Dateline: Maryland— A homeless man tried to leave the town of Frederick by stealing a single-engine aircraft at a municipal airport, but he crashed before reaching the end of the runway. Calvin C. Cox, 51, wanted to fly away from Frederick early last Monday morning but ended up in jail on felony charges of theft, burglary and trespassing. Cox was unhurt when the Piper Super Cub ran off a runway at Frederick Municipal Airport and upended in the grass around 2:15 a.m. A canine team tracked him into nearby woods where he was arrested. “He was familiar with aircraft, but I don’t believe he was proficient in the operation of aircraft,” Frederick Police Lt. Clark Pennington told reporters. Dateline: Michigan— Detroit TV station WDIV reports that a man walked into a diner last week with a 5-inch knife buried in his chest and ordered a drink. Police said that the 52-year old man used a pay phone to call 911 around 10 p.m. to report that he had been attacked in the town of Warren. After reporting the crime, the victim walked a mile to Bray’s Hamburger in Hazel Park. Restaurant employee George Mirdita told the TV station that the man walked in, casually ordered a coffee and said he was waiting for an ambulance to come. “It was like out of a movie,” Mirdita said of the impaled customer. “It kind of freaked us all out here. The customers realized it and they were turning their heads in disgust.” After police arrived, the unidentified victim said he was out walking when he was approached by a man demanding money. When the victim refused to comply, he was stabbed. The victim was treated at a nearby hospital and has been released. Police are still searching for the attacker. Dateline: Tennessee— ’Tis the season. Police in Hermitage are looking for a bank robber with a fluffy white beard, fuzzy red suit and black boots. Armed with a gun, a Santa-suited criminal robbed the SunTrust Bank on Old Hickory Boulevard. According to The Tennessean , it’s the first time that a Santa suit has been used to pull off a robbery in Davidson County in recent years. Police spokesperson Kristin Mumford could recall plenty of Halloween masks, but no Jolly Old St. Nicks. “I don’t remember a Santa doing that,” she was quoted in the newspaper as saying. After receiving an undisclosed sum of cash, the reverse Santa stuffed his loot into a red sack and rode out of sight in a gray, mid-sized car. Dateline: California— A Southern California man went on a bizarre rampage last week, allegedly jumping out of a third-story window, killing a dog with his bare hands and then pouring coffee all over himself after running naked through a tennis club. “He may have been under the influence of drugs,” sheriff’s spokesperson Jim Amormino told the Orange County Register . Bayron Reyes Lopez allegedly started his unusual romp at a San Clemente apartment, where deputies responded to reports of a loud radio at 4:30 a.m. last Wednesday. “We get there, go in the room, the guy is gone,” Amormino said. Lopez is believed to have leaped out the window of that third-story apartment. Around 6 a.m. Lopez resurfaced, reportedly attacking Julie Donnelly’s miniature Schnauzer, Kokanee, and choking it to death. A few minutes later, deputies found Lopez at the Rancho San Clemente Tennis Club, lying naked on the ground pouring coffee on himself. Lopez, who is a maintenance worker at the club, was arrested and hospitalized. Dateline: Texas— Police in Kerrville have arrested a 53-year-old woman for repeatedly abusing the 911 system after she called to report that her husband didn’t want to eat supper. Elsa Benson was taken into custody around 8 p.m. on Dec. 18. She faces one count of “silent abusive calls” to 911 and was held on a $1,000 bond. This is the second time Benson has been arrested on those charges. Local authorities say she has a history of calling 911 to report incidents that are not emergencies when she is intoxicated. On the night in question, Benson phoned 911 twice. The first time, she hung up. The second time, a dispatcher heard screaming. Responding officers noted that Benson smelled strongly of alcohol. “While attempting to understand what she was talking about, she advised the reason she’d called 911 is because her husband would not eat his supper,” police spokesperson Paul Gonzales told San Antonio’s Express-News. Officers have referred Benson to the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services’ Adult Protective Services. In the past six months, Benson has called 911 more than 30 times. “We’re hoping that with other agency interactions, and with her facing the court system, we can educate her in some form or fashion that she’s not supposed to do this,” Gonzales said.
Compiled by Devin D. O'Leary. E-mail your weird news to devin@alibi.com.
