Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Wednesday's Wild, Weird and Wonderful

Wild - Another Mecklenburg County murder trial goes down the drain due to police errors.

Weeks ago the Demetris Montgomery case, and now details have emerged of a second case where a judge has sanctioned the prosecution. This time during the murder trial of Iaian McClellan. He was accused of killing a man during an armed robbery and shooting at police officers.


Iaian McClellan

Late Tuesday night WBTV's Sharon Smith reported the following:

Judge Linwood Foust sanctioned the case because CMPD SWAT officers failed to turn over evidence from their database they deemed irrelevant. A veteran homicide detective also failed to request radio traffic recordings be saved. Instead, they were erased.

Judge Foust said SWAT officers would not be allowed to testify.

The case was going down the drain for prosecutors. They offered McClellan a plea deal before the case went to the jury.

Instead of life in prison, McClellan got a sentence which could have him out of prison in ten years with credit for time served. Watch the WBTV report here.

Bus Crash - Just after 6 PM Tuesday a Greyhound bus slammed into logging truck. The bus was traveling north on I-95 a few miles before the I-26 interchange when it struck the truck.



More than 2 dozen people were injured, including the driver of the bus who was pinned in the bus by logs that had pushed through the windshield.

Some patients were transported to Colleton County Medical Center, while others are being taken to MUSC in Charleston.

Officials were not able to use helicopters due to the weather conditions and the accident closed both north bound traffic lanes for more than 4 hours.

More Details here.

Weird - Wiki Leaks founder Julian Assange is either villain or crusader, it just depends on whether you are the target or the benefactor of the "leaked" information.



On Sunday 28th Novembre 2010, Wikileaks began publishing 251,287 leaked United States embassy cables, the largest set of confidential documents ever to be released into the public domain. The documents may give an unprecedented insight into the US Government's foreign activities.

Now Wiki Leaks claims to have 5 gigs of documents from a US bank. The rumor is that the target is Bank of America.

Scott Silvestri, a Bank of America spokesman, told the New York Times Dealbook blog in a statement: “More than a year ago WikiLeaks claimed to have the computer hard drive of a Bank of America executive. Aside from the claims themselves we have no evidence that supports this assertion. We are unaware of any new claims by WikiLeaks that pertain specifically to Bank of America.”

While many condemn the "leaking" of recent US State Department documents, the pattern of weirdness is so overwhelming that one can only imagine what is lurking in the wings for B of A. Wikileaks is here.

Wonderful - The photo could be of Black Friday shoppers lined up at the local Target or Best Buy store anywhere in the country. But the line that stretched down Meeting street in Charleston was not for super sale deals on huge flat screen televisions, this line was for the most basic item a $50 gift card from Piggly Wiggly.


Photo by Andy Paras Post and Courier

Star Gospel Mission on Charleston's Meeting Street greeted 1,000 people who received a $50 Piggly Wiggly gift card when the doors opened at 7:30 a.m. Monday.

Some people started lining up as early as 3 p.m on Sunday. By the time the doors opened, a line stretched along Meeting Street, onto Line Street and onto Nassau Street where it went all the way to Columbus Street.

"It's the longest line I've ever seen," Star Gospel Mission Pastor William Christian said.

The church gave out 1,000 gift cards Monday morning. Officials said as many as 500 people had to be turned away after the cards ran out.

The rest of Andy's story is here at the Post and Courier.

McAdenville is Christmas Town USA, and while other Christmas light shows come and go, McAdenville has been lighting up the town in an organized manner since 1956.

Wednesday the 55th year kicks off with the "Official Lighting of Christmas Town USA".
The ceremony starts at the Pharr Family YMCA Center starting at 4:30 pm, and the "big" switch is pulled about 5:30 pm.



The red, green and white lights are on from: 5:30-9:30 pm weekdays and 5:30-11 pm on weekends now through December 26. The best part is McAdenville is free.

Cedar Says: Christmas light tour driver etiquette, whether you are in the long line of cars at McAdenville, Charleston's Holiday Festival of Lights at the James Island County Park, or the new Carolina Christmas at Charlotte Motor Speedway Christmas its proper to kill your headlights while creeping along at 5 mph.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like a bunch of burnt out homicide detectives and supervisors to me. Maybe it's time to clean house in the homicide penthouse suite?

Anonymous said...

It seems that this might have something to do with the termination of Marsha Goodenow. The timing is right.

Anonymous said...

And Chief Monroe says it is not the fault of the police department but the DA who decided, wos what an arrogant statement. Bet no one gets in trouble over this one but when will it stop. There is not accountability there and as long as you are on the good side of the king then you will be allright.

Anonymous said...

Anon 8:18
Truer words were never spoken.

Anon 10:22
Correct you are, as long as you are one of the clique, one of his butt smooching followers, you will never see ANY consequences for your ill actions.....as evidenced over and over and over so many times that it has just become an embarrassment. Let someone who is not under his benevolent
"protection" stick a little toe over an imaginery line, and you are done.

The problem is, the "lines" move at rodney's discretion...there is NO level playing field.

And so it goes on and on and on, no one has the guts to stop it, to tell the truth.

Anonymous said...

I don't get the point of standing in the cold for 12 hours just to get a $50.00 gift card.

Are these people in Charleston just that lazy? They could make more money at McD's.

I'm all for charity but these people are just losers.

Anonymous said...

Anon 12:12 p.m. A person who is destitute, who is out of work and can't find a job or who has children to feed would gladly stand in line for hours for a $50.00 gift card for groceries. Some of these folks may indeed be losers as you claim, but you label all of them as losers? I sincerely doubt that you are "all for charity".

Anonymous said...

Cedar just a short note to say I like your Wednesday's WWW

I think its a pretty smart way to keep from being a just "Law Enforcement" blog like Fox News called you the other day.

Keep up the good work.

BTW Thanks for pointing out the gift card program in Charleston, because we often forget how lucky we are to be free of hunger.

God Bless!

Anonymous said...

Wikileaks seems fair to me. It is beyond me why anyone would say something in an email, letter, cable or phone line that someone else might haver access to.

This is a failure of our Federal Government at the highest level and on many levels.

Weird indeed!

DC TRANSPLANT said...

What a cluster F*ck CMPD is going to be looked at for every little thing. They will continue to make examples of them . If the idiot who ran the place - well atleast get's paid to do so would have done his job instead of putting idiot's in charge maybe just maybe they wouldn't be in the position they are now. The once prestigous homocide unit is going to be picked through and under the miscroscope because of their leader...Poor management skill, leadership skills, a lot of ass kissing ...Yes 8:18 it is time to clean house starting w/ Monroe...