Keystone Cops: Fumomania Continues

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• Vince Fumo, superhero striving against the Bush goverment? Or Vince Fumo, state senator who used senate funds to spy on his exes. Oh, and bought 19 Oreck vacuum cleaners for himself. What, no Dyson? Or even a Roomba? Come on, Vince, we taught you to make better vacuum cleaner choices than that. [Daily News]

• The Inquirer’s coverage of this is great: More on spying on enemies and the whole indictment from them. [Inky]

• A bomb scare closed down a PATCO station. Authorities later revealed the “bomb” to be a Lite Brite, and Easy Bake Oven and a few Ninja Turtles action figures. [Inky]

• A video! On Myspace! Might! Show! Animal! Cruelty! Sweet, let’s all gather ’round and watch. [NBC 10]

Keystone Cops: NASA Finally Finds Way To Get People To Pay Attention To Space Program Again

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• This is the story everyone’s talking about at the water cooler today. (Fortunately, I sit right next to the water cooler.) NASA astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak has been charged with attempted murder of another astronaut, who was in a astronaut love triangle with another astronaut. She also had on diapers so she wouldn’t have to stop on the drive. Okay, so attemped murder and kidnapping aren’t cool, but if they have to happen, I’m pretty happy that astronauts are involved. Oh, yeah, and Philly astronaut Chris Ferguson went down to support her at her preliminary hearing. [Orlando Sentinel]

• A Lancaster County coroner is accused of leaking 911 info to reporters at the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal. Four reporters testified in front of a grand jury, though, so apparently they did a nice job of ratting him out. [KYW 1060]

• An unloaded gun was seized at a Winslow, N.J., middle school. The student claims it was for protection, so apparently it’s a club- or baseball bat-sized gun. [Camden Courier-Post]

• A woman was hit by a schoolbus and died and another man was found dead this morning as well. Huzzah for Philadelphia! [Inquirer]

Keystone Cops: Fumo-Mania!

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• Well, it was a fairly quiet front on the Philadelphia crime scene this weekend, unless you dig white collar crime! In which case, you are set. Vince Fumo is set to make a public statement this afternoon regarding the FBI investigation into his ties to a South Philly charity. The Inquirer reported over the weekend he’s due to be indicted as early as Tuesday. But: “Another person close to the senator said he expected Fumo to come out swinging today with a vow to fight any such charges.” This is going to be awesome. [Inquirer]

• A man’s defense when he’s accused at throwing a rock at — but missing — his neighbor? Well, here’s an interesting one: “Zowniriw admitted to throwing the rock in ‘frustration,’ but he pointed out it did not hit Bonomo. Describing himself as an ‘athletic person’ who pitched for a high school championship baseball team, he insisted Friday he could have hit his neighbor had he intended to. ‘I picked up a rock and threw it at nobody,’ he said. ‘I was upset.’” [Doylestown Intelligencer]

• After a loss to Division I youngin Longwood, Morgan State’s basketball team drove to a restaurant. After asking for 52 sandwiches with either Philly steak or chicken, coach Todd Bozeman flew into a rage. A witness: “He yelled, ‘I ain’t scared of you country bumpkins. I want my fucking money back!’” There is a warrant out for Bozeman’s arrest. The things people do when they’re deprived of Philly cheesesteaks. [Richmond Times-Dispatch]

• Bucks County crime log: “400 block Bridgetown Pk., 12:33 a.m., fish, TV, watches and clothing, no value given.” Seriously? A fish? Wow. [Bucks County Courier Times]

• Major drug bust! This should keep our streets free of illegal drugs for… ahh, too late, they’re back. [Inquirer]

Keystone Cops: Affluent Twentysomethings Have Guns, Do Drugs

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• Garret Reid admitted to police he used heroin on the day of his car accident, and now both Reid sons could face charges from police for unrelated incidents. Actual line from article: “Andy Reid is not suspected of wrongdoing.” [Inquirer]

• A car crashed into a house in Bucks County. I don’t know why this is big, either, but it was one of the top stories on Action News‘ website, and they’re the ones who know about these car crash things. Plus, it’s about as big of a story of the Reid sons one. [6 ABC]

• Parole and probation in Bear, Del. — please tell me that’s not a real city — shot and killed a man who they said drove his car at them while trying to pick him up for failing to show up for work. [NBC 10]

• A gray seal was killed on Long Beach Island. Actual story lead: “A gray seal pup’s journey from Canada to Long Beach Island ended when it was struck and killed while crossing a road.” [AP/CBS 3]

• Penn prof Rafael Robb will go on trial for allegedly murdering his wife. [Inquirer]

Keystone Cops: Pay Up, Joe Grace

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• More on this later, but, yes, bureaucrats in Philadelphia are very, very, very upset at this advertising campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force. From the AP story: “[Mayor's spokesman Joe] Grace said Philadelphia intended to recoup all costs associated with what he called ‘a stupid, reckless, irresponsible prank.’” What costs? Pedro Ramos and Joe Grace going to 6th and South last night to get on TV and act all ridiculously angry? You know what, guys? I think you owe me money. [AP/Philly.com]

• Oh and you can get one of those signs from Philadelphia on eBay (natch). [eBay]

• Homicide number #32 — the final one for January — took place yesterday in North Philly. [Inquirer]

• Oh, and in that six-person opus in today’s Daily News, everyone who knows them says say Andy Reid’s sons are good kids, etc., etc. [Daily News]

Keystone Cops: Keystone Cops

• The moniker for this feature doesn’t really fit most of the time. Police officers are generally hard-working people who do a fine job. But every once in a while, the planets align and cops really do whatever it is the Keystone Cops did. (I’ve never seen one of those movies, obvs.) And I don’t know if this was a plot for a Keystone Cops movie, but it really should have been: Just two days before his promotion to police chief of Wall Township, N.J., Bernard Sullivan was arrested for a DUI. In Wall Township. Whoops! [AP/NBC 10]

• Animal rights activists are protesting Penn because they want to save humans by testing on animals. Or they don’t do it humane enough or something, with four times the violations of any other group. [KYW 1060]

• A Pennsylvania woman has been told to move her alpaca shed 18 feet. [AP/Philly.com]

• Some dude in Jersey shot a horse with an arrow and killed him. No, it wasn’t me. I prefer to slaughter my horses with machetes. [6 ABC]

Keystone Cops: Sighs All Around

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial. I’m not quite sure why any of you need to know they’re unofficial, unless you’re betting on the number of homicides in this city, in which case you are kinda creepy.

• Two men were shot and killed overnight, bringing the number of homicides in Philly this year to 31 and guaranteeing this month will have at least one homicide a day, on average. [Inquirer]

• Blacks in Pennsylvania die from a gunshot wound at a higher percentage than anywhere else in the country. But as the head of Men United for a Better Philadelphia points out, white males kill themselves with handguns, too. Ahh… yeah. [Daily News]

• Police log: “The bloody bathroom was discovered after a woman wearing a medium black coat and dark shoes but no pants was seen leaving the restaurant, police said.” [Doylestown Intelligencer]

• And just when you thought a child porn case with a million pieces of child porn couldn’t get any worse. [Inky]

Keystone Cops: Dogged Police Work, ‘Inky’

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial. No horses were euthanized in the making of this post.

• Police in Bucks County shot and killed a 33-year-old man in an apartment complex after he came at them with a baseball bat. Inquirer report: “One man at Building 57, responding to the buzzer at the front door, yelled down from a fourth-floor window that he was at work at the time of the incident and heard about it only when he returned home. In another apartment, a television flickered, but no one answered the security phone. What appeared to be an unmarked police cruiser with two plainclothes officers rolled by.” Gee, way to blow their cover. [Inquirer]

• A study done by the state Dept. of Health shows that Warminster residents don’t have a higher rate of cancer than elsewhere. Unfortunately, the study found that they living in Warminster is worse than cancer. [Bucks County Courier Times]

• The Inquirer’s Robert Moran spent a night on the cold streets talking to homeless people. It’s a pretty good video. [Inky]

• A 28-year-old woman was found shot in Southwest Philly over the weekend. [Inky]

Keystone Cops: Maybe You Shouldn’t Have

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• The Daily News follows the media horde to Michael Chitwood’s press conference in Upper Darby for the story about the newborn baby found in the trunk and wrote this lead: “Maybe the newborn boy took his last breaths in the cold trunk of the Volkswagen Beetle, his umbilical cord still attached. Maybe he was already dead when he was stuffed into a tote bag under bloody clothes and stashed in the car trunk.” Thanks, guys! [DN]

• Atlantic City Council will debate about and vote on only a partial smoking ban in casinos, with a giant, smoke-filled “smoking quadrant” in each casino. Sounds healthy. [AP/Camden Courier-Post]

• The “trial” — actually a degree-of-guilt hearing — of Brian Hall began yesterday. Hall admitted to police last year that he murdered a girl in 1987. [Daily News]

• Oh yea: State of the Union was last night. Meh. [Whitehouse.gov]

Keystone Cops: Back To The Norm

Keystone Cops is a daily look at crime, police, public safety and drug news. Homicide totals are unofficial.

• A man in North Philadelphia late last night became the city’s 27th homicide victim this year. On this date last year, two people were killed, bringing the total to 22. There hadn’t been a homicide since Jan. 14 beforehand. (Yesterday’s “27″ was a typo.) [Inquirer]

• Hate symbols were used in a vandalism spree in Cape May County. The punks — Or do we use “thugs” now? Can somebody from the Daily News clue me in? — even broke the window of the Donut Connection. Jerks! Oh, and they also apparently wrote “abortion is murder.” [NBC 10]

• Another copycat threat from a schoolkid! A 14-year-old girl was arrested for having a hit list with people she wanted to hurt, including fellow students, faculty members and staff. School district officials called her note a “death list.” Don’t kids have fistfights anymore? [NBC 10]

• A pilot on a Continental flight died, and naturally local passengers were on board! Their take: It was scary. [KYW 1060]

• Oh, and a baby boy was found stuffed into a tote bag and “entombed in the trunk of a car.” Sigh. [CBS 3]