Floridian: 13th Annual Sour Orange Awards

13th Annual Sour Orange Awards

Pucker up for this year's Sour Orange Awards, which slices up Florida's wackiest stories and the people who made them possible.

By TOM ZUCCO, Times Staff Writer

We begin the 13th annual St. Petersburg Times Sour Orange Awards -- or, as we call them, the Sordids -- by tossing out a few ceremonial first pitches. There will be a lot of wild throws, so you might want to hide behind Don Connolly's pink fence.

Please direct your attention now to the pitcher's mound, where we have assembled:

A man who locked himself inside a car he was trying to steal.

A mysterious boneless bucket baby.

A group of teenagers who glued active beehives to the floors of DeLand High School.

A dog that tried to run for Congress against Katherine Harris.

Four people who were attacked by leaping sturgeon. (And you thought all they did was overbill.)

And finally, No. 9 in your program but No. 1 in your hearts, the reason we went with this lame baseball theme in the first place, the Sox-cicle himself, Ted Williams.

For those of you who were absent, the Sordids are an annual compilation of all the absurd, inane and generally futile news events that happened in Florida during the year. In years past, we've had a woman who shot her husband because her TV told her to. A man who rigged tiny cameras in his shoes so he could look up women's skirts. And another guy who got kicked out of an all-you-can-eat restaurant for overeating.

Every year we promise we'll never say it again. And every year, we break that promise.

It can not get any more ridiculous.

But it does. It always does. And this year, we've outdone ourselves again.

Is this a great state or what?

* * *

AND SOME OF YOU ARE THINKING, "WHAT DID SHE DO WRONG?"

Tanya Collins of Port Richey told police her 10-year-old son, Casey, scrambled up a magnolia tree after she told him they were going to the store for milk and bread. Casey, a fifth-grader, thought they were really going to visit his mother's fiance, whom he doesn't like. Collins responded like any dutiful parent. She went back inside her house, grabbed a BB gun and started popping her son. Casey wasn't seriously hurt; Collins, 29, was charged with child abuse.

I'LL . . . I MEAN, YOU'LL NEED MAJOR RENOVATIONS.

Police charged a home builder from Port Charlotte with bilking a customer out of nearly $300,000. He wanted the money to pay for his sex-change operation. Frank Patterson Hague, 55, also known as Jennifer Patterson, had planned to fly to Thailand for the operation.

WHERE TO, MISS?

Like most people, Patricia Agness of Jacksonville wanted to see America. So, unlike most people, she dialed up her neighborhood taxi company, negotiated a fare ($2 a mile) and embarked on a 10,000-mile cross-continent cab ride. She wanted to make it to Juneau, Alaska. Alas, Agness' journey ended in Northern California when police detained the 55-year-old woman for . . . a mental health evaluation. She was eventually put on a plane and sent home. But Agness promised she'd try again.

SMOKE GETS IN YOUR THIGHS.

Police in Tallahassee said they spotted Carl Franklin with his pants open and his hands in front of him near a fence. They suspected he was going to relieve himself. When an officer shouted, Franklin ran.

Apparently, Franklin had been smoking and put the cigarette in his pocket. Franklin, 30, ran until his pants, which by then were on fire, dropped to his ankles. The officer tried to slap out the fire until another officer arrived and cut Franklin's pants away.

THAT WON'T EVEN BUY YOU A VAGUE THREAT IN MOST CITIES.

Police in Tampa said Cheryl Wyman wanted her husband killed so she could -- what else? -- collect on his life insurance policy. But Wyman told the wrong guy about her intentions -- a former captain in the Winter Springs Police Department, who set up a meeting with an officer posing as a hit man. Police say Wyman offered the officer $600 to do the deed. So which is worse: that Wyman wanted her husband dead, or that she thought he was worth $600?

AND THE CREW FROM "AMPHIBIANS GONE WILD" WAS THERE!

Tens of thousands of young frogs invaded an animal control agency in Fort Walton Beach, the town where the ecological horror movie Frogs was filmed 30 years ago.

PILING ON

Green Bay Packers rookie running back Najeh Davenport, who helped the University of Miami win the 2001 national championship, pleaded innocent to charges that he broke into a UM dormitory and defecated in a woman's closet.

IS BOCA RATON THAT BORING?

It started when 12-year-old Galit Raviv was balling up a small bit of tape in her hands. Someone in the Boca Raton girl's family suggested she add more. And then more. A month later, the Ravivs became the proud owners of the world's largest ball of transparent tape, certified by Guinness World Records. The family used about 12 miles worth of clear packing tape to create the ball, which is 2 feet high and weighs 80 pounds.

HE'S NOW LIVING IN BOCA RATON.

A 20-year-old Gainesville man was arrested after placing more than 1,100 fake calls to the city's 911 service, tying up emergency lines for two days. Michael A. Holmes said he made the calls because he was bored.

YEAH? HOW DO YOU STAND ON GAMBLING?

Pompano Beach city Commissioner Ed Phillips said his No. 1 issue was fighting crime. Perhaps that's because Phillips had to walk home in his underwear after being robbed at gunpoint in his own district. The stick-up followed a poker game with friends.

WHEN I WAS HERE, I WANTED TO BE THERE. WHEN I WAS THERE, ALL I COULD THINK OF WAS GETTING BACK INTO THE JUNGLE.

Santo Bonventre, 89, wanted to hunt for wayward golf balls near the sixth hole at a Holiday golf course. Next to the hole is a muddy swamp that's home to alligators and snakes. His driver and a ball retriever in hand, the brave Bonventre set off into the muck. Where, of course, he got stuck.

Bonventre managed to wave his driver in the air, hoping to attract the more than 30 police and firefighters who were searching for him. Apparently, he needed a bigger driver. About 26 hours later, a helicopter spotted Bonventre on his back in the mud about 200 yards from the sixth green.

Used golfs balls are worth, what? Fifty cents apiece? But like something out of Apocalypse Now, Bonventre promised that as soon as he recovered, he'd be back in the swamps, ball-hunting again. "I've got to," he said.

UH . . . I'M DOING RESEARCH FOR A BOOK.

James F. Welles, 61, was arrested in Lantana for trying to have sex with a 15-year-old girl he met over the Internet. After the girl said she could call him "Dad" when they met at a restaurant, Welles said they could go to his car and have sex, police said. But the date fell apart when Welles was met by two police officers. Welles had been corresponding for three weeks, not with a teenage girl, but with a 40-year-old male detective.

Welles is the author of The Story of Stupidity and Understanding Stupidity.

SPEAKING OF RESEARCH . . .

A University of Florida medical school professor was fired after police found heads, brains, arms and other body parts preserved at his house, some stored in Tupperware containers. Joseph James Warner, 49, also was charged with illegal storage and preservation of human remains. Warner told officers he "conducted research" at his home.

THE ANTIMORON DEVICE WAS APPARENTLY TURNED OFF.

David Christopher Lander, 51, of Gainesville, was arrested after the car he was allegedly burglarizing locked him inside. The 1994 Infiniti is equipped with an antitheft device that automatically locks the doors when the car alarm is triggered. When Lander entered the car, the doors locked. Had he pushed a button on the driver's side door, he could've gotten out.

ME? I'M IN THE PIPE BUSINESS.

Sarasota businessman Chris Hill won an award from the National Republican Congressional Committee and was in the running for Republican of the Year. Hill, 30, also was an honorary member of the committee's business advisory council, which made him a candidate for the Businessman of the Year award.

Nice, huh? Unfortunately, it was the same Chris Hill who earlier in the year was indicted in Iowa for making pipes used to smoke marijuana and was facing up to 20 years in prison.

BRAINED STURGEON.

A Panama City fisherman crashed his boat on a river bank when a 5-foot sturgeon jumped from the water and hit him in the chest. Brian Clemens, 50, was one of at least four Florida boaters struck by leaping sturgeon last year.

DIDN'T POPEYE SAY THAT?

A judge denied a request by a Lake City man who wanted to change his name to God. So Charles Haffey, 55, did what any right-thinking person would do. He changed his name to I Am Who I Am. Haffey, or rather, Am, said after his first choice was rejected, he went to the Bible to find a backup. He drew on a passage where Moses asks God who he is and hears: "I am who I am."

BROWN-WAITE VICTORY BASED ON HIGHWAY BEAUTIFICATION CAMPAIGN.

A Hernando County sheriff's deputy was doing surveillance at a Spring Hill shopping center when he heard a loud smash and saw an unidentified man running toward a pickup truck. The man turned out to be Harvey Waite, husband of Republican House candidate Ginny Brown-Waite. Next to him was Larry Laxton, whose wife works for Brown-Waite.

The deputy discovered four campaign signs for Brown-Waite's opponent, Rep. Karen Thurman, in the truck. The men initially gave conflicting statements but eventually confessed to stealing the signs. No arrests were made because the deputy did not actually witness the signs being stolen.

WE WON'T BE DOING MUCH MORE RUNNING, WILL WE?

A fugitive sex offender from Florida who fled into the Maine woods complained that he lost several toes to frostbite because police were slow in arresting him. Harvey Taylor, 48, spent at least three nights in the woods after running from a sheriff's detective.

AIM HIGH.

Florida Highway Patrol Capt. Van Fussell, a 30-year veteran, was at a firing range for his biannual firearms qualification exam when he accidentally shot off his tennis shoe. Fussell was not hurt, but he had to retake the test.

OKAY, I'M ONE OF THE EVERLY BROTHERS. REALLY.

Chris Harry Everley, 40, of Lake City, was sentenced to more than three years in federal prison and ordered to reimburse $20,800 to victims from Philadelphia to Arizona. What did he do?

Using the name Charles Elias Disney and claiming to be heir to Walt Disney's fortune, Everley conned dozens of people out of investment money. Four years earlier, he pulled a similar scam in New Jersey, where he said he was former President Ronald Reagan's grandson.

YOU HAVE TO PICK YOUR BATTLES, PART I.

A North Fort Myers man was arrested for running into his burning house to save an American flag because he ignored firefighters' warnings to stay away from the fire.

PART II.

Authorities in Hollywood, Calif., said Tyrone Jermaine Hogan had already stolen a car with a woman inside and robbed a passenger on a bus when he approached a van carrying members of the Florida International University judo club at a gas station. Hogan allegedly asked a club member for money before he reached into the van to take the keys.

Big mistake. A half dozen athletes piled out of the van, beat Hogan to a pulp, then held him on the ground until police arrived. The club members were in Los Angeles to teach . . . a self-defense class.

LOOK OUT CAPTAIN. THAT THING MIGHT BE LOADED!

Renee Koutsouradis, 36, said she was with her husband awaiting takeoff from Dallas when her name was called over the loudspeaker. She said she was met by a Delta security agent who told her something was vibrating in one of her bags. The Clearwater woman explained it was an adult toy that she and her husband had just bought on a trip to Las Vegas.

Koutsouradis said the agent took her to the bag on the tarmac and made her remove the toy and hold it up. Some passengers on the plane saw everything, she said, and three male Delta employees "began laughing hysterically" and made "obnoxious and sexually harassing comments."

Koutsouradis, who was allowed to repack and return to her seat, sued the airline.

THE VIEW.

A quadriplegic who claimed he can't get into a West Palm Beach strip club's lap-dancing room made a federal case out of it. The aptly named Edward Law, an adult-entertainment enthusiast (Well? That's what they are), filed a lawsuit against Wildside Adult Sports Cabaret, alleging that a lack of handicap access to the room violates the Americans With Disabilities Act.

MAJORING IN SPORTS MANAGEMENT.

Three University of North Florida students admitted swiping more than 1,600 copies of the weekly student newspaper because they were unhappy with a sports article.

In other sports/banditry news, someone stole copies of the playbook the Miami Hurricanes football team used to win the 2001 national championship and posted parts of it on the Internet.

PUTTING THE LICK BACK IN REPUBLICAN.

State election officials refused to qualify Percy, a 5-year-old border-collie mix, as a rival to Secretary of State Katherine Harris in her bid for Congress. Percy barked loudly when elections officials told the dog's owner, Wayne Genthner, that canines don't meet the state's elections requirements. (They're too loyal and honest.)

Genthner, a Republican, then decided he'd run himself as a write-in candidate. The 42-year-old charter-boat captain said he was frustrated with sterile campaigns that avoid meaningful debate. He remains frustrated today.

GUSTICE.

A man won a new trial on federal gun charges because his jury had too many people whose last names started with the letter "G". Roderick B. Carter, 24, of Opa-Locka, had been charged with possession of a handgun by a convicted felon. A judge granted Carter a new trial after Carter's attorney argued that his client's right to a jury of his peers had been violated. Federal jury pools in Miami are selected by dividing potential jurists alphabetically by the first letter of their last name and then selecting letters randomly.

Carter's attorney argued that because the jury pool was full of Hispanic names that started with "G" -- such as Garcia, Gomez, Gonzalez and Gutierrez -- Carter, who is black, could not have gotten a fair trial because the jury did not have a fair cross-sample.

The original 12-person jury had seven Hispanic members. At the second trial, Carter was acquitted by a jury of six blacks, two whites and four Hispanics.

WHAT? WHERE WAS THE STURGEON?

A fight between two Madeira Beach men ended when one man stabbed the other with the bill of a swordfish. Police said Frank Ashmus, 46, used the swordfish bill to stab Garth Spacek, 42, in the stomach as Spacek was beating Ashmus in the head with a beer bottle.

AND THIS IS OUR SON, PRINCE MICHAEL III.

The auction Web site eBay removed an advertisement from a Tampa couple who wanted to sell the rights to name their unborn baby. The auction had already attracted bids of more than $7,000.

NANNY AND THE PRO RACER.

Her name is Lil' Dale, she's a goat, and she had fans of the late racing star Dale Earnhardt flocking to her North Florida home to see her. That, as any NASCAR fan can tell you, is because Lil' Dale was born with a curious birthmark: a distinctive white No. 3 -- Big Dale's number -- on her right side. "It's weird," said Lil' Dale's owner, Jerry Pierson. "I've seen people take pictures and get tears in their eyes."

That may be the quote of the year.

HAM AND BOLOGNA ON A ROLL. HOLD THE HAM.

A Bradenton woman who said she has suffered epileptic seizures since a 13-pound ham fell on her head at a Wal-Mart sued the discount chain for $500,000. The woman testified that she was leaning over a meat cooler, inspecting hams, when one hanging above fell and struck her head. Her husband was the only person who saw the accident. An attorney for Wal-Mart said the woman's description of the accident defied the laws of gravity and physics.

Jurors agreed and dismissed the suit.

MAY I HAVE 10,000 MARBLES PLEASE?

A dozen seniors who glued eight beehives to the floors of DeLand High School and sealed about 90 classroom doors with glue were charged with felonies. No one was hurt, but school officials estimated the senior prank caused as much as $5,000 damage.

POLICE USED THE OLD "STUCK IN THE BOG" TRICK.

Thomas Edward Tweed Jr., 35, of New Smyrna Beach, was charged with fleeing and eluding a police officer and driving with a suspended license. How did the police catch him? A deputy was parked on the side of a road when Tweed drove past him at a high speed. The deputy pursued him, but instead of pulling over, Tweed drove into the woods. The deputy followed until his car became stuck in a bog.

Tweed noticed the troubled patrol car and turned around to assist the officer. Tweed apologized and said he didn't stop because he feared the consequences of driving with a suspended license.

LET YOUR FINGERS DO THE STUMBLING.

When residents of Holly Hill got their South Real Yellow Pages phone books, this is what they found: The city listed on the cover was Holly Hills with an "s," nearby Ormond Beach was spelled Ormand Beach, and South Daytona was listed as South Orange. Oh, and all 38 of Holly Hill's city government phone numbers? Each one wrong.

LAST SEEN TRAVELING WITH BATBOY AND BIGFOOT.

The Jan. 29 edition of the Weekly World News trumpeted the birth in St. Petersburg of Tara Jurtens, a perfectly healthy baby girl. Except that she has no bones. And lives in a plastic bucket. But wait. The plot thins. Amazingly, a St. Petersburg Times check of bay area courts and hospitals showed no record of a Tara Jurtens. Maybe she moved. (How, we don't know.)

WELL? WHAT DO YOU EXPECT?

A teacher at a charter school in Pensacola founded by boxer Derrick "Smoke" Gainer was arrested on charges of fighting in class with two students.

GOT MY POCKETKNIFE, MY COMPASS . . . MY CELL PHONE.

Lake County sheriff's deputies rescued 10 Boy Scouts and their two adult leaders after the troop became stranded during a canoe trip near Orlando. Deputies searched by land and helicopter, but didn't locate them until one of the scouts was able to contact his parents by cell phone and say where they were.

MS. PUFFY'S ALL NATURAL LIP ENHANCERS.

Carnival Cruise Line officials, suspicious because six passengers were repeatedly reboarding a cruise ship in Miami, discovered 160 bees in several bottles. Authorities think the bees were intended to be used for medicinal reasons.

WE HAVE ONE OF THESE EVERY YEAR

A Pompano Beach man was arrested after he bit a police dog after a hit-and-run car accident.

OF ALL THE GIN JOINTS IN ALL THE WORLD . . .

A woman trying to elude mall security guards in Miami while carrying $900 worth of stolen clothing dashed into a parking lot, picked a car at random and jumped in. Sitting in the car were two off-duty police officers.

EACH FORTUNE READ: LIKE THESE COOKIES, MANY PROMOTIONS HALF-BAKED.

To promote the appearance of 7-foot-5 rookie center Yao Ming, and to further deepen America's ties with China, the first 8,000 fans entering a recent NBA game between the Miami Heat and Houston Rockets at Miami's AmericanAirlines Arena got a free fortune cookie. "First of all," Yao said after the game, "there is no such thing as a fortune cookie in China. Second, I'd give out something a little bigger."

NO ONE WOULD EVER BUY A TINY SPOT OF SUBMERGED LAND.

Don Connolly's most publicized exploitation of a tax deed involved a lake bottom in the north Pinellas neighborhood of Tarpon Woods. Connolly paid about $1,000 for the lake bottom tax deed, erected a pink fence on part of the shoreline, then put a price tag of $450,000 on the land.

Faced with legal troubles, Connolly eventually softened his demands and offered to sell his tax deed properties back at cost. The Tarpon Woods homeowners got the lake bottom back for $4,000.

AND FINALLY, THE SPLENDID STALACTITE.

After months of wrangling and sniping and handwritten notes stashed in trunks of cars, the family feud involving the body of the late, great baseball legend Ted Williams ended when Williams' eldest daughter dropped her challenge to her half-sibling's decision to have their father's body permanently frozen. In return, she got part of a trust Williams had set up. If they ever do bring Teddy Ballgame back for extra innings, his kids may want to go into hiding.

They could play for the Devil Rays.