xxxNews Of The Weirdxxx

Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.

In April, community activists and other volunteers established a “safe injection site” in Vancouver, British Columbia, so that addicts can bring their heroin, crystal meth or cocaine, and prepare and inject it with clean equipment and in an environment free of hassling by police, who have been reluctant to close the site down. Often, there is a volunteer registered nurse on duty to provide advice on injection technique.

Marion, Ohio, inmate Willie Chapman got permission to delay his scheduled parole by one day until Aug. 12 so he could attend a prison meeting of the religious/personal-responsibility organization Promise Keepers. Chapman’s inspirational decision made the newspapers, inadvertently alerting his manslaughter victim’s family, who complained to the Ohio Parole Board that Chapman should not be free at all. Consequently, the board reconsidered Chapman’s parole and delayed it 991 days, until May 1, 2006.

In Knoxville, Tenn., in September, Thomas Martin McGouey, 51, apparently set on committing suicide, left a note and painted a bull’s-eye on his body before arranging a standoff in which he pointed a gun at police officers so they would kill him in self-defense. McGouey’s scheme failed because Knox County sheriff’s deputies, who fired 28 shots at him, missed with 27 and only grazed his shoulder with the other.
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Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd

NEWS OF THE WEIRD