Obit watch: April 4, 2019.

April 4th, 2019

David Fechheimer, private investigator. Noted here because this is one of the better NYT obits for a not-so-famous person I’ve read in a while.

Ron “The Ghoul” Sweed, late night TV host in Cleveland during the 70s.

Sweed broke into Cleveland TV in 1971 on WKBF Channel 61. He wore a lab coat and was armed with an assortment of low-rent props, from Cheez Whiz to firecrackers to flying pierogis, kielbasa and slime. He quickly was syndicated in six other markets — Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco.
He got his start working as an assistant for another late-night TV legend, Ernie “Ghoulardi” Anderson. He received Anderson’s permission to appear as the Ghoul in 1971.

(Previously. Hattip: Lawrence.)

Posted in 1970s, Obits, TV | 2 Comments »

Brief notes from the legal beat.

April 4th, 2019

Following up on a few things:

The Waco biker trials turned into a huge nothingburger.

All charges have been dropped against Chauna Thompson. You may remember her as the Harris County Sheriff’s deputy who was fired and indicted after her husband choked a man to death during an altercation outside a Denny’s. Her husband has been sentenced to 25 years. (Previously. Previously. Previously.)

From the Department of Well, That Will Show Them: The Texas Department of Corrections has banned all chaplains, regardless of religion, from the death chamber. (Previously. More from Reason.)

Posted in Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Obit watch: April 2, 2019.

April 2nd, 2019

The Alliance of American Football.

I actually feel sort of sorry for Johnny Manziel. Out of the NFL, banned from the CFL (not just cut, banned from the league), and now his latest gig has folded underneath him.

Maybe he can get a new gig with the revived XFL next year.

Posted in Sports | Comments Closed

Obit watch: special 007 edition, April 1, 2019.

April 1st, 2019

By way of Lawrence: Tania Mallet, Tilly Masterson in “Goldfinger”.

Shane Rimmer has also passed away. He was in a whole bunch of stuff, including “The Spy Who Loved Me” and uncredited parts in “You Only Live Twice”, “Diamonds Are Forever”, “Live and Let Die”, and “Star Wars”. He was the B-52 copilot in “Dr. Strangelove” and Rusty in “Rollerball”.

He was perhaps most famous to some people as the voice of Scott Tracy on the “Thunderbirds” TV series.

Posted in Movies, Obits | 3 Comments »

Obit watch: March 30, 2019.

March 30th, 2019

I’m no military aviation expert, but I’ve read a fair amount on the subject. Much to my chagrin, I had not heard of Commander Joe “Hoser” Satrapa (USN – ret.) until McThag linked to his obit.

What a guy. He was one of the leading advocates of fighters carrying guns, instead of relying on missiles. He was also famous as something of a “swashbuckling, authority-challenging maverick”. This obit is full of great stories and quotes:

While flying and fighting in his F-8E Crusader over North Vietnam, CDR. Satrapa was famous for the personal arsenal that he wore on his flying kit in the event he was shot down. According to anecdotes shared in social media by fellow squadron members, Satrapa reportedly carried “Two Mark 33 hand grenades, a Colt Python .357 revolver with 60 rounds of ammunition, a Smith & Wesson 9mm with non-NATO hollow-point ammunition and 3 spare magazines, a custom Randall survival knife and an additional throwing knife over his left shoulder.”

Among other highpoints:

  • He was drummed out of the Navy for “administrative deficiencies” in the early 1980’s, only to be reinstated by SecNav John Lehman and President Ronald Reagan in 1981…and retroactively promoted to commander.
  • Whereupon he was assigned as an instructor at the Navy Fighter Weapons School: “As a part of his training syllabus, some sources recounted that Joe “Hoser” Satrapa delivered his initial lecture as an adaptation of General George Patton’s famous flag speech.”
  • His call sign later changed from “Hoser” to “Toser”. I won’t spoil the story, but I will give a hint: “a pilot without a right thumb cannot fly a jet fighter”.
  • During one training flight, he “shot down” two Air Force F-15s…in one Navy F-14…twice…with his gun.
  • He nearly caused Japan to cancel their F-15 order.
  • After he left the Navy, he went on to fly fire suppression drops in California. One day, an aircraft above him dropped fire retardant on top of him, completely covering his windscreen. What did he do? Read the obit.

How have I never heard of this guy before? And thanks, McThag, for the heads-up.

Also among the dead:

Agnès Varda, French film maker. I’ve never seen anything of hers, though I think I have the Criterion “Cléo from 5 to 7” somewhere, and I remember Roger Ebert extravagantly praising “The Gleaners and I”.

Victoria Ruvolo. Her story is kind of interesting: she was driving home one night with a friend, from her niece’s recital, when a 18-year old man threw a frozen turkey through the windshield of her car:

The turkey crashed through Ms. Ruvolo’s windshield, crushing the bones in her cheeks and jaw, fracturing the socket of her left eye, causing her esophagus to cave in and leaving her with brain trauma.

…

Ms. Ruvolo required extensive reconstructive surgery to her face and months of physical and cognitive rehabilitation before she could return to work as a collection agency manager nine months later.

In spite of this, she forgave the young man, and lobbied for him to receive a light sentence. The prosecution wanted him to serve 25 years: thanks to Ms. Ruvolo’s advocacy, he served six months in prison and five years of probation.

After Ms. Ruvolo’s recovery, she spoke about empathy and forgiveness at schools and programs like Taste (Thinking Errors, Anger Management, Social Skills and Talking Empathy), which holds criminals accountable for their actions.
As part of his rehabilitation, [the turkey thrower – DB] also spoke to Taste, Robert Goldman, its founder, said by phone.
“[The turkey thrower – DB] has a job and is a productive member of society,” said Mr. Goldman, who collaborated with Ms. Ruvolo and Lisa Pulitzer on a book, “No Room for Vengeance …” (2011). “He did everything Victoria challenged him to do and spoke to kids about the mistakes he made.
“That’s her legacy: She’s an example of forgiveness in a vengeful world.”

Posted in History, Movies, Obits, Planes | 1 Comment »

Bad cop! No doughnut!

March 29th, 2019

Lawrence emailed me about this yesterday: while I think some other people have picked up on this, it still seems to be worth covering.

Paterson, New Jersey police officer (in uniform) slaps the s–t out of a hospital patient lying in a bed. The same officer also previously punched the same man while he was in a wheelchair.

Ruben McAusland was sentenced Wednesday to more than five years in prison for drug dealing and assaulting a hospital patient. McAusland was on duty and in uniform during the March 18, 2018 incident.

How do we know this happened? One of his fellow officers took cell phone video.

Police officer Roger Then recorded video of the assault with his cell phone. Then has pleaded guilty in the hospital assault.

Earlier this month, the Columbus (Ohio) police department disbanded their vice unit. This is the same vice unit that arrested Stormy Daniels, an arrest that Internal Affairs deemed “improper”.

Three out of ten officers in the unit had been suspended, and one – Andrew Mitchell – is under indictment:

…on federal charges of abusing his role as a law enforcement officer, obstructing justice, witness tampering, and making false statements to investigators. According to the indictment, he had kidnapped multiple women and coerced them into sex in exchange for their release from his custody.

Last August, Mitchell shot and killed a woman during a prostitution arrest. He was already being investigated by the department.

On the side, former officer Mitchell (he retired after the indictment) is a landlord. Arguably, he’s a slumlord:

The former tenants interviewed by The Appeal described their buildings as neglected and pest-ridden (the city has filed 37 violations on his properties since 2015 for problems like housing code violations and environmental issues). Mitchell also was known for frequent evictions—381 since 1996, according to county records.

Mitchell is said to own fifteen properties. Assuming he’s owned all of those since 1996, that’s over one eviction per year per property. That seems rather high to me, but this might explain it:

Mitchell apparently was in the practice of renting to desperate women who didn’t have much money, pressuring them to have sex with him in exchange for free or discounted rent, and evicting the ones who wouldn’t.

Sometimes, I just don’t know what to say.

Unrelated to bad police side note that I don’t have anyplace else for: the Supreme Court granted Patrick Murphy a stay of execution.

The State may not carry out Murphy’s execution pending the timely filing and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari unless the State permits Murphy’s Buddhist spiritual advisor or another Buddhist reverend of the State’s choosing to accompany Murphy in the execution chamber during the execution.

Posted in Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Obit watch: March 29, 2019.

March 29th, 2019

I think this is a swell NYT obit for Michel Bacos. (Previously.)

His death was announced by Christian Estrosi, the mayor of Nice, where Mr. Bacos lived.
“Michel bravely refused to surrender to anti-Semitism and barbarism and brought honor to France,” Mayor Estrosi said. “Michel was a hero.”

…

“There was no way we were going to leave — we were staying with the passengers to the end,” Mr. Bacos (pronounced bah-COSE) told the Israeli website Ynetnews.com in 2016. “This was a matter of conscience, professionalism and morality. As a former officer in the Free French Forces, I couldn’t imagine leaving behind not even a single passenger.”
As he recounted to the BBC that year, “I told my crew that we must stay until the end, because that was our tradition, so we cannot accept being freed. All my crew agreed without exception.”

…

[Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu tweeted this week that Mr. Bacos had “stayed with the hostages through all their hardships, until I.D.F. soldiers — led by my brother Yoni — freed him in a daring operation.”
“I bow my head in his memory,” he added, “and salute Michel’s bravery.”

(For those unfamiliar with the Entebbe raid: Yonatan Netanyahu was the leader of the assault force, and was killed during the attack.)

Returning to Israel in their military transport plane, the commandos fetched Mr. Bacos from the cabin. “Your place is not here,” he recalled a soldier telling him, “but in the cockpit.”

…

Michel joined the Free French Forces as a teenager during World War II and was stationed in Morocco as a naval aviation officer.
“I fought the Nazis,” he said. “I knew precisely what fascism was all about. The genocide is a horror that none of us had forgotten.”

…

Mr. Bacos allowed himself a two-weak break after the hijacking. But once back from vacation, he requested a specific destination for his first flight: Tel Aviv.

Awful lot of dust in the air this morning.

Edited to add 3/30:

Posted in Obits, Planes | 1 Comment »

Random notes: March 28, 2019.

March 28th, 2019

Chron Eye For The Killer Guy:

Raised by a single mother who avoided taking care of him, [Patrick] Murphy was beaten and abused as a child, according to court records. His grandmother taught him to shoplift at a young age, and by 17 he’d run away and moved into a homeless shelter.

What did Mr. Murphy do? He’s one of the Texas 7, who broke out of prison in December of 2000, went on the run, and killed Irving Police Officer Aubrey Hawkins while stealing guns from an Oshman’s.

When it was over, Hawkins lay dead in the parking lot, shot 11 times and run over by an SUV as the men fled.

Part of the argument is that Mr. Murphy didn’t actually pull a trigger: he was just a lookout, and it was five other guys who shot Officer Hawkins. But he was still convicted and sentenced to death based on…yes, the law of parties. (Still want to do that podcast some day.)

Even though Murphy went along the day of the killing, his lawyers say he didn’t want to take part in the crime, pointing out that he left as soon as he told the others of the officer’s arrival. Now, they say, executing him would be cruel and unusual punishment.

Pull the other one, guys: it has bells.

(The execution is currently delayed while the Supreme Court evaluates Mr. Murphy’s claim that he’s entitled to a Buddhist spiritual advisor in the death chamber.)

On a much happier note: up yours, Andrew Cuomo. Up yours, Bill de Blasio.

A federal judge ruled today that New York’s notoriously nonsensical law criminalizing “gravity knives”—which groups have said for years is used by New York City to selectively prosecute people, especially the working class and minorities, for carrying common folding knives—is unconstitutionally vague.

Posted in Cops, IANAL, Knives, Law | Comments Closed

This is intended to enrage you. (#9 in a series)

March 28th, 2019

The decision of the University of Texas to suspend the Texas Cowboys spirit group for six years because of hazing is disappointing and might prevent the group from continuing its community service and charitable donations, the group’s alumni association said Thursday.

I’m sure Nicholas Cumberland’s family is disappointed, too. Disappointed that they won’t see him again in this life.

The Cowboys are best known for firing Smokey the Cannon when UT scores at home football games. In addition, “our members have volunteered tens of thousands of community service hours, donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to charity and contributed to campus learning through activities such as hosting a lectureship series featuring world leaders on campus,” the alumni association said.

…

Nicholas Cumberland, who was majoring in business, finance and radio-television-film, was traveling in a pickup with other members of the Cowboys when it rolled over in Lampasas County after the September retreat, which occurred at a private ranch in Brown County. He was ejected from the vehicle and died four weeks later.

…

UT’s dean of students office on Wednesday told the Cowboys that it was suspending the group after its investigation found that a host of violations took place at a retreat in September, including coerced consumption of alcohol, cat food, Spam, milk and Tabasco sauce, as well as so-called Oklahoma drills, in which two people run directly at each other in a confined space. A UT Police Department spokeswoman said Thursday that its criminal investigation, separate from the student conduct investigation, is ongoing.

…

“As an organization, we are disappointed by the misconduct of certain student members,” the alumni association said in a statement provided to the American-Statesman by Eddie Lopez, the association’s president. “In fact, we have expelled and suspended from our organization the students who were connected to the hazing. Their actions violated University regulations and did not align with our organization’s standards — and they do not represent the heart and soul of our organization.

“However, hazing did not cause the car accident that took Nicky Cumberland’s life,” the statement added, noting that the university’s report determined that sleep deprivation did not occur at the retreat.

Oh, what a relief. The hazing didn’t kill him, and they dumped all the hazers anyway.

Formed in 1922, the Cowboys have been subjected to harsh penalties previously as a result of hazing. In 1995, [Gabe] Higgins, 19, drowned in the Colorado River after what school officials said were hours of alcohol-fueled hazing. In response, UT disbanded the Cowboys for five years.

Enough said.

Posted in Rage | Comments Closed

From the legal beat.

March 28th, 2019

A mistrial was declared yesterday in the murder case against Charles Reedy.

Mr. Reedy was accused of stabbing his roommate to death. However…

…Travis County prosecutors discovered several hundred new photos that Austin police detectives had taken as evidence. Their discovery prompted state District Judge Brad Urrutia to order a mistrial after Reedy’s lawyers said the new batch of photos might have impaired the case they had planned to present to the jury.

I believe that is what lawyers call a “Brady violation”, also known as “bad move, space cadet”. But that’s not why this story is interesting.

You see, Mr. Reedy has been convicted of murder before:

In 2001, a jury found him guilty of killing John Teller in a wooded area near St. Edward’s University and Interstate 35. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
But in 2006, the 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin overturned the conviction. Chief Justice W. Kenneth Law wrote an opinion saying, “The jury’s verdict is unsupported by proof beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Kind of makes you go “Hmmmmmmmm”, doesn’t it?

Posted in Law, TCDA | Comments Closed

Obit watch: March 27, 2019.

March 27th, 2019

Larry Cohen, noted film director and writer.

I actually rented “Q” at one point when I was younger, and wouldn’t mind watching it again. As I recall, it was kind of silly, but I like Quetzalcoatls and Michael Moriarty.

I haven’t been able to find a reliable source for this, but Mike the Musicologist forwarded me a Wikipedia link: Michel Bacos apparently passed away yesterday. Mr. Bacos was the pilot of Air France 139 when it was hijacked on June 27, 1976. As you know, Bob, the plane eventually ended up in Uganda at the Entebbe Airport, and things proceeded from there.

Posted in History, Movies, Obits, Planes | Comments Closed

Less Miles.

March 26th, 2019

Tim Miles out as men’s basketball coach at Nebraska.

Seven seasons, 116-114 overall, 19-17 (6-14 in conference) this season.

Mike Anderson gone at Arkansas after eight seasons. 18-16 this season (8-10 in conference), 169-102 overall.

Posted in Firings, Sports | Comments Closed

Win free stuff!

March 23rd, 2019

You may very well have seen this elsewhere, but: the folks at BulkMunitions sent me a nice personal email and suggested the two of you who read my blog might be interested in their giveaway.

They’re offering a .50 caliber ammo can with foam inserts for two pistols and a 25 pack of dessicant.

You can enter here.

I’m not going to be entering, because I don’t think it’s fair to my loyal readers. Also, I haven’t had any dealings with BulkMunitions, so this is not an endorsement: as I said, they sent me a nice email, personalized so it didn’t come across as spam, so I’m willing to give them some space here.

Contest ends April 13th, two days before Buy a Gun Day. So if you win the contest, you have a built-in excuse to go buy something to keep in your ammo can.

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

Quick TMQ Watch.

March 23rd, 2019

TMQ, October 30, 2018:

TMQ would think the single easiest thing in all of sports would be to predict success for LeBron James. Yet this is currently unfashionable.

…

He’ll be a force in the 2019 NBA postseason with the Lakers. Why isn’t this obvious?

ESPN, March 23, 2019:

After the Los Angeles Lakers missed the playoffs only five times in the first 65 years of the franchise’s existence, Friday’s 111-106 loss to the Brooklyn Nets officially eliminated them from postseason contention for the sixth straight year.

Yes, yes, “all predictions wrong or your money back”, but: obvious?

Posted in Sports, TMQ watch | Comments Closed

Obit watch: March 20, 2019.

March 20th, 2019

Richard Erdman, noted character actor. He was on “Community”, which I never watched. But before that, he seems to have done guest shots on many TV shows of the 1970s and 1960s (except “Mannix”). Like everyone else in Hollywood, he was also in “Tora! Tora! Tora!”, and played Hoffman in “Stalag 17”.

Al Silverman passed away on Sunday. He worked in publishing, spending 16 years with Book of the Month Club and later becoming an editor with Viking Books.

Before that, he was a freelance sportswriter and later editor in chief of “Sport” magazine. While he was editing “Sport”, he met and wrote about Gayle Sayers, who was recovering from a knee injury. Ultimately, Mr. Silverman and Mr. Sayers collaborated on Mr. Sayers’s autobiography, I Am Third. And, in turn, a chapter from that book became the basis for “Brian’s Song”.

“I don’t remember my father talking about his greatest projects, but in terms of royalties, it was the best,” Brian Silverman said by telephone.

Another great story:

When the running back Paul Hornung was celebrated for leading the Green Bay Packers to the 1961 National Football League championship, Sport awarded him a 1962 Corvette. Mr. Hornung soon after sold the car and got into a dispute with the Internal Revenue Service in United States Tax Court after he failed to disclose the full market value of the car as part of his gross income for 1962.
“My father testified to Hornung’s defense that he should not pay income tax on the car,” Brian Silverman said. His father argued that the car was an unsolicited reward for Mr. Hornung’s talents and thus should be tax-exempt — “the same as a Nobel Prize, because football was Hornung’s art and he performed it to an award-winning degree.” Mr. Hornung lost the case.

Posted in 1970s, Books, Obits, Sports, TV | Comments Closed

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