Señor Onion’s Archives
Gary Plauche
updated
The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Investigation has found St. Cloud, Minn. police officer Patrick Grossback justified in shooting a man during a DWI arrest in downtown St. Cloud in July.
The ruling comes after a three-month investigation.
Criminal charges were filed Monday against Russell Williams, who is charged with obstructing the legal process, fleeing a police officer in a motor vehicle and DWI. Williams will make his first court appearance Nov. 7 in Stearns County.
According to the criminal complaint, Grossback and another St. Cloud officer were arresting Williams for DWI when Williams got into his vehicle and tried to flee. Grossback was pinned in the vehicle while trying to remove Williams.
freestar
The complaint says Grossback warned Williams, but Williams drove up over the curb and over a parking meter before Grossback shot him once.
Two Wyandotte County officers used a stun gun on a psychiatric patient holding a sword, and the incident was caught on tape, KMBC's Peggy Breit reported Wednesday.
Sheriff's deputies went to the man's apartment to take him to a state mental hospital, but when they arrived, he had barricaded himself inside a bathroom.
The incident was caught on tape by a camera mounted within the Taser gun; it records both audio and video.
"There are a lot of unknown factors when you go to places, and therefore we need to utilize technology available, such as the Taser equipped with the camera," Wyandotte County Jail Administrator Randall Henderson said.
A man who allegedly kidnapped a woman and child was killed by police after a high-speed chase and shootout that was
caught on tape
.
With a shotgun to her head, reports CBS News correspondent Lee Cowan, the mother and her 4-year-old daughter were forced to weave their Dodge Neon in and out of traffic on I-45 in Houston, as police gave chase, all the while dodging bullets from the suspect, who was firing at them and other drivers.
"As soon as I saw the gun," said motorist Q. Harris, "I told my wife to duck, and as soon as I told her to duck, he let off two rounds."
To escape the madness, Cowan says, the mother tried to open her door to bail out but, just as she did, the car slammed into the back of a pickup truck.
She went rolling down the pavement but got up and ran over to a police officer, who quickly threw her behind the car for protection as the shootout continued.
Witness Kimberly Rooks told reporters: "I heard one sound, 'Pow,' and then I heard, 'Patter, patter, patter, patter,' and I'm like, 'Oh my God, what's happening?' "
The car rolled slowly to a stop, riddled with bullet holes. The suspect, Jeremy Ethon Roberson, was found dead inside. Mother and daughter were rushed to a hospital for treatment.
Cowan noted that it all started in Dallas, where Roberson, believed to be the mother's boyfriend, grabbed the two and started the 230-mile chase south to Houston.
His family was at a loss to explain it all.
Four terrified workers were rescued Monday from the rain-swollen Los Angeles River after a powerful surge of storm runoff dislodged a half-dozen construction vehicles at work sites in the riverbed near downtown, officials said.
Two men were plucked by helicopter from the raging gray waters after their cement truck had been carried nearly half a mile, finally coming to rest against a concrete abutment supporting the Santa Monica Freeway.
In another scene, two workers clinging to concrete girders beneath another bridge were helped to safety by ladder-toting Los Angeles City Fire Department rescuers. The men had been working on a type of crane known as a zoom boom, which apparently was washed away by the rushing waters, authorities said.
No one was injured in either rescue but workers were faced with the prospect late Monday of retrieving the vehicles from the river.
The sequence of mishaps began shortly before 2 p.m. as a surge of storm water surprised a paving crew from Associated Ready Mix. The crew was pouring concrete along the floor of the riverbed beneath Cesar Chavez Avenue, just east of downtown Los Angeles.
On 1 January 2011, Deputy Hopper was responding to a call about shots being fired at the Enon Beach Campground with her partner Sergeant Dustin White.[3] Around 11:35 a.m., while her partner was interviewing the family whose trailer had been shot at, Hopper was shot at very close range while she was attempting to photograph a footprint. The gunman pointed a H&R 12-gauge break-action shotgun at her from inside his trailer and shot her with no warning.[4] According to Clark County Sheriff Gene Kelly, Hopper "never had the opportunity to return fire or take cover".[3]
A gun battle erupted between the suspect and other responding officers as they attempted to retrieve Hopper's body. According to an eyewitness, one officer attempted desperately to reach Hopper's body: he repeatedly asked over radio if he could get her but was denied because the scene was not secure. The police used a loudspeaker to ask the suspect to surrender himself for several minutes, before returning fire on his trailer and killing him.[3]
A German Township officer, Jeremy Blum, was also wounded.[3] He was flown to Miami Valley Hospital in stable condition.[5] The proximity between the Enon Beach trailer park and Interstate 70 led to the highway being closed for about an hour.
Two Keizer Police officers are being hailed as heroes after they risked their own safety to rescue a man from a burning car.
On Monday, Sgt. Andrew Copeland and Officer Rodney Bamford received Keizer's Medal of Valor for their actions last September.
The two-and-a-half minute incident was captured on Copeland's dashboard video camera mounted in his police cruiser. The camera started recording when a car speeding down Salem's River Road crashed into a utility pole.
Watch the raw video
"It ran into this power pole right behind us - sheared the power pole off," Copeland said. The car also flipped upside down.
Downed power lines then sparked a fire.
Copeland and Bamford arrived on the scene and realized a man was trapped inside the car.
"He was basically passed out, knocked out, unconscious when I got to him," Copeland said.
"You see in the movies cars crash and they burst into flames, but that statistically speaking isn't the norm," Bamford said. "It's very rare."
The rescue wasn't easy. The officers couldn't simply pull the man out the driver's side because it was too close to the fire.
"It was to the point where I was afraid my uniform shirt was going to start melting because it's polyester," Bamford said.
"Officer Bamford and I come back around to the passenger side and we basically climb inside the car and then start, both of us together are able to unwedge this guy from the driver's side and then pull him out," Copeland said.
They finally managed to drag the man to safety.
Tpr. Robert J. Bodo was presented with a Certificate of Recognition today at the Steubenville Post by Capt. Cory Davies, Cambridge District Commander, for his actions that helped to save the life of John R. Courtright, 43, of Dillonvale, Ohio, who had suffered cardiac arrest.
On February 1, 2012, at approximately 3:15 p.m., Tpr. Bodo observed what appeared to be an abandoned vehicle, westbound on US 22, near milepost 6, just east of Bloomingdale in Jefferson County. Upon inspecting the vehicle, Tpr. Bodo noticed Courtright seated behind the wheel and unresponsive. Tpr. Bodo tried to get his attention by knocking on the window. Once Mr. Courtright was alert, Tpr. Bodo returned to his vehicle to request assistance from emergency response personnel. Upon returning to Mr. Courtright, Tpr. Bodo noticed he was in obvious breathing distress and extracted him from the vehicle and placed him on his backside and immediately began CPR. Troopers Greg A. Mamula and Eric J. Derrington arrived on the scene and prepared the Automated External Defibrillator (AED). Tpr. Bodo utilized the AED until emergency response personnel arrived. Courtright was then transported to a local hospital. Tpr. Bodo’s attention to detail and investigation allowed him to undoubtedly save the life of Mr. Courtright.
A former teacher who left a teenager for dead after snapping her neck pleaded guilty to attempted murder, and the victim said she did not expect an apology.
"I'm glad it's over with," said Ashley Reeves, who continues to undergo rehabilitation from the broken neck and other injuries she suffered in April 2006. She was not paralyzed but had to learn how to swallow, talk and move her head and arms again.
I just want to continue with my life and not worry about it," she said Friday.
Reeves, 18, graduated from high school last month and plans to go to college.
Samson Shelton, 27, declined to address the court before he was sentenced to 20 years in prison for attempted first-degree murder.
Reeves' family signed off on the sentence and the plea deal.
"Ashley needed to have some peace," St. Clair County State's Attorney Robert Haida said, noting the plea deal spares her from having to testify.
Shelton's mother, Susan, said the family "reluctantly" settled for the deal, insisting he would not have gotten a fair trial because of "the continuing demonization of Sam."
Officials have said Shelton once taught at a middle school Reeves attended. At the time of the attack, Shelton taught driver's education and physical education at a high school, but not the one Reeves attended.
Surely this is the stupidest hold-up in history - and it was all captured on CCTV film.
A woman with a black rubbish sack over her head attempted to rob a jewellery shop while her accomplice waited outside with her getaway vehicle - a wheelchair.
The farcical hold-up began when Noemi Duchene arrived outside the jewellers in El Paso, Texas, having being pushed to the store in a wheelchair.
As CCTV cameras captured her arrival outside the Estate and New Jewellery store, the 44-year-old rises out of the wheelchair.
The Los Angeles police officer driving the cruiser that collided with the sedan was taken to a hospital with a cut to his face, said Los Angeles police Lt. Lisa Wernli of the Southeast Station. He was in good condition, she said.
The chase began around 10:15 p.m. near Olive Street and the Harbor (110) Freeway in South Los Angeles and ended around 10:30 p.m. at the intersection of Billings Street and Wadsworth Avenue in Compton, Wernli said.
Celebration after the Lakers win over the Celtics for the NBA championship turned ugly Thursday evening in neighborhoods near the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
Hundreds of police officers massed around the Staples Center before Game 7 of the NBA finals , aiming to prevent a repeat of the violence that accompanied the Lakers' victory last year. But despite that, scattered pockets of violence erupted around the arena.
CBS affiliate KCBS reports that rocks and traffic cones were thrown at cars, and motorists were harassed. At least two fights broke out that included several people being dragged from cars.
The windows of one car were smashed and bonfires were started; a cab was set on fire and within moments was engulfed in flames, according to aerial reports from the station.
KCBS reporters saw one man kicked and beaten by at least three people until he appeared to be unconscious.


