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Mike Pingree

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April 30, 2000

MESS WITH ME, WILL YOU? Paramilitary thugs have been kidnapping prominent athletes in Jamundi, a wild and volatile town in Colombia, for several months, but last week they picked on the wrong guy: Olympic sharpshooter Bernado Tobar.
He had been practicing at the shooting range, and was headed home with his wife and children when two would-be kidnappers blocked the road with a taxi and opened fire.
Tobar grabbed his target pistol and shot both men dead.

FOOL ME TWICE, SHAME ON ME: Four months after scamming an elderly Tennessee woman out of $11,700, Melvin Alexander, a conman, sent his female accomplice - who posed as a police officer investigating the case - to the same victim to swindle her again, police said.
The accomplice told the 70-year-old woman that the conman had been arrested (he hadn't), and managed to talk her into withdrawing $6,700 from her bank to help, she said, catch a counterfeiter.
The accomplice, identified as Gwendolyn McClain, then fled with the money after scuffling with the old lady and other bank customers. Alexander, who was hiding nearby, was arrested as he helped McClain get away.

ROOK TO QUEEN'S BISH... WHAM! As David Beaumont played a chess game in the fourth round of the prestigious Doeberl Cup matches in Canberra, he says that Alexander Gaft, a possible future tournament opponent, purposely distracted him from the sidelines.
Unable to get him to stop, Beaumont got up and belted him. The fistfight lasted several minutes before other players separated them. Such episodes are considered rare in the serene world of chess.

NOW, BE CAREFUL WITH THESE: While Betty Smith, a 66-year-old grandmother, was visiting relatives in Vancouver, Wash., they asked her to take two handguns - a .357 Ruger and a .22-caliber revolver - back with her when she flew home to Eagle River, Alaska.
Alas, Betty failed to unload the weapons before packing them into her suitcase. When a baggage handler threw her luggage into the plane's cargo hold, the .357 went off, sending a bullet ricocheting through the underside of the passenger compartment and into a baby's diaper bag which was sitting on the floor. Airline officials gave Betty a stern lecture.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZ! ARGHHHH! Thomas Brady was a very loud snorer. Since he was also a criminal, he was doing his snoring in a cell at the Mountjoy Prison in Dublin. But when the guards made their early-morning rounds, they discovered that he was not making a sound. That's because he had been stabbed to death during the night.
His cellmate, who had not been getting his rest, is considered a prime suspect.

Mike Pingree writes another Looking Glass column in the Boston Sunday Herald. You can read it at bostonherald.com.

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