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Video: One Dead After Christian Street Performers Brawl With Cops

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On Friday, authorities in Arizona released a video showing a chaotic brawl between police and a family of Christian street performers, an incident that left one man dead in a Walmart parking lot last month.

According to police, the confrontation began when members of the Boise-based Gaver family attacked officers responding to an alleged assault in a Walmart bathroom. The fight reportedly turned deadly when 21-year-old Enoch Gaver grabbed Sgt. Jeremy Daniels' gun and shot him, causing another officer to return fire. From NBC News:

The brawl broke out when eight officers from the Cottonwood Police Department responded to a call on Saturday, March 21 that a female Walmart employee had been physically assaulted when trying to enter a store restroom, according to a statement from police. When officers arrived, the suspects — identified by police as members of the Gaver family — were in the parking lot attacking a second store employee, and immediately began attacking officers who tried to break up the melee, Arizona Department of Public Safety spokesman Bart Graves said.

The newly released video appears to show officers and suspects punching and kicking one another, and officers using Tasers, batons and pepper spray on several members of the Gaver family. An officer identified as Sgt. Jeremy Daniels appears to be on the ground in a struggle with a suspect over the officer's weapon. An officer identified as Officer Rick Hicks appears to shoot one man in the stomach before fatally shooting a man on top of Daniels.

"The officers did a very good job of restraining themselves,'' Cottonwood Police Chief Jody Fanning told The Arizona Republic. "I have no reason why [the Gavers] decided to fight us."

According to The Republic, the Gavers were well-known around Boise as members of Matthew 24 Now, a Christian acoustic band that would play for tips outside a local supermarket. "We won't do any events where there's gonna be illegal drugs," states the band's Facebook page. "Or any form of promiscuity."


Man Commits Suicide After Receiving Guilty Verdict in Wife's Death

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Man Commits Suicide After Receiving Guilty Verdict in Wife's Death

A man who had just been found guilty of voluntary manslaughter in the 2000 choking death of his wife killed himself in a courthouse holding room on Friday, the Roanoke Times reports. The 72-year-old Mark Ward Faville was awaiting sentencing after a week-long trial.

According to the Times, Judge Brett Geisler called for a short recess after the Montgomery County jury's verdict was read. Faville was lead out of the coutroom, after which a sheriff's deputy was heard to yell, "Drop it!"

"There was a lot commotion. Apparently he used something and killed himself,” Faville's defense attorney Jimmy Turk told WSLS. Faville was pronounced dead at the scene. The cause of death remains unclear, however; the Times reports that Faville did not die of a gunshot wound.

Faville was facing between a year and ten years in prison. From the Times:

The crux of the case hinged on two different autopsies by assistant chief medical examiners for Western Virginia: the initial report completed by Dr. William Massello, who has since left his Virginia job, and one done later by current medical examiner Dr. Amy Tharp.

Massello found that evidence showed Anne Faville died from choking on a piece of chicken. Tharp, who reviewed the autopsy evidence 12 years later upon law enforcement’s request, ruled that the evidence showed Faville was suffocated in a homicidal manner.

During the trial, one of Faville's daughters Holly read from a note her father wrote several weeks after his wife's death, WSLS reports. "After the toxicology report, they will have all they need," it read. "They will come to get me any minute."


Photo via Roanoke Times. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

The Gawker Review Weekend Reading List [4.11.15]

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The Gawker Review Weekend Reading List [4.11.15]

Here is the best story you will ever read: The Potato Incident, a 2015 epic about a man driven by love and laughs. The story begins with a man who has been invited to dinner to meet his girlfriend's parents. "When I saw that baked potatoes were served I got the idea that it would be very good if I pretended I did not know what potatoes was. That would be funny." But this choice quickly backfires. It continues:

This went on for a bit and my girlfriend was acting very confused and embarrassed by my "fucked up antics", and then the more insistent I was about not knowing what a potato is was when them parents starting thinking I DID know what a potato was.

Well let me tell you I had to commit 100% at this point. When I would not admit to knowing what a potato was, the father especially began to get annoyed. At one point he said something like "Enough is enough. You're fucking with us. Admit it." And I said "Sir, before today I never heard of a potato. I still don't know what a potato is, other than some kind of food. I don't know what to tell you."

Maybe we're all Potato Man. Maybe the secret to life is believing in your story, even when others don't. Or maybe we're all just full of shit—Hi, Food Babe!—and making it up as we go along.


"Upon Further Review: Inside the Police Failure to Stop Darren Sharper's Rape Spree" by T. Christian Miller and Ryan Gabrielson

Nine women reported being raped or drugged by Sharper to four different agencies before his January 2014 capture. But police and prosecutors along the way failed to investigate fully the women's allegations. They made no arrests. Some victims and eyewitnesses felt their claims were downplayed. Corroborating evidence, including DNA matches and video surveillance, was minimized or put on hold.

Perhaps most critically, police did not inquire into Sharper's history. Had they done so, they would have detected a chilling predatory pattern that strongly bolstered the women's accounts.

http://www.propublica.org/article/police...

"On the Road With Hannibal Buress, Comedy's Most Respected Slacker" by Hua Hsu

It's hard to distinguish altitude-induced sluggishness from Hannibal's naturally subdued vibe. When he's not on stage, he's withdrawn and disarmingly quiet, almost to the point of seeming perpetually bored. As his friend and collaborator Eric Andre tells me later, "He's the lowest key on the piano." They met around 2006, back when they were just a couple of broke stand-ups taking any gigs they could get. "I loved his act," Andre recalls. "He had a real unique point of view. You would think the joke was going one place, and it would go another place." But what really drew him to Hannibal was his unusual charisma. Small talk seems to pain Hannibal. At one point backstage, a bizarre public access show on TV catches his attention. It's a low-budget music video that never quite evolves into the bad softcore porn everyone is expecting it to become. A fan who has wandered in seems troubled that we're watching something so awful. "How do you think I write jokes?" Hannibal answers impatiently. "By looking at shit." "What's your joke about it?" she challenges. He doesn't say anything to her for the rest of the night.

http://www.thefader.com/2015/04/07/cov...

"Jason Rabedeaux Was Here" by Wright Thompson

Nobody could really say how he died, or why, not in the first hours and not in the months that would follow. In America and in Ho Chi Minh City, still called Saigon by locals, people could only guess. Family members initially told some people he'd had a heart attack. On the advice of the team, they requested no autopsy be performed. The insurance policy paid off only in the event of an accidental death. The Vietnamese media described an "accident" at home. One of his former players suspected murder, and the deep cut on his left forearm is what ER doctors call a nightstick injury, almost always a defensive wound. Friends wondered about alcohol, even drugs. It was a mystery. The death certificate, written in Vietnamese, listed the cause of death as a traumatic brain injury.

http://espn.go.com/espn/feature/s...

"Mainstream Rap's Gay Future Is Upon Us" by Jordan Sargent

Visually speaking, Thug, and to a lesser extent Makonnen, are upturning rap music, but they're also following a path charted by artists—Andre 3000, Kanye West, Lil Wayne—before them. Those rappers rejected masculinity in their own ways—through style, too, or in the case of Wayne, by rapping proudly about a photo of him kissing Birdman—in the process moving rap, socially, to where it is now. Nonetheless, Makonnen and Young Thug feel like an acceleration point, and it's not because of their fashion, but because of their songs.

http://gawker.com/mainstream-rap...

"The Radical Vision of Toni Morrison" by Rachel Kaadzi Ghansah

It is also true that a sizable portion of her audience simply looks like her, in a world where black Americans, and people of color in general, are still perceived to be nonreaders. But of course Morrison, rather than feeling marginalized or slighted by that criticism, takes delight in it. In an interview for The Paris Review, she said: "I would like to write novels that were unmistakably mine but nevertheless fit first into African-American traditions and, second of all, this whole thing called literature." She added: "It's very important to me that my work be African-American. If it assimilates into a different or larger pool, so much the better. But I shouldn't be asked to do that. Joyce isnot asked to do that. Tolstoy is not. I mean, they can all be Russian, French, Irish or Catholic, they write out of where they come from, and I do too." It is a reply that stumps her interviewer. First African-American, she asks her, as if Morrison had stuttered. Yes, Morrison replies. Rather than the whole of literature she asks. "Oh, yes," Morrison replies.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/mag...

"I Was No Tourist: My Travels Through Tokyo's Sex Underworld" by Karen Gardiner

Determined to stay in place, my fellow mizu shobai workers and I took precautions. We walked to and from work via backstreets, wearing nondescript clothes and our hair bundled under baseball caps. We stored our customers' phone numbers under coded names because we had heard that the police were stopping women and going through their phones hoping to find evidence of illegal work. Although none of us actually knew anyone this had happened to, we became inured to the atmosphere of paranoia.

The story of Lucie's murder hung heavy around Roppongi for years afterwards, always within easy reach of a customer—particularly the self-described "playboys" who'd been frequenting the clubs for years—who wanted to scare, or maybe impress, us with their familiarity with Lucie or the suspect. My Tokyo life seemed to orbit around the case. I worked in the same club as Lucie. I was there two years before her disappearance; later the club changed its name and I returned after four years. Barely two months later I was fired for not getting enough dohans, so I moved on to another club.

http://flygirl.jezebel.com/i-was-no-touri...

And because last week got away from us—sorry about that!—here are some stories you probably missed:

"The Sharp, Sensitive, and Surreal New Wave of Black Male Comedians" by E. Alex Jung

Black male nerd comedians are now a fixture in the traditionally white alternative comedy scene, and they reflect the tenor of that space: conversational and at times digressive, touching upon a wide array of cultural references plucked from childhood memories to nerd culture. This type of humor has entered the mainstream consciousness: Along with Buress and the Lucas Brothers, there are Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele with Key & Peele; Wyatt Cenac, who was one of three writer-correspondents on The Daily Show; Michael Che, who hosts "Weekend Update" on SNL; Eric Andre with The Eric Andre Show, and W. Kamau Bell, who will host a docu-series for CNN called United Shades of America. For their part, the Lucas Brothers are writing the third season of their surrealistically deadpan animated series, Lucas Bros. Moving Co., for FXX, and shooting the second season of Friends of the People, a truTV sketch comedy show that includes a cast of predominantly black male comedians including Jermaine Fowler and Lil Rel Howery. Their jokes are oddball and sometimes experimental, occasionally detouring into the self-referential and the surreal, and they have popularized a more playful, introverted version of black masculinity in comedy.

http://www.vulture.com/2015/04/black-...

"Selena's Legacy: Remembering the Singer on the 20th Anniversary of Her Death" by Erika Ramirez

In every corner of Corpus Christi's Hi-Ho Restaurant on 3703 Morgan Avenue — one of Selena's favorite hometown restaurants — she's there. The walls are covered with her signature smile, traced with red lipstick. The one exception is a painting which hangs in middle of the main dining area. Selena's eyes are closed, and though she's not holding a mic, her lips are slightly parted as if ready to belt passionately.

http://www.billboard.com/articles/colum...

"How 'You Do You' Perfectly Captures Our Narcissistic Culture" by Colson Whitehead

You've also come across that expression's siblings, like the defensive, arms-­crossed "Haters gonna hate" or the perpetually shrugging "It is what it is." Like black holes, they are inviolable. All criticism is destroyed when it hits the horizon of their circular logic, and not even light can escape their immense gravity. In a world where the selfie has become our dominant art form, tautological phrases like "You do you" and its tribe provide a philosophical scaffolding for our ever-­evolving, ever more complicated narcissism.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/mag...

"Life Lines" by Daniel Zalewski

Lately, Johnson draws for pleasure, but for three decades she had a happily hectic career as an illustrator, sometimes presenting clients with dozens of sketches a day. Her playful watercolors once adorned packages of Lotus software; for a program called Magellan, she created a ship whose masts were tethered to billowing diskettes. She made a popular postcard of two red parachutes tied together, forming a heart; several other cards were sold for years at MOMA's gift shop. Johnson produced half a dozen covers for this magazine, including one, from 1985, that presented a sunny vision of an artist's life: a loft cluttered with pastel canvases, each of them depicting a fragment of the skyline that is framed by a picture window. It's as if the paintings were jigsaw pieces, and the city a puzzle being solved. Now Johnson is obsessed with making puzzles. Many times a day, she uses her grids as foundations for elaborate arrangements of letters on a page—word searches by way of Mondrian. For all the dedication that goes into her puzzles, however, they are confounding creations: very few are complete. She is assembling one of the world's largest bodies of unfinished art.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/...

The Sockman and Me: Encounters With a Friendly Neighborhood Festishist" by David Wilson

Ours was your typical suburban New Jersey neighborhood—late '60s split-level houses only distinguishable from one another by their color. Most of the families were the original owners—couples who'd moved in thinking it would be a nice place to start a family. My parents bought on a dead-end that was built after the original development was completed. Except for Brian Werner, I was years younger than any of the other kids in the neighborhood. Brian was just two years older than me and split his time between hanging out with me and hanging out with the older boys. The older boys introduced Brian to the lucrative world of sock selling and he introduced me. I was twelve.

"Carl Mitchell will buy the socks off of your feet," he told me while we both straddled our bikes like cowboys in the middle of Laney Court. "They call him the Sockman. He'll give you $5 or $10 a pair. He'll probably give you $10 'cause you're young, but still."

http://gawker.com/the-sockman-an...

"California Drought Tests History of Endless Growth" by Adam Nagourney, Jack Healy, and Nelson D. Schawartz

This state has survived many a catastrophe before — and defied the doomsayers who have regularly proclaimed the death of the California dream — as it emerged, often stronger, from the challenges of earthquakes, an energy crisis and, most recently, a budgetary collapse that forced years of devastating cuts in spending. These days, the economy is thriving, the population is growing, the state budget is in surplus, and development is exploding from Silicon Valley to San Diego; the evidence of it can be seen in the construction cranes dotting the skylines of Los Angeles and San Francisco.

But even California's biggest advocates are wondering if the severity of this drought, now in its fourth year, is going to force a change in the way the state does business.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/us/...

"The Great Cocaine Treasure Hunt" by Daniel Riley

Julian was no drug dealer. He didn't even really like blow. But he cut some into a jelly jar he kept in the kitchen, the way you keep nutmeg around for the rare party that requires eggnog. Then he buried the rest. Dug a hole out by the cistern at his house, and into the ground it went.

That was more than fifteen years ago. Julian and his wife kept looking for the sea turtles, but not for much longer. They split up, and he moved back to the States, eventually settling in an Airstream trailer on a big piece of land in northern Florida near a dozen new neighbors who'd get together on the edge of Watermelon Pond and swap stories on Friday nights.

Ain't no way that coke is anywhere but where I left it, he'd say. A million bucks in the ground, and all someone's gotta do is grow a big enough pair to go and get it.

Read the full story here.

[Image via Getty]


Gawker Review of Books is a new hub for book, art, and film coverage. Find us on Twitter.

Egypt Sentences U.S. Citizen to Life in Prison

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Egypt Sentences U.S. Citizen to Life in Prison

On Saturday, an American citizen, Mohamed Soltan, was sentenced to life imprisonment in Egypt for his support of an Islamist protest in the summer of 2013, the New York Times reports. The presiding judge sentenced more than 35 other defendants in the case to the same penalty, while fourteen senior members of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood were sentenced to death, Reuters reports.

According to the Times, Soltan graduated from The Ohio State University in 2012 and was working in Cairo at a petroleum services company. His father, Salah Soltan, was a prominent member of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Times reports. Mohamed was critical of the group, but also opposed the military's removal of President Mohamed Morsi. From the Times:

Mr. Soltan began volunteering as a translator for Western journalists covering the Islamist sit-in at Rabaa al-Adawiya Square to protest the takeover. Security forces forcibly broke up the sit-in on Aug. 14, 2013, killing nearly a thousand, according to the best estimates provided by Human Rights Watch and others. Mr. Soltan was shot in the arm during the assault on the sit-in, and the police arrested him at his home several days later. He has remained in jail since then.

He and the others in the case were reportedly accused of joining a command center at the sit-in that sought to spread chaos across Egypt in defiance of the government.

The judge who issued these sentences is the same judge who last summer sentenced three Al Jazeera journalists to seven years in prison. In December, Judge Mohammed Nagi Shehata sentenced more than 180 defendants to death in a single mass trial.

According to Reuters, Soltan's father—a Muslim Brotherhood preacher—was amongst those sentenced to death.


Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

International Scofflaw Justin Bieber Wanted in Argentina

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International Scofflaw Justin Bieber Wanted in Argentina

An Argentine judge issued a warrant for the arrest of Justin Bieber on Friday, making the jet-setting petty criminal a wanted man in South America and prompting widespread pleas of "go ahead and take him, then."

Canadian by birth but a true cosmopolitan of misconduct, Bieber is accused of ordering his bodyguards to beat a photographer outside a Buenos Aires nightclub in 2013. Since then, Bieber has failed to return to the country for questioning, resulting in yesterday's request for "immediate detention."

"Now we just need to wait for the police to find him and bring him [to Argentina]," the photographer's lawyer told the Associated Press yesterday, a fantasy surely shared by few of his countrymen and many around the world.

[Image via Getty Images]

My Time Living in a New York City Commune

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My Time Living in a New York City Commune

As requested, I arrived just before dinner. A tall, Hollywood-beautiful blonde woman vacuumed the room that would soon be swimming in hippies. Except they weren't stereotypical hippies; the people who would soon become my house- and community-mates were an eclectic blend of professionals, students, and everyday folks who'd answered a Craigslist ad for a unique job/housing opportunity in New York City.

I'd been in New York only a few weeks, and as my spot on my college buddy's Bed-Stuy floor drove a wedge between our friendship, another friend sent word about this modern-day commune, or "intentional community," where I'd be able to work in exchange for a room in a house, daily meals, and toiletries. I was expecting a tense, panel interview, but instead I had several conversations about random topics with genuinely interested strangers who would appear like award show seat-fillers when another would get up to presumably grab more food. Having grown up in various group homes and shelters as a foster kid, the mix of people and conversations was familiar, intoxicating. I was thrilled to get the call the next day that my request to join had been approved.

It was mid-summer 2002, and I was starting a teaching gig that fall. I was grateful for the ability to spend my days cleaning a few of the public spaces of the community's 10 homes instead of paying cash for my place there. It was easy work, and I encountered an interesting sample of the community's 100 or so members along the way.

Sometime during my first week, while straightening pillows on a funky couch in the entertainment room of one house, I bumped into Adam, a Beck doppelganger who boycotted personal hygiene in protest of forced social standards. A few of the members who were home during the day as I worked struck me as clearly unable to function outside of the community's protective social walls. They rarely left their houses, even to walk a block over to the dining room for dinner, opting instead to make meals at home (the fridge and cabinets were stocked daily by the community).

I eventually learned that some people live in these communities could easily afford to live well on their own, but, for any number of reasons, made this as an intentional choice. I couldn't get a clear read on Adam, typing a seemingly intense email. He was disheveled, wild-eyed, smelly, and playing hooky from his own community job that day. After introducing myself and continuing to clean, Adam seemed to be preparing to say something to me. His taps on the keyboard grew less urgent.

He reminded me of some of the group home boys who'd brag about their acid trips after weekend furloughs, and get red-faced pissed when I played BDP's "Dope Beat" because it ripped off an AC/DC song they'd inevitably play in a vain attempt to prove hip-hop's insurmountable inferiority. Because of my lived experience with the behavior of people with questionable mental health statuses, and decidedly maladaptive coping skills, I was only semi-stunned when Adam suddenly asked, "Can I call you a fucking nigger?"

I'd only heard the word once before from white lips in actual life, when a roommate at my last group home before college demanded to know why the black kids sat together at our suburban Connecticut school. Dissatisfied with my "probably the same reason the white kids do" reply, she said, "Well I think you're a fucking nigger." My reaction to her was far less reasoned than my "Say what now?" to Adam.

"I used to be around these black guys, and they were always,” he began, gesticulating foolishly as white people do when attempting to perform blackness. "Yo, nigger, you're my nigger, we're fucking niggers". I watched him punctuate the display in a b-boy stance, disbelieving that this shit was really happening.

"So, I figured you'd think it was okay to be called a fucking nigger."

I nodded, I think, slowly filing away the first of far-too-many "white American liberals are still white fucking Americans" moments.

"I prefer Red," I told him. He said okay, and, as I hand-vacuumed crumbs from a recliner, told me how the women he liked chose not to wear protection during their menses.

While that exchange was easily the most bat-shit of my early interactions at the commune, I soon found myself on the receiving end of more puzzling introductions. First from Spack, a tall, handsome-ish dude also from New England, who my housemates would later claim had such a bad case of herpes that people in his polyamorous "pod" made him wear two condoms.

"So, I'm one of the founders here," he said while sitting barefoot and crosslegged in the seat beside me in the dining room. At the time, and even now if I'm being honest, I went out of my way to be agreeable with those I believed held power over whether I had a roof at night or not. When he said he wanted to get to know me in a later conversation, I assumed it was part of an extended interview process, as I'd been advised there would always be people who were watching, listening, reporting. His query about my relationship status seemed fair, too. Upon hearing I was single, he asked how I felt about "sexual friendships." I shrugged, and said something like "to each their own, right?"

Later, Lane would pose the same exact question, also after telling me that the whole place was his idea. He'd knocked on my open door and was lying on his elbow on my twin bed awaiting my reply about sexual friendships when Kana, a housemate who'd previously barely acknowledged me, suddenly appeared in my doorway. She glared at Lane and, with barely-controlled rage, pointed to the door and said "Out." Lane jumped up, welcomed me to the community, and though a solid foot taller than Kana, shrank to nothing as he exited beside her. Or perhaps, in my eyes, she grew. It was the first time in my life anyone had protected me from a sleazy dude. I instantly and forever loved her.

Kana was a Wiccan, feminist attorney, and I was clearly the first black person she knew. Over the three plus years we spent as housemates, we battled often, our mutual defenses and stereotypes clashing, but our respect and friendship became stronger. She had zero problem speaking truth to power, and took pride in her ability to solve problems.

"You know that's why you're always fighting, right?" I told her once as she stirred her coffee in our kitchen. "Because you feel useless if you aren't a savior, so you create shit to fix." It wasn't the equivalent of her swooping in to rescue me from, and later school me about, known community predators, but she confessed it made her think about her reputation around the houses as something of a troublemaker.

Perhaps it was her consideration of this possibility that kept her mostly silent the one day I needed her to challenge authority most. It started because I'd baked a cake to bring to dinner one night, sliced it, then ventured to the bathroom before heading across the street to the dining room. When I exited the bathroom, Tina—a community vet who was new to our particular house—was at the stove cooking, and half the cake was gone. I knew no one could have eaten it that quickly (she had!), so I laughed and asked, "Ok, who hid half the cake?" Tina's face instantly matched her box-red hair as she took the plate the cake was on, dumped it in the trash, and stormed out, yelling that she was about to get my ass kicked out.

The community had few official rules, but no violence or "non-negotiable negativity” were tolerated. People could be as loopy as they wanted, but if called on something that infringed on someone else's comfort, they had to be open to discussing and resolving it. These concepts neatly underscored another community must: commitment to non-judgment. I saw this concept beautifully mastered and modeled by a few in the core group (the 20 or so members who committed to share their finances, and were responsible for planning the day-to-day running of the community). They really were able to separate an act from a person's value, something I'd never witnessed or experienced. It was the example that helped me navigate through the many times an otherwise decent person made a spectacularly stupid or racist comment. It was difficult for me to suspend personal judgment when I felt someone was so clearly fucking wrong, but being the recipient of the unconditional positive regard some of them showed me was profoundly moving, and it remains a gift I strive to give in all my relationships. On this day, it was Tina's behavior that was least in line with the rules, so I was hardly worried when our exchange became the subject of a community session to discuss and resolve the cake-trashing incident.

The meeting was presided over by Tato, a Napoleanic core member who remains, to this day, the most arrogant, condescending asshole I've ever met in my life. He was married to the blonde who, on this night, sat on the floor at his dangling feet, a comfy chair shrouding him like a throne. Tato’s tiny, paw-like hand stroked her head in a way that both mesmerized and repulsed me. A couple dozen community folks showed up, minus the more level-headed core group members I considered my friends, who were out of the country.

Tato had the cocky smirk of a man who'd always hated sharing leadership with others, and practically salivated at this chance to call shots unchallenged. Instead of the usual style of letting each party speak, and others chiming in helpfully to point out flawed thinking or to offer new perspectives, Tato asked every person in the room to share a negative experience they'd had with or witnessed from me. No compliments were allowed, nor comments about Tina's notoriously nutty ass (the reason she was moved to another house), as Tato said I needed to know how I'd made her feel when I baked a cake while she was avoiding carbs. I exhaled through a wave of panic as every person—some I knew and others I didn't—made their mandatory criticism of my existence.

I was mostly okay, though, because I knew Kana was about to shut the whole abusive operation down. But instead of plucking Tato's head off and feasting on his bloated ego, she said she didn't like it when she came downstairs for coffee and I wasn't singing in my room, because it usually meant I was in a shitty mood. This complaint had actually become a running theme for me there, just as in other environments I shared with whites: a non-smiling Negro was a thing to be feared, and if we could be kept singing or otherwise performing, all was good. Badu-less mornings didn't mean I was sleeping in, busy, or just not in the mood for music, it meant I was plotting a black revolt, and people would poke at my "dude, I'm fine" until I was the one red-faced and frustrated. White community members, of course, were allowed the full range of human emotions without ever being accused of having attitudes or being "negative."

It happened enough that I always feared I was about to be asked to leave, though it would be dishonest to say that fear didn't exist long before I lived there. It was the other members' doing the non-judgment thing that first gave me the idea that I could be flawed as fuck and still be a desired, even necessary part of a home. But this session, with Tato saying he would have to think about whether I could stay, meant that all that was false, I was indeed too flawed to love, and a fucking chocolate cake I made to share with the community is what did me in. Kana's participation in Tato's irresponsibly abusive process sealed my expulsion, I believed. I sat there stifling a scream or torrent of tears, either of which would confirm Tato's premise that I couldn't handle negative feedback, and thus should have to leave.

Months earlier, another housemate, in response to my telling her about a relative who'd been killed, said, "But you're, like, used to that, right?" It would be years before science revealed that white people really believed blacks were immune to pain, and endowed with superhuman powers, but I experienced that belief repeatedly while there, though never more than that night, as I was expected to sit quietly while friends and strangers were encouraged to break me down. Ultimately, it was just a mindfuck, as Tato lacked the authority to make such a call, and I simply hadn't broken any rules. But I was no less traumatized, awaking the next morning in a pool of urine, just as I did daily before being removed from my abusive family. I soon moved out, unable to handle the constant fear that I might "attitude" or bake my way to homelessness.

However, that was not my last experience living "in a community." Years later, I found myself pregnant with a baby I was told I'd never be able to have, and the ensuing complications sent me from teaching Life Skills to living in a homeless shelter. Like most adult former foster kids, there was no familial safety net to protect me once a medical emergency prevented me from working. No mama's basements or (safe and healthy) family couches to turn to once I was in financial straits; I had to apply for welfare. The shame of having fallen so far was debilitating, and I had no reason to believe I could overcome my statistically assured dismal future twice.

But I researched and eventually found another community in the south; far from perfect, nowhere near as organized, disproportionately full of Adams and Tinas, but certainly not the nasty homeless shelter my son came home to from the hospital. Buoyed by the support I got there (and, ok, the desire to get the fuck back north), I was back on my feet far sooner than if I'd had no community of strangers who were willing to see us as family. Though I haven't yet found one that's a perfect fit, I strongly believe in, and yearn for, chosen community. I will never stop trying to find something that feels like home.

Teller Red now lives in the Pacific Northwest with her son, where she fantasizes about dropping out of her counseling grad program to tell stories full time. Reach her here.

[Illustration by Tara Jacoby]

Judge Reprimands Bharara for "Media Blitz" Following Silver Indictment

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Judge Reprimands Bharara for "Media Blitz" Following Silver Indictment

A federal judge reprimanded U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara for his "media blitz" following the indictment of Sheldon Silver on corruption charges in January, Capital New York reports. The warning came even as the judge rejected Silver's motion to dismiss the case on the grounds that Bharara had made "prejudicial extrajudical statements."

In her decision rejecting Silver's motion to dismiss the case, United States District Court Judge Valerie Caproni wrote, "The U.S. Attorney, while castigating politicians in Albany for playing fast and loose with the ethical rules that govern their conduct, strayed so close to the edge of the rules governing his own conduct that defendant Sheldon Silver has a non-frivolous argument that he fell over the edge to the defendant’s prejudice."

"In particular, the court is troubled by remarks by the U.S. Attorney that appeared to bundle together unproven allegations regarding the defendant with broader commentary on corruption and a lack of transparency in certain aspects of New York State politics."

The day after the former New York state assembly speaker was arrested, Bharara delivered a gleeful speech at the New York Law School criticizing (rightfully) Albany's so-called culture of "three men in a room," of which Silver was allegedly one.

"Why three men?" Bharara asked. "Can there be a woman? Do they always have to be white? How small is the room that they can only fit three men? Is it three men in a closet? Are there cigars? Can they have Cuban cigars now? After a while, doesn’t it get a little gamy in that room?"

"Criminal cases should be tried in the courtroom and not in the press," Caproni wrote.


Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Man Shoots Self on Steps of Capitol Building

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Man Shoots Self on Steps of Capitol Building

Police placed the U.S. Capitol on lockdown "as a precautionary measure" after an apparent suicide shooting near the building's West Front on Saturday. In their initial statement, authorities said only that the suspected shooter had been "neutralized."

Additionally, police are reportedly investigating a "potential explosive device" found at the scene. According to NBC News reporter Pete Williams, the suspected gunman shot and killed himself and the suspicious package is the man's briefcase.

UPDATE 2:40 p.m.: Officials speaking to NBC News have confirmed that the shooting appears to be a suicide and the suspicious package is the gunman's suitcase. One federal official told the network "there are no indications at this point of terrorism."

UPDATE 2:50 p.m.: In addition to the suitcase found nearby, ABC News reports that the shooter was wearing a backpack and had a sign taped to one of his hands. A bomb disposal team is reportedly preparing to investigate the suitcase.

UPDATE 3:00 p.m.: According to WTOP, a Capitol Police spokesperson has confirmed that the suspected gunman was "neutralized" by a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

UPDATE 3:20 p.m.: An unverified eyewitness on Twitter reports the shooter's sign read "tax the other 1/4 or something like that."

UPDATE 4:55 p.m.: The lockdown at the U.S. Capitol has been lifted.

UPDATE 5:20 p.m.: At a press conference Saturday afternoon, Capitol Police Chief Kim Dine said today's incident had no connection with terrorism and that the suspect's sign had a "social justice" message.

[Image via Shutterstock]


SeaWorld Whale Torturers Now Facing Two Class Action Lawsuits

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SeaWorld Whale Torturers Now Facing Two Class Action Lawsuits

A new class action lawsuit has been filed against SeaWorld in Florida, the Orlando Sentinel reports. This is the second such suit filed against the company in the last month. The earlier suit was filed in California.http://gawker.com/sea-world-assu...

The Florida suit—filed by Gainesville attorney Paul Rothstein on behalf of Joyce Kuhl of South Carolina—alleges that, in 2013, Kuhl bought a $97 ticket to the Orlando "on a false understanding of the conditions and treatment of SeaWorld’s orcas, given SeaWorld’s omission of fact regarding the treatment, longevity and well-being of the orcas."

From the Guardian's report on Kuhl's suit:

The public court document accuses SeaWorld of keeping the whales in tanks that, compared with the open ocean where she says they regularly swim 100 miles a day, is like being confined to a single room for life.

The lawsuit details chlorine solution “many times stronger than household bleach” and other chemicals dissolved in the water where the whales are confined after being caught or bred, which makes their trainers’ eyes burn and forces the humans to have to stay out of the water on occasions.

“The orca, of course, have no such reprieve,” the court document states. “These orcas suffer in tiny, unnatural chemical tubs.”

The suit proposes to include anyone who bought a ticket to Seaworld Orlando in the last four years. "Although the company doesn’t release attendance figures for individual parks, it reported in 2014 that annual attendance for the three parks dropped 4.1 percent to 24.4 million visitors," the Sentinel reports.

According to the Guardian, if the class action suit is successful, damages would amount to at least $2 billion. SeaWorld's CEO resigned in December after the company's stock hit an all-time low.

Sea Lion Pup's First Day of High School Ends in Detention

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Sea Lion Pup's First Day of High School Ends in Detention

A San Diego-area sea lion lived out the worst nightmare of ocean-dwelling teens everywhere this week, when his first day at a new school ended in the back of a squad car, the NY Daily News reports.

According to KNSD, administrators called police after spotting the flip-tailed transfer student outside Mar Vista High School in Imperial Beach on Wednesday. Authorities quickly apprehended the pup and Animal Control arrived soon after.

Sea Lion Pup's First Day of High School Ends in Detention

"The little guy was 'detained' without incident in the back of the patrol car," wrote the San Diego County Sheriff's Department in a statement. "While Deputy Sheriffs attempted to interview him as to his activities, he clammed-up and requested his lawyer."

In closely related news, more than 2,000 starving, disoriented sea lions have been found stranded on California beaches this year, twice as many as in 2013, the previous worst year on record. Happy Saturday, everybody!

[Images via Twitter/San Diego County Sheriff's Department]

Nun Sets Herself on Fire in Tibet to Protest Chinese Occupation

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Nun Sets Herself on Fire in Tibet to Protest Chinese Occupation

On Wednesday, a nun set herself on fire in a Tibetan area of Western China, the New York Times reports. The nun's death could not be confirmed, because police took her away after extinguishing the flames.

Two pro-Tibet advocacy groups that spoke to people in the area believe that the nun, Yeshi Khando, died, the Times reports. According to the International Campaign for Tibet, Khando was the second woman to set herself on fire this year and the 138th Tibetan to do so since 2009 in Tibetan areas of China.

According to Agence France-Press, People's Daily—the official party newspaper—published an article on Wednesday by party chief Chen Quanguo encouraging Tibetan monks and nuns to "educate themselves in patriotism" and to "feel the warmth and care of the party and the government."


Photo credit: AP Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Mary Kay Letourneau Wants To "Return To Teaching" 

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Mary Kay Letourneau Wants To "Return To Teaching" 

Last night Mary Kay Letourneau - the Seattle teacher convicted of two counts of felony second degree rape of a child - and her former student/victim/now husband,Vili Fualaau, sat down with Barbara Walters to detail their ten year marriage.

The couple married in 2004, after Letourneau served two prison sentences equaling about eight years. During that time, Letourneau gave birth to two children, both Fualaau’s who are now teenagers, they appeared with their parents during the interview.

Via ABC:

Their two teenage girls, who are in the same school district where Mary used to teach, said their parents have told them how they met, and they knew their mother was different from others when their interaction was limited to prison visits. But the girls seem unfazed by the controversial circumstances of how their family was formed.

“There was never a sit-down chat: ‘Now is the time we’re going to talk to our children about this,” Mary said. “They seemed to already know ... because they grew up with it. ... There’s just never been a, ‘Wow, we better explain.’”

Fualaau and Letourneau also spoke about their lives post-marriage: from the challenges of stepchildren (Letourneau has four children from her first marriage) to work and “getting on track with life.”

Fualaau works as a DJ, and then there’s this:

Mary is working as a legal assistant but hopes she can return to teaching. Her teaching license was revoked during the scandal, but she has now started tutoring and giving piano lessons. She is still registered as a sex offender, but is trying to get her name removed from the registry.

You can watch the entire interview here.

Photo via Heidi Gutman/ABC

Two College Students Charged After Spring Break Gang Rape

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Two College Students Charged After Spring Break Gang Rape

Two college students have been arrested in connection with what authorities are describing as a gang rape that took place during spring break at Panama City Beach, Florida last month, NBC News reports. Police said that hundreds of bystanders did nothing to stop the assault.

According to NBC, police in Troy, Alabama arrested Troy University students Delonte Martistee, 22, and Ryan Austin Calhoun, 23 after discovering a video of the rape while investigating an unrelated shooting.

At a press conference on Friday, Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen announced the students' arrest in connection with a sexual battery by multiple perpetrators, the Panama City News Herald reports. The incident took place between March 10-12 behind the Spinnaker Beach Club.

"This is happening in broad daylight with hundreds of people seeing and hearing what is happening, and they are more concerned about spilling their beer than somebody being raped," McKeithen said. "This is such a traumatizing event for this girl. No one should have to fear this would happen in Panama City Beach, but it does."

Police said that the 19-year-old victim did not report the incident at the time because she did not remember it and that she believes she had been drugged, the News Herald reports.

"This draws the line in the sand for us," McKeithen said. "It is not safe for our children on the beach."

CNN reports that Troy University has placed Martistee and Calhoun on temporary suspension from the school, and that Martistee has been removed from the track team, of which he was a member.

Both men appeared in court on Saturday morning in Bay County, NBC affiliate WJHG reports. Their bonds were set at $50,000. Police are still looking for a third suspect shown assaulting the woman in the video.


Image via Picayune Leader. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Police Accuse Nelly of Still Existing, Possessing Meth

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Police Accuse Nelly of Still Existing, Possessing Meth

Hip-hop artist Nelly, best known for his 2002 climate change anthem "Hot in Herre," was arrested in Tennessee on felony drug charges yesterday, thus confirming the St. Lunatic's continued existence well into the current decade.

According to the Associated Press, state troopers searched the rapper's tour bus after smelling marijuana during a routine traffic stop Saturday morning, finding meth, "numerous" handguns and a small amount of weed. From The Tennessee Department of Safety and Homeland Security:

The troopers discovered in the sleeper area a plastic bag that contained five colored crystal-type rocks that tested positive for methamphetamine, as well as a small amount of marijuana and other drug paraphernalia. Further investigation revealed approximately 100 small Ziploc bags that are commonly associated with the sale of narcotics and numerous handguns, including a gold-plated 50-caliber Desert Eagle pistol, a 45-caliber [Taurus] pistol, and a 500 magnum Smith and Wesson.

The 40-year-old shirt-shirker born Cornell Haynes has been charged with felony possession of drugs, simple possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia. Already out on a $10,000 bond, Haynes is due back in court this June to explain why he does live this way.

[Image via Putnam County Sheriff's Office/KTVI]

California Cop Put on Leave For Allegedly Tickling Corpse

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California Cop Put on Leave For Allegedly Tickling Corpse

A California cop has been placed on paid leave after allegedly playing with a corpse's feet, the New York Daily News reports. The man had been shot and killed by police after leading them on a high-speed chase in November.

Mark Geragos, the attorney representing the family of the man who was killed, told the Daily News that Bakersfield police officer Aaron Stringer pulled on the deceased Ramiro James Villegas' toes while saying "tickle tickle," manipulated the dead man's head and told a trainee that he "loved" playing with dead bodies.

"We are grossly disturbed by the ghoulish behavior of the police," Geragos said. "The family wants answers and accountability."

The internal investigation into Officer Stringer's actions at the Kern Medical Center came to light on Friday after the Bakersfield Californian obtained reports describing the incident.

The 22-year-old Villegas was shot and killed after a high-speed chase ended when he slammed into a traffic light pole, got out of his car and approached police in what they described as an aggressive manner, the Californian reports. Villegas was unarmed.

Stringer had taken his trainee, Lindy DeGeare, to see the body after interviewing witnesses at the scene. According to the Californian, Stringer did not have permission to touch the body.


Image via Shutterstock. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.


"Fuck Your Breath": Video of "Inadvertent" Police Shooting Released

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On Friday, authorities released footage of the final moments of Eric Courtney Harris, the unarmed Oklahoma man shot and killed by a Tulsa County reserve deputy who claims he mistakenly fired his gun instead of his Taser.

After a brief foot chase, the video shows an officer subduing Harris and Reserve Deputy Robert Bates, 73, can be heard shouting "Taser!" before a single shot rings out. "I shot him," Bates says afterward, "I'm sorry."

Pinned by multiple sheriff's deputies, a panicked Harris repeats "He shot me!" eight times before saying, "I'm losing my breath."

"Fuck your breath," an officer replies.

At a press conference on Friday, Tulsa County Sheriff’s Capt. Billy McKelvey told reporters that deputies were not aware Harris had been shot, having not heard the weapon discharge.

McKelvey additionally noted that Bates' pistol and Taser had similar weights and both had laser sights. “He made an inadvertent mistake,” McKelvey said.

[Video via NY Daily News//h/t Mediaite]

Mother of Quadriplegic Man Left in Woods Taken Into Police Custody

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Mother of Quadriplegic Man Left in Woods Taken Into Police Custody

Maryland police have arrested the Philadelphia woman accused of abandoning her quadriplegic son with cerebral palsy in the woods for over five days, NBC Philadelphia reports. Police say Nyia Parler, 41, left her son on Monday morning with just a blanket and a Bible.

Parler's son, who officials described as non-verbal, was found on Friday night, the Associated Press reports.

"She pushes him about 150 yards from the highway into the wooded area, takes him out of wheelchair, lays him on the ground, puts a blanket over him and leaves a Bible with him, and then just walks away," Lt. John Walker of the Southwest Detectives division said.

"It's only by the grace of God that he survived this."

According to NBC Philadelphia, Parler is expected to be charged with aggravated assault, simple assault, reckless endangerment, neglect of a care-dependent person, unlawful restraint, kidnapping and false imprisonment.

Parler was taken to the hospital for unknown reasons following her arrest on Sunday morning by Montgomery County sheriff's deputies. She had reportedly left Philadelphia to visit her boyfriend.


Image via NBC Philadelphia. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

Dumbass Mom Reportedly Dangled Toddler Over Cheetah Pit Before Fall

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Dumbass Mom Reportedly Dangled Toddler Over Cheetah Pit Before Fall

Offering another clear example of why we can't have nice (probably unethical) things, the mother of a two-year-old who fell into a zoo's cheetah enclosure yesterday is accused of dangling the boy over the exhibit beforehand.

According to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo's executive director, witnesses say the child was "held over the railing and then dropped," reportedly falling between 10 and 12 feet.

"You just hear these screams, then all you could see is the adult that jumped in, got the child and then somebody pulled him out," an eyewitness told WJW.

After being pulled from the cheetah pit, the toddler was reportedly sent to an area hospital with a leg injury.

In a statement, the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo said it plans to file child endangerment charges against the boy's parents and that the cheetahs did not "attempt to interact" with the child.

"I think they were just curious as to what was going on and why somebody was in the pen with them because it's not every day that somebody is just in the pen with them," a zoo visitor told WKYC. "And everyone else is screaming and they probably got scared."

Poor kitties.

[Image via AP Images]

Sure

Vietnam Vet Denied Custom License Plate Featuring the Sex Number

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Vietnam Vet Denied Custom License Plate Featuring the Sex Number

The Utah Division of Motor Vehicles has denied a Vietnam War veteran a license plate he requested with the number "69," signifying the year in which he was awarded the Purple Heart, the Spectrum reports. The number has sexual connotations.

According to the Spectrum, Arnold Breitenbach was a gunner on an armored personnel carrier. He received the Purple Heart in 1969 for hearing damage sustained during a rocket-propelled grenade attack. Breitenbach also received the Combat Infantryman's Badge—the full text of the license plate he requested was CIB-69.

Breitenbach's request was initially denied in November 2013. He appealed the decision.

"I figured in today's day and age, when President (Bill) Clinton can have all that stuff going on in the Oval Office and he says that what he did wasn't really sex with that woman, (it's odd) to be turned down because this is so offensive to the citizens of Utah," he told the Spectrum.

"While your intended meaning behind the requested plate, CIB-69, is honorable, the Division of Motor Vehicles is required to follow Utah law when approving personalized plates," DMV Audit Manager Sherri Murray wrote in 2013.

"Administrative Rule R873-22M-34 is clear regarding the use of '69' on personalized plates – '69' formats are prohibited unless used in a combination with the vehicle make, model, style, type, or commonly used or readily understood abbreviations of those terms."

Breitenbach's appeal was denied in January.

"They've got Viagra (ads) all over the place," the vet said. "I can't imagine myself sitting on the sofa with my parents when I was a little kid having something like that on TV. In today's day and age, it seems like everything is out in the open."


Image via Shutterstock. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.

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