Did they hold a seminar on it?

On Thursday, October 18 2007, deputy sheriffs in South Florida made another arrest. It would seem that their arrest of Gibson proved he was not that unique.

"It was elaborate in the sense that it was a very purpose-built and stealthy vehicle and trailer," stated Jim Soloman, sheriff's spokesman.

Deputy sheriffs caught two men this time in Orange County FL, trying to siphon more than 500 gallons of diesel fuel from the tanks at a Mobil gas station at Goldenrod and Curry Ford roads. The theft was discovered by a leak detector at the On The Run Mobil gas station at 12:03 pm and officers arrived there by 12:06 pm.

Deputy Pamela Porter was the first to arrive and noticed a truck with trailer parked there with it's hood up and a man working on it. She asked him what the problem was and he kept stating "car broke, car broke." The man, later identified as Octavio Garcia, 27, claimed that he spoke no English and had a Georgia drivers license for identification. The front of the truck was littered with items consistant with someone who works on their own vehicle such as car part boxes, power-steering bottles and tools but it started as soon as the officer turned the key.

Porter's backup, Deputy Timothy Graeber, heard noises coming from the trailer and when checking, he spotted a wall of black brushes that blocked the view under the trailer. They discovered Jose Luis Guerra, 25, of Miami in the back transferring fuel. This trailer as well had a hole cut in the floor which allowed Guerra to use a battery-powered siphon to pump fuel into the two tanks the trailer held. Officers discovered a third tank in the truck's bed with a hose that allowed fuel to be loaded there from inside the trailer

The tanks inside the trailer were converted chlorine tanks of 300 and 250 gallons each and the metal tank in the bed was 150 gallons. The men had managed to pump out 182.5 gallons of fuel of an estimated value of $550 and police estimate that they had the capacity to steal approximately $2,100 worth of diesel. To add to the efficiency of their operation, one played the part of the stranded motorist while the other worked inside and they kept in contact through walkie-talkies.

Large scale thefts of diesel and gas have been a problem for years and with the rising costs of late, some companies are willing to purchase the fuel, tax free, that has been stolen. Members of a theft ring in Florida were arrested in June 2005 for using trucks to siphon 1,000 gallons of fuel and a Cottondale AL man was severely burned in June 2005 when the fuel he was siphoning, exploded in flames.

Neither man would talk to police and both have been charged with third-degree grand theft and taken to the Orange County Jail.

It would almost seem that there must have been a seminar offered in this new and dangerous way to profit in the fuel business.

For my related post, go here.

Don't argue, just do it

There seems to have developed a common theme in Alabama this month... guns and cleaning. Some have learned at gunpoint that cleaning isn't what they should be doing, others, that you had better do the cleaning.

"Tears just rolled down my face as I walked in and saw everything gone and piles of trash all over my home," stated Tiffany McKinnon.

Adrian and Tiffany McKinnon returned home after a week away and found that almost everything the family of five owned had been stolen. Adrian sent his wife to see her sister while he inspected what was left behind in the piles of trash. As he was walking into the back sunroom, a man walked in through the backdoor straight into him.

Adrian held the suspect, Tajuan Bullock, 33, who was wearing Adrian's hat, at gunpoint. He told him to sit on the floor until he decided what to do with him. While waiting for the police to arrive, Adrian decided to take matters into his own hands for a bit......... he ordered Bullock to clean up the mess he had made throwing things out of drawers and cabinets.

"This man had the nerve to raise sand about us making him clean up the mess he had made in my house," stated Tiffany.

That's correct, Bullock complained to the police when they arrived that he had been forced to clean up his own mess at gunpoint. It's reported that the police laughed at his complaint and explained to him that anyone else probably would have shot him dead when they had caught him in the house.

Capt Huey Thornton, a police spokesman, stated that Bullock was arrested at 2 pm Tuesday, October 15 2007 on burglary and theft charges. He was being held in the Montgomery County Detention Facility on a $30,000 bond.

"Whenever I hear a noise, I just go grab my gun," stated Ethel
Sanders.

That is exactly what the 81 year-old grandmother did in Mobile AL, Monday October 14 2005, when she heard noises in her laundryroom. When Ethel, who usually uses a walker, got there, she encountered a man in his underwear, washing his clothes in her washing machine.

She took a shot at the man when he came at her, which knocked her to the ground and the man grabbed her gun and pointed it at her. He then grabbed his soaking wet clothes and ran for it. Officers quickly found the man in a nearby community center, possibly because he was bleeding and still only in his underwear. He is expected to survive the bullet that went through his leg to his stomach and will be charged with first-degree burglary when he is released from the hospital.

Sanders stated that she had bought the gun four years ago as protection, since she lives alone but added that she had never shot it before.

I would think now, Bullock would take note of what the officers had told him when he whined to them, he got lucky just having to clean his own mess. Sanders on the other hand, missed a "kill shot" but I am betting people think twice about using her washer for free laundry service.

Don't toss it... chuck it

Some pumpkins find a new home nestled inside a pie this time of year or carved into that special jack-o-lantern. Others though will find a new home, possibly one town over by afternoon.

Yes, it isn't just fall and Halloween........... it's pumpkin-chucking season. That wonderful time of year when pumpkins learn to fly and residents of neighboring towns get nervous. The World Championship Punkin Chukin contest and billed as the oldest, begun in 1983 and largest competition takes place November 2-4 in Bridgeville, Del and organizers stated that more than 50,000 people watched 100 teams compete last year.

The record for distance set there in 2003 was set by launching a pumpkin 4,434 feet, approximately 500 feet short of a mile. Pumpkins can become airborne there with catapults, air compressors, centrifugal machines and trebuchets, whose design dates back to the Middle Ages and uses a counterweight to hurl objects into the air. There is also a "theatrical" category which states that distance isn't the objective but rather, the ability of the team to ham it up.

Another well known event is the Morton Punkin Chuckin contest, held on October 20-21 in Morton IL, home of 85 % of the world's canned pumpkin is manufactured. It began in 1996 and is held about 10 miles southeast of Peoria on the Uhlman family farm and attracts several thousand visitors a year. In years past, winners of the contest have appeared on both the David Letterman Show and with Jay Leno.

Tossing your pumpkins to the wind seems to have become more popular as there are numerous other contests held throughout the U S. These include a Pumpkin Chucking weekend, November 3-4 in Ellicott MD and the Pumpkin Chuck, November 3 held in Cincinnati's Stanbery Park. That event allows you to bring your own pumpkin or purchase one there and for $2, you can launch the hapless pumpkin skyward with a trebuchet.

With these choices, who would want to even think of just leaving that used jack-o-lantern on the front step till April of next year, not that I would ever do that.

For more information, go here and here.

Creative profits

The best way to turn a definate profit in your business is to first keep the costs of your overhead down. One businessman in Winter Haven FL it seems had discovered how to creatively aquire his product and maximize his profits.

Hobert Gibson, 70 did not know that police were observing him on Tuesday, October 16 2007, while he stood outside his pick-up truck at a Cumberland Farms gas station. Not many people would have paid attention to him as he waited, propping his arms on the door window. They probably also had no idea why he was just standing there, waiting but police did.

Gibson it seems had devised a system to steal gas from the underground tanks at gas stations and pump it into the trailer his truck was towing. Polf County detectives stated that they had observed him stealing about 400 gallons of gas from a Lakeland gas station and had followed him to the Dade City store.

Detectives would not state how they had come to suspect Gibson but at least one Lakeland store had reported 11,000 gallons of fuel missing since January 2007. They did state that Gibson was towing a box trailer that had been reported stolen from a Lakeland business in 2005. He had cut a trap door in the bottom in the bottom of the trailer and then park it above the underground fuel tanks at a gas station. Gibson had maritime batteries to power the fuel pumps that would load the gas into his trailer and then offload it to larger tanks at his Winter Haven business, Crews Towing for later sale.

Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd stated that they believe he had been stealing approximately 3,000 to 10,000 gallons of fuel each week from gas stations and added that this is the first time he has seen this kind of theft. Gibson was arrested for stealing nearly 1,000 gallons of gas and faces two counts of grand theft.


For a related post, go here

We didn't need that extra insulation?

"Now I know why my bill is so high," stated Ed Arzooman.

It wasn't Arzooman's high electric bill that led to the recent discovery at a one story house on 269th St in Floral Park NY October 17 2007. It was the distinctive smell of marijuana that police officers on a routine patrol in Queens instead.

Arzooman stood by and watched as officers removed 300 live plants and 10 garbage bags of drying weed after the officers had noticed the smell the night before. Three men who lived at the home, ages 23, 28 and 43 have been charged with felony drug possession of the reportedly $500,000 street value pot.

Ed had finally found out that not only had there been a marijuana farm at the home next door but Con Edison informed him that their powerline had been split, so they had been paying for the cultivation for the past year. This explained how their power bill had gone from $300 a month to $800.

I can understand how out of control cost increases and a lack of conservation can lead to a higher bill but to go more than a year with a $500 increase without questioning it.........that makes it a bit more understandable as to how they managed to run a pot farm next door.

The mystery may unravel

In November 1717, English pirates captured the French slave ship La Concorde near the island of Martinique. She was renamed Queen Ann's Revenge and headed north the following spring as the flagship of the pirate fleet.

In May 1718, the pirates, led by Blackbeard, aka Edward Teach, blockaded the port of Charleston SC with his flagship and three smaller sloops. He continued up the coast and lost his the Queen Ann's Revenge while attempting to enter Beaufort Inlet NC and about five months after her sinking, Blackbeard was killed in battle at Ocracoke NC.

In November 1996, the private research firm, Intersal Inc., was winding down their search for shipwrecks in Beaufort Inlet when they discovered a mound of anchors, cannons and ballast stones. They had held permits from the North Carolina UBA to search for the El Salvador, which was lost in 1750 and the Queen Ann's Revenge. The Intersal divers recovered some artifacts including a brass bell which had the date of 1705 on it and they felt that they had possibly found the site of the QAR. After months of secrecy, they finally announced that they may have found Blackbeard's flagship.

The QAR lies in 20 to 25 feet of water approximately 1.5 nautical miles off Fort Macon and about 1,500 feet west of the present Inlet shipping channel. Studies have shown that the channel may have crossed over the ship numerous times in the three hundred years it has sat there and has spent time buffeted by currents or covered by 20 feet of sand.

Since it's discovery, numerous trips have been made to uncover artifacts on the site and map the wrecks location. It is offlimits to divers at this time but in the future, when all work has been completed, it will most likely be available for divers to visit.

This years visit is considered it's most ambitious and has already uncovered more artifacts to study and later display at the NC Maritime Museum at Gallants Bay, Beaufort NC. Items brought to the surface this year include copper alloy cufflinks and straight pin, net weights, pewter plates, a brass trigger guard, gold dust, a yellow glass bead and on one return trip to shore......a five foot spotted eagle ray which leaped aboard the deck of the Shell Point.

After much careful planning, this week they also raised cannon C16, under the watchful eye of a group of reporters from TV, newspapers and radio as well as a German documentary filmaker and a writer and photographer from Archaeology Magazine. On October 17 2007, the cannon made a schedualed stop at the NC Maritime Museum expansion property for another public viewing, which was attended by approximately 100 people.

The cannon will then be taken to the QAR in Greenville NC and placed in a freshwater tank where it will begin a multi-year process of cleaning, study and preparation for display. This cannon is believed to be one of the best links to proving whether the wreck that has been studied for ten years is Blackbeard's famous flagship, the Queen Ann's Revenge.

For more about the Queen Ann's Revenge project, go here.

You're right......

Cynthia Hunter, 38, was arrested in Agust 2007, accused of theft in a Brandon FL Wal-Mart and ended up being jailed for almost two months.

It seems that the police found a small vial in her purse that a police field test suggested was meth. Hunter explained that it wasn't drugs but was instead, dehydrated cat urine for her son's science project. She added that it had been purchased at an animal clinic.

Police arrested her on the theft charge as well as possession of a controlled substance. She was released from jail in October 2007 after the results from the lab tests found that the "controlled" substance was, in fact, cat urine. Hunter pleaded guilty to petty theft and the judge sentenced her to time served.

Now I am not sure of any state where cat urine is a controlled substance and I certainly don't know why they did not investigate far enough as to possibly call the clinic she claimed to have bought it at. I do question what the purpose of keeping a mother in jail for that length of time and away from her son over a possibility it may be drugs.