Arcturus Publishing - Urban Legends

This edition published in 2012 by Arcturus Publishing Limited
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Copyright 2006 Arcturus Publishing Limited

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1956 (as amended). Any person or persons who do any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

ISBN: 978-1-84858-720-5

URBAN LEGENDS

They say that truth is often stranger than fiction, and so it would appear when browsing through this collection of urban myths and incredible stories. Of course, whether these tales are really true can never be proven, as they have now passed into folklore, added to and embellished with each re-telling.

We leave it to you decide which stories in this compendium ring true and which are too off-the-wall to be believable. What we can guarantee is that you wont be bored with our selection, which includes loony lawsuits, crazy criminal misdemeanours, humiliating mistakes and mind-boggling misfortunes. Some of these tales will send a chill down your spine while others will have you laughing in amazement at the sheer stupidity of your fellow citizens of the world.

True or false, these are stories you will want to tell your friends about.

COMMITTED WORKER

Bus driver MichaelPemberton was driving 20 patients from an inner city psychiatric hospital to an institution in the countryside. As the patients were sedated, Michael thought it would be all right to stop at a roadside caff for a break. However, to his horror, he returned to find that every single one of the patients had escaped and the bus was now empty.

Rather than admit to his mistake, Michael decided to cover up what had happened and drove round the city, picking up people from bus-stops along the way until he had 20 people in the bus. He then drove out to the countryside institution and told them that he was delivering the inner city patients. He also warned the staff that the patients were highly excitable. When the case later came to court, a jury heard that it took eight hours before the patients managed to convince the institution staff of Michaels cover-up.

SURPRISE VISITOR

Shelly Watson was about to step out of the shower when she realised that there were no clean towels in the bathroom.

Not worried, she walked naked downstairs to get some towels from the tumble drier, which was located on her back porch. She had not yet taken them out of the machine when she heard the milkman coming up the porch steps.

As he left the milk on the back step, Shelly quickly stepped inside a cupboard, in case he should look through the screen door and see her. As she stood waiting for him to leave, the cupboard door was suddenly flung open. Standing in front of Shelly was the gas meter reader.

In her embarrassment she quickly blurted out, Oh! I thought you were the milkman. Shellys hubby, who had shown the meter reader where to find the meter, was not amused.

QUITE A SHOCK

When Eleanor Goodman walked in the kitchen and saw her husband Claude shaking violently with a wire running from his waist, seemingly towards the kettle, she immediately thought the worst, that he was being electrocuted.

She panicked and picked up a large piece of wood from near the back door, then brought the plank down heavily on to his arm, intending to jolt him away from the deadly current. She succeeded in breaking his arm in two places. Until then he had been happily dancing to the music on his Walkman and making a cup of tea.

STUCK ON YOU

Shaun Lewitt and former girlfriend Sadie Thomas relationship had ended badly, and in May 2000 she had been forced to take out a restraining order.

Shaun decided that he was going to disobey the order and, since he knew Sadie would not let him into her Texas home through the front door, he decided to enter through the chimney. Rather predictably, the chimney was not wide enough to allow him to pass through. However, he managed to get quite a way down before realising he was stuck.

After a few hours, neighbours followed his cries, and firefighters were forced to knock down part of the chimney in order to get him out. Shaun was arrested on suspicion of burglary and stalking, while Sadie returned from her holiday in the Bahamas to find her chimney destroyed and her former boyfriend behind bars. She moved house shortly after.

FINDING BLAME

A court case almost certain to fail was that of Indiana resident Shaun Perkins, who was struck by lightning while in the car park of the Kings Island theme park in Mason, Ohio.

Rather than feel grateful that he survived such an event with relatively minor injuries, Perkins chose instead to place the blame on the theme parks owners. His lawyer dismissed the usual idea that lightning is an act of God, saying: That would be a lot of peoples knee jerk reaction in these types of situations. Instead, he claimed it was the theme parks fault for not warning people that being outside in a thunderstorm was dangerous.

Asking for unspecified damages, Perkins was awarded exactly nothing.

JAILBREAK

Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in Indiana saw the attempted escape from prison of Jimmy Torin, who was serving time for fraud. His attempt failed for several reasons.

Jimmy arranged with two of his fellow prisoners to be smuggled out of the prison when the rubbish was collected and taken away. These two inmates were on garbage duty, and rather gleefully agreed to add a rubbish bag containing Jimmy to the other bags to be taken away. Pleased with his plan, Jimmy thought his freedom was just a few hours away. However, two hours later he was in the prison hospital, lucky to be alive. Jimmys first mistake was to think that a human being could survive being tied up inside a plastic bag for hours. His second, and potentially fatal, mistake was to trust his life to two men who were serving time for murder. The third mistake was not to notice that all rubbish from the prison went through a trash compactor, to prevent people from escaping that way. Fortunately one of the binmen noticed that one bag was too heavy, and opened it to find Jimmy passed out inside.

UNLUCKY IN LIFE

August 1, 1999 was not a good night for Brendan Myner.

The 22-year-old broke into a house in Los Angeles at 3am with the intention of helping himself to the familys possessions, after being told they were on holiday. He was startled to discover the homeowner was not only home and wide awake, but was an armed police officer who had just got home from a shift. Officer Vargas fired wide to startle Myner, whose attempt to flee was then hampered by a fall into a cactus bed, followed by a trip over a wrought-iron fence that speared him in the groin. He managed to limp away and escape, but was arrested when he checked into the hospital for treatment for his injuries. The final straw was to discover that he had broken into the wrong house the vacationing family lived next-door.

UNWANTED FAME

Daniel Clarkson of Canterbury, UK, suffered several instances of acute embarrassment after a drunken evening went horribly wrong.

Driving home slightly intoxicated after an evening in the pub, he should not have been surprised when he was pulled over after a policeman saw his car weaving all over the road. Desperate not to lose his licence, in the back of the patrol car, Daniel tore off his underwear and stuffed the fabric in his mouth, believing that it would soak up the alcohol. Needless to say, it did not. However, when he was in court, there was a class of law students who found Daniels actions so funny they had to be removed from the courtroom. And, to add just one more embarrassment, his picture and story were then reported in the local newspaper. Said Daniel: I will never drive drunk again.