The Whiteboard News
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WhiteBoard News for Monday, September 21, 1998
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Jonesboro, Georgia:
A teacher was acquitted of a charge that she swapped
sex for an A grade with a 16-year-old student after she
bared her breasts to show jurors a surgical scar the
student failed to identify.
Doris Walker, 43, was acquitted Wednesday after she
bared her breasts in private in the jury room in front
of jurors, attorneys and the judge, said Lee Sexton,
Ms. Walker's lawyer.
Ms. Walker, a longtime teacher of biology and
physiology at Riverdale High School, was indicted this
summer on a charge of sexual assault on a person in
custody - a statute originally aimed at preventing
sexual coercion of prison inmates and patients in
mental hospitals.
The former student testified that Ms. Walker promised
him an A in physiology if he would have sex with her.
She denied having sex with him.
==========
Milwaukee, Wisconsin:
For $69, you too can look like an escapee from the
Milwaukee County Jail.
Shirt designer George Keppler has designed a line of
blazing orange jumpsuits with the words "Milwaukee
County Jail" stamped on the back. And they're selling
like hot cakes, said Keppler.
County Sheriff Lev Baldwin doesn't care much about
fashion. He said the shirts are simply too dangerous.
"Bottom line: They're dumb. Real dumb," Baldwin said.
Baldwin has asked Keppler to stop making the mock
jailware because of an incident earlier this month in
which a bus driver thought a man wearing the shirt was
an escaped inmate.
The sheriff's department detained the man for several
hours while deputies conducted a head count at the
jail.
Keppler complied with the sheriff's request for a few
days but then returning his jail-inspired outfits to
shops in several area shopping malls.
About 100 of the jumpsuits have been sold since they
went on the market in July, Keppler said. He's also
sold about 1,000 jail work shirts and two or three
times that number of T-shirts since their introduction
a year ago.
==========
Greenville, South Carolina:
Timothy Dale Crockett was angry at his bank for
charging huge overdraft fees. So angry, in fact, that
he allegedly robbed one.
"It's the bank that started this," he said Tuesday as
he waited for a federal judge to formally charge him
with armed robbery. "Banking institutions are robbing
people."
Crockett, 34, said First Federal Bank of Spartanburg
charged him almost $600 in overdraft fees because his
student loan money did not arrive in his account on
time.
But instead of taking his anger out on First Federal,
the University of South Carolina student said he robbed
Palmetto Bank because its branches are open on Saturday
mornings. First Federal's are not.
Spartanburg County sheriff's deputies arrested Crockett
on Monday after receiving an anonymous tip.
===========
Danville, Illinois:
Cops didn't need a trial of bread crumbs to follow this
suspected burglar.
Officers checking into an attempted robbery at an auto
repair shop on Sunday spotted a car that looked like
one involved in a burglary the week before, police
spokesman Larry Thomason said.
Falling out of the car were gum balls. Just that
morning, a gum ball machine had been reported stolen at
a Danville business.
Police arrested three men in the car, including
21-year-old prison guard Christopher Grant. Police have
since linked them to a string of burglaries and
attempted burglaries in two counties, Thomason said.
All three were charged Monday in county court with five
counts of burglary and one count of residential
burglary.
Authorities at the Danville Correction Center hadn't
decided if action would be taken against Grant, warden
James Schomig said.
==========
Calgary, Canada:
The bride is a sword swallower, the groom tames wasps
and hornets and the maid of honour eats live bugs - all
in all, it was a lovely wedding.
Megan Evans and Jim Rogers were married in front of
about 200 musicians, comedians and assorted freak show
performers who witnessed the union at the Calgary
Science Centre Saturday night.
Evans, a member of the Virtual Insanity show, is billed
as Canada's only female sword swallower.
"She also lies on a bed of nails," said excited
bridesmaid Brenda Fox. Rogers is Calgary's Bee Man, she
said.
"He goes out to where people are having problems with
bees and he tames them with his bare hands, then
relocates them to a more friendly atmosphere," said
Fox, who eats maggots and worms as part of her
performance with the troupe.
The wedding was the first one to be held in the science
centre and the couple pulled out all the stops.
Everything from projectors, slides, videos, music and
lasers were used in the nuptials.
Their honeymoon plans were kept under wraps but Fox
said the bride and groom may take a tent to some
"backwoods" area.
==========
Syracuse, New York:
It looked as though Annette Decker was making amends
when she handed over a $20,000 check to her lawyer in
February.
The money was restitution under a court agreement for
the tab she had run up on four credit cards she got by
using a former boss's name.
Everything seemed fine.
Until police learned where the $20,000 came from.
Decker admitted Thursday in Onondaga County Court that
she stole $28,000 from The Pyramid Cos. in rent paid by
business tenants at Pyramid's Holyoke Mall in
Massachusetts.
Decker, 30, of Camillus, pleaded guilty to grand
larceny. She had faced up to seven years in prison but
Judge Joseph Fahey agreed to five years probation.
Sentencing was set for Nov. 19.
According to police, Decker falsified business records
at Pyramid, where she worked as a lease administrator,
and later stole money from a Syracuse travel agency
after taking a job as the business' comptroller. She
was charged with multiple counts of falsifying records,
forgery and grand larceny.
In April, another judge told Decker that if she stayed
out of trouble for six months, the credit card case
would be dismissed. Decker had admitted that in 1994
she used a former boss's name to apply for credit cards
and ran up bills totaling $24,000.
===========
Hyannis, Massachusetts:
The high school's new $45 million wing is so soundproof
that youngsters can't hear the fire alarms - so the
school board is hiring firefighters to stand guard at
nearly $1,000 a day.
Barnstable High School officials discovered that the
hallway alarms cannot be heard in 70 classrooms in the
new wing, which uses concrete supports and thick
ceiling tiles to make it earthquake proof and virtually
soundproof.
Officials considered using a louder alarm or having it
routed through each classroom's public address system.
But neither plan met codes.
Until the problem can be fixed, fire codes require the
school keep three firefighters on duty from 7 a.m. to 7
p.m. each school day. If the fire alarms sound, the
firefighters will let everyone know.
The problem was discovered a week before school started
Sept 8.
"This was a surprise to us," said Harry Holway, a
Barnstable School Committee member and chairman of the
building committee.
"We went to the fullest extent of the building code and
beyond and, I think, caught the engineers off guard.
The building is so well-constructed, you can't hear the
alarms."
Nine firefighters work four-hour shifts - all of it
overtime - at $25 or more per hour. The firefighters
will be paid out of the building project's $1 million
contingency fund.
The building committee will discuss a permanent
solution next week.
==========
Chow
SuperChef
WhiteBoard News Service Bureau Chef
www.joeha.com/whiteboard
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