11/30/98

1998 DARWIN AWARD CANDIDATES

Once again it is time to start thinking about casting your vote
for the 1998 Darwin Award winner! As you may already know,
the Darwin Awards are for those nominees who contribute to
the gene pool by dying in spectacularly stupid ways before
they breed (thankfully). The 1998 nominees are:

NOMINEE No. 1 [San Jose Mercury News]: An unidentified man,
using a shotgun like a club to break a former girlfriend's
windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when the gun
discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.

NOMINEE No.2: [Kalamazoo Gazette] James Burns, 34, (a mechanic)
of Alamo, Mich., was killed in March as he was trying to repair
what police described as a "farm-type truck." Burns got a friend
to drive the truck on a highway while Burns hung underneath so
that he could ascertain the source of a troubling noise. Burns'
clothes caught on something, however,and the other man found
Burns "wrapped in the drive shaft."

NOMINEE No.3: [Hickory Daily Record] Ken Charles Barger, 47,
accidentally shot himself to death in December in Newton, N.C.
Awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside his bed,
he reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson .38
Special, which discharged when he drew it to his ear.

NOMINEE No.4: [UPI, Toronto] Police said a lawyer demonstrating the
safety of windows in a downtown Toronto skyscraper crashed through
a pane with his shoulder and plunged 24 floors to his death. A police
spokesman said Garry Hoy, 39, fell into the courtyard of the Toronto
Dominion Bank Tower early Friday evening as he was explaining the
strength of the building's windows to visiting law students. Hoy
previously has conducted demonstrations of window strength
according to police reports. Peter lawyers, managing partner of the
firm Holden Day Wilson, told the Toronto Sun newspaper that Hoy
was "one of the best and brightest" members of the 200-man
association.

NOMINEE No.5: [Bloomburg News Service] A terrible diet and room
with no ventilation are being blamed for the death of a man who
was killed by his own gas. There was no mark on his body but an
autopsy showed large amounts of methane gas in his system. His
diet had consisted primarily of beans and cabbage (and a couple of
other things). It was just the right combination of foods. It
appears that the man died in his sleep from breathing the
poisonous cloud that was hanging over his bed. Had he been outside
or had his windows been opened, it wouldn't have been fatal. But the
man was shut up in his near airtight bedroom.
According to the article, "He was a big man with a huge capacity for
creating "this deadly gas." Three of the rescuers got sick and one
was hospitalized.

NOMINEE No.6: [The News of the Weird.] Michael Anderson Godwin
made News of the Weird posthumously. He had spent several years
awaiting South Carolina's electric chair on a murder conviction
before having his sentence reduced to life in prison.
Whilst sitting on a metal toilet in his cell and attempting to fix
his small TV set, he bit into a wire and was electrocuted.

NOMINEE NO.7: ["The Indianapolis Star"]. A cigarette lighter may
have triggered fatal explosion - Dunkirk, Indiana. A Jay County
man using a cigarette lighter to check the barrel of a muzzle
loader was killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in
his face, sheriff's investigators said. Gregory David Pryor, 19,
died in his parents' rural Dunkirk home about 11:30p.m.
Investigators said Pryor was cleaning a 54-caliber muzzleloader
that had not been firing properly. He was using the lighter to look
into the barrel when the gunpowder ignited.

NOMINEE No.8: [AP, St. Louis] Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently
being disorderly in a St. Louis market. When the clerk threatened
to call police, Puelo grabbed a hot dog, shoved it in his mouth,
and walked out without paying for it. Police found him unconscious
in front of the store; paramedics removed the six-inch wiener
from his throat, where it had choked him to death.

NOMINEE No.9: [Unknown] To poacher Marino Malerba, who shot
a stag standing above him on an overhanging rock-and was
killed instantly when it fell on him.

NOMINEE No.10: [Associated Press, Kincaid, W. VA]
Blasting Cap Explodes in Man's Mouth at Party. A man at a
party popped a blasting cap into his mouth and bit down,
triggering an explosion that blew off his lips, teeth and tongue,
state police said Wednesday. Jerry Stromyer, 24, of Kincaid, bit
the blasting cap as a prank during a party late Tuesday night,
said Cpl. M.D. Payne. "Another man had it in an aquarium,
hooked to a battery, and was trying to explode it," Payne said.
"It wouldn't go off" and this guy said, "'I'll show you how to set
it off."

NOMINEE No.11: [Reuters, Mississauga, Ontario] A man cleaning a
birdfeeder on the balcony of his condominium apartment in this
Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23 stories to his death. Stefan
Macko, 55, was standing on a wheeled chair when the accident
occurred, said Inspector D'Arcy Honer of the Peel regional police.
"It appears the chair moved and he went over the balcony," Honer
said.

NOMINEE No.12: [UPI, Portland, OR] Doctors at Portland's University
Hospital said Wednesday an Oregon man shot through the skull by a
hunting arrow is lucky to be alive, and will be released soon from
the hospital. Tony Roberts, 25, lost his right eye during an
initiation into a men's rafting club, Mountain Men Anonymous, in
Grants Pass,OR. A friend tried to shoot a beer can off his head, but
the arrow entered Roberts' right eye. Doctors said had the arrow gone
1 millimeter to the left, a major blood vessel would have cut and
Roberts would have died instantly. Neurosurgeon Dr. Johnny Delashaw at
the University Hospital in Portland said the arrow went through 8 to 10
inches of brain, with the tip protruding at the rear of his skull, yet
somehow managed to miss all major blood vessels. Delashaw also said
that if Robert had tried to pull the arrow out he surely would have
killed himself. Roberts admitted afterwards he and his friends had
been drinking that afternoon. Said Roberts, "I feel so dumb about
this."

NOMINEE No.13 The Calgary Sun Saturday, December 28, 1996
VANCOUVER (CP)-A man arguing over a love triangle accidentally
shot himself in the groin, taking off his testicles and part of his
penis. Police said the man was waving a .357 Magnum revolver
around during the shouting match early yesterday. But when he
stuffed it back in his pants the gun went off. Police were called to
the hospital after the man in his 20s was brought in by friends.
Charges are pending against the victim, who is expected to survive.

AND FINALLY, NOMINEE No.14!!!: [Arkansas Democrat Gazette] Two
local men were seriously injured when their pick-up truck left the
road and struck a tree near Cotton Patch on State Highway 38 early
Monday morning. Woodruff County deputy Dovey Snyder reported the
accident shortly after midnight Monday. Thurston Poole, 33, of Des
Arc and Billy Ray Wallis,38, of Little Rock are listed in serious
condition at Baptist Medical Center. The accident occurred as the
two men were returning to Des Arc after a frog gigging trip. On an
overcast Sunday night, Poole's pick-up truck headlights
malfunctioned. The two men concluded that the headlight fuse on the
older model truck had burned out. As replacement fuse was not
available, Wallis noticed that the .22 caliber bullet from his pistol
fit perfectly into the fuse box next to the steering wheel column. Upon
inserting the bullet, the headlights again began to operate properly
and the two men proceeded on east-bound toward the White River
bridge. After traveling approximately twenty miles and just before
crossing the river, the bullet apparently overheated, discharged
and struck Poole in the right testicle. The vehicle swerved sharply to
the right exiting the pavement and striking a tree. Poole suffered only
minor cuts and abrasions from the accident, but will require surgery
to repair the other wound. Wallis sustained a broken clavicle and
was treated and released. "Thank God we weren't on that bridge when
Thurstonshot his _____ off or we might both be dead" stated Wallis.
"I've been a trooper for ten years in this part of the world, but
this is a first for me. I can't believe that those two would admit
how this accident happened," said Snyder. Upon being notified of the
wreck, Lavinia, Poole's wife asked how many frogs the boys had caught
and did anyone get them from the truck.