This Crazy WORLD #8

Highlights from the "Quick Takes" section of August 23/30 issue of WORLD magazine. This week, the main theme seems to be "people who get sent to jail for doing stupid things!"


It's a small world

According to Microsoft, the fabled Six Degrees of Separation theory holds water. After studying 30 billion computer instant message conversations among 180 million people, Microsoft found just 6.6 degrees of separation between any two users of its Microsoft Messenger instant message program. In essence, any two random people in the Microsoft survey were separated by a string of just 6.6 acquaintances on average. "To me, it was pretty shocking. What we're seeing suggests there may be a social connectivity constant for humanity," Microsoft researcher Eric Horvitz told The Washington Post. "People have had this suspicion that we are really close. But we are showing on a very large scale that this idea goes beyond folklore."

So it really IS true! I wonder how much this study cost? At least it wasn't on the taxpayers' dime!


Easy collar

Call it an arrest wish. A Plant City, Fla., man repeatedly phoned 911 telling the operator he had a warrant out for his arrest and that he would wait by the pay phone for a cruiser to pick him up and take him to the station. Problem: 47-year-old Peiter Vanvliet had no arrest warrant. But after repeated phone calls, a sheriff's deputy drove over to the pay phone to arrest Vanvliet for misuse of the 911 phone system.

"Ask, and you shall receive!"


Skirt chaser

Letter carrier Dean Peterson isn't Scottish, but he's on a campaign to make the classic fashion for male Scots—the kilt—a uniform option for Postal Service employees. "In one word, it's comfort," Peterson told the Associated Press. The letter carrier, who weighs in at 250 pounds, says slacks chafe against his thighs. Last month at his union's convention he made the case for the kilt option: "Please open your hearts—and inseams—for an option in mail carrier comfort!" But the union decided against a kilt resolution. Now he's trying to convince management that he'll be a better worker in a kilt. "It's the difference," he said, "between wearing jammies to bed and wearing your work clothes to bed."

And all you Scots out there are saying "Amen!"

There oughta be a law

Unsatisfied with his sandwich, Reginald Peterson contacted a higher authority. Unfortunately for the Florida man, the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office seemed unwilling to respond to the customer's complaint about his Subway sandwich. According to an arrest report, Peterson called 911 to complain that employees at the Subway had left off certain ingredients from his sandwich. When police didn't come, Peterson began yelling at employees and customers before stepping outside to dial 911 again. Shortly after, an officer arrived to lecture Peterson on the proper use of emergency services. But Peterson became belligerent and was eventually arrested.

Two words come to mind: Anger management (or maybe "mentally ill"?)!

Wannabe cop

Teenager Myko Coker Jr. thought his father's position as a deputy with the Broward County (Fla.) Sheriff's Office would protect him. It turns out, his father brought him to justice. On July 29, Coker took his father's unmarked patrol car out at about 4 a.m. and made a number of traffic stops. After receiving a call from one motorist, a local police officer stopped the 18-year-old and questioned him. Coker, who was wearing a Broward Sheriff T-shirt, convinced the cop he was in fact an undercover Sheriff's deputy. But as the officer drove away, he saw Coker make a suspicious U-turn and pull over another vehicle. The officer, Rod Hailey, once again stopped Coker and asked him to show a badge or firearm. Coker could not. Again, Hailey let him go, but then drove to Coker's home and talked to his father, Myko Coker Sr. The father and 11-year force veteran called his son and had him arrested when he returned home. The boy faces charges of grand theft auto and impersonating a police officer.

Ah, teenagers! What would we do without them?!