SWAT-ing Fries 8.4
When 12-year-old Ansche Hedgepeth was discovered violating the
Metro's "zero tolerance" policy by Washington transit police, she
was arrested, handcuffed and taken off to a detention center. But
Hedgepeth wasn't holding drugs or a gun: she was eating French fries,
and just happened to be caught in the Great Snack Scofflaw Crackdown
of 2000.
After hearing numerous commuter complaints about snacking on Metro
trains, the
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TERRY LABAN
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Washington Post reports, Metro Transit Police Chief Barry McDevitt
decided that enough was enough and launched a week-long crackdown
on snackers involving a dozen undercover officers (who apparently
don't have anything better to do). In all, 35 violators were nabbed
by police.
While most of the adults were simply given citations, juveniles
charged with criminal offenses have to be taken into custody. And,
as the chief told the Post, "Anyone taken into custody has to be
handcuffed for officer safety" because youngsters "can kill you
too." (Though probably not, even the chief would admit, with a side
order of fries.)
Hedgepeth, who some say was targeted for arrest because she is
black, is being forced to atone for her, er, crime, with community
service and counseling. She may also face disciplinary actions at
school for her reckless snacking, the Post reports.
Hard-Knock Life 6.8
The BBC is in hot water after one of its film crews left a child
pretending to be a homeless African orphan on the doorstep of a
London-area resident--as part of an ill-conceived, Candid-Camera-style
practical joke. According to London's Daily Telegraph, Gillian
Dumbarton answered the door of her Croxley Green home to find a
man claiming to be raising money for African children. After she
gave the man a one-pound note, the Telegraph reports, "a
wooden box was unloaded from a lorry, out of which came a 7-year-old
actor pretending to be an African child. As the boy ran toward her,
she was told she would have to keep him."
After the film crew came out of hiding and revealed it had all
been a joke, an angry Dumbarton called police. "I've got a sense
of humor," she explained, "but this was in such bad taste when you
think of all the disasters that have hit people in Africa."
The BBC has apologized for the incident, saying it didn't mean
any offense.
Say What? 7.9
When Bill Clinton decided to make some critical remarks about Vietnam's
lack of human rights in a recent speech at Hanoi's National University,
the translator for the Vietnamese government seemed to have wax
in his ears. "Most of Clinton's uncontroversial remarks were rendered
clearly," Reuters reports, "but the translation became hopelessly
garbled when Clinton touched on human rights."
Clinton noted, for example, that "only you can decide how to weave
individual liberties and human rights into the rich and strong fabric
of Vietnamese national identity." But the translator rendered his
comments as "only you can decide (pause) on how to live with the
issue, um, (pause) in the issue that human rights in Vietnam and
in the society then you make a decision on your own."
Not that Clinton was exactly forthcoming himself, pointedly refusing
to apologize for American actions during the Vietnam War.
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