(AP) — DETROIT – A man who began robbing banks to fix his mother’s plumbing was sentenced to just two years in prison Tuesday, a significant break, after a judge said he was an “outstanding citizen” before his crimes.
Jimmie Lee Fortune, 29, of Detroit, pleaded guilty in March to stealing nearly $14,000 from five banks in Macomb County. Prosecutors agreed not to charge him with three more robberies.
Fortune said he committed a “lapse of judgment.”
B.S.–Some of us might even call it (gasp), a crime.
“I was so stressed and depressed,” he told U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman. “I found it difficult to separate life from fiction.”
Fortune had told investigators that he robbed the first bank in April 2008 to fix his mother’s plumbing and get his driver’s license reinstated.
He entered banks demanding money and yelling threats such as, “Large bills or I’ll start shooting,” according to the FBI. Fortune was not armed during the robberies.
The judge went with a sentence that was less than the suggested range of five years to six years in prison.
“Every defendant should be treated individually. He was an outstanding citizen before this happened,” said Friedman, who received 17 letters supporting Fortune.
Defense lawyer Stacy Studnicki said the sentencing guidelines were “too harsh” in the case. She urged the judge to choose a lighter punishment and often referred to the sealed findings of a mental-health expert who met Fortune.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Regina McCullough asked Friedman to stay within the guidelines.
“People deal with financial crisis every day. Is the answer to rob banks? … What message are we sending to others if we just slap Mr. Fortune on the wrist?” McCullough said.
Outside court, she declined to comment. Gina Balaya, a spokeswoman for prosecutors, said: “We respect the court’s position.”
B.S. Report–It sounds like Mr. Fortune really just charmed the pants off these guys. That reminds me: There was a villain on the old “Get Smart” TV show played by Jack Gilford known as “Simon the Likeable.” The gag was that he was just so darn likeable that no one had the heart to do anything bad to him. The aptly named Mr. Fortune seems to have some luck of his own.
Use in case of emergency...open book before robbing bank
1933 – Edd Byrnes (Breitenberger)
actor: 77 Sunset Strip, Darby’s Rangers; singer [w/Connie Stevens]: Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb; holds record for appearing on the most magazine covers [20] in one month [October 1960]
1934 – Ben Piazza
actor: The Hanging Tree, The Bad News Bears, The Blues Brothers, Dynasty, Dallas, The Winds of War, Guilty by Suspicion; died Sep 7, 1991
1936 – Buddy (George) Guy
musician: blues guitar, singer: Stone Crazy, LPs: A Man and His Blues, This is Buddy Guy, Hold That Plane, Hot and Cool, Buddy and the Juniors, In the Beginning; in films: The Blues is Alive and Well in Chicago, Out of the Blacks and into the Blues; on BBC-TV: Supershow, Chicago Blues
1939 – Peter Bogdanovich
director: What’s Up Doc?, Paper Moon, Nickelodeon; director/writer: The Last Picture Show, Texasville
1941 – Paul Anka
songwriter: Johnny’s Theme [Tonight Show Theme], My Way, She’s a Lady, Diana; singer: 33 hits over 3 decades: Diana, You Are My Destiny, Lonely Boy, Put Your Head on My Shoulder, Puppy Love, You’re Having My Baby
1945 – David Sanborn
Grammy Award-winning musician: saxophone, flute: LP: Voyeur [1981]; Sanborn, David Sanborn Band, Heart to Heart, Hideaway, As We Speak, Backstreet, Straight to the Heart, Love and Happiness; composer: TV movie score: Finnegan Begin Again
1947 – William Atherton
actor: Bio-Dome, Saints and Sinners, The Pelican Brief, Die Hard series, Ghostbusters, Looking for Mr. Goodbar, The Day of the Locust, Class of ’44, Centennial
1947 – Marc Bolan (Feld)
singer: group: T. Rex: Bang a Gong; killed in car crash Sep 16, 1977
1947 – Arnold Schwarzenegger
actor: Eraser, The Terminator, Predator, Twins, Conan the Barbarian, Total Recall, Kindergarten Cop, True Lies, Last Action Hero; married to Maria Shriver; 5-time Mr. Universe; part owner of Planet Hollywood restaurants; governor of California [2003- ]
1948 – Jean Reno
actor: Le Grand bleu, Les Visiteurs, Léon, Mission: Impossible, Godzilla, Just Visiting
1949 – Dwight White
football: Pittsburgh Steelers defensive end: Super Bowl IX, X, XIII, XIV; died June 6, 2008
1950 – Frank Stallone
actor: Rocky series, Staying Alive, Ten Little Indians, Hudson Hawk, Tombstone, Doublecross On Costa’s Island; brother of actor Sylvester Stallone
1954 – Ken Olin
actor: Hill Street Blues, Falcon Crest, Thirtysomething
1956 – Anita Hill
law professor: Hill-Thomas hearings before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee concerning Clarence Thomas’ nomination to the Supreme Court
1957 – Rat Scabies (Chris Millar)
musician: drums: group: The Damned: Neat, Neat, Neat, New Rose, Love Song, Grimly Fiendish, Shadow of Love, LP: Phantasmagoria
1958 – Kate Bush
singer: Experimental IV, Running Up That Hill, The Man with the Child in His Eyes, Wow, Wuthering Heights
1961 – Laurence Fishburne (Lawrence Fishburne III/Larry Fishburne)
Tony Award-winning actor: Two Trains Running; Apocalypse Now, Bad Company, Boyz N the Hood
1963 – Monique Gabrielle
actress: Night Shift, Bachelor Party, Young Lady Chatterley II, Electric Blue series Bad Girls IV, Emmanuelle 5, Amazon Women on the Moon, Hard To Die, Scream Queen Hot Tub Party, Angel Eyes
1963 – Lisa Kudrow
actress: Friends, Mad About You, The Opposite of Sex, Analyze This, Dr. Dolittle 2
1964 – Vivica A. Fox
actress: Days of Our Lives, The Young and the Restless, Independence Day, Booty Call, Hollywood Squares, City of Angels
1974 – Hilary Swank
actress: Growing Pains, Evening Shade, The Next Karate Kid
“It is certain that despotism ruins individuals by preventing them from producing wealth, much more than by depriving them of wealth when they have produced; it dries up the source of riches….”
1898 – Scientific American carried the first magazine automobile ad. The Winton Motor Car Company of Cleveland, OH invited readers to “Dispense with a Horse.”
1908 Winton Touring Car
1932 – The Olympic Games opened in Los Angeles, CA. The Games would revisit Los Angeles — and the same venues of the Los Angeles Coliseum, the Rose Bowl, etc. — in 1984.
1942 – Frank Sinatra recorded the last of 90 recordings with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra on Victor Records. His last side was There are Such Things, which became number one in January of 1943. Sinatra moved on to Columbia Records (1943-1952) as a solo singing sensation.
1942 – Stage Door Canteen was first heard on CBS radio. The show was broadcast live from New York City and 500 servicemen were entertained each week by celebrities who freely donated their time for the war (WWII) effort.
1956 – Singer Brenda Lee recorded her first hit for Decca Records. Jambalaya and Bigelow 6-200 started a new career for the petite 11-year-old from Lithonia, GA (near Atlanta). Brenda Mae Tarpley (Brenda Lee) had been singing professionally since age six. She recorded 29 hit songs in the 1960s and became a successful country singer in 1971. Brenda Lee had a pair of number one tunes with I’m Sorry and I Want to be Wanted. She recorded a dozen hits that made it to the top 10.
1956 – The phrase “In God We Trust” was adopted as the U.S. national motto.
1959 – Willie McCovey stepped to the plate for the first time in his major-league baseball career. McCovey of the San Francisco Giants batted 4-for-4 in his debut against Robin Roberts of the Philadelphia Phillies. He hit two singles and two triples, driving in two runs. It was the start of an all-star career that landed McCovey in baseball’s Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY.
1984 – Reggie Jackson hit the 494th home run of his career, passing the Yankees’ Lou Gehrig and taking over 13th place on the all-time home run list. Larry Sorenson was the victim who gave up Reggie’s milestone homer.
1985 – Gerry Cooney retired from professional boxing. Cooney had only one loss — in a championship match with Larry Holmes (boxing’s biggest money-making fight to that time). Cooney had a record of 28 wins (24 by knockout) and three losses.
1987 – NBC’s L.A. Law was nominated for 20 Emmy Awards, one shy of the record for nominations. Hill Street Blues was the recordholder (in the 1981-1982 season). L.A. Law had only been on the air a year when it earned four out of the 20 Emmys.
1998 – A world-record Powerball jackpot of $295.7 million was won by a group of 13 machinists who worked together in Westerville, Ohio. The group chose the cash option, and received a lump-sum payment of $161.5 million dollars.
1999 – Richard Gere (Ike Graham) and Julia Roberts (Maggie Carpenter) star in Runaway Bride, which opened this day. The romantic comedy scored big with movie crowds, doing $35.06 million during its first weekend.
I was in the pub yesterday when I suddenly realized I desperately needed to pass gas. The music was really, really loud, so I timed my gas’s with the beat.
After a couple of songs, I started to feel better. I finished my pint and noticed that everybody was staring at me.
Then I suddenly remembered that I was listening to my iPod.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) – How much are politicians straining to convince people that the government is stimulating the economy? In Oregon, where lawmakers are spending $176 million to supplement the federal stimulus, Democrats are taking credit for a remarkable feat: creating 3,236 new jobs in the program’s first three months.
But those jobs lasted on average only 35 hours, or about one work week. After that, those workers were effectively back unemployed, according to an Associated Press analysis of state spending and hiring data. By the state’s accounting, a job is a job, whether it lasts three hours, three days, three months, or a lifetime.
Oregon "stimulus" a smashing success--just ask anyone in government
“Sometimes some work for an individual is better than no work,” said Oregon’s Senate president, Peter Courtney.
With the economy in tatters and unemployment rising, Oregon’s inventive math underscores the urgency for politicians across the country to show that spending programs designed to stimulate the economy are working—even if that means stretching the facts.
At the federal level, President Barack Obama has said the federal stimulus has created 150,000 jobs, a number based on a misused formula and which is so murky it can’t be verified.
At least 10 other states have launched their own miniature stimulus plans and nine others have proposed one, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many of them, like Oregon, have promised job creation as a result of the public spending. (Read more.)
B.S. Report–It would be impossible to throw a trillion dollars at the economy and not create some jobs. But at what cost? There will never be an accurate accounting of how many jobs the so-called “stimulus” has created or, to cite the President’s favorite catch-all term: “saved” because it’s impossible to filter all the variables involved.
But one of these days, a few years from now when all the “stimulus” money has been spent, a “jobs created” number will be arrived at one way or another. Politicians that voted for the “stimulus” fraud will trumpet this number as if the “stimulus” legislation saved the free world. Already, we hear various reports that the recession has ended and the “stimulus” is working.
In reality, it would have been far more economical for the federal government to simply have mailed checks to each citizen and be done with it. That would have immediately “stimulated” the economy. But that was never the goal.
Politicians want to control the economy, and to do that they need to control your money–and the only way they can control your money is by taking as much of it away from you as you’ll tolerate.
WAUSAU, Wis. (AP) — A central Wisconsin father charged with reckless homicide for not taking his dying daughter to a doctor told police that he believed God would heal her and that he thought she was simply sleeping when she became unconscious.
Madeline Neumann died on March 23, 2008, from undiagnosed diabetes on the floor of the family’s rural Weston home as people surrounded the 11-year-old girl and prayed. Someone called 911 when she stopped breathing.
Prosecutors contend her father, Dale Neumann, had a legal duty to take his weakened daughter to a doctor. A videotape of his interview with police after her death was shown to jurors during his trial Wednesday before prosecutors rested their case.
Neumann, 47, told the judge that he planned to testify in his defense.
In the interview with Everest Metro Police Department detective Scott Sleeter, Neumann described the weeks leading up to Madeline’s death, when he said she was a “little weak and a little slower,” something he attributed to puberty. Her condition deteriorated, and by the day before her death, he said, Madeline could not walk or talk.
“We just trusted the Lord for complete healing,” he said. “We didn’t really sense it was like a life-and-death situation. We figured there was something really fighting in her body. We asked people to join with us in prayer agreement.”
Neumann said it never crossed his mind that his daughter might have lost consciousness.
“She was just sleeping,” Neumann said. “I didn’t believe at all that the Lord would even allow her to pass.”
Neumann also told the detective that “sickness is a result of sin” and that his daughter’s death had not shaken his faith.
About a half-hour before the girl stopped breathing, one of the friends who was praying with the family suggested he take the girl to a hospital, the father said.
“I wasn’t taken back by it, and I understood where he was coming from,” Neumann said. “We just weren’t doubting the Lord. The word says that we shall be healed.” (Read more.)
B.S. Report–Once your daughter has deteriorated to the point where she can no longer walk or talk, it’s time to conclude that the power of prayer is not working and it’s time to try something else.
I’m sure these parents loved their daughter but they committed a serious crime against her. They allowed her to die without taking any (tangible) action to prevent it. All religions rely on faith to a certain degree but you can’t lose yourself 100% in the faith aspects and ignore reality.
What you believe is your own business and you have the right to refuse medical care for yourself–but not for others. But these people believed that G0d would intervene to heal their daughter and that no other steps need be taken. That’s not just irresponsible–that’s a crime.
A Swedish company has been fined 25,000 kronor ($3,000) after a malfunctioning robot attacked and almost killed one of its workers at a factory north of Stockholm.
Public prosecutor Leif Johansson mulled pressing charges against the firm but eventually opted to settle for a fine.
“I’ve never heard of a robot attacking somebody like this,” he told news agency TT.
The incident took place in June 2007 at a factory in Bålsta, north of Stockholm, when the industrial worker was trying to carry out maintenance on a defective machine generally used to lift heavy rocks. Thinking he had cut off the power supply, the man approached the robot with no sense of trepidation.
But the robot suddenly came to life and grabbed a tight hold of the victim’s head. The man succeeded in defending himself but not before suffering serious injuries.
“The man was very lucky. He broke four ribs and came close to losing his life,” said Leif Johansson.
The matter was subject to an investigation by both the Swedish Work Environment Authority (Arbetsmiljöverket) and the police.
Prosecutor Johansson chastised the company for its inadequate safety procedures but he also placed part of the blame on the injured worker.
B.S. Report–Who attacked whom? This sounds like self-defense to me. The robot was minding its own business. It was the worker who approached the machine. He accosted the “sleeping” machine and it was forced to defend itself. I think it’s the robot that has a lawsuit in this instance.
How can political commentators, politicians and academics get away with statements like “Reagan budget deficits,” “Clinton budget surplus,” “Bush budget deficits” or “Obama’s tax increases”? The only answer is that they, or the people who believe such statements, are ignorant, conniving or just plain stupid. Article I, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution reads: “All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other Bills.”
A president has no power to raise or lower taxes. He can propose tax measures or veto them but since Congress can ignore presidential proposals and override a presidential veto, it has the ultimate taxing power. The same principle applies to spending. A president cannot spend a dime that Congress does not first appropriate. As such, presidents cannot be held responsible for budget deficits or surpluses. That means that credit for a budget surplus or blame for budget deficits rests on the congressional majority at the time.
Thinking about today’s massive deficits, we might ask: Where in the U.S. Constitution is Congress given the authority to do anything about the economy? Between 1787 and 1930, we have had both mild and severe economic downturns that have ranged from one to seven years. During that time there was no thought that Congress should enact New Deal legislation or stimulus packages along with massive corporate handouts.
It took the Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt administrations to massively intervene in the economy. As a result, they turned what might have been a two or three-year sharp downturn into a 16-year depression that ended in 1946. How they accomplished that is covered very well in a book authored by Jim Powell titled “FDR’s Folly.” Here’s my question: Were the presidents in office and congresses assembled from 1787 to 1930 ignorant of their constitutional authority to manage and save the economy? (Read more.)
