2007 Darwin awards

Elvier

Elvier

Active Member
FC/Active Member
Here they are: I like the lawyer that plummeted 24 floors to his death. His boss described him as one of their "best and brightest".


DARWIN AWARDS 2007


And once again, it’s time for the Darwin Award Nominees. The Darwins
are awarded every year to the persons who died in the most stupid
manner, thereby removing themselves from the gene pool.


This years nominees are:


Nominee No. 1: [San Jose Mercury News]


An unidentified man, using a shotgun like a club to break a former
girlfriends windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when the gun
discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.


Nominee No. 2: [Kalamazoo Gazette]


James Burns, 34, (a mechanic) of Alamo, MI. was killed in March as he
was trying to repair what police describe as a “farm-type truck”. Burns
got a friend to drive the truck on a highway while Burns hung
underneath so that he could ascertain the source of a troubling noise.
Burns clothes caught on something however, and the other man found
Burns “wrapped in the drive shaft”.


Nominee No. 3: [Hickory Daily Record]


Ken Charles Barger, 47, accidentally shot himself to death in December
in Newton, NC. Awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside his
bed, he reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith & Wesson 38
Special, which discharged when he drew it to his ear.


Nominee No. 4: [UPI, Toronto]


Police said a lawyer demonstrating the safety of windows in a downtown
Toronto skyscraper crashed through a pane with his shoulder and plunged
24 floors to his death. A police spokesman said Garry Hoy, 39, fell
into the courtyard of the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower early Friday
evening as he was explaining the strength of the buildings windows to
visiting law students. Hoy previously has conducted demonstrations of
window strength according to police reports. Peter Lawson, managing
partner of the firm Holden Day Wilson, told the Toronto Sun newspaper
that Hoy was “one of the best and brightest” members of the 200-man
association.


Nominee No. 5: [The News of the Weird]


Michael Anderson Godwin made News of the Weird posthumously. He had
spent several years awaiting South Carolinas electric chair on a murder
conviction before having his sentence reduced to life in prison. While
sitting on a metal toilet in his cell attempting to fix his small TV
set, he bit into a wire and was electrocuted.


Nominee No. 6: [The Indianapolis Star]


A cigarette lighter may have triggered a fatal explosion in Dunkirk,
IN. A Jay County man, using a cigarette lighter to check the barrel of
a muzzle loader, was killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in
his face, sheriffs investigators said. Gregory David Pryor, 19, died in
his parents rural Dunkirk home at about 11:30 PM. Investigators said
Pryor was cleaning a 54-caliber muzzle-loader that had not been firing
properly. He was using the lighter to look into the barrel when the
gun-powder ignited.


Nominee No. 7: [Reuters, Mississauga, Ontario]


A man cleaning a bird feeder on the balcony of his condominium
apartment in this Toronto suburb slipped and fell 23 stories to his
death. Stefan Macko, 55, was standing on a wheelchair when the accident
occurred, said Inspector Darcy Honer of the Peel Regional Police. “It
appears that the chair moved, and he went over the balcony,” Honer said.


Finally, THE WINNER!!!: [Arkansas Democrat Gazette]


Two local men were injured when their pickup truck left the road and
struck a tree near Cotton Patch on State Highway 38 early Monday.
Woodruff County deputy Dovey Snyder reported the accident shortly after
midnight Monday. Thurston Poole, 33, of Des Arc, and Billy Ray Wallis,
38, of Little Rock, were returning to Des Arc after a frog catching
trip. On an overcast Sunday night, Pooles pickup truck headlights
malfunctioned. The two men concluded that the headlight fuse on the
older-model truck had burned out. As a replacement fuse was not
available, Wallis noticed that the .22 caliber bullets from his pistol
fit perfectly into the fuse box next to the steering-wheel column. Upon
inserting the bullet the headlights again began to operate properly,
and the two men proceeded on eastbound toward the White River Bridge.
After Traveling Approximately 20 miles, and just before crossing the
river, the bullet apparently overheated, discharged, and struck Poole
in the testicles. The vehicle swerved sharply right, exiting the
pavement, and striking a tree Poole suffered only minor cuts and
abrasions from the accident but will require extensive surgery to
repair the damage to his testicles, which will never operate as
intended. Wallis sustained a broken clavicle and was treated and
released. “Thank God we weren’t on that bridge when Thurston shot his
balls off, or we might both be dead,” stated Wallis “I’ve been a
trooper for 10 years in this part of the world, but this is a first for
me. I can’t believe that those two would admit how this accident
happened,” said Snyder. Upon being notified of the wreck, Lavinia
(Poole’s wife) asked how many frogs the boys had caught and did anyone
get them from the truck???


(Though Poole and Wallis did not die as a result of their misadventure
as normally required by Darwin Award Official Rules, it can be argued
that Poole did, in fact, effectively remove himself from the gene pool.)
Click to expand...
 
lol i think 2# should have won.

-ara
 
The lawyer one (#4) sounds amazingly like another entry on the Darwin awards list from an earlier year. I assume they're checking these stories out as usual, but I can hardly believe 2 people would die in this same manner....

Then again, there's the famous Einstein quote: "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe." ^_^;;

My vote for most ironic goes to #5, the death-row inmate whose electric chair appointment was changed to life imprisonment but who ended up doing the job himself. :p
 
lol V, the winner has been in at least 5 of the previous ones.

great to read nonetheless
 
Kinda weird to call it the 2007 Darwin award then....

Oh well, it's their award, and it's still entertaining. ^_^
 
Nominee No. 6: [The Indianapolis Star]


A cigarette lighter may have triggered a fatal explosion in Dunkirk,
IN. A Jay County man, using a cigarette lighter to check the barrel of
a muzzle loader, was killed Monday night when the weapon discharged in
his face, sheriffs investigators said. Gregory David Pryor, 19, died in
his parents rural Dunkirk home at about 11:30 PM. Investigators said
Pryor was cleaning a 54-caliber muzzle-loader that had not been firing
properly. He was using the lighter to look into the barrel when the
gun-powder ignited.
Click to expand...


THis is Great. In an English class I had to take this last summer, a chick in the class with me told everyone this story, and how she went to High School with this guy (The University I attend is 10 miles from Dunkirk). I can't actually believe it is a true story.



The winner; however, wasn't from this year. It was the focal point of a Lewis Black stand-up special 5 or 6 years ago.
 
Anyone with a loaded weapon on their bedside table deserves what they get... #2 takes the cake. However the winner was good for a laugh, wonder why they didn't use the shell instead of the bullet >.>
 
These are hilarious.

When I was a senior in high school, that year's freshmen made the news in Norway. Several of the students (over 30 in all) had decided to get to know each other better, and decided to go to a cabin in the woods outside of Oslo. However, as they walked out, a group of about 10 of them managed to get lost in the woods. Now, first of all, getting lost in the woods outside of Oslo is about as dangerous as getting lost in someone's back yard. There are marked paths all over the place. And I mean ALL over the place.

To make matters better, they came across an old shed at a farm or something, that was clearly abandoned for the winter (this was during the fall). They go into the shed and find a moped. The rest was quoted in the yearbook: One of the students went, "Oh, sweet, I can drive for help on this thing!" Another student unscrews the lid for the gas tank: "No, it doesn't have any gas on it." Student #1: "Sure it does, listen!" *wobbles bike, hears liquid clunk clunk sounds from inside* Student #2: "No, it's empty, I'm telling you! Look!" *lights lighter into gas tank* Boom.


The students were rescued 12(!!!) hours later by Red Cross.


True story.
 
The list might be cooked a little. The story that was listed as the 2007 winner was on a Lewis Black album from back when Clinton was president. He presented it as evidence why we shouldn't elect politicians from Arkansas. :p
 
Yeah Eticket posted real 2007 list. Never trust email from friends! Check your sources.. the list I posted was from a friend and I did not check it before copying. This years award winners were ok ... but I do think someone just went through and picked past favorites to come up with the list I posted first.
 
some of those have been on episodes of mythbusters. Lawyer with the glass, fusebox bullets off the top of my head.

also, #3 on the origional list seems sketchy... how is it possible for investigators to come to the conclusion that he reached for the phone and grabbed a gun and shot himself in the head? did he have a security camera above his head that taped the whole thing? It just seems like a pretty outlandish conclusion for what would seem like just a regular suicide.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top