Last Days

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 28 T he week kicks off with a horrifying
mystery from Tacoma, which commenced yesterday morning when police
arrived to interview the 31-year-old woman who’d shown up in the
emergency room of Tacoma General Hospital with signs of sexual trauma
and a shocking story. As the woman told police, she was driving near
the Tacoma Mall between 9:00 and 10:00 p.m. Saturday when she was
pulled over by a man wearing a uniform, carrying a gun, and driving a
vehicle with what looked like a police light in the window. The man
held her in his vehicle for up to nine hours, during which time he
raped her, she reported. No suspects have been identified, and as
Tacoma police detective Brad Graham told KIRO, “all possible scenarios”
remain on the table, including the possibility that the woman’s
attacker could have been a police officer, someone posing as a police
officer, or a security guard in a vehicle that looks like a police
car.

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29 Speaking of awful rape stories: The
week continues with an update on Roman Polanski, the celebrated
film director arrested last Saturday in Zurich, three decades after he
fled the United States, where he’d pleaded guilty to drugging and
anally raping a 13-year-old girl he’d been hired to photograph in
1977. Almost as appalling as Polanski’s 30-year-old crime are his
contemporary supporters, a cornucopia of film and entertainment
types from the U.S. and Europe who apparently think drugging and anally
raping a child is no big whoop and signed a petition demanding
Polanski’s immediate release. Meanwhile in Switzerland, today
Polanski’s attorney filed a request seeking his client’s release from
jail while his extradition case works its way through the courts; one
week from today, the Swiss Justice Ministry will reject the request,
citing Polanski’s “high risk of flight” should he be released. And so
Polanski remains imprisoned while Swiss courts figure out the U.S.’s
request for his extradition. “We are talking about three, four months
easily,” said former prosecutor Peter Cosandey to the Los Angeles
Times.

WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30 In WAY better news, the week
continues with Stranger Genius Award Announcement Day, when this
paper’s various arts editors run around town bestowing congratulatory
cakes on five beloved local artists and one beloved local arts
organization, each of which will receive $5,000, no-strings-attached
cash prizes and a humongous party in their honor. Recipients of
today’s “You’re a Frickin’ Genius!”–iced cakes:
avant-garde comedy troupe and 2009 Theater Geniuses the Cody Rivers
Show, multimedia tornado and 2009 Visual Art Genius Jeffry
Mitchell, music-video mastermind and 2009 Film Genius Zia
Mohajerjasbi, deep-‘n’-twisty-fiction maker and 2009 Literature
Genius Stacey Levine, and the visionaries and 2009 Arts
Organization Geniuses at the Pacific Northwest Ballet. All of
these folks and the city that loves them will celebrate with a big
party November 13 at the Moore. See you there.

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1 Speaking of geniuses, today doesn’t
involve any, just some Florida doofus who was arrested after
allegedly jumping into a stranger’s pool while naked and
covered in feces. Details come from the always-amazing Local 6
News, which reports the unfortunate pool owner told police that he
heard someone crash through the screen of his pool and splash into the
water. By the time police arrived at the man’s Stuart, Florida, home,
the pool intruder had fled, with a K-9 unit soon tracking him to a
nearby home, where 21-year-old Robert Stark Higgins—the formerly
feces-covered man who “told deputies he had been drinking”—was
charged with burglary to an occupied dwelling, disorderly conduct, and
misdemeanor theft (he allegedly swiped one of the pool owner’s towels).
Higgins remains held at the Martin County Jail in lieu of $10,500
bail.

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2 The week continues with the long-awaited
results of Michael Jackson’s autopsy, during which the eternally
beguiling
musical-genius-turned-global-superstar-turned-cautionary-tale-about-the-dark-side-of-the-American-dream
was cut open by professionals to see what made him tick and/or stop
ticking. Among the shocking discoveries shared by the Associated Press:
Despite being covered with plastic-surgery scars, Michael Jackson
was relatively healthy, with his most significant medical ailment
being his chronically inflamed lungs. Also: “Jackson had several
tattoos, all of them cosmetic, including dark tattoos in the areas
of both eyebrows and under his eyes, and a pink tattoo around his lips.
He was going bald at the front of his head, with his remaining hair
described as short and tightly curled. The bald part of his scalp
was darkened with what appeared to be a tattoo stretching across the
top of his head from ear to ear… The coroner also found Jackson
was actively producing sperm.” Meanwhile, Jackson’s former physician
Dr. Conrad Murray remains the target of what police are thus far
labeling a manslaughter investigation, following the coroner’s
office’s classification of Jackson’s death as a homicide caused by
“acute propofol intoxication,” with the standard of care for
administering the quick-hit anesthetic not met and the recommended
equipment for patient monitoring, precision dosing, and resuscitation
missing. Criminal charges are pending.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 3 Nothing happened today, unless you
count… nope, nothing.

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 4 The week ends with not one but two stories
of people being viciously attacked by animals. Story number one comes
from Lakeland, Florida, where today a 74-year-old woman was
mauled by a pack of raccoons. As the Associated Press reports,
septuagenarian Gretchen Whitted fell to the ground after five raccoons
surrounded and attacked her in her yard. “We’re not talking about a lot
of little bites here,” said Polk County sheriff Grady Judd to the
Associated Press. “She was filleted.” Ms. Whitted was hospitalized with
“extensive cuts from her neck to her legs,” and animal-control officers
hope to catch the gang of violent raccoons “using cat food and sardines
as bait.” Story number two comes from Allentown, Pennsylvania,
where tonight a woman was cleaning the cage of her husband’s 350-pound
black bear when she was fatally mauled by a 350-pound black
bear. As the AP reports, 37-year-old Kelly Ann Walz was pronounced
dead at the scene, where her husband was found to be operating an
unlicensed exotic-pet dealership. Condolences to all.

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