Minneapolis car dealer has car accident

Top automotive dealer Denny Hecker was taken to the hospital on Thursday after suffering injuries in a one-car traffic accident.

Police in the Minneapolis suburb of Plymouth said Hecker went off a road and struck a utility pole around 8:15 on Wednesday night. Paramedics took him to the hospital, where he was in fair condition Thursday at North Memorial Medical Center in Robbinsdale.

Jon Austin, Denny Hecker Automotive Group’s spokesperson, said Hecker’s vehicle went down an embankment and rolled over.

“It was a bad accident,” Austin said. “Denny was roughed up pretty good, but he’s not in any life-threatening situation.”

Austin said he wasn’t aware of the cause of Hecker’s vehicle to drive off the road. He said there were “no indications” that he was under the influence of alcohol.

FL. teen broadcasts suicide over webcam

A South Florida teen committed suicide using a lethal drug overdose in front of a live webcam audience. According to an investigator on Friday, the event occurred 12 hours after he began blogging about his plan to do it.

According to Broward County investigator Wendy Crane, Abraham Biggs, 19, died from a lethal combination of opiates and benzodiazepine, which is used to treat insomnia and depression. At least one of the drugs was prescribed to him and it is yet unclear how he came into possession of the others, said the medical examiner.

Some of the viewers encouraged Biggs, while others tried to talk him out of doing it, and a few were debating whether the dose he took was actually lethal, Crane said. It’s still unknown how many people were watching the broadcast.

Biggs revealed his plan on a body building forum, where some users said they did not take him seriously because he had made statements about killing himself before. Biggs posted a link from there to Justin.tv, a site that gives users the ability to broadcast live videos from their webcams.

Lieutenant Shot to Death During Confrontation

A U.S. Army lieutenant was shot and killed by an Army specialist during a confrontation between the two on Monday. Police arrived on the scene in Killeen, TX and allegedly saw the shooting.

As fire was being exchanged, the specialist then turned the gun around and shot himself in the head. There was also a staff sargeant involoved in the altercation who was not injured. Until all families have been notified, authorities are withholding the identies of those involved.

Eleven Year Old Rape Victim Allowed Abortion

The Romanian government ruled Thursday that, despite the objections of twenty church groups, an eleven year old rape victim would be allowed to have an abortion.

Objections stemmed not only from the girl’s age, but also that she is twenty one pregnant. The legal limit for obtaining an abortion in Romania is fourteen weeks.

The girl’s pregnancy was discovered earlier this month, when her parents took her to the doctor believing she was sick. She told doctors she had been raped by her nineteen year old cousin, who has since disappeared.

Theodora Bertzi, a Labor Ministry official who is one of the government officials who ruled on the case stated, “We are talking about … the rights of this child who was subjected to rape and incest.”

Constantin Stoica, spokesman for the Romanian Orthodox Church seemingly agreed, stating that this is “an exceptional situation which must be treated in an exceptional manner and the family is the only one to take this decision.” He further went on to say that while the church, which eighty percent of Romania’s population belongs to, believes abortion is a crime exceptions are made in the case of incest and rape.

Parents will not be Prosecuted for Selling Baby on eBay

The names of a twenty three year old woman and twenty four year man in Germany who posted an ad on eBay selling their baby “as a joke” were not released.

 

The ad, posted May 24^th read, “Offering my nearly new baby for sale, as it has gotten too loud. It is a male baby, nearly 28 inches long and can be used either in a baby carrier or a stroller.” It was online for one two and a half hours before being removed, and received no bids.

 

Investigators removed the child from the home during the investigation, though the family still remained in contact, even sleeping together at the facility the baby was being held. He was away from home for several days but was returned to his parents Thursday.

 

The parents maintained that the affair was simply a joke gone wrong, a claim prosecutors found to be true.

Deputy Chief of Child Services, Otto Gaschler, said that, “the parents saw the bid as a joke,” Gaschler said. “It was like a game for them. They never thought that this stupid joke could have such an effect.” No charges will be filed.     

Three Teachers, Three Sex Scandals: All in One Day

Almost one on top of the other, three stories have emerged of unrelated teachers involved in sex scandals with students.

The first woman, Maggie Laughlin, aged twenty-three and engaged, is a former junior high math teacher from Mentor, Ohio. She is accused of having sexual contact with a fifteen year old student, and was arrested Wednesday night for charges of third-degree sexual battery and fourth-degree unlawful sexual conduct with a minor.

She was caught when the student allegedly told his girlfriend he was “cheating on her with teach”, prompting the girl to tell her mother, who notified police.

Laughlin has entered no plea, but if she is found guilty she could face up to six and a half years in jail.

Julie Pritchett, the second teacher who is accused of sexual misconduct with students, is a thirty-four year old married former special education teacher from Trussville, Alabama. She allegedly was involved with eight male high school students, ranging in age from fifteen to nineteen years old.

Pritchett was reported to authorities by a parent of one of the teen boys filed a complaint.

Pritchett has been arrested on two counts of second degree sodomy and one count of second-degree sexual abuse. She is only being prosecuted for two of the male students she was involved with, as the others are all either above the age of consent or refused to cooperate with authorities.

The third woman, Adrienne LaFlamme is a sixty year old science teacher at the Brevard County Juvenile Detention Center in Sharpes, Florida who was arrested on fifteen counts of unlawful sex with minors.

LaFlamme allegedly began a sexual relationship with a seventeen year old student she taught a few days after he was released from the detention center. Their relationship reportedly included drug usage and a threesome with a fourteen year old male.

She is currently being held on $225,000 bail.

Naked Cowboy Can Proceed with Lawsuit

The underwear-clad New York guitarist known as the “Naked Cowboy” can proceed with his trademark infringement lawsuit against the maker of M&Ms and its ad agency, a New York judge has ruled. If you’ve visited New York and have walked in the Times Square area, you’ve probably seeing the Naked Cowboy (Robert Buck) strumming on his guitar.

Burck has become a fixture in Times Square for playing the guitar dressed in a white cowboy hat, white cowboy boots and white underpants while tourists pose with him for pictures and slip money into his boots.

Earlier this year the street performer filed a lawsuit against Mars Inc. and Chute Gerdeman Inc., after they released a video billboard showing a guitar-playing blue M&M dressed in a white cowboy hat, cowboy boots and underpants.

The company also ran print ads showing a similar yellow M&M.

Burck says in his lawsuit that he has registered trademarks to the Naked Cowboy name and likeness.

The lawsuit alleges that the ads violate Burck’s right to privacy and infringe on his trademark by “using his likeness, persona, and image for commercial purposes without his written permission and by falsely suggesting that he endorses M&M candy.”  Watch the Naked Cowboy in his natural environment »

U.S. District Judge Denny Chin ruled Monday that the trademark infringement claim can proceed.

Chin dismissed the privacy claim, however, saying New York law protects only the “name, portrait, or picture of a living person” and not a character “created or a role performed by a living person,” according to a statement from the court.

Lawyers for Mars and Chute Gerdeman did not return calls for comment.

Mars issued a statement saying, “we do not comment on matters of litigation. However, as a good corporate citizen, Mars will handle this matter accordingly.”

Burck said he is looking forward to pursuing the matter.

“I have spent 10 years in every kind of weather and going through the legal, step by step [process of getting a trademark],” Burck said. “It is imperative that damages are pushed so … an example will be set.”

He is seeking up to $100 million in punitive damages, plus attorney’s fees.

Chin ordered attorneys for both sides to appear at a pretrial conference July 11, according to the statement.