Dead Pool 14th February 2021
Welcome to the not so Valentine’s Special, where I have endeavoured to not mention it… Oops! A fairly run of the mill edition this week, no points awarded but a few small bits to read.
Look Who You Could Have Had:
- Dai Davies, 72, Welsh footballer (Wrexham, Everton, national team), pancreatic cancer.
- Rynagh O’Grady, 66, Irish actress (Far and Away, Father Ted, Breakfast on Pluto).
- Anthony Sowell, 61, American serial killer.
- Mary Wilson, 76, American singer (The Supremes), hypertensive atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.
- Larry Flynt, 78, American publisher (Hustler), founder of Larry Flynt Publications, heart failure.
- Rowena Morrill, 76, American fantasy illustrator.
In Other News
Ashley Judd has been taken to hospital following a “catastrophic” accident in the Congo after suffering a shattered leg.. The actress, 52, revealed the news during an an Instagram Live that she was resting in a “trauma unit in beautiful South Africa” after sustaining “massive catastrophic injuries” during a rainforest excursion. Judd said that she had been travelling in the Congo when she tripped over a fallen tree. She recalled lying on the forest floor for five hours, and “howling like an animal” while being carried back to her camp by her “Congolese brothers”. She added that she faded in and out of consciousness during the journey out of the rainforest and to the capital of Kinshasa, and had kept herself awake by reciting Bible passages. She was finally taken to hospital in South Africa after what she described as an “incredibly harrowing” experience. In the Instagram Live, Judd, said that the accident was a reminder of her privilege as a person of means travelling in the Congo, explaining: “The difference between a Congolese person and me is disaster insurance that allowed me, 55 hours after my accident, to get to an operating table in South Africa.”
Fernando Alonso suffered a broken jaw after he was involved in a road accident while cycling, his Formula One team have confirmed. The 39-year-old suffered the accident while riding in Switzerland on Thursday. The Spanish driver was due to return to the grid this season following two years away. And while his injuries are understandably serious, Alpine F1 expect him to be “fully operational” by the time the season begins in Bahrain next month. A statement from the team read: “Following his cycling accident yesterday Fernando Alonso was kept under observation in hospital in Switzerland. “Medics discovered a fracture in his upper jaw and conducted a successful corrective operation. The attending medical team are satisfied with his progress. Fernando will remain under observation in hospital for a further 48 hours. Looking forward, after a few days of complete rest, he will be able to progressively resume training. We expect him to be fully operational to undertake preparation for the season.” In 2018, Alonso quit the sport and set his sights on becoming only the second driver since Britain’s Graham Hill to complete the so-called Triple Crown – winning the Monaco Grand Prix, Le Mans 24 Hours and Indy 500. Although he won the famous sportscar endurance race in 2018 and 2019 he has not been able to crack the Indy 500, despite a remarkable effort on his first appearance back in 2017.
As you all know, I had written a piece on Capt. Tom Moore for last weeks edition, but I chickened out publishing it because I felt it was edging on going a little too far. Well, somebody didn’t listen to their own inner monologue and has now been charged in connection with an offensive social media tweet about the dead Captain. The 35-year-old man is due to appear in court in Lanarkshire later this week! A Police Scotland spokeswoman said: “On Friday 5th February 2021, we received a report of an offensive tweet about Sir Captain Tom Moore who died on Tuesday 2nd February. A 35-year-old man has subsequently been arrested and charged in connection with communication offences and is due to appear at Lanark Sheriff Court on Wednesday 17th February.” I have no idea what was tweeted, but I’m fairly sure it wasn’t as bad as what I wrote last week! Maybe I did make the correct judgement call? Looks like you can’t make offence online nowadays without finding yourself cancelled or arrested.
On This Day
- 1779 – James Cook is killed by Native Hawaiians near Kealakekua on the Island of Hawaii.
- 1849 – James Knox Polk becomes the first serving President of the United States to have his photograph taken.
- 1852 – Great Ormond St Hospital for Sick Children, the first hospital in England to provide in-patient beds specifically for children, is founded in London.
- 1924 – The Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company changes its name to International Business Machines Corporation (IBM).
- 1929 – Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre: Seven people, six of them gangster rivals of Al Capone‘s gang, are murdered in Chicago.
- 1989 – Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini issues a fatwa encouraging Muslims to kill Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses.
- 1990 – The Voyager 1 spacecraft takes the photograph of planet Earth that later becomes famous as Pale Blue Dot.
- 2005 – YouTube is launched.
Deaths
- 1779 – James Cook, English captain, cartographer, and explorer (b. 1728).
- 1975 – P. G. Wodehouse, English novelist and playwright (b. 1881).
- 1996 – Bob Paisley, English footballer and manager (b. 1919).
- 2010 – Dick Francis, Welsh jockey and author (b. 1920).
- 2018 – Morgan Tsvangirai, 2nd Prime Minister of Zimbabwe (b. 1952).
Last Meals
Anthony Sowell was an American serial killer and rapist known as the Cleveland Strangler. He was arrested in October 2009 after the bodies of eleven women were discovered by police at his home, in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood of Cleveland, Ohio.
Sowell was one of seven children born to single parent Claudia “Gertude” Garrison. Seven other children belonging to Sowell’s sister also lived in the household, having moved in after her death following a chronic illness. According to Sowell’s niece, Leona Davis, Garrison subjected them to physical abuse while her own children watched from adjacent rooms. In one incident, Garrison forced Davis to strip naked in front of the other children, then whipped her with electrical cords until she bled. Sowell himself began raping his niece on an almost daily basis for two years, starting when she was 10. It was also reported by Davis that the other males in the household also participated in the rapes.
In 1989, Sowell attacked Melvette Sockwell, who was three months pregnant at the time, when she attempted to leave his home. He tied her up and choked her so badly that she thought that she was going to die. He was charged with kidnapping, rape, and attempted murder for which Sowell pled guilty and served a 15-year sentence. He was released from prison in 2005.
Unfortunately, this did not serve as a deterrent for his murderous actions. He said he was a master looking for a submissive partner to “tame” and neighbours complained of a foul odor coming from his home. He also, somehow, dated the niece of the Cleveland Mayor Frank G Jackson for a time, who smelled the decaying bodies but was told various different stories by Sowell. Somewhere between 2007-2008, she moved out.
No one knew about the bodies until 2009 when Latundra Billups was invited to Sowell’s home for a drink. After he had a couple of drinks, he assaulted, choked, and raped her. Billups went to the police who arrived with an arrest warrant. Sowell had fled, but he was captured two days later. Either way, police went inside which is when they started to find the bodies.
Much like John Wayne Gacy, Sowell’s 11 murder victims were found in and around his home. Bodies were found in the basement, in crawl spaces, in the backyard. One skull was found in a bucket. Most victims were killed by manual strangulation, leading to the name the Cleveland Strangler. Some of the bodies still had the ligatures used to kill them on them.
In addition to the murders, Sowell also raped three women. He would invite them home to smoke crack cocaine with him and then assault them. He would be charged with 11 counts of aggravated murder and 74 counts of rape, kidnapping, tampering with evidence, and abuse of a corpse. Initially, he pled “not guilty by reason of insanity”, but later changed it to just “not guilty”. Sowell was convicted of his crimes and sentenced to death. He was still exhausting his appeals as late as May 2020.
On January 21st 2021, he began receiving end-of-life care at the Franklin Medical Centre for a terminal illness and died on the 8th February. His last meal has not been released.
Last Week’s Birthdays
Simon Pegg (51), Danai Gurira (43), Andrew Robinson (79), Neal McDonough (55), Mena Suvari (42), Stockard Channing (77), Kim Novak (88), Josh Brolin (53), Christina Ricci (41), Michael Ironside (71), Arsenio Hall (65), Maud Adams (76), Natalie Dormer (39), Jennifer Aniston (52), Damian Lewis (50), Thomas Turgoose (29), Sheryl Crow (59), Chloë Grace Moretz (24), Elizabeth Banks (47), Keeley Hawes (45), Laura Dern (54), Robert Wagner (91), Philip Glenister (58), Holly Willoughby (40), Tom Hiddleston (40), Michael B. Jordan (34), Rose Leslie (34), Joe Pesci (78), Ciarán Hinds (68), Mia Farrow (76), Mary Steenburgen (68), Seth Green (47), Nick Nolte (80), and Ethan Phillips (66).
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