News of the Weird May 24, 2019

LEAD STORY -- If at First You Don't Succeed ...

Jennifer G. Hernandez, 58, is nothing if not persistent. On April 22, Hernandez walked through the vehicle gate at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where she was stopped by a police officer. She explained that she had an interview in the complex, but the officer discovered she had no official business there and told her to leave. On May 1, Military Times reported, Hernandez returned, this time in a Lyft vehicle, again asking to see her recruiter. She was issued a written warning and directed to leave. On May 2, she was back (in an Uber this time), telling officers she returned because the recruiter's "phone was off." On that day, officers inadvertently kept her North Carolina ID card, so on May 3, she came back to pick it up, and also asked if she could speak to "Agent Penis." Promising to leave by bus, Hernandez ultimately refused, telling an officer, "Do you really think I'm going to leave?" And that's when they'd had enough. Hernandez was arrested and charged with trespassing. [Military Times, 5/8/2019]


The Continuing Crisis

An employee of Candyland Park in Longwood, Florida, was surprised on the evening of May 12 when he spotted a man shooting hoops without a stitch of clothing on. Police responded to the 911 call and found Jordon Anderson, 29, who said he was working on his game and "feels playing naked enhances his skill level," according to The Smoking Gun. Officers asked Anderson to put his clothes back on, which he did, but he was still charged with indecent exposure. [The Smoking Gun, 5/13/2019]


Unconventional Weapons

-- We don't know what brought 29-year-old Coffii Castellion of Largo, Florida, to the Mease Dunedin Hospital emergency room on May 13, but we know where she went afterward: the Pinellas County jail. According to The Smoking Gun, Castellion first caused a stir when she nicked seven bathing cloths and 10 pairs of hospital slippers, valued at a combined $10.79, earning her a felony charge because of her two previous theft convictions. But her most grievous crime that evening was "taking a (used) feminine pad from underneath her pants" and throwing it at a health care provider, striking her in the stomach. For that, Castellion was charged with battery and held on $7,000 bond. [The Smoking Gun, 5/15/2019]

-- Shonta Bolds, 36, was arrested on May 11 and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon after she threw a coconut at a man who was sitting on the porch of the VIP Gentleman's Club in Key West, Florida. The man had started filming Bolds, which upset her, leading her to yell at him and call him names. Fox News reported that Bolds admitted to throwing the coconut but noted "it did not hit him." Police explained to Bolds that since she was outside of the club, she could have no expectation of privacy. [Fox News, 5/15/2019]


A Birthday Girl Scorned

Georgia Michelle Zowacki of West Newton Borough, Pennsylvania, celebrated her 55th birthday on May 15 by drinking vodka all day, according to her boyfriend, David Rae. They also went out to dinner to mark the occasion, but after they returned home, Zowacki became angry that there were no gifts or cards or a cake. "Next thing you know, I'm getting stabbed," Rae told KDKA. He told Westmoreland County Police Zowacki came at him with a box cutter: "She went to my neck, she says, 'I'm going to kill you.'" She ended up cutting his arm. Then she "destroyed" his bedroom, throwing his TV to the floor and breaking his bed. She was charged with aggravated assault and spent the rest of her birthday in jail. [KDKA, 5/16/2019]


Fine Points of the Law

In December, three dancers at the Foxy Lady strip club in Providence, Rhode Island, were arrested after allegedly offering sex in exchange for money. On May 15, the last of those dancers to appear in court, Lindsay Hoffmann, 30, was cleared on those charges. It all came down to one word: "anything." Officer Sean Lafferty, an undercover investigator at the club that night, testified that Hoffmann approached him and told him that for $300, he could get anything he wanted in a downstairs VIP room, reported the Providence Journal. Lafferty believed her offer was of a sexual nature, but Judge Melissa DuBose said "anything" could have meant, well, anything. "You could ask 50 people... and it would be a range from really freaky stuff to stuff that would be completely benign," she said. Lafferty admitted that Hoffmann did not explicitly offer sex, even during a $160 nude lap dance. Hoffmann declined to comment. [Providence Journal, 5/15/2019]


Precocious

A preschool student at St. Cyprian Children's Center in Philadelphia arrived at school on May 14 with a little something extra in his pocket: a baggie containing 22 purple plastic bags of crack cocaine. Fox29 News reported that a teacher's aide noticed the bulge in the 5-year-old's pocket and asked him to take the item out. He told her the person who had handed him the bag had asked him to hide it. Philadelphia police are investigating. [Fox29, 5/15/2019]


Unclear on the Concept

-- Jesse Barner-Walton, 39, of Webster, Massachusetts, got a free ride from police after refusing to leave the Cadillac Ranch bar in Southington, Connecticut, on May 5. But as he sat in the back seat, he repeatedly called 911, according to WTIC. Finally the officers pulled over to make him stop, but he became uncooperative when officers tried to put handcuffs on. Barner-Walton was charged with misuse of the 911 system and interfering with an officer. [WTIC, 5/14/2019]

-- Leonard Olsen, 70, was arrested in Lakeland, Florida, on May 10 for reckless driving after an off-duty sheriff's deputy filmed him sitting on his sunroof while his Cadillac motored down the road at about 40 mph. When Florida Highway Patrol troopers asked him about riding on his sunroof, Olsen said he "didn't know about that" but later admitted that the car was on cruise control. "The car drives itself and has a gigantic computer in it," he said, according to WTSP. "I thought it would be a nice way to praise God for a minute ... and that's what I did." After his arrest, Olsen told officers he would rather be taken to jail than back to his wife, who "treats (him) like a servant." [WTSP, 5/11/2019]


What's in a Name?

Dog owners in China are advised to take great care when naming their pets, as was demonstrated by the case of a man from Anhui Province. The man, a dog breeder named Ban, was summoned by police on May 13 after posting on social media that he had two new dogs named Chengguan and Xieguan -- titles given to law enforcement personnel dealing with petty crimes and traffic issues, the BBC reports. He was sentenced to 10 days in a detention center in Xiangyang. One police officer said Ban had "caused great harm to the nation and the city's urban management, in terms of their feelings." For his part, Ban said he "didn't know this was illegal." [BBC, 5/14/2019]


Source acknowledgement. News of the Weird by the Editors at Andrews McMeel Syndication