[doc.]

Subject : Darwin


> Darwin award nominees
> Hard to believe, but another year has passed. Once again, it's
> timefor the
> Darwin Award Nominees. The Darwin's are awarded every year to
> thepersons
> who died in the most stupid manner, thereby removing themselves
> fromthe
> gene pool. This year's nine nominees are:
>
> Nominee No. 1: [San Jose Mercury News]:
> An unidentified man, using a shotgun like a club to break a
> former
> girlfriend's windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when
> the gun discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.
>
> Nominee No. 2: [Kalamazoo Gazette]:
> James Burns, 34, (a mechanic) of Alamo, MI, was killed in March
> as
> He was trying to repair what police describe as a "farm-type
> truck."
> Burns got a friend to drive the truck on a highway while Burns
> hung
> underneath
> so that he could ascertain the source of a troubling noise.
> Burns'
> clothes caught on something, however, and the other man found
> Burns "wrapped
> in
> the drive shaft."
>
> Nominee No. 3: [Hickory Daily Record]:
> Ken Charles Barger, 47, accidentally shot himself to death in
> December
> in
> Newton, NC. Awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside
> his bed, he
>
> reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson 38
> Special,
> which discharged when he drew it to his ear. (For whatever
> reason, residents
>
> of Southern states always seem to figure prominently among the
> Darwin
> nominees.)
>
> Nominee No. 4: [UPI, Toronto]:
> Police said a lawyer demonstrating the safety of windows in
> A down town Toronto skyscraper crashed through a pane with his
> shoulder and
> plunged 24
> floors to his death. A police spokesman said Garry Hoy, 39, fell
> in to the courtyard of the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower early
> Friday evening
> as he was explaining the strength of the building's windows to
> visiting
> law students.
> Hoy previously has conducted demonstrations of window strength
> according to
>
> police reports. Peter Lawson, managing partner of the firm
> HoldenDay,
> told the Toronto Sun newspaper that Hoy was "one of the best
> and brightest" members of the 200-man association.
>
> Nominee No. 5: [Bloomberg News Service]:
> A terrible diet and a room with no ventilation are being blamed
> for the death of a man who was killed by his own gas emissions.
> There was
> no mark on his body, and an autopsy showed large amounts of
> methane gas in
> his system. His diet had consisted primarily of beans and cabbage
> (and a
> coupleof
> other things). It was just the right combination of foods. It
> appears that
> the man
> died in his sleep from breathing the poisonous cloud that was
> hanging over his bed. Had he been outside or had his windows been
> opened,
> it wouldn't have been fatal. But the man was shut up in his
> nearly
> air tight bedroom.
> According to the article, "He was a big man with a huge capacity
> for
> creating "this deadly gas." Three of the rescuers got sick, and
> one was hospitalized.
>
> Nominee No. 6: [The News of the Weird]:
> Michael Anderson Godwin made News of the Weird posthumously. He
> had spent
> several years awaiting South Carolina's electric chair on a
> murder
> conviction before having his sentence reduced to life in
> prison. While sitting on a metal toilet in his cell attempting to
> fix his
> small
> TV set, he bit into a wire and was electrocuted.
>
> Nominee No. 7: [The Indianapolis Star]:A cigarette lighter may
> have
> triggered a fatal explosion in Dunkirk, IN. A Jay County man,
> using a
> cigarette lighter to check the barrel of a muzzle loader, was
> killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in his face,
> sheriff's
> investigators said Gregory David Pryor, 19, died in his parents'
> rural
> Dunkirk home
> at about 11:30 PM. Investigators said Pryor was cleaning a 54-
> caliber muzzleloader that had not been firing properly. He was
> using the
> lighter to
> look into the barrel when the gunpowder ignited.
>
> Nominee No. 8: [Reuters, Mississauga, Ontario]:
> A man cleaning a bird feeder on the balcony of his
> Condominium apartment in this Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23
> stories to
> his death.
> Stefan Macko, 55, was standing on a wheeled chair when the
> accident
> occurred, said
> Inspector D'Arcy Honer of the Peel Regional Police. "It appears
> That the chair moved, and he went over the balcony," Honer said.
>
> Finally, THE WINNER!!!: [Arkansas Democrat Gazette]:
> Two local men were injured when their pickup truck left the road
> And struck a tree near Cotton Patch on State Highway 38 early
> Monday.
> Woodruff County deputy Dovey Snyder reported the accident shortly
> after
> Midnight Monday.
> Thurston Poole, 33, of Des Arc, and Billy Ray Wallis, 38, of
> Little Rock, were returning to Des Arc after a frog gigging trip
> on an
> Overcast Sunday night when Poole's pickup truck headlights
> malfunctioned.
>
> The two men concluded that the headlight fuse on the older-model
> truck
> had burned out. As a replacement fuse was not available, Wallis
> noticed that the .22 caliber bullet from his pistol fit perfectly
> into the
> fuse
> box next to the steering wheel column. Upon inserting the bullet
> the
> headlights again began to operate properly, and the two men
> proceeded on
> eastbound toward the White River Bridge.
>
> After traveling approximately 20 miles, and just before crossing
> The river, the bullet apparently overheated, discharged, and
> struck Poole in
> the
> testicles. The vehicle swerved sharply right, exiting the
> pavement, and
> striking a tree. Poole suffered only minor cuts and abrasions
> from the
> accident, but will require extensive surgery to repair the damage
> to his
> testicles, which
> will never operate as intended. Wallis sustained a broken
> clavicle and
> was treated and released.
>
> "Thank God we weren't on that bridge when Thurston shot his balls
> off,
> or we might both be dead," stated Wallis. "I've been a trooper
> for 10
> years in this part of the world, but this is a first for me. I
> can't
> believe that those two would admit how this accident happened,"
> said Snyder.
>
> Upon being
> notified of the wreck, Lavinia (Poole's wife) asked how many
> frogs the
> boys had caught and did anyone get them from the truck???
> (Though Poole and Wallis did not die as a result of their
> misadventure
> as
> normally required by Darwin Award Official Rules, it can be
> argued that Poole DID, in fact, effectively remove himself from
> the gene
> pool

[Steve]

Love the last one, some of them are pretty scary but the last one is definitely the winner...how dumb are some people?