Dead Pool 6th October 2019

A fairly quiet week for the world of celebrity deaths, worry not though, we have plenty for you to read. Next weeks issue will be deferred until the following Saturday as this writer will be partying hard and unable to put pen to paper. 

Look Who You Could Have Had:

 In Other News

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders underwent emergency surgery after suffering a heart attack, his campaign has confirmed. The senator was taken to hospital on Tuesday after complaining of chest pain at a campaign event in Nevada. Doctors operated on Mr Sanders, 78, to remove a blockage in one of his arteries. His doctors said “two stents were placed in a blocked coronary artery in a timely fashion”. A stent is a small mesh tube used to help keep arteries open. Receiving stents is “a minimally invasive procedure”, typically with a short recovery time, the US National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute says. Tehe doctors, Arturo Marchand and Arjun Gururaj, said Mr Sanders’s other arteries were “normal”. On Friday, Mr Sanders was well enough to be discharged from Desert Springs Hospital Medical Center in Las Vegas, the doctors said. The two doctors said that, while Mr Sanders has made “good progress”, he has been advised “to follow up with his personal physician”. In an upbeat statement, Mr Sanders said: “After taking a short time off, I look forward to getting back to work.” 

It was a horrific bison attack that left trail runner Kyler Bourgeous with a collapsed lung and cracked ribs. But when the fully-recovered 30-year-old wanted to impress a date three months later, he invited her to the state park where he had been gored. Bison attacks are rare, he reasoned. And the scenery at Antelope Island in the US state of Utah was too stunning to be scared of going back: “I’ve never seen better sunsets anywhere,” he said. It was to be, it turned out, an unwise decision. His date became the second person attacked there this year. Kayleigh Davis was airlifted to hospital with a gored thigh and broken ankle after being charged by one of the beasts. “I thought my situation was just a freak accident,” Mr Bourgeous, from nearby Syracuse, told the Washington Post on Monday. “But apparently, they’re a lot more aggressive than I ever thought.” Neither he nor Ms Davis are understood to have made the mistake of approaching the animals. Both are keen outdoor types, and know the 900kg monsters are best left alone. “There’s a fair number of people that assume by association that this was somehow my fault, because I was there when it happened again,” Mr Bourgeous say. “I would never intentionally approach a bison.” During his own ordeal on 1 June, the keen cyclist and climber had reached a park summit when he saw two bison. As he attempted to get out of sight, one of the beasts – which can hit speeds of 35mph – charged. His attempts to flee were in vain. “You can’t outrun bison,” he noted. He was thrown into the air by the animal. Its horns pierced his hips and armpit. As he lay on the floor, it trampled him before waiting to see if he would move again. “It’s just hovering there, waiting for you to move, and it will finish you off if you do,” he said. He was rescued after two park-users saw the incident. Yet, despite needing to use a hip drain for several weeks, Mr Bourgeous says he was determined to go back to the park, which he has been visiting since childhood.  

So, when he and Ms Davis decided to have an outdoors date, it seemed like just the right location. She had gone ahead and out of sight as he put on bug spray, when a group of Scouts on bikes raced up to him to say they had just seen a woman being gored. Ms Davis later said she had seen the bison and given it space but the Scouts coming into view may have spooked it. “I looked over my shoulder, seeing it get closer,” she told the BBC. “And I looked again and it was pretty much right behind me. Right as I saw it, I flew up in the air 15 ft.” She landed on her back and – remembering conversations about her date’s previous experience – lay completely still as the bison sniffed her. Eventually, it wandered away, allowing Mr Bourgeous and other hikers to move into help. Yet despite what may now seem a disastrous date, the pair say it may have brought them closer together and they are continuing to see each other.

On This Day

  • 1854 – In England the Great fire of Newcastle and Gateshead leads to 53 deaths and hundreds injured.
  • 1927 – Opening of The Jazz Singer, the first prominent “talkie” movie.
  • 1985 – Police constable Keith Blakelock is murdered as riots erupt in the Broadwater Farm suburb of London.
  • 1995 – The first planet orbiting another sun, 51 Pegasi b, is discovered.

Deaths

Last Meals

Stephen Wayne Anderson was an American murderer who was executed at California’s San Quentin State Prison by lethal injection in 2002 for the murder of Elizabeth Lyman. He was either known to have killed or admitted to the killings of at least eight other people, including a fellow inmate and at least seven contract killings.

Anderson had been incarcerated for one count of aggravated burglary in 1971 and three counts of aggravated burglary in 1973. While incarcerated at Utah State Prison, Anderson murdered an inmate, assaulted another inmate, and assaulted a correctional officer. Anderson admitted to six other contract killings in Las Vegas, Nevada that happened prior to the crime for which he received a death sentence. On November 24, 1979, he escaped from prison, after which he worked for narcotics traffickers and committed at least one contract killing in the eastern mountains of Salt Lake County, Utah.

On May 26, 1980, Anderson, then 26, burglarised the Bloomington, California house of 81-year-old Elizabeth Lyman, a retired piano teacher. In the middle of the night, Anderson cut Lyman’s telephone line with a knife, and broke into her home by removing a glass pane from her French doors. He checked the house for occupants room by room. When he entered Lyman’s bedroom, she awoke and screamed. Anderson shot her in the face from close range with a .45 calibre handgun, fatally wounding her. He covered her body with a blanket, recovered the expelled casing from the hollow-point bullet that killed her, and ransacked her house for money. He found less than $100.

Anderson then prepared himself a meal in Lyman’s kitchen. A suspicious next door neighbour called the sheriff’s department. As he was eating and watching television, sheriff’s deputies responded to the call and arrested him. He obviously admitted to the murder. 

On July 24, 1981, a San Bernardino County jury sentenced Anderson to death. His last meal before the execution was two grilled cheese sandwiches with radishes, one pint of cottage cheese, a hominy/corn mixture, one slice of peach pie, and one pint of chocolate chip ice cream. When asked by the Warden if he had any last words, Mr. Anderson was very adamant that he did not. On January 29, 2002, Anderson was executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison. He was pronounced dead at 12:30 am Pacific Time.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Elisabeth Shue (55), Ioan Gruffudd (45), Britt Ekland (76), Kate Winslet (43), Guy Pearce (51), Jesse Eisenberg (35), Karen Allen (67), Clive Barker (66), Neil deGrasse Tyson (60), Bob Geldof (67), Melissa Benoist (30), Dakota Johnson (29), Christoph Waltz (62), Alicia Silverstone (42), Susan Sarandon (72), Liev Schreiber (51), Sarah Lancashire (54), Lena Headey (45), Seann William Scott (42), Denis Villeneuve (51), Neve Campbell (45), Clive Owen (54), Gwen Stefani (49), Tommy Lee (56), Avery Brooks (70), Sting (67), Brie Larson (30), Zach Galifianakis (50), Julie Andrews (84), Randy Quaid (69), Monica Bellucci (55), and Omid Djalili (54).

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