163 YEARS AGO TODAY

Jul 28 1841

James Boulard and Henry Mallin pull the decomposed body of a young woman from the Hudson River near Hoboken, New Jersey. Mary Cecilia Rogers, who worked at a popular cigar store, is initially thought to have been killed in the course of a brutal gang rape, but ultimately it seems more likely that she died from a botched abortion. Years later, novelist Edgar Allen Poe adapts the sensational news story about "The Beautiful Cigar Girl" into the short story "The Mystery of Marie Roget."

"THERE are few persons, even among the calmest thinkers, who have not occasionally been startled into a vague yet thrilling half-credence in the supernatural, by coincidences of so seemingly marvellous a character that, as mere coincidences, the intellect has been unable to receive them. Such sentiments --- for the half-credences of which I speak have never the full force of thought --- such sentiments are seldom thoroughly stifled unless by reference to the doctrine of chance, or, as it is technically termed, the Calculus of Probabilities. Now this Calculus is, in its essence, purely mathematical; and thus we have the anomaly of the most rigidly exact in science applied to the shadow and spirituality of the most intangible in speculation."

- Edgar Allen Poe,  The Mystery of Marie Roget

The Mystery of Marie Roget

A SEQUEL TO "THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE."

Man spends 12 hours in box with scorpions

Hanoi - A Vietnamese man in his 60s has become a local celebrity by locking himself in a box filled with scorpions for more than 12 hours.

Pham Ro keeps more than 2 000 scorpions as pets.

Ro performed the stunt to set a record. He was stung dozens of times during the 12 hour ordeal but suffered no ill effects from the stings. - Sapa-dpa

An Iranian man who lost his keys 16 years ago was shocked to find they'd been embedded in his leg all along.

The 50-year-old man felt a strong pain in his leg and was taken to the hospital.

An X-ray showed the keys were lodged in his leg.

The man accidentally fired a rifle 16 years ago, injuring himself in the leg.

The bullet was removed but the keys that were lodged in his leg along with the bullet were left there.

Recycled paper only for the most die-hard environmentalists

By The Associated Press
(7/27/04 - COLOMBO, Sri Lanka) — The Millennium Elephant Foundation is producing stationery made from elephant dung. The writing paper comes in a number of different colors, depending on the diet, age and dental health of the dung producing pachyderm.

The foundation is based in Sri Lanka, and is using proceeds from the paper sale to benefit an elephant orphanage.

A former Sri Lankan prime minister gave President Bush some of the personalized dung stationery during a visit to Washington a couple of years ago.

Giovanna Guidoni(R) and Stefania Ugolini chat as they wait for make-up before attending the 16th edition of Italy's Miss Cicciona (Miss Chubby) in Forcoli, central Italy, July 24, 2004.

Caterina Callio' performs on the catwalk during the 16th edition of Italy's Miss Cicciona (Miss Chubby) contest.

Giovanna Guidoni stands on the weighing machine as she wins the 16th edition of Italy's Miss Cicciona contest (Italy's Miss Chubby)

Cane or breast for naughty pupils
by STAFF EDITORS (6/29/2004)

A schoolteacher has been suspended in Zimbabwe for allegedly giving pupils the choice of being caned or suckling her breasts. The woman faces a disciplinary hearing after one of the pupils reported the "punishment" to his parents.

 The boy claimed he was asked to choose between suckling the teacher's breasts or receiving 100 strokes of the cane for being noisy. The boy chose to suckle the teacher's breasts, as did 14 others.

The body that monitors piracy around the world has reported a sharp rise in the number of ships crew killed in the first half of 2004.

The International Maritime Bureau says 30 crew members were killed, twice as many as in the same period last year.

It is the highest number of piracy related killings for a decade, despite a global fall in the number of attacks.

Half of those killed were in Nigerian waters. Other hot spots were Vietnam, Bangladesh, and the Philippines.

Nation's Jails Stuffed With Drug Offenders, Justice Department Says 7/23/04

The Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that 665,475 people were being held in local lock-ups as of June 30, 2002. Of that number, 156,000 were doing time for drug crimes, an increase of 37% since 1996. Some 13% of jailed drug offenders, or about 20,000 people, had no previous criminal record and were facing drug charges for the first time.

Some 76,400 people were doing time for drug sales, up from 47,700 in 1996. About two-thirds of the increase in jailed drug offenders was due to the increase in the number of people jailed for trafficking.

More than half of jail inmates were on probation, parole or pre-trial release at the time of their arrests. About 18% were being held for parole or probation violations, while 28% were being held simply because they could not make bail pending trial.

 41% of jail inmates had a current or prior violent offense. 46% were nonviolent repeat offenders. Nearly one-quarter of all jail inmates had been locked up three or more times before.

Two-thirds of 2002 jail inmates said they were regular drug users, with more than half reporting use within the last month. Almost one-third said they were using drugs at the time of their offense, and slightly more than one-third said they were using alcohol.

The percentage of women inmates jumped from 10% to 12% of the total jail population. About 30% of them were doing time on drug charges.

More than 60% of jail inmates were non-white, with blacks making up 40% of those jailed, whites 36%, and non-white Hispanics 19%. Two percent were Asian or American Indian, while 3% claimed a multicultural heritage.

 http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/abstract/pji02.htm

Doom and Gloom by 2100

By Julie Wakefield


Sir Martin Rees, Britain's Astronomer Royal, warns that civilization has only an even chance of making it to the end of this century.

Rees thinks science and technology are creating not only new opportunities but also new threats.

Advances in biotechnology, in terms of both increasing sophistication and decreasing costs, means that weaponized germs pose a huge risk. Rees has bet $1,000 that a biological incident will claim one million lives by 2020.

Self-replicating, nanometer-size robots might chew through organic matter and turn the biosphere into a lifeless "gray goo."

Princeton University physicist Frank Wilczek pointed to "a speculative but quite respectable possibility" that the Brookhaven National Laboratory's Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) could produce particles called strangelets. These subatomic oddities could grow by consuming nearby ordinary matter.

Life exists thanks to a happy combination of physical constants. Tweak a few, and life as we know it becomes impossible.

Williams faces SPCA complaint over dog's death

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) -- Jayson Williams faces an animal cruelty complaint for allegedly killing his dog with a shotgun three years ago.

Former New Jersey Nets player Dwayne Schintzius told investigators he and Williams bet $100 that Schintzius could not drag Williams' Rottweiler out of his house. Schintzius said he won the bet and told Williams to pay up.

An angry Williams went inside, returned with a shotgun and killed the dog, Schintzius said. The former teammate told investigators that Williams pointed the gun at him and told him to clean up the dog's remains 'or you're next."

Williams, 36, still faces a retrial on charges of reckless manslaughter in a limo driver's death.