HOW did they get this way? The causes are many. First, political: The Ottoman Empire collapsed suddenly in the aftermath of World War I, and nothing legitimate succeeded it. Colonialism did its thing, succeeded by pan-Arabic nationalism. Both failed.

Pax Americana didn't help either, for we propped up brutal and corrupt dictatorships for cheap oil.

Second, economic: Without oil, all these countries in the Persian Gulf would be poorer than sub-Saharan Africa but because of oil, they became corrupt.

Egypt, which has no oil, has an unemployment rate of 25 per cent, and 90 per cent of the jobless have university degrees. Those figures are going to get worse, for half of the population in most Arabic countries is under the age of 25.

And finally, religion: For what filled the void left by failed politics and failed economics was a distortion of Islam.

You remember our old friend, Karl Marx? He got all his economics wrong, but the old coot knew a thing or two about history.

'Religion is the opium of the people,' he said.

But that's not all. He also said: 'Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the feeling of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of unspiritual conditions.'

That is spot on. For if you live in hell, what do you do? Well, you create a heaven in your head where all the difficult questions are neatly resolved, and presto, you have a comforting Theory of Everything.

Find modernity difficult? Force your women into purdah. Find it tough to compete with Hongkong and Taiwan? Withdraw into the madrasah. Feel ashamed of what has become of the once glorious Arabic civilisation? Blame the West and Jews.

Up to just 100 years ago, they didn't feel like that. Do you know who protected Jews for almost 2,000 years after the Romans destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem? It wasn't Christians, folks. Christian Europe killed them by the millions. Rather, it was Muslims.

Dhimmi, they called them - people of the Book - and allowed them full religious liberty for the most part. Jews became prime ministers in the Ottoman Empire.

Now all that is gone, except for islands of almost cowed rationality, amid a sea of hatred, fear and intolerance. The sea is spreading, the islands are shrinking. What is more, this Thing - these horrid distortions of Islam - seems to have a life of its own, quite apart from socio-economic factors. Why?

Karl Marx again: There is base - economics and politics - and there is superstructure - culture, religion. The two are connected, but the latter can have a life of its own.

Thus, we find scholarship boys in prosperous Malaysia joining Al-Qaeda, world-class physicists in Pakistan offering to make the bomb for Osama bin Laden, and Osama himself, a blasted millionaire. There is no economics here; this is straightforward religious obscurantism.

Can we do something about all this, besides capturing or killing the chief lunatics, which we must and will? Can these cultures be fixed?

Yes - they must; we have no alternative. But we can't do the fixing ourselves. Americans can't be theologians to the Islamic world. Muslims have to be that themselves. But we can help.

So I'm announcing today a US$1 trillion (S$1.74 trillion) development programme, a joint European-Japanese-American, public-private sector plan to shake up the Middle East and put it back on its feet.

Harry Truman did something similar in Europe and Japan after World War II, and named it after his Secretary of State, a former general, George Marshall. I'm naming my programme after my own Secretary of State, also a former general, Mr Colin Powell. He is African-American, and he knows what it means to overcome oppression.

The Powell Plan's aim is simple: Where there are politico-socio-economic swamps feeding this beast, we will help drain them. Men and women of goodwill in the Arab world, you take on the ideological battles yourselves.

But this is not baksheesh, free money. The Arab world has to earn it.

No transparent and accountable governments, no money. No liberation of women, nothing for health clinics. No bunsen burners and test-tubes in the madrasah, zilch for education.

CHANGE OR DECLINE FURTHER

MESSAGE to ordinary, decent Arabs: This is your chance, folks; force the changes to make a better life; grasp modernity.

Message to oil-rich Arab kingdoms: By Sept 11, 2011, all cars in the US will be battery-powered. We put a man on the moon and brought him back; we can make a battery-powered car to drive from New York to Los Angeles, and back.

So Arab princes, get a life. Teach your peoples to earn a living the old-fashioned way - by working - or you can drink the oil.

Alas, Mr Bush gave no such speech. There is no Powell Plan, only a botched State Department advertising campaign in the Middle East. And there is no battery-powered car, only thirst for more oil which, in part, is driving the US to invade Iraq.

Ho-Hum

[plschwartz]

Ultra-orthodox party's theme tune goes pop

January 23 2003 at 07:05AM
Quickwire

Jerusalem - The ultra-Orthodox Jewish Shas party has stopped using a Ricky Martin pop tune as its campaign jingle, but not because it's not in keeping with the party's strait-laced religious message.

It's because of a lawsuit over copyright infringement.

Gyrating, scantily-clad dancers from the Puerto Rican superstar's video clip were replaced by shots of black-suited rabbis, and the lyrics, in Hebrew, were more attuned to the party's message of Torah study and righteousness than the original.

"We took something impure and turned it into something holy," said Shas spokesperson Yitzhak Sudri. But it wasn't enough to avoid copyright problems.

The party recycled the jingle, to the tune of Martin's "Copa de la Vida" (Cup of Life) Latin dance hit, from its 1999 election campaign.

Then, too, Universal Music sued the party for copyright infringement and won damages, said lawyer Nahum Gavrieli, who is handling the case.

In late November, Israel called a snap election for January 28, setting parties scrambling for campaign material. Shas used the same jingle, despite the court order, with the same results - another suit.

Shas spokesperson Yitzhak Sudri said the party stopped using the melody this week because of the suit.

Israeli campaign ads are concentrated in a daily bloc on each of the three main TV channels and two radio stations in the weeks before the election.

Shas represents traditional Jews whose families originated in the Arab world. Along with its religious message, the party has set up a system of kindergartens and schools that offer incentives like free lunches and longer hours than other schools, attracting supporters from among secular Israelis, as well. - Sapa-AP


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[angelize56]

LOL who doesn't know what it smells like? I sure miss the taste!

Kath: I'm shocked! YOU! Did you inhale??? Take care. angel

[eggplant43]

To me, this young lady's inquiry seems to be the essesnce of research.


Posted on Tue, Jan. 28, 2003



Pot project pulled
13-YEAR-OLD TO FIGHT FOR HER SCIENCE FAIR STUDY
By Renee Koury
Mercury News

Controversy over medicinal marijuana has reached the eighth grade in Belmont, where a middle school principal has refused to let a student display her project on the possible medical benefits of pot.

Ralston Intermediate School Principal Deborah Ferguson told 13-year-old Veronica Mouser last week she was barring her project -- called ``Mary Jane for Pain'' -- from the school science fair opening today.

Projects are supposed to be hands-on, the school says, and marijuana is still considered an illegal drug by the federal government.

Veronica burst into sobs and called her stepfather from the nearest phone. Now the emboldened teen, who loves debating and wants to be a lawyer, is ready to put up a battle.

``It's just not fair,'' Veronica said. ``I put in months of work. This is a controversial subject and it should be discussed.''

The American Civil Liberties Union has already called, and the county's science fair coordinator says he plans to rewrite the rules to make it clear projects involving drugs are out.

Veronica's stepfather, Dave Phillips, a systems administrator at Oracle, filed a complaint with the school district to compel the school to display her work. A decision by district officials is expected today.

Veronica didn't smoke marijuana herself or give it to her research subjects. Instead, she studied the effects the weed had on three medicinal marijuana patients, visited an Oakland cannabis club, toured a private pot-growing room in Redwood Shores and interviewed doctors. She didn't attach any samples on her cardboard display, and her parents supervised her at every step.

She concluded that medicinal marijuana helped relieve pain and nausea in chronically ill patients.

Ferguson was not available for comment Monday. But Marcia Harter, assistant superintendent of the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District, said science fair projects are supposed to include hands-on experiments, and it could be inappropriate to let a student conduct research of marijuana; it is still considered an illegal drug by the federal government even though Californians have sanctioned it for medical use.

``Science fairs do not allow the use of controlled substances, and also they have been careful not to let students experiment with substances that are illegal or controlled,'' Harter said.

Veronica did get the approval of her science teacher Mark Jorgensen in December to do the project, Harter said. Jorgensen did not return calls seeking comment.

The dispute illustrates the wider conflict over use of medicinal marijuana since state voters approved its use while federal law bans it.

Cannabis buyer clubs have sprung up to fill prescriptions even as the federal government has swept in to shut them down. And in San Mateo County, work is under way on a federally sanctioned study of the possible benefits and detriments of using medicinal pot.

Veronica also conducted a survey of about 100 students and relatives on whether it's easier for teens to buy marijuana or alcohol. Seventy-two percent said pot is more accessible.

Veronica and her stepfather decided the project also should include a form from the principal approving the work to make it clear that Veronica was supervised and authorized.

That was how Ferguson learned of the project. The principal consulted the county's science fair coordinator, Gary Nakagiri, about whether the exhibit would meet guidelines set by the county, regional and state science fairs.

While the rules wouldn't ban her project, Nakagiri said the work would be viewed unfavorably because it amounts to a research paper not a scientific process. A hands-on experiment could bend a rule against using ``dangerous'' substances, though that rule was originally aimed at explosives and harmful chemicals.

``Marijuana is still borderline,'' Nakagiri said. ``It's still an emotional issue for many folks. Nowadays, with education being on the firing line already, when something like this comes up, our inclination is to be careful.''

But Veronica said pursuit of scientific inquiry shouldn't be restrained because of controversy. ``I think they just didn't like what I had to say, or talking about it, so they block it out, and that's not science,'' she said.

She also contends her project did have scientific merit; three patients logged what happened after using marijuana for one week and stopping use the next week. Veronica said she abhors recreational use of drugs, and warns in her project about the dangers of the smoke.

Either way, she's making change. Nakagiri said the county science fair will sharpen its guidelines to block handling of illegal substances.

``I guess I've learned not only about medical pot, but how people will try to control what you say,'' Veronica said. ``Now I'm even more determined to say what I have to say.''


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[jimi]

Originally posted by eggplant43:
``I think they just didn't like what I had to say, or talking about it, so they block it out

``I guess I've learned not only about medical pot, but how people will try to control what you say,''

sounds like she's met mulder and i used that research line also when i visited my, err i mean somebody's growing room also