News of the Weird: Oct. 18, 2018

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Satan Ruled Out

Officials in Midway, Ark., still don’t know what caused flames to shoot out of a hole in the ground on Sept. 17. Volunteer fire chief Donald Tucker was summoned to private property at the edge of town where the flames were shooting up to 12 feet high, reported the Springfield News-Leader. Tucker inspected the site after the fire subsided and said the two-foot-diameter hole was about three feet deep and made a 45-degree turn at the bottom. “I took a temperature reading, and it showed 780 degrees Fahrenheit inside the hole,” he added, but couldn’t identify the source of the flames. There are no gas lines nearby, and there was no smell of gas before or during the fire. He also ruled out a meteor strike or flaming space junk; meanwhile, geologists from the Arkansas Geological Survey inspected the hole, concluding it had been dug by an animal (they took soil samples for testing). Much to the relief of the locals, we’re sure, County Judge Mickey Pendergrass said Satan had also been ruled out.

Strange Brew

On the day Ester Price, 95, of Pamplin, Va., was admitted to the hospital with an unexplained illness, her son-in-law, Jack David Price, 56, had kindly brought her some coffee, which was “not an ordinary event,” according to an investigator. Doctors found signs of meth in her system, reported The News & Advance. Jack Price’s stepdaughter told the Appomattox County Sheriff’s Office she suspected he was trying to kill his mother-in-law, and a neighbor said Price had once told him he should “put some meth in her drink,” then claimed to be only kidding. On Oct. 4, Price was sentenced to six years in prison after pleading guilty to two felonies.

Fun-Sucking Virginians

If you’re over 12-years-old in certain parts of Virginia, you’d better hustle up your own fun for Halloween night. In several communities surrounding Chesapeake and Newport News, KUTV reported, city codes make it a misdemeanor for anyone over 12 to wear a costume and stroll about the neighborhood for candy. Penalties include fines ($25 to $100) and up to six months in jail. Even lawful trick-or-treaters must be done by 8 p.m., and in Newport News, parents accompanying children may not wear masks.

Llama Larceny

Staci Tinney of Charleston, W.V., was expecting a bank statement when she picked up her mail on Oct. 8, but instead she found just one item in her mailbox: a picture of a llama. Tinney’s surveillance video showed “a woman was hanging out of the passenger’s side of a black pickup truck removing things from my mailbox, and it looked like she was putting something in it,” Tinney stated. WCHS reported other neighbors also were missing mail and packages that day and, instead, received llama pictures. “We don’t know anybody who knows a llama personally,” Tinney explained. Charleston police are investigating.

No Squirrelly Passengers Allowed

Frontier Airlines removed a passenger before takeoff from a flight from Orlando, Fla., to Cleveland, Ohio, on Oct. 9 because of her accompanying “emotional support animal,” a squirrel. Passengers were alerted to “a situation” and told they needed to exit the airplane, according to 24-year-old flyer Brandon Nixon of Ashland, Ohio. “You expect the worst when they say something like that,” Nixon told the Associated Press. When he asked a flight attendant for more information, “All she said was: ‘A squirrel.’” Police were called when the woman (and her squirrel) refused to deplane. She was eventually removed and escorted through the terminal, pumping one fist in the air as she held the squirrel in the other.

How-To Video Violator

A Springfield, Mo., man took to Facebook in July to proudly demonstrate how to remove an ankle monitor. Dustin W. Burns, 33, pled guilty earlier this year to violating a restraining order and was placed on probation. Burns used a butter knife and a screwdriver in the video, saying, “This is how you take an ankle bracelet off without breaking the circuit,” according to the Springfield News-Leader. He advises against damaging the electronic equipment so as to avoid thousands of dollars in fines. Subsequent Facebook posts reference trips to Utah, Idaho and Oregon; one particularly in-your-face video shows Burns walking through a large marijuana farm with the caption “A Dream Come True.” He has been in the Greene County jail since Aug. 28 and was charged in early October with tampering with electronic monitoring equipment, a felony.

‘How Happy You Made Me, Oh Mandy’

Police officers in Richardson Forest Preserve, near Cincinnati thought they had come across a gruesome discovery on Oct. 4: a corpse in a plastic trash bag dumped in the woods. Upon further investigation, however, they discovered that the human body was actually “Mandi”—a life-size female sex doll—according to Metro News. Residents from the area later erected a shrine in Mandi’s memory, leaving flowers and candles along with messages, such as, “Mandi, you were taken too soon; we will remember you fondly. RIP.” The doll, which is an expensive, high-end model, makes the unsolved mystery of its disposal even more perplexing...

© 2018 ANDREWS MCMEEL SYNDICATION