Addicted to Egg Rolls?

US agent was allegedly bribed with cash, egg rolls

Jun 26 2013 07:32PM EST

SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) — An immigration officer has been indicted on charges that she took cash and egg rolls as bribes from immigrants seeking citizenship and green cards.
Federal prosecutors say 47-year-old Mai Nhu Nguyen was indicted Wednesday on three counts of solicitation of a bribe by a public official.
Prosecutors say Nguyen took 200 egg rolls from a citizenship applicant and received $1,000 and $2,200 bribes from two other immigrants since 2011.
Nguyen worked as an officer for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in Santa Ana where she reviewed immigrants' applications for benefits.
Nguyen was arrested June 6 and released on a $20,000 bond. She is set to be arraigned July 1.
A message left for an attorney for Nguyen was not immediately returned.

Beauty Pageants From Behind Bars

      In a country known for its beauty -- both natural and human -- it appears that even Brazil's convicted killers are easy on the eye.

A prison in Recife, a city in the state of Pernambuco, recently held its inaugural Miss Jail pageant to join a growing global list of contests for beauties behind bars.

"It's flattering that people think I am pretty," said the winner of Miss Jail 2011, 19-year-old convicted murderer Rebecca Rhaysa Suelen Guedesin.

Europics/CEN

Rebecca Rhaysa Suelen Guedesin, 19, second from right, was voted Miss Jail in the Brazilian state of Pernambuco. She's been imprisoned in Recife since December for homicide.

"I don't have a boyfriend at the moment," added Guedesin, who maintains her innocence even though she is serving a life sentence for her crime.

"I am just focused on getting out of here. I never killed anyone, so I hope to return to normal life one day soon."

Twelve contestants were judged for beauty, general knowledge and their good behavior record. First prize included about $1,000 in cash to be deposited in the winner's prison bank account.

"It was a real thrill to be cheered by the inmates and the guards," Guedesin said after her win. "Sadly the dress has to go now and it's back to prison routine."

Brazil's Ministry of Social Development and Human Rights organized the contest within a jail system more known for its ugly brutality.

In one recent reported case, a 15-year-old girl was held for a month in a cell with 20 adult men and subjected to rape and torture.

According to Brazil's Justice Ministry, 40 percent of female inmates are in prison for drug trafficking and 21 percent for theft.

Miss Jail is the latest in a growing trend. Prison beauty pageants have also been held in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, as well as in Russia, Colombia and Lithuania.

The winner of Miss Spring, held in an all-women's Siberian jail known as UF 91/9, was awarded early release if she won that contest.

Contestants in the Miss Captivity pageant, held in a Lithuanian jail, were required to take part in swimsuit parades and model designer dresses and wedding gowns.

The Miss Prisoner contest in Rio de Janeiro's Talavera Bruce jail is part of an effort by the jail's administration to reinvent its notorious prison system.

"They used to have riots, but now we don't have more than isolated problems," said guard Andrea Carvalho.

Man Rats Out Mom As Bank Robber

Mich. man recognizes mom as bank robbery suspect

Jun 26 2013 

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BYRON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — The FBI says a Michigan man who recognized his mother in surveillance photos of a bank robbery called police to turn her in.
MLive.com (http://bit.ly/18gvfgh ) reports the man told police his mother was at his home in Kent County's Byron Township.
Authorities say 53-year-old Dee Ann Sanders of Martin was charged Tuesday with robbing a Bank of America branch on June 18.
Her arraignment is scheduled Thursday in Grand Rapids.
A teller says the robber handed her a note demanding $2,500 for her children and grandchildren. She got $1,092.
Surveillance photos show a woman wearing a bright red T-shirt with a large American flag on the front.
FBI special agent Adam Van Deuren says Sanders confessed.
It's unknown if she has a lawyer yet. She doesn't have a phone listing.

Mother-Daughter Murderesses Kill Two Family Members - Try to Kill Third

2 Mo. women charged in antifreeze poisoning deaths

Jun 22 2013 

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri woman and her daughter confessed to fatally poisoning two relatives with antifreeze and attempting to kill a third over a 14-month period, according to court documents.
Diane Staudte, 51, of Springfield, was charged Friday with two counts of first-degree murder, one count of first-degree assault and one count of armed criminal action. Her daughter, Rachel Staudte, 22, was charged with the same counts Saturday.
Both women are jailed without bond. A spokeswoman for the Greene County prosecutor's office didn't immediately return an email Saturday from The Associated Press. It wasn't clear if the women had attorneys.
Diane Staudte initially told law enforcement that her husband, Mark Staudte, 61, hadn't been feeling well and suffered from seizures before his April 2012 death, the probable cause statement said. And she said her son, Shawn Staudte, 26, had been sick with flu-like symptoms before his death in September.
The medical examiner in Greene County at first ruled that the husband died of natural causes and the son as a result of prior medical issues. But an anonymous tip led authorities to re-examine the deaths earlier this month following the hospitalization of Diane Staudte's daughter, 24-year-old Sarah Staudte, the statement said.
A detective wrote that a nurse told him that although Sarah Staudte's condition was potentially fatal, Diane Staudte had visited only a couple times and not stayed long. The nurse described Diane Staudte's actions as "inappropriate," saying she joked and laughed with hospital personnel. The nurse also told the detective that Diane Staudte told her that she planned to go on an upcoming vacation to Florida regardless of her daughter's status.

A doctor told the detective that Sarah Staudte's condition was "very suspicious" and said he suspected the young woman had been poisoned.
Diane Staudte admitted under questioning to poisoning her family by putting antifreeze in their soda and Gatorade over several days, the statement said.
She told the detective that she killed her husband because she "hated him" and her son because he was "worse than a pest." She said she wanted to kill her daughter, Sarah, because the young woman "would not get a job and had student loans that had to be paid," the probable cause statement said.
The Springfield News-Leader, citing the probable cause statement in Rachel Staudte's case, said Diane Staudte originally told police she was the only one involved. But the statement said that when Rachel Staudte was confronted with evidence, she admitted to taking part in the deaths and assault.
During a subsequent interview, Diane Staudte then admitted that she and Rachel Staudte had planned, researched and committed the crimes together, the statement said.

Inmate "Beer Runs" Permitted By Jailers

PAGO PAGO, American Samoa (AP) - October 3, 2012  -- Two corrections officers at American Samoa's only jail are suspected of letting inmates leave to go on beer and food runs.

Officers Fiti Aina and Rocky Tua were charged this week with aiding the escape of a prisoner, permitting escape and public servant acceding to corruption.

A police search at Territorial Correctional Facility in July turned up beer in an inmate's cell.

Police say that while trying to find out how it got there, they learned the officers were sending inmates unsupervised to a nearby store. One inmate allowed out is serving 40 months for assaulting another man with a machete.

Court documents say an inmate told investigators he bought beer for another inmate and chips and cookies for Tua.

Aina and Tua were each held on $10,000 bail.

Nik Wallenda Tempts Fate

Wallenda to cross gorge near Grand Canyon on wire

Jun 21 2013 0

(The Associated Press)

High wire performer Nik Wallenda walks across a wire as he practices Tuesday, June 18, 2013 in Sarasota, Fla. Wallenda, a seventh generation high-wire walker, will attempt to walk across the Grand Canyon on Sunday, June 23, 2013. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

SARASOTA, Fla. (AP) — Nik Wallenda, the Florida-based daredevil, acrobat and heir to the famed Flying Wallendas circus family, is afraid of only one thing.

"I would say the only thing I fear is God," said the 34-year-old Wallenda.

He certainly had no fear of walking across Niagara Falls on a tightrope, riding a bike on a high wire 260 feet above the ground or hanging from a hovering helicopter by his teeth.

On Sunday, Wallenda will attempt an even more ambitious feat, even for a man who was born into a family of risk-takers.

He will bid to walk on a tightrope stretched across the Little Colorado River Gorge near the Grand Canyon. The event, which will be broadcast on live television at 8 p.m. EDT on Sunday with a 10 second delay, will take place on the Navajo reservation near Cameron, outside the boundaries of Grand Canyon National Park.

Wallenda will walk a third of a mile across a wire suspended 1,500 feet above the river. (In comparison, the Empire State Building in New York City is 1,454 feet high).

Spotlessly Clean Car - Price: $800

Driver says he was speeding so he could dry car

 Jun 18 2013

BLACK DIAMOND, Alberta (AP) — He was drying off his freshly washed car.

That's what the Canadian man told the Mounties when they stopped him doing 180 kilometers per hour (112 mph) south on Highway 22 south of Black Diamond, Alberta in Western Canada.

The driver, a 67-year-old who lives in the area, was in court Monday.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said Tuesday the judge fined the man $800 and suspended him from driving for 45 days.