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Billionaire’s Hit-and-Run Crash Leaves Single Mom With $4K Bill

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Billionaire’s Hit-and-Run Crash Leaves Single Mom With $4K BillDaily News owner and aging billionaire Mort Zuckerman was having a bit too much fun in East Hampton, New York on August 11 when he rammed his Lexus into single mom and store manager Charlene F. Peele’s parked Ford sedan, all but destroying the vehicle. Zuckerman, while claiming to have left his business card at the scene, shortly left the crash site—a violation of state law. Worse, according the New York Post’s Jeane Macintosh, Zuck’s insurance company is refusing to pay for the total cost of the damange, sticking Peele with $4,000 to pay on a car she can’t drive. The East Hampton Star describes the crash:

Driving his car south on Main Street on a clear, sunny afternoon, Mr. Zuckerman, 76, suddenly steered right, his Lexus striking Ms. Peele’s parked 2009 Ford Fusion, according to the accident report. The impact pushed Ms. Peele’s car, which was parked opposite the East Hampton Presbyterian Church, several feet forward.

Peele ended up sending her Ford to the junkyard, leaving her without a way to drive. On Monday — four days after the Star reported Peele’s ordeal, and nearly a month after the accident — she told the New York Post that Zuckerman might not even be aware that his insurance company is stiffing her.

“I had no idea who he was, and it’s really not important. I just want this mess straightened out so I can get my car replaced and get on with my life,” said Peele, who is in the process of being transferred to Miami and leaving for Florida in three weeks. “I called Mr. Zuckerman’s office and spoke to his assistant, and said, ‘I just don’t want any problems’ and was told ‘Don’t worry, it’ll be fine,’” Peele said.

Given the Post’s long-standing rivalry with his own New York tabloid, however, Zuckerman is likely more aware of his insurance’s stinginess than he was on Sunday. And he could certainly afford to make amends: assuming his net worth of $2.4 billion remains accurate, he could buy Pelle more than 140,000 new Ford sedans.

In any case, look forward to more Daily News takedowns of Rupert Murdoch:

[East Hampton Star via New York Post // Image via Associated Press]


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Bejeweled European Skeleton Gods Discovered By "Macabre Art" Expert

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Bejeweled European Skeleton Gods Discovered By "Macabre Art" Expert

In the middle of the European Renaissance, these fantastic skeleton gods were being constructed in the bowels of Europe's Catholic churches. Los Angeles art historian and photographer Paul Koudounaris found these secret saints in catacombs and storage bins across the old Holy Roman Empire.

Made of real human bones and a shockingly vulgar amount of jewels and gold, these creations were constructed to replace older skeleton gods destroyed by Protestant uprisings. Late in the 16th Century, the Vatican began shipping these skeletons to its churches that survived the Reformation, so that believers would have "saints" to pray to once again—while named after popular Catholic saints, the origins of these skeletons are even more dubious than the better known relics of Europe.

Bejeweled European Skeleton Gods Discovered By "Macabre Art" Expert

Koudounaris specializes in macabre art, particularly the human remains used in religious worship around the world. He was reportedly given rare access to these ornate skeletons, which were mostly tucked away a century ago as open worship of bejeweled bones fell out of religious fashion.

Bejeweled European Skeleton Gods Discovered By "Macabre Art" Expert

Heavenly Bodies, Koudounaris' new book of photography about the gruesome bone-gods, will be released next month in time for Halloween. If you enjoy the decorated and costumed skeletons of Mexico's Día de Muertos, their European cousins will look very familiar, even if they lack the whimsy of the New World style.

[Photographs courtesy of Dr. Paul Koudounaris.]

Five Years After Lehman, Is Wall Street Any Safer?

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Five Years After Lehman, Is Wall Street Any Safer?

Five years ago this week, the storied Wall Street firm Lehman Brothers collapsed, heralding the true onslaught of the Great Recession. Has the system been "fixed" since then?

Don't ask me, I work for Gawker.com! However, we can safely say that among the sort of experts who drove the financial system into the Great Recession in the first place, opinion is mixed.

Is Wall Street Less Risky Now?

Yes, says the Wall Street Journal, citing the reformation of Morgan Stanley as a shining example:

The firm also has changed in less noticeable ways. There now are 3,000 different limits that restrict such things as how much capital traders can put at risk, up from 30 before the crisis. About 50 full-time government regulators are now stationed at Morgan Stanley. There were none before 2008, when it was regulated as a brokerage firm instead of a bank. Most deals over $10 million now require a green light from a risk committee and [CEO James] Gorman...

Mr. Gorman's supporters say the firm is setting an example after Wall Street's years of excess, forging a business that more closely resembles the banking industry's old model of eschewing risky bets and collecting reliable fees.

Somewhat, says Bloomberg, in an exhaustive story that outlines the (slow) progress of various post-recession regulatory reforms, while noting that the "Too Big to Fail" problem still clearly exists—and that some on Wall Street are happy to let it remain that way.

“It’s just a reality of the world we live in, and how global and how interrelated it is,” said [former Goldman Sachs exec Daniel] Neidich, CEO of New York-based Dune Real Estate Partners LP. “The benefits that all of that interconnectedness has created are tremendous.” [...]

[Government regulators' plan to wind down the big banks in case of emergency] could fail if some of the world’s largest banks implode simultaneously. Regulators aren’t sure their plan to keep banks’ derivatives-trading partners and lenders from pulling out collateral in a run will work, according to three people with knowledge of the discussions.

Not really, Credit Suisse CEO Brady Dougan tells the FT, because the risk has just been pushed elsewhere:

However, the 54-year-old investment banker, who has been with Credit Suisse for 23 years, warns not to confuse sounder banks with a safer financial system. “Some amount of risk has gone away because some activities are not being undertaken any more. But also a fair amount of risk has been transferred to other parts of the system, areas like shadow banking, insurance companies, pension funds or retail investors,” he says.

In any case, Wall Street can take heart in the fact that it is resoundingly winning the class war.

[Photo: David Shankbone/ Flickr]

Internet Pranks Are Getting Rapey-er Every Day

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YouTube pranksters have long flirted with the fine line between poor taste and out-right crime (some doing a better job of it than others), but two prank videos released in succession this week seem to have hopped over the fence and left that fine line far behind.

The two videos — released as part of a pranking collective featuring YouTubers LAHWF and Stuart Edge — go well beyond the previous touchy-feely shenanigans of the two notorious pranksters.

Whereas Edge's "stolen kiss" pranks were previously consensual, the newly released "Greeting People With A Kiss" involves bombarding random girls with entirely unsolicited lip-smacking.

The second of the two appears more convivial but might actually be creepier.

In "Sweeping Girls Off Their Feet," Edge and LAHWF approach a different set of nonconsenting women and quite literally lift them off the ground and attempt to walk away. Even BroBible was forced to call this premise "maybe the stupidest prank video idea ever."

Some YouTube commenters also tried their hand at explaining to the practical jokesters why sneaking up behind girls and grabbing them without permission might be problematic.

"How many people yelled 'rape'" and were cut out of the video, wondered one.

"Women aren't objects to 'sweep off their feet' and kiss without their consent," explained another. "This is, by any modest definition, a sexual assault."

Most of these voices, however, were drowned out by the bro-haha of the opposite side.

"The people saying this is rape are just the people who would not get picked up," insisted one prank apologist.

"How is it sexual assault if it's not sexual?" inquired another.

"This is risky," conceded a third. "Some girls might file charges of assault/rape... the cunt girls. I'd only do this to girls I know."

Joss Whedon Is Last-Minute Rewriting S.H.I.E.L.D. and Other TV Gossip

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Joss Whedon Is Last-Minute Rewriting S.H.I.E.L.D. and Other TV Gossip

September is upon us, and that can only mean one thing: You can stop pretending you know what people mean when they say "If Chip Kelly's offense stays healthy, Shady is going to be explosive this season!" and go back to talking about God's work—network television. To help you avoid embarrassing yourself at the office Keurig predicting the season's first cancellation—you need a better answer than Dads, it's not June anymore, c'mon—here are some of the best and juiciest rumors we've been hearing:

Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Looks like ABC's highly anticipated Joss Whedon-produced drama is in need of a superhero. A source close to the show tells us that the latest scripts that have come in have been so bad, Whedon had to pull off a page one rewrite just an hour before the table read. Given that Whedon is supposed to be transitioning full showrunner responsibilities to his brother Jed Whedon and sister-in-law Maurissa Tancharoen so that he can focus on his 83 other film projects, this ain't a good sign.

Dads

While most people have written off the Seth Macfarlane-produced Dads as unfunny comedy at best and racist drivel at worst, sources tell us that the dailies coming in on new episodes are shockingly not awful at all. While it doesn't make up for the pilot, it appears the writing staff that was hired for episode 2 onwards is working its ass off to redeem the show. I wouldn't rush to set a season pass on your DVR, but give this one a chance. It may not end up going the way of last year's Animal Practice just yet.

The Mindy Project

To kick off its sophomore season, The Mindy Project will be taking a page out of their season one playbook and making its premiere episode available to stream online a week before the official air date. Yes it has James Franco, and yes we're all super tired of him, but the show found its footing at the tail end of its last season, beefed up its writing staff, and is back better than ever. You can watch it here.

Almost Human

As Deadline reports, Fox's Almost Human is already facing behind the scenes shakeups. Co-showrunner Naren Shankar, who was brought on this May after the show was picked up and presented at Upfronts, has already departed, after a mere three and a half months. Reasons remain unspecified, but if you know anything, do let me know.

As always, please send tips and gossip to beejoli@defamer.com.

The first Atlantic hurricane of the season is coming.

Wikipedia deleted its "Antoinette Tuff" article, instead merging the woman who talked a would-be sho


George Zimmerman's Lawyer Quits Following Domestic Incident

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George Zimmerman's Lawyer Quits Following Domestic Incident

George Zimmerman's attorney is quitting on him, kind of.

Mark O'Mara, who helped successfully defend Zimmerman in the Trayvon Martin murder case, said today that he will not represent Zimmerman in his upcoming divorce or for any charges stemming from a domestic dispute with his estranged wife and father-in-law yesterday. ABC reports that O'Mara "appeared to struggle with his anger at his client during Monday's incident in which he went to Zimmerman's house while police were still there." At a press conference following the argument, O'Mara responded tersely to a question asking if he had any advice for Zimmerman. "Pay me," he said.

O'Mara isn't severing all of his ties with his reviled client, of course, because there's still some money to be squeezed from the circus show that is George Zimmerman's life. The lawyer, who now moonlights as a CNN legal analyst, will still serve as Zimmerman's counsel in a defamation suit against NBC.

[Image via AP]

If You Are On GRINDR And In District 3

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If You Are On GRINDR And In District 3

You will probably get this ad.

[Screen grab from anonymous D&B tipster's smart phone]

Stupid Bullshit "Fake" Van Gogh Turns Out to Be Just a Real Van Gogh

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Stupid Bullshit "Fake" Van Gogh Turns Out to Be Just a Real Van Gogh

A dumb and bad imitation van Gogh painting that was so fake it made people throw-up all over themselves and their nice clothes just to look at it has left the world breathless in awe over its poignant beauty as it has just been revealed, on second thought, to be a real van Gogh.

The painting, an 1888 landscape now called "Sunset at Montmajour," was authenticated by the van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam at the culmination of two years of research. It had come before the museum once before, in 1991, but, at the time, museum experts determined it was a fake. When not serving as the world's largest repository of Vincent van Gogh artworks, the van Gogh Museum functions as a Magic-8 ball. Its hours are 9 a.m. to Reply Hazy, Ask Again Later.

Despite refusing to authenticate the painting two decades earlier, museum officials asked to re-examine the work in 2011. This time when they looked at it, they realized, whoopsie, it's real. Chemical analysis of the pigments showed they were identical to ones found in other van Gogh paintings produced during the artist's prolific stay in the French city of Arles. It was numbered on the back, and catalogued with his brother Theo's collection. Van Gogh also mentioned or described the painting explicitly in multiple letters to his brother. ("It was romantic, it couldn’t be more so, à la Monticelli, the sun was pouring its very yellow rays over the bushes and the ground, absolutely a shower of gold. And all the lines were beautiful; the whole scene had charming nobility," wrote van Gogh, after painting exactly that.) He pretty much did everything he could to show he painted this painting without abandoning the landscape altogether and simply drawing a picture of the words "I, VINCENT VAN GOGH, PAINTED THIS PAINTING" in bubble letters.

Except sign it. He didn't sign it. Possibly because he was displeased with the final result (Who wouldn't be? It looks like a fake van Gogh); probably because he just didn't sign most things.

The painting remained in his brother's collection until 1901, when it was sold to an art dealer, which is where the mystery begins.

In 1908, the van Gogh was purchased by a Norwegian industrialist named Christian Mustad. Shortly thereafter, a French ambassador to Sweden and RUDE-LAND WHERE PEOPLE SAY WHATEVER THEY WANT AND HURT FEELINGS WITHOUT CONSEQUENCE told the Mustad that his van Gogh was a fake. Deeply embarrassed, Mustad banished the painting to his attic where it passed the next six decades surrounded by musty Christmas decorations, paperbacks that smelled like yard sales, and the ghosts of people who had died in the attic. In 1970, following his death, the painting was bought by some IDIOT who couldn't buy a real fake van Gogh if he tried. The museum declined to release the name of the buyer or state whether it had been resold since then.

The painting will go on public display at the museum for one year beginning September 24th. The museum did not provide an estimate of its value, so pick any double digit number, add six zeroes after the end, and that can be your estimate.

[Image via AP]

'Sorcerer' Helps Women Get Over Bad Breakups By Sleeping With Them

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'Sorcerer' Helps Women Get Over Bad Breakups By Sleeping With Them

A man claiming to be a sorcerer with magical healing powers was arrested this week after he allegedly convinced at least one woman that she had to have sex with him in order to get over a bad breakup.

According to police in Tel Aviv, the unnamed 39-year-old was paid thousands of shekels for a series of "magical treatments" aimed at helping the victim recover from being dumped by her boyfriend.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

The story began six months ago, police said, when the woman found the 39-year-old Golan Heights resident on the Internet and asked him to help her with holistic treatment to recover from emotional despair caused by the break-up. Over the coming months the man held a number of meetings with the woman, during which he promised that through the power of sorcery he could make her boyfriend come back to her.

It was during one of those sessions that the man reportedly informed the woman that she had to sleep with him "in order to make the magic work."

He was arrested this past Sunday and charged with sexual assault.

An investigation has since been launched to find other victims of the man's "magic," as well as other "sorcerers" employing similar tactics to exploit desperate women.

In an odd twist made slightly less so by the rest of this story, the victim was also held for questioning by police after it was revealed that she had asked the wizard to beat up her ex-boyfriend's new girlfriend.

Police have placed the woman under house arrest on suspicion of conspiring to cause someone bodily harm.

[H/T: Opposing Views, photo via Shutterstock]

Syria to Declare Chemical Weapons, Plans to "Give Them Up Altogether"

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Just one day after Secretary of State John Kerry said Syria could avoid a U.S. bombing by relinquishing its chemical weapons "without delay and allow the full and total accounting," Syria says it will allow for an accounting of its chemical weapons, with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem saying, "We intend to give up chemical weapons altogether."

Hopefully this means we've avoided a war.

Happy Christmas Advertising Season! *Gunshot*

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Do you know what yesterday was? September 9. Also, the start of the Christmas advertising season. Fuck you, Kmart.

"This might give new meaning to the phrase Christmas Creep," said Kathy Grannis, a spokeswoman for the National Retail Federation, of Kmart's ad. "It's anybody's game right now, wheels are definitely in motion for a very promotional holiday season."

Santa Claus, please burn every last Kmart to the ground.

[Ad Age]

People Aren't as Horribly Lazy as This Startup Hoped

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People Aren't as Horribly Lazy as This Startup Hoped

In the future, you'll barely need to move: food, cars, and laundry will all arrive directly at your door. Think of how much society will save on sidewalks. But this future isn't here yet, as gofer startup Exec learned the hard way—it turns out no one wants on-demand servants.

With human trafficking something of a taboo these days, but other smartphone sloth-enablers like Seamless and Uber proving popular, it made sense to try. After all, if the San Francisco area can support four simultaneous laundry apps, wouldn't more than one errand app be possible? Michael Arrington's CrunchFund and other venture firms kicked over $3 million toward the idea, and TechCrunch's Josh "News Feed" Constine sure liked it:

The Execs would show up in jazzy black track jackets and cordially do whatever you ask. I once had an Exec move my car to avoid parking tickets when I suddenly went out of town, and they saved me a ton. I’ve seen friends successfully use Execs as dog-walkers, bartenders, and urban sherpas.

"Urban sherpas," alright. A rep from Exec explained the decision:

We haven't been able to figure out a great way to scale it beyond SF, but through the process of creating errands we were able to figure out some things people wanted (one major of which was cleaning) and then take the best aspects of errands and apply them to our new business.

So that's how it'll have to be—if you need things cleaned for you, no problem. If you need someone in a black tracksuit to "cordially do whatever you ask," sadly the future is not now.


Man Tries to Show Wife Gun Isn't Loaded, Ends Up Shooting Her Instead

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Man Tries to Show Wife Gun Isn't Loaded, Ends Up Shooting Her Instead

An attempt to show his wife that a gun brought into their home by a friend wasn't loaded went terribly awry for one Vermont man who ended up shooting his wife in the legs.

Authorities in Windsor say Matthew Coleman, 37, had brought the 9mm handgun into the couple's bedroom for safekeeping out of concern that children in the house might play with it.

When his wife, Dorthea, asked him if the gun was loaded, Coleman assured her it wasn't, and demonstrated by pulling the trigger.

The gun went off, and a bullet struck Dorthea in one leg and exited through the other.

Emergency services were called to the scene, and Dorthea was rushed to a nearby hospital. She was conscious and alert at the time.

Police officers subsequently arrested Coleman and charged him with simple assault with a deadly weapon.

The county's Deputy State’s Attorney David Cahill said Coleman avoided a harsher charge of aggravated assault because he failed to demonstrate "extreme indifference to human life."

"Simply put, the state has charged Mr. Coleman for making a tragic, easily avoidable mistake," Cahill told reporters.

Coleman pleaded innocent just the same.

[screengrab via WCAX]

Contributing editor Max Rivlin-Nadler reports that an Orthodox Jewish group is (illegally) sponsorin

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Contributing editor Max Rivlin-Nadler reports that an Orthodox Jewish group is (illegally) sponsoring a cash raffle in Williamsburg to reward residents who voted in today’s city-wide primary. The raffle’s signage encourages entrants to re-elect Brooklyn D.A. Charles Hynes, who helped conceal child sex abuse within the borough’s Orthodox Jewish communities.

[Gothamist]

It's been 20 years since Nirvana's In Utero came out.

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It's been 20 years since Nirvana's In Utero came out. If you want to feel old and young again at the same time, you can listen to Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic reflect on it—and hear Steve Albini's remixes—in this NPR interview.

Watch a Teenager's Relationship Fall Apart Before Your Very Eyes [NSFW]

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Kids these days with their whozits and their whatzits and their living their lives entirely online to the point where the overabundance of personal and private information made public becomes an impediment to communication and the forming of real, honest, and long-lasting relationships.

That's the premise behind Noah, a short film by budding movie-makers Walter Woodman and Patrick Cederberg that premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival's Student Film Showcase.

In a story that plays out entirely on a teenager's computer screen, Noah follows its eponymous protagonist as his relationship takes a rapid turn for the worse in this fascinating study of behaviour (and romance) in the digital age.

Though it was not the best received short cut in the program, Noah did meet with appropriate (and well-deserved) success online where it has been viewed thousands of times since being uploaded to YouTube yesterday.

Caution: The film contains a fairly lengthy Chatroulette scene. So dicks ahoy.

[H/T: Reddit]

Our financial oligarchy briskly marches on: "[T]he top 1 percent of earners took more than one-fifth

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Our financial oligarchy briskly marches on: "[T]he top 1 percent of earners took more than one-fifth of the country’s total income in 2012 ... The top 10 percent of earners took more than half of all income. That is the highest-ever recorded level."

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