Darwin: 1 Man: 0 – Teenager “Accidentally” Kills Himself Trying To Rob A House

June 18th, 2008 (Visited 29,762 times)

You might say he had one shot.. and he blew it.

I’m sure we’ve all met people who we’re SURE would get eaten by a hippo or butchered by a walrus were it not for our global societies subsidizing stupidity.

Here is a case in point:

A 19-year-old man accidentally shot and killed himself Tuesday morning while he was attempting to rob a Grand Prairie home, authorities said.

Cameron Sands, 19, of Fort Worth kicked in the door of the house and then shot himself in the stomach as he pulled a gun out of his pants to shoot the homeowner, Grand Prairie police said. The homeowner was not injured.

After Mr. Sands shot himself, he dropped the gun and ran out of the home. Police found his body around 5:30 a.m. in the driveway of the home in the 2800 block Garden Grove Road, said Lt. John Brimmer, a Grand Prairie police spokesman.

“This is the first that I’ve heard of a robbery suspect killing himself as he is drawing a gun out of his waist band,” Lt. Brimmer said. “The criminal evidence points to that. It certainly isn’t common.”

The Tarrant County Medical Examiner has ruled the death an accident.

Home invasions are scary things indeed. So I can’t feel TOO bad for laughing at what normally should be a much less laughable headline. Pat yourself on the back today… You’re almost certainly doing better than at least one person today.

Posted in Funny, Just Shocking | 12 Comments »

Weapons of Mass Destruction: The Compressed Air Knife

June 18th, 2008 (Visited 27,347 times)

While originally for underwater purposes, one can’t help but think of all the gruesome ways this could be used for evil. Important to note though, that sticks, papercuts, and Elmer’s Glue can also be used for evil, keep the knee-jerk-must-ban-now reactions to yourself

Gregory Rondinone patented this device, which blows compressed air through a small slit in the knife that can blast the internals of anything it pierces with highly pressurized air. Wicked sick is an understatement. Just the simple mental image of the damage this could do is amazing. It takes combat knives to a whole new level.

Here’s more from the patent itself:

The handle has an internal cavity containing a compressed gas source and the blade is affixed to the handle. The blade has an internal bore running along a longitudinal axis from the handle to a point proximate a tip. The blade further has an aperture extending from a first edge to the internal bore at an angle relative to the longitudinal axis of between 15.degree. and 75.degree..

The trigger has a depressed position and a not depressed position. When in the depressed position, the internal bore communicates with the compressed gas source and when in said not depressed position, the internal bore is blocked from the compressed gas source. When a creature is pierced with the knife, the trigger is depressed injecting compressed gas into the creature greatly enhancing the incapacitating effect of the knife.

“Their bellies would inflate and they said it would force the shark’s stomach out of their mouths”

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Posted in Just Shocking, Overheard Gems, Technology | 1 Comment »

How To Properly Dispose Of A Body? Don’t Ask The Internet Questions You’re Not Comfortable Getting Answers To…

June 5th, 2008 (Visited 553,854 times)

Yikes! I remember growing up, we always had those discussions in our groups about stupid questions like how to get away with something.

How to sneak out at night?

Stuff your blankets in the shape of a body and quietly crawl through the window.

How to cheat on a test?

Write the answers on your palm.

How to get away with murder?

Someone would always bring up something from a prison movie or something where some stealthy murder weapon was used. An icicle so the evidence melts, etc. That was about as far as we got. Not actually planning a murder, we didn’t really need to go much further than baseless conjecture and entertaining TV plot twists.

For example, if you’ve watched Guy Ritchie’s movie “Snatch”, you got a disturbingly funny and unusual answer from Brick Top:

You’re always gonna have problems lifting a body in one piece. Apparently the best thing to do is cut up a corpse into six pieces and pile it all together. [...] And when you got your six pieces, you gotta get rid of them, because it’s no good leaving it in the deep freeze for your mum to discover, now is it?

Then I hear the best thing to do is feed them to pigs. You got to starve the pigs for a few days, then the sight of a chopped-up body will look like curry to a pisshead. You gotta shave the heads of your victims, and pull the teeth out for the sake of the piggies’ digestion. You could do this afterwards, of course, but you don’t want to go sievin’ through pig sh*t, now do you?

They will go through bone like butter. You need at least sixteen pigs to finish the job in one sitting, so be wary of any man who keeps a pig farm. They will go through a body that weighs 200 pounds in about eight minutes. That means that a single pig can consume two pounds of uncooked flesh every minute. Hence the expression, “as greedy as a pig”.

But then if you’ve seen his other films like Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, there’s always a collection of great quotes to be gleamed from those movies.

David Lamar Anthony – How NOT To Dispose Of A Body

As I was thinking about this, it reminded me of the bodies police found buried in oil drums out in Buckeye, Arizona. It used to be the boonies, but as the Arizona real estate housing bubble hit and even the boonies had new development going up for homes, Walmarts, Costcos, and other cookie cutter commercial landmarks, the oil drums were discovered by a backhoe. A family member had just moved into the new homes across the street from this location and watched the construction screech to a halt while the investigation went on:

On October 18, 2005, construction workers who had been contracted to work on the building of a Walmart store found two trash drums hidden under a tree in Buckeye, forty miles from downtown Phoenix. Skeletal remains were found inside the drums.

Police were called to investigate the area, and, after collecting the skeletons, DNA testing was performed, confirming that the skeletons belonged to Donna Anthony and her daughter, who was fourteen at the time of her death. On October 31, police investigating the area found a third trash bin, with more remains inside. The third trash can was found with help of a metal detection machine that had been loaned by the Phoenix Police Department from the United States Air Force. Maricopa county sheriff Joe Arpaio, a particularly outspoken sheriff, told the Arizona Republic that he was “99 percent sure” that the remains inside the bin belonged to Donna Anthony’s son Richard, who was twelve at the time of his death.

But then you go and ask the internet, what they would do? You get some very scary answers.

One answer that came up Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Ask The Internet, Funny, Just Shocking, Stories and Experiences | 5 Comments »

5 Of The Most Simple And Most Effective Ways To Raise Your Credit Score 100 Points Or More

May 28th, 2008 (Visited 38,198 times)

The truth is that there really are no secrets about building better credit. Most consolidation or debt management agencies simply try to get lenders to write-down debt which still leaves marks on your credit score. Credit card piggybacking is no longer counted in your FICO score or other credit scores. But, that can also be refreshing news. If you spend less time focusing on the small ways to sneak away with a better score, you can spend more time on the most simple and effective ways to get to that three digit number you want so badly.

It’s not impossible to see as much as a 100 point increase in your score if you’re diligent. Consider it like a role-playing game. Your goal is to level up, reach a new credit tier, and reduce your excess baggage. In 25 days last month, by clearing up some of my credit reports of false claims or inaccurate information, I raised my score almost 50 points.

1) Your Credit Score and Reason Codes

Consumer credit scores are not the same as lender credit scores. Consumer credit scores pulled online are considered educational and are different from those used by lenders. You can go online to sites like MyFico.com and pull the more accurate credit scores used by the majority of lenders. In most cases, there is a cost for these scores (I recommend using the 30-day trial banner at the bottom of this post since you can cancel at no charge before 30 days).

Be aware that your credit scores are pulled when you apply for a loan. Ask the loan officer for your credit scores and the reason codes that go with them. The reason codes provide valuable information by which you can identify problems affecting your credit score. They are your road map to improving your credit. Mortgage lenders are required to give you a copy of your credit scores and usually the reason codes that go with them. It is much more informative if you can get your actual reason codes from the lender.

2) “Time is of the Essence” – Think “Golden Accounts” and Good Lenders

A Golden Account is any account you have that remains open for many years (ten or more) and can drive credit scores to higher levels. Once such accounts are identified, leave them open and periodically use them. If you can, establish multiple golden accounts in your credit profile. They will add substantial value to your credit scores for months and years to come. You want to create “Depth”.

Depth is created by how long our accounts have been open. Depth with our accounts determines how high our credit scores can go. Review your credit file and identify how long your accounts have been open. Higher scores will be realized when most of your accounts have been open for at least four years.

3) New Accounts Hurt – At Least At First

Once you have an established credit profile, avoid opening new accounts at every opportunity. Opening multiple accounts within a 12-month period can be extremely detrimental to credit scores. We should pay particular attention to the number of loans we have opened in the last year. Any new loan adds risk and lower credit scores. Space them out to avoid sudden declines in your scores.

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Posted in Credit Score | 2 Comments »

Sallie Mae Student Loan Glitch Crashes Credit Scores For 1 Million Students

May 19th, 2008 (Visited 36,324 times)

Checked mine and I’m fine – might want to do the same.

If it does appear you were affected, contact Sallie Mae immediately to get a credit reference so that you can clear things up. 52 points is huge.

Michelle Richards and her husband have been saving up so they and their toddler can move out of their 500-square-foot rental, and into a home of their own.

She’s worked diligently to improve her credit score so they can qualify for a loan.

“Never pay late. Never,” she said.

Part of that effort has meant paying her monthly Sallie Mae student loan bills in full, on time for the past two years.

That’s why she was shocked when an e-mail from her credit monitoring service popped up Tuesday night.

“Michelle, there are a few changes to your credit report today,” it said.

The alert says that overnight, her FICO credit score dropped by 52 points.

“Devastation hit me at that point, in fact, I was shaking. Oh, my gosh, did I overlook something?’” she said.

Richards had not overlooked a thing. The problem originated with Sallie Mae last week, during a download of account information to a credit bureau. That mistake negatively impacted the credit scores of 1 million Sallie Mae customers.

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Posted in Stories and Experiences | 2 Comments »