Category:
Crime

Birds in his pants

It's definitely a recurring theme in weird news since an example of it was included in my "name that list, #15" (things people smuggle by stuffing down their pants). However, I've never seen a picture of it before. But the Smoking Gun has obtained a photo of a California man, Sony Dong, who was caught trying to illegally smuggle 14 live Asian songbirds into the country by hiding them beneath his pants.

Posted By: Alex - Wed May 06, 2009 - Comments (4)
Category: Animals, Crime

Mugshots of Moonshiners

Mugshots of Southern moonshiners, from Life Magazine (Jan 1, 1940):


During 1939, agents working out of Atlanta destroyed $423946-worth of illicit distilling apparatus. But this comparatively small figure represented 4325 stills, with a total estimated capacity of 650000 gallons per day.
Of the convicted moonshiners above, most famous is Theressa Brown (fourth row, center). Known to agents as "Queen of the Bootleggers," she has been arrested 22 times, mostly for liquor-law violation, but once for arson, once for shooting her husband.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Mar 26, 2009 - Comments (12)
Category: Crime, Inebriation and Intoxicants, 1940s

Bertillon Measurements

You've probably heard of the Bertillon System, one of those discredited "scientific" theories detailing how body measurements indicated racial and/or criminal aspects of a person.

Well, here's how the NYC Police Department went about securing Bertillon measurements, circa 1908--courtesy of the George Bain Collection at the Library of Congress.

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Posted By: Paul - Fri Feb 06, 2009 - Comments (6)
Category: Crime, Fads, Science, Anthropology, Experiments, Stereotypes and Cliches, 1900s

Motor Patrol

For those of you who are wondering about the possible ancestors of the famed TV show CHiPs--and there must be at least six of you--here comes the 1950 film MOTOR PATROL. I watched it recently, and it's not as goofy as many cheap films of this era. But the fact that ninety percent of the action and intrigue does NOT involve motorcycles has to count for something.

Isn't that fellow in the white suit really channelling Clark Gable pretty badly?

Posted By: Paul - Wed Jan 28, 2009 - Comments (1)
Category: Crime, Stupid Criminals, Movies, Regionalism, 1950s, Motorcycles

Angry Santa

Here's a treat from weird news of Christmases past. Published in the Miami Herald, Jan 4, 1984:

A disgruntled investor dressed as Santa Claus abducted his broker from a Christmas party and punished him for 12 days in a homemade torture chamber because $500,000 in deals had gone sour, police said Tuesday. Broker Robert J. Haye, 49, of Mount Lebanon was freed by police Monday at a farm 50 miles south of Pittsburgh. He was found chained and handcuffed to a bed in the makeshift torture chamber...
Haye was kept in a small trailer inside the building that contained the bed, an electric chair and a pine box resembling a coffin with spikes inside, police said. He had been drugged and shocked repeatedly, police said.
"Over the 12 days, he was beaten and tortured," said Detective Lt. Leo O'Neill. "His nose was broken. He was placed in the chair at various times and interrogated. He had been given junk food. We were lucky to find the victim alive."

Phillippi was arrested at his home, and police later recovered the Santa Claus suit.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Dec 25, 2008 - Comments (1)
Category: Crime, Christmas

The Bad Sleep Well

We've been alerted to the serial killer in Japan who's taking revenge for corporate fraud, as described in this article in today's NY TIMES. But what no one seems to have noticed is that we've already seen this scenario in a film. THE BAD SLEEP WELL is one of Akira Kurosawa's masterpieces, and details how a man whose father was killed by corrupt businessmen exacts his revenge. Here's the excellent trailer.

Posted By: Paul - Sat Nov 22, 2008 - Comments (1)
Category: Business, Crime, Death, Frauds, Cons and Scams, Movies, Foreign Customs, 1960s, Asia

Cow-Costumed Woman Chases Children

We here at Weird Universe have been warning our readers for quite some time about the danger posed by cows who attack. (See here, here, and here.) It has now become apparent that this threat extends to women dressed up as cows.

Evidence: Michelle Allen of Middletown, Ohio was taken into custody for disorderly conduct that included chasing children, urinating on a neighbor's front porch, and causing traffic problems -- all while wearing a cow costume.

In case you have any desire to imitate Michelle this Halloween -- and I suspect many people will be doing so -- it looks like Amazon has a similar cow costume in stock.

(Thanks to everyone who forwarded us this story!)

Posted By: Alex - Wed Oct 01, 2008 - Comments (6)
Category: Crime, Cows

Marvin Hewitt, Imposter

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Sometimes it seems as if credentials-faking imposters are a wholly recent phenomenon, due to our contemporary insistence on the all-important documentation needed to get ahead. But of course, the human race has churned out imposters ever since the days of Baron Munchausen and prior, giving our pal Alex plenty of material for his Museum of Hoaxes.

I ran across a fifty-year-old case recently in Life magazine from April 12, 1954. The perp was one Marvin Hewitt, and he managed to masquerade as a college-level physics professor, among other positions!

You can read most of the article here. The ending, unfortunately, was missing from my issue of the zine.

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More in extended >>

Posted By: Paul - Mon Sep 15, 2008 - Comments (0)
Category: Celebrities, Crime, Education, Hoaxes and Imposters and Imitators, Magazines, 1950s

Follies of the Mad Men #15

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[From Life for May 22 1964.]

Our booze appeals mainly to Eighteenth-century highwaymen.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Aug 27, 2008 - Comments (1)
Category: Business, Advertising, Celebrities, Crime, History, Hollywood, Inebriation and Intoxicants, 1960s

Criminal Confession For Sale

Ebay seller "pepullperson" once committed a crime that he's never told anyone about. But for the right price, he's willing to tell you. He says he's doing this to make some money so that his "loved ones are taken care of." Bidding is currently at $20, so he's well on his way.

My guess: He'll confess to committing eBay fraud. But what if the police are the winning bidders?

Posted By: Alex - Mon Aug 25, 2008 - Comments (1)
Category: Business, Crime, Stupid Criminals

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Who We Are
Alex Boese
Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes.

Paul Di Filippo
Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.

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