Neff Zone Column -- March 8, 2008

Print Edition: March 8, 2008

YOU CAN’T MAKE UP THIS STUFF: Volume 19

OK, kidlings, it’s time for another edition of "Big Rob’s You Can’t Make Up This Stuff," the game based on my brother’s theory that reality is stranger than any fiction you can conjure up. As always we begin with an item from Big Rob’s stomping grounds of Flint.

You may recall back in October we brought you the story about Flint Southwestern High School letting two felons play in a high school football game on sort of a play-release program. Eventually, the two offenders were returned to the hoosegow to finish their sentences and the coach lost his job.

Here’s what the attorney for one of the felons said back then: " Reginald Owens is a fine young man…you must balance that punishment with encouragement for the young man to succeed academically as well as athletically."

Well, that fine young man has now been charged with larceny from a building by a Flint District Court magistrate, a felony punishable with up to four years in prison. Perhaps the warden will "encourage" the fine young man by releasing him on furloughs to play for the Lions.

Or, maybe Mr. Owens will get lucky and get a ride to prison on a bus driven by an Alabama Greyhound bus driver. One of their drivers was assigned to pilot a bus full of Huntsville prison inmates. She later abandoned the bus along a highway because her hours for the day were over. The driver pulled over in front of a convenience store and told the passengers her allotted driving time was up. A clerk in the convenience store called police. Officers arrived to find the prisoners milling around the bus and a replacement bus driver was called in. Police said there were no incidents involving the passengers while they were stranded. Apparently none had to play in a high school football game that night.

The police in this case were understanding because they sometimes have security lapses themselves. Like the cops in Berlin, Germany who were testing a "theft-proof" patrol car. The special BMW was equipped with surveillance equipment, electronic locks, and other systems to ensure it could be stolen. The two officers assigned to the test vehicle both jumped out to chase a car thief on foot, and left the doors unlocked and the keys in the ignition. Naturally, the car was stolen.

Well, if the police could not track down their theft-proof patrol car, at least some fellow officers were more successful finding a truck stolen from Charles McCowan in Azuza, California. McCowan parked his pickup in front of a mini-mart and when he came out the truck was gone. So he called police, assuming the truck had been hijacked. Police checked the store’s security video and saw the truck rolling backward out of the parking lot with McCowan’s 80-pound Boxer named Max in the front seat, threading its way through traffic and winding up across street in a fast-food restaurant parking lot. No word if Max rolled through the drive-in window.

Still in the law enforcement realm, a couple of court cases have caught my eye. In the first one, a major insurance company provided worker's compensation insurance for a Wisconsin "Meals on Wheels" program. Delivering a meal, a volunteer slipped and fell on a participant's driveway. The company had to pay to care for her resulting injuries. The insurance company wants its money back, so it is suing the 81-year-old homeowner getting the Meals on Wheels service.

The second case involves an Army vet named Robert Hornbeck who served a stint in Iraq. After getting home, he got drunk, wandered into a hotel's service area (passing warning signs), crawled into an air conditioning unit, and was severely cut when the machinery activated. Unable to care for himself due to his drunkenness, he bled to death. Despite his irresponsible behavior -- and his perhaps criminal trespassing -- Hornbeck's family is suing the hotel for $10 million.

You have to have a lot of chutzpah to engage in one of these lawsuits, but that’s nothing compared to the audacity of Anthony Armatys, 34, of Palatine, Ill. A while back he accepted a job at a New Jersey-based telecommunications firm, but decided he didn't want it after all and never reported for work. The company accidentally put him on its payroll anyway, and he allegedly collected more than $469,000 in salary over the next five years. The fraud was finally discovered when Armatys, not one to leave a good thing alone, allegedly tried to get cash out of the company’s retirement fund.

Finally, wonder where all the money goes that you spend on gasoline and heating oil? A couple of weeks ago, Saeed Khouri, a member of a wealthy Abu Dhabi family, paid $14 million for a license plate that has nothing but the number "1" on it. "I bought it because I want to be the best in the world," he said. Makes you really root for electric cars, doesn’t it?

Jim Neff is a local columnist. Comments to neffzone@gmail.com. Read Neff Zone columns online at www.neffzone.com/cadillacnews.