Darwin Award: Man Died After Placing Lit Fireworks on His Head

NOTE: Darwin Award is a satirical award and should not be treated literally. 

South Carolina man was found dead by arriving deputies who responded to a "fireworks accident" at a neighborhood block party in Summerville about 10:23 pm. The man had suffered from massive head injuries. 

The victim, 41-yr old Allen M, according to witnesses which included family members, ignited a large firework device and set it on his head. The device went off, and the victim collapsed. 

It is not known if alcohol played a factor in this incident, but the victim's wife believed the victim was "showing off". 

Source: WCBD-TV news. 

WTF: Woman Sues Man Who Setup GoFundMe for a server She Shamed

 It goes like this, as per USA Today:

Amber, an anti-mask coffee drinker in San Diego, posted her outrage on her FB page back in June, that "lenen" won't serve her at her local Starbucks. 

A guy named Matt then launched "Tips for Lenin" campaign on GoFundMe, and raised over 105445 dollars for the server, Lenin Guitierrez. 

Amber decided because the campaign used her name, she's entitled to some of that money, and demanded half of it. When Matt refused, she sued Matt for "unspecified damages". 

Both have launched respective GoFundMe campaigns for their legal costs. Let's just say, Matt's winning by a wide margin. 

Just proves that you can hire a lawyer for almost ANYTHING. 

Today I learned: Do NOT Retire in New Mexico

Why should you NEVER retire in New Mexico? Because the government there can detain a senior against his or her will, commit her to a nursing home, seize all of her assets, and use that money to KEEP her in a nursing home, all in the name of keeping her safe with a "guardianship". That's exactly what had happened to Dorris Hamilton, who's 91, and had lived in Las Cruces NM for over 50 years. And she's not alone. 

As reported by the Santa Fe New Mexican news Dorris had lived the same for decades, then one day, her mail stopped coming. Then she's locked out of all of her bank accounts. Then she got a letter stating that a judge had granted an emergency petition to put her in a nursing home. WITHOUT EVER TALKING TO HER OR HER RELATIVES. 

So she drove herself down to the courthouse and trying to ask someone. Where she encountered a police sergeant, who was sympathetic, but a judge's orders were not discretionary. He put her in the back of his cruiser and drove her to a hospital where she was then transported to the nursing. In the meanwhile, her car was towed and sold. Her mobile home was also sold along with her possessions.

So what exactly happened? 

It appears that Dorris' son Rios may have had an accidental hand in what happened to his mother. 

According to Rios, Dorris and he had spoken to an attorney in Las Cruces, CaraLyn Banks, about giving Rios powers of attorney, as Dorris had taken up hoarding, and Dorris realized she is having a bit of diminished capacity, and wanted Rios to handle a part of her life. They went to the attorney to draft such documents. And they had several meetings. 

From there on, the narrative diverged. Rios remembered Banks mentioning that she can find someone who can help clean out his mother's house, but he had made no further commitments. 

Banks, however, apparently came away with a completely different set of instructions, as she petitioned the court for emergency appointment of guardianship over Dorris Hamilton, listing Rios as the petitioner. 

Rios, who lived and worked in NYC, apparently did not think to ask questions as he did receive an email from Banks. He said he believed it was about cleaning up the house, not declaring his mother unfit to live by herself. 

And a few weeks later, Dorris' life was uprooted. 

And this was NOT the first time Banks had done it to seniors and their families in New Mexico. In several cases, a distant child, a local senior, a meeting about the will, and BLAM!  An emergency petition to put a guardianship on the parent. The child denied that guardianship was EVER discussed, much less requested. 

SEVERAL court cases happened where Banks argued, supposedly for the seniors, AGAINST the relatives who denied ever authorizing the petition. Banks argued that the senior should stay in the care of the guardian she had chosen, a company called Advocate Services. Keep in mind, both draw their salary from Dorris' estate... while she's still alive! Your jailer is using your money to keep you in jail against your will! And it's all LEGAL! 

What's worse, the chief guardian of Advocate Services is fond of filing restraining orders against the relatives of the seniors. Fortunately, some reforms in 2018 barred guardians from preventing families from visiting the seniors in question, but the fundamental problem had not been addressed... If the guardianship was appointed by mistake (or fraud), how do you undo it? 

Turns out, you really can't. Guardianship is supposed to be only done to people who are no longer capable of taking care of themselves, and little provision exists to undo a guardianship. Hypothetically, one can petition the court for a review of the guardianship (and it was supposed to be done every 10 years) as per 45-5-307F NMSA (2009). But there is no deadline for the judge to review the petition or any requirement to do it in a timely manner, even though the judge can rubber-stamp an "emergency petition" that uprooted Dorris' life in only 4 days. 

What's really weird is the senior in question has NO SAY in the matter, since s/he was ALREADY judged to be incapacitated. Even the death, resignation, or removal of the guardian will only result in the appointment of a new guardian. Only a judge can undo a guardianship, and remember what happened to Dorris? She never got to see a judge, lost a good percentage of her property, because a judge signed an order, sight unseen, and declared she is no longer fit to live by herself. Now she's living in a place she never wanted to be, her assets dissipated and sold to KEEP her there, and there's no way out... 

And that's why, folks, do NOT retire in New Mexico, at least not with any money. Or they can do this to you. 

How Much Licensing Is Too Much?

When you see an injustice, what do you do about it? If you said nothing, would you at least morally support those who to decided to speak up against the injustice? Let's assume you agree...

Next, do you support state licensing of various professions? Cosmetology? Engineering? Contractors? It's all in the interest of public protection, right? These are supposed to be responsible for people's lives or money, and they should know what they're doing, so the government is supposed to license them to 1) make sure they meet requirements, like went to a certain school, and b) pay a licensing fee for the cost of this licensing program. If it operates as intended, then there is no problem. 

But when it is used indiscriminately against the citizens then there is a problem. 

Let me introduce you to two heroes who decided to speak up against such injustices. 

Mats Jarlstrom's wife got a red-light ticket while making a right turn in 2013. He investigated the signal and found that the yellow light interval can be shortened in order to elevate maximum revenue, not safety. And he has found that most jurisdictions set the yellow light interval too short and does not account for right-hand turn traffic, but only for straight-through vehicles (who can come to a stop or speed through). He started to advocate his findings by going to interviews with news stations, talking to traffic engineers, and even presented his research at a national conference of the Institute of Transportation Engineers. 

Then "Oregon State Board of Examiners for Engineering and Land Surveying" fined him $500 for "practicing engineering without a license". No, I am NOT making this up. In fact, the board wanted Mats to stop calling himself an engineer (he has a degree in electrical engineering, but he's not a licensed engineer in Oregon). And continued offense could be fined up to several thousand dollars and one year in jail, if he continued to "critique" traffic lights.  

So Mats sued the board in Federal Court for violating his first amendment rights. And he won in 2018. 

In 2020, Journal of the Institute of Transportation Engineers said Jarlstrom was right. 

This is a clear case of state licensing gone overboard. 

But let's look at another example... something a bit closer to home... hair braiding. 

In at least SEVEN states (including Oregon), hair braiders are required to have cosmetology or hairstyling licenses... even though hair braiding was not taught in cosmetology AT ALL. Keep in mind that hair braiding uses NO chemicals, dyes or colors, or other products. It is completely natural, involves no cutting or bleaching. 

Yet in multiple states, hair braiders have to obtain either cosmetology or hairstyling licenses. And these operators are forced to learn things they will NEVER use (like bleaching, or nail trimming). Keep in mind that many of these cosmetology courses require THOUSANDS of hours in training and TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS tuition. 

In 1997, Isis Brantley was raided by multiple state agents who arrested her for braiding hair without cosmetology license in Texas. So when Texas started licensing Hair Braiding in 2007, it was supposed to be a relief, but it wasn't. The new law was attached to the existing barbering statute. Brantley's hair braiding school, in order to become legal, must be turned into a barber school including size, barber chairs, and sinks, and she must become a licensed barber instructor in order to teach. 

No, I am not making this up either. 

Fortunately, over a dozen states have separate "specialty licenses" for hair braiders, and some of them have lesser training requirements, if at all. A few hundred hours. 

So what happened to Isis Brantley? She sued the state of Texas in Federal Court, and won in 2015. Braiding instructor course was shortened to a 50-hour course (instead of 750-hour barber course) and the laws forcing barber school standards onto hair braiding schools? Unconstitutional.  And in 2015, Texas chose to deregulate hair braiding altogether. 

And indeed, in 30 states, hair braiders need NO LICENSE at all. 

So next time you think about licensing, in these tough economic times, consider this: is the licensing HELPING the public... or hurting the businesses? 

WTF: GM claims "design defects" are NOT covered by express warranty... and they may win

 The TL;DR version: GM seems to have some problems with their eight-speed automatic transmissions... rough shifting, hesitating, shudder, etc. Complaints from multiple states have been combined into a single class action lawsuit in Michigan, and for paperwork reasons, some plaintiffs using their own state law have been dismissed. 

So what's the argument? GM basically argued that "express warranty only covers defects in material or workmanship. Since these problems are inherent in the design, they are NOT covered by our express warranty." Here's Steve Lehto explaining the longer version on his YT channel. 

At this time, you're probably going WTF?! Can they do that? Apparently, they could. It'd be very short-sighted decision, but there's a chance this argument would stand up in court. 

If you don't get the implications, let me give you an example. 

Let's say you buy this broom. It sweeps fine, until you accidentally bump into a wall or a piece of furniture, and the bristles started to bend and won't sweep nicely anymore. The bristles don't have any flexibility. They bend and break, and that's it. You want a refund or replacement but was told: they are all like that, and they are working exactly to our design, so there is no defect in workmanship or material. No refund, no exchange. 

Yes, you can argue that bristles *should* flex and bend but spring back to shape. But the broom maker said this is a DESIGN flaw (they specified the wrong type of plastic), and this is NOT covered by the warranty. 

But isn't the "wrong" type of plastic a material defect? Nope. It works as-is. 

I am not a lawyer so I am not going to go into the intricacies of "implied merchantability" or stuff like that. This goes into the Uniform Commercial Code (which are NOT uniform across all states) and just go watch Lehto's Law episode I linked above. 

But it brings up a very good point: this is an extremely short-sighted decision... These are not cheap transmissions. They are not the stuff that goes into economy cars, but the high-end cars like Denali, Corvette, Cadillac (various models), and so on. 

And if GM refuses to make things right, they will lose even MORE market share in the more profitable high-end market, as this sort of experience is what will drive a previously brand-loyal auto owner to switch to something else, often, an imported brand.