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Author Topic: Darwin Awards  (Read 791 times)

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Offline Callaway

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Darwin Awards
« on: June 21, 2007, 09:13:32 PM »
This one is particularly freaky:

http://darwinawards.com/legends/legends1998-16.html

Bizarre Death
 
1994 Urban Legend
 
At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, AAFS, President Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications of a bizarre death. Here is the story:

On March 23,1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to that effect, indicating his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window which killed him instantly.

Neither the shooter nor the descender was aware that a safety net had been installed just below at the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned.

"Ordinarily," Dr. Mills continued, "a person who sets out to commit suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide."

That Mr. Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands. The room on the ninth floor, whence the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window, striking Mr. Opus.

When one intends to kill subject A but kills subject B in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject B. When confronted with the murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant. They both said they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was his long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is, the gun had been accidentally loaded.

The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his mother. The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus.

Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to jump off the ten story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window. The son had actually murdered himself so the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide.
 

Offline maldoror

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #1 on: June 21, 2007, 09:39:51 PM »
I used to have a couple books of Darwin Awards. That's an interesting story, but it's probably just a creative urban legend.
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Scrapheap

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #2 on: June 21, 2007, 09:56:12 PM »
A very creative person with too much time on their hands , and a jug of moonshine thought that one up.  ::)

Offline Callaway

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #3 on: June 21, 2007, 09:57:48 PM »
I used to have a couple books of Darwin Awards. That's an interesting story, but it's probably just a creative urban legend.

Probably so, but it was still a freaky story.

willow

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #4 on: June 21, 2007, 10:30:40 PM »
anyone snopes it?

Offline SomeRandomGuy

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #5 on: June 21, 2007, 10:51:39 PM »
This is a collection of a few legal 'puzzles' that law students must understand and be able to respond to during law school.

My thought would be that someone strung them together into a story.
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willow

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #6 on: June 21, 2007, 10:52:31 PM »
This is a collection of a few legal 'puzzles' that law students must understand and be able to respond to during law school.

My thought would be that someone strung them together into a story.

shut up.

 :eyelash:

Offline maldoror

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #7 on: June 21, 2007, 11:02:25 PM »
When they give out Darwin Awards, they do the same research into authenticity that they would do at snopes. If it is classified as urban legend instead of unconfirmed they've probably made up their minds; if you think about it, it's pretty intensely far fetched, anyway, especially him hitting the bullet like that.
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willow

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #8 on: June 21, 2007, 11:18:29 PM »
When they give out Darwin Awards, they do the same research into authenticity that they would do at snopes. If it is classified as urban legend instead of unconfirmed they've probably made up their minds; if you think about it, it's pretty intensely far fetched, anyway, especially him hitting the bullet like that.

you know you want to hit that, hit that.

Offline El

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #9 on: June 22, 2007, 07:40:06 AM »
+ to callaway.  It's complete bullshit, but because nobody actually did die, I think I can also safely say it's a fucking cool story.
it is well known that PMS Elle is evil.
I think you'd fit in a 12" or at least a 16" firework mortar
You win this thread because that's most unsettling to even think about.

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #10 on: June 22, 2007, 08:34:32 AM »
girls this award thing is getting out of hand, i mean what could they possibly give out an award for next? :laugh:

Offline DirtDawg

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #11 on: June 22, 2007, 08:48:16 AM »
girls this award thing is getting out of hand, i mean what could they possibly give out an award for next? :laugh:

Some of us are watching you to find out.
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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #12 on: June 22, 2007, 08:55:13 AM »
girls this award thing is getting out of hand, i mean what could they possibly give out an award for next? :laugh:

Some of us are watching you to find out.
 :laugh:

To win a darwin, you only need to remove yourself from the gene pool. Richard could cut his balls off in a creative manner and still win the Darwin top prize for 2007.  ;)

Offline Callaway

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #13 on: June 22, 2007, 10:39:20 AM »
anyone snopes it?

I just did:

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/freakish/opus.asp

They say it's false too, but it is still a freaky story.

Offline Lucifer

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Re: Darwin Awards
« Reply #14 on: June 22, 2007, 12:34:59 PM »
who cares if it's true or not - it's a bloody brilliant story.  thank you callaway.   :plus: