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Woman exits parking garage through second floor wall
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The photo pretty much tells the story here. A 49-year-old woman, who was reverse parking in a multi-story car park, mixed up the gas and brake pedals and almost ran her car completely through the second floor garage wall.
Looking like something out of an action movie, this nasty situation took place on the January 23rd, 2007 in the northern German town of Langenhagen. Apparently the automatic gearbox was the villain according to the woman, who was thankfully unharmed but no doubt received the shock of her life. Wonder if anyone was walking down the sidewalk underneath when it happened?
Cargo
Judge overturns verdict against Iraq war contractor in fraud case
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A federal judge has overturned on a technicality a $10 million jury verdict against a military contractor accused of defrauding the U.S. government in the initial months of the Iraq war.
The verdict, awarded in March against Fairfax-based Custer Battles LLC, had been the first civil fraud verdict arising from the Iraq war. Custer Battles based most of its operations in Rhode Island.
A former Custer Battles employee filed the lawsuit under a whistleblower statute, alleging that Custer Battles used shell companies and false invoices to vastly overstate its expenses on a $3 million contract to assist in establishing a new currency to replace the old Iraqi dinar used during Saddam Hussein’s regime.
The verdict reached $10 million because the law calls for triple damages, plus penalties fines and legal costs.
But U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III, in a ruling made public Friday, ruled that Custer Battles’ accusers failed to prove that the U.S. government was ever defrauded. Any fraud that occurred was perpetrated instead against the Coalition Provisional Authority, formed shortly after the war to run Iraq during the occupation until an Iraqi government was established.
Ellis ruled that the trial evidence failed to show that the U.S. government was the actual victim, even though U.S. taxpayers ultimately footed the bill.
That’s right. If you defrauded American taxpayers through the cut-out of the Coalition Provisional Authority — and let’s face it, just about everyone did — you’re off the hook. Because although the CPA paid you with money provided by the American government, and was almost entirely staffed by the American government, and acted at the behest of the American government, technically speaking it wasn’t the American government. So those bricks of taxpayer cash are yours to keep. Hooray for you!
The Rape of Sabrine…
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As I write this, Oprah is on Channel 4 (one of the MBC channels we get on Nilesat), showing Americans how to get out of debt. Her guest speaker is telling a studio full of American women who seem to have over-shopped that they could probably do with fewer designer products. As they talk about increasing incomes and fortunes, Sabrine Al-Janabi, a young Iraqi woman, is on Al Jazeera telling how Iraqi security forces abducted her from her home and raped her. You can only see her eyes, her voice is hoarse and it keeps breaking as she speaks. In the end she tells the reporter that she can’t talk about it anymore and she covers her eyes with shame.
She might just be the bravest Iraqi woman ever. Everyone knows American forces and Iraqi security forces are raping women (and men), but this is possibly the first woman who publicly comes out and tells about it using her actual name. Hearing her tell her story physically makes my heart ache. Some people will call her a liar. Others (including pro-war Iraqis) will call her a prostitute- shame on you in advance.
I wonder what excuse they used when they took her. It’s most likely she’s one of the thousands of people they round up under the general headline of ‘terrorist suspect’. She might have been one of those subtitles you read on CNN or BBC or Arabiya, “13 insurgents captured by Iraqi security forces.? The men who raped her are those same security forces Bush and Condi are so proud of- you know- the ones the Americans trained. It’s a chapter right out of the book that documents American occupation in Iraq: the chapter that will tell the story of 14-year-old Abeer who was raped, killed and burned with her little sister and parents.
This is Iran, but not as you know it
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Tehran is one of the most talked about cities in the world; many people believe it could well be the next target for the Bush administration’s third invasion in its so-called “war on terror?. The majority of the limited reports and images to have emerged from the Iranian capital in the past year have been about alleged nuclear weapons programmes, senior members of Iran’s theocratic state and, of course, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Very little has been said that accurately describes this nation of 70m, which is one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse countries in the Middle East. Despite a recorded history of more than 5,000 years, making it one of the oldest civilisations on earth, Iran remains shackled to a small number of clichés; turbaned mullahs, women wearing the black chador and antiwestern rhetoric.
As a news correspondent this Iran was familiar to me. I’d seen many angry rallies postFriday prayers and done interviews with politicians and military figures. But I longed to show the unseen and hugely varied life of ordinary people in Tehran; one of the least understood cities on earth.
You can also watch the video (Google video | Torrent)
Spanked!
A float depicting U.S. President George W. Bush being spanked by the Statue Of Liberty passes by during the Rose Monday carnival parade in Mainz, western Germany, on Monday, Feb. 19, 2007. Thousands of spectators attended the traditional street carnival parade in the state of Rhineland-Palatinates’s capital. (AP Photo/Bernd Kammerer)
Couple Who Catch Cop Speeding Could Face Charges
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A Bartow County couple will go before a magistrate judge today to see if they will be arrested for allegedly stalking a Kennesaw police officer by installing cameras to track neighborhood speeders.
Lee and Teresa Sipple spent $1,200 mounting three video cameras and a radar speed unit outside their home, which is at the bottom of a hill. They have said they did so in hopes of convincing neighbors to slow down to create a safe environment for their son.
The Sipples allegedly caught Kennesaw police officer Richard Perrone speeding up to 17 mph over the speed limit. Perrone alerted Bartow authorities, who in turn visited the Sipples’ home to tell them Perrone intended to press charges against them for stalking.
The best way to fight cockroaches is to shine light on them. They hate that.