For this month’s installment, by suggestion of a fellow reporter here in the Herald, I shall cover three bizarre stories related to crime and justice.

Straight Out of TV

On November 24, two inmates successfully broke out of the Santa Clara County jail in San Jose, California. As if from an episode of Prison Break, four inmates (including the two that escaped) procured tools with which they cut through the bars of one of their jail’s windows. They then used bedclothes and clothing to fabricate a makeshift rope that they used to rappel down from the jail’s second floor. A patrolling deputy noticed the clothing hanging from the window, which led to two of the inmates being caught immediately. However, the other two, Rogelio Chavez and Lanon Campbell, who were both facing charges for false imprisonment and firearms violations, are still being searched for.

“Now You Can’t Take the Kids from Me”

In the small town of Darlington, Indiana, Brandi Worley was charged with the murder of her seven year-old son and three year-old daughter. Worley, 30, confessed to the police that, two days prior to the murder, her husband had filed for divorce and that he was going to take their children, so she “did not want him taking them, so […] stabbed them.” The children were found inside the daughter’s bedroom with stab wounds on their necks. Worley said, “I did not want him to take my kids; I just wanted to die with them.” After murdering her children, she turned herself in by calling 911, saying that she stabbed herself and killed her own children.

Four is Okay, Five is Not

In the UK, it might soon be a crime to show “unconventional” pornography. The Digital Economy Bill, if passed, will ban the access to sites hosting pornographic content that would not be authorized for commercial DVD sale by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC). The bill limits adult content in a number of ways, including the ban of sexual acts involving female ejaculation, urination, or menstruation as well as any spanking, whipping, or caning that leaves marks on the body. Another bizarrely detailed restriction includes the “four-finger rule”, which, as its own name states, limits the number of fingers that can be inserted into any orifice to four. If adult websites allow UK viewers to access any content deemed to be too extreme for them, they will be breaking the law. Another article the bill seeks to enforce is stricter age verification checks, which would require any porn website to check that its users are over the age of 18. Many fear that this can allow a database of viewing history or habits to be obtained by companies or the government. The bill has led to an outcry claiming that “It should not be the business of government to regulate what kinds of consensual adult sex can be viewed by adults” and that the bill will “regulate such material that aren’t even criminal acts”.