- Certain individuals enter prison with established
credibility based on their crimes and who they were on the outside. Former St.
Louis Cardinals scouting director Christopher Correa is not one of those
people. Correa had pleaded guilty in January to five counts of unauthorized
access of a protected computer from 2013 to at least 2014 and this week, he was
sentenced to nearly four years in prison for hacking the Houston Astros' player
personnel database and email system. It was the über-rare case of high-tech
cheating involving two Major League Baseball clubs and while federal prisons
aren't typically known as the roughest of correctional facilities, this guy
wouldn’t seem to rank high on the prison totem pole once he arrives. Correa was
fired last summer and now faces 46 months behind bars and a court order to pay
$279,038 in restitution, but seeing as he faced up to five years in prison on
each count, it could have turned out much worse for him. Maybe it was that very
convincing letter he read in court before he was sentenced by U.S. District
Court Judge Lynn Hughes in which Correa said he was "overwhelmed with
remorse and regret for my actions." Calling this “the worst thing I've
done in my life by far” might be a tad dramatic, but the team threw him under
the bus when Cardinals chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. had blamed the hack on
"roguish behavior" by a handful of individuals and yet, Correa was
the only one charged. MLB could still discipline the Cardinals, possibly with a
fine or a loss of draft picks, but that’s still to be determined. All of this
came to light in June 2014 when Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow told
reporters the team had been the victim of hackers who accessed servers and
proceeded to publish online months of internal trade talks. Now, the case has
been closed………
- If you’re going to rob a bank, you may as well do it in
style. No one needs to tell that to a well-dressed suspect wanted in connection
to at least four armed bank robberies in Cobb County, Georgia this year. This
suave stealer of cash started his string of robberies began February 4 when the
man hit the Fifth Third Bank location on Roswell Road in Marietta. On that
fateful day, this bold bank intruder entered the branch armed with a
semi-automatic handgun and demanded cash. However, he was polite enough to
apologize for the robbery on his way out and said he owed money to someone in
Nashville. Whoever he owed money to, he clearly didn’t get all he needed the
first time and thus, he also allegedly robbed the Regions Bank location on
Roswell Road in Marietta on April 1. Witnesses reported that he brandished the
same kind of weapon, a semi-automatic handgun, and left with an undisclosed
amount of cash. Each time, he entered wearing a suit and tie, proving that you
should always dress for the job you want and not the one you currently have. The
thief followed suit - pun intended - when he allegedly robbed the BB&T Bank
on Roswell Road in Marietta on May 25 and the PNC bank on Johnson Ferry Road in
Marietta on July 13, following the same M.O. each time. Given that he’s hit
four banks within five months, you’d think his capture would be a top priority,
but the FBI is offering a measly $2,500 reward for information leading to his
arrest. Up the ante if you want anyone to help, FBI………
- Oscar Isaac will follow you anywhere, Steven Spielberg. That
includes going from a galaxy far, far away Italy circa 1858, where Isaac will
be a part of Spielberg's next project, “The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara.” The
movie is an adaptation of David Kertzer’s novel, which tells the true story of
a 7-year-old Italian Jew thrust into controversy in 1858 when he was taken from
his parents and raised as a Catholic by authorities of the papacy. In a swell
plot twist, the boy ends up becoming a priest in a story that sees the pope
clashing with the forces of Italian democracy. No one is sure which character
Isaac will play, but he’ll have to wait until Spielberg finishes his next film,
“Ready Player One,” before getting the chance. Sir Steven is a busy man these days
and there are also rumors that he and Peter Jackson are working on a new film
together. "Peter was so busy with The Hobbit that it took him away from
Tintin and he's doing another film for my company now,” Spielberg said of that
pairing. “It's a secret, nobody knows about it. Then after that he'll do
Tintin.” Lots of things about Spielberg’s work are a secret these days, but he
clearly has the lasting faith of actors like Isaac, who want to be a part of
projects he’s doing that don’t involve massive CGI effects, sci-fi storylines
and a budget the size of Jabba the Hut………
- The job of counting Queen Elizabeth II's mute swans is an
important one…really. But it’s a job that’s getting more difficult by the day
on account of fears that dog attacks may have taken their toll on the monarch's
waterfowl in the River Thames. These damn dogs either don’t know or don’t care
that the queen is the traditional owner of unmarked mute swans, nor do they
seem to recognize the fact that royal
tradition requires the swans to be counted each year. This year’s tally
officially began this week, when royal Swan Uppers rowed up the River Thames
outside London to count and examine cygnets, or young swans, for disease and
injuries. These civil servants fear that a recent rash of fatal dog attacks may
affect the final tally and that’s a big concern on the heels of last year’s
count, when they only marked 83 cygnets, down from 120 the previous year. The
Queen's Swan Marker, David Barker, may be a man with a ridiculous title, but he
also has thoughts on his gig and he expressed hope that this year, the number
of cygnets has grown to 100. Whether or not that’s true won't be known until
the end of the week, but any visitors to London who see weirdly dressed
individuals rowing up and down the Thames, accosting birds and looking them
over like a prized heifer, should know that no animals are being harmed in the
taking of this survey and it’s all being done in the name of letting a really
old monarch know how many prestigious fowl she has left in the kingdom she doesn’t
actually rule over…….
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