Mid-Daily Items: Cracking the critter caper

August 26, 2008 11:06 am

— The evidence in his office gave the judge pause: a half-eaten apple and some very distinctive footprints.
Federal bankruptcy Judge Paul W. Bonapfel reported the break-in last week at the Richard B. Russell Federal Building in downtown Atlanta.
The intruder made no effort to cover his tracks across a stack of federal memos in the 14th-floor office. When the judge called in his staff and others to examine the scene, the evidence was conclusive: The perpetrator was a raccoon.
In the following days, judges and staff who work in the building reported other thefts — chocolate chip cookies stolen from a 10th-floor desk, a sandwich on the 9th floor, and a packet of dried soup purloined from the 23rd floor.
A court clerk created a “wanted” poster, and Bonapfel’s staff posted a “raccoon crossing” sign on the judge’s door.
Workers from a company that specializes in catching wildlife placed a trap in the ceiling over a judge’s office and baited it with tuna.
The wait ended Monday when a judicial assistant heard a noise overhead. Two workers removed the ceiling tiles and grabbed the suspect.
Office workers named the raccoon “Russell,” in honor of the building’s namesake. The General Services Administration, which manages the building, theorizes that Russell wriggled into the heating system from outside.
“We’re going to see if we can get him turned loose on a farm somewhere,” said Robert Perkins, the building’s manager.
“We’re going to take him a long way from this building.”

— If only Goldilocks had a cockapoo.
A 15-pound cocker spaniel-poodle mix named Pawlee scared off a mother bear and her two cubs Sunday morning after they strayed into his owners’ back yard. That’s Pawlee over there on the left of the page, just below the trespassing raccoon.
Whether his bark was worse than his bite, Pawlee’s tactic worked just fine. These three bears got the hint and took off.
“We had just let him out for the morning and he ran into the yard and started barking his head off,” owner Fran Osiason said.
Osiason said her 9-year-old son, Jacob, went outside to see what the commotion was about and came running back in to report there were bears in the yard.
She was worried that the mother would come after Pawlee to protect her cubs, but the pugnacious pup, just 8 months old, had other plans.
His barking drove the two cubs up a tree, and they eventually climbed down and hopped over a fence with their mother and retreated into the woods.
Osiason said she, her son, husband Andrew and daughter Eden, 6, have had Pawlee since he was about 8 weeks old. She marveled at his fearlessness.
“He’s a little fur ball,” she said.
Northern New Jersey seems to breed feisty pets: In 2006, a tabby cat named Jack chased a bear up a tree in his West Milford yard.
Bears are not uncommon in Wyckoff, but Osiason said her family has lived there for about 10 years and had not seen any until Sunday.
With Pawlee on guard, they might not see another one anytime soon.

— Looks like someone forgot to stop at the pump.
A quick train trip down the California coast turned into a long haul for more than 80 Amtrak passengers when their train from Los Angeles to San Diego ran out of fuel Sunday night.
Amtrak spokesman Cliff Cole said the train sat for about two hours on the northern edge of San Diego before another engine came along to push it the last several miles to the San Diego train station.
The train, which had left Los Angeles at 8:30 p.m., didn’t get there until 1:15 a.m. Monday, two hours late.
A train running out of fuel is “an unusual occurrence” and Amtrak officials will be looking into how it happened, Cole said.

— And finally, Firefighters in De Queen, Ark., were right on top of this blaze.
The De Queen fire station is closed on weekends, so when a call is received the firefighters go to the station to get their gear before heading out.
But when they gathered at the station Saturday to answer a call about a burning utility pole, they discovered they had another problem on their hands.
“One of the firemen called me and said the place was full of smoke. I thought he was joshing me. He said ‘We’ve got a fire at the fire station,’” De Queen Fire Marshal Dennis Pruitt said.
Firefighters called a dispatcher to get the Southwestern Electric Power Co. to disconnect the station’s electrical service.
“We told them the fire department has a fire. SWEPCO said ‘Yeah, the fire department has a fire.’ The dispatcher told them, ‘No it’s the fire station on fire!’” Pruitt said.
Authorities say the blaze was started by lightning.
Much of the station’s equipment was saved by surge protectors, Pruitt said.
“We fuss and fuss at people to get surge protectors and they do work,” Pruitt said.
The original call turned out to be a limb on top of a power line — not a fire.
“We’re fortunate we got the fire call. If it hadn’t been for that call, there is no telling what would have happened to the building,” Pruitt said.

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