SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (AP) — A Scottsdale man inadvertently shot himself in the buttocks Thursday morning. Scottsdale police Sgt. Mark Clark said Daniel Leatherman, 26, heard a disturbance outside his apartment and saw a man he knew fighting with a cab driver. Leatherman told police that the man, Cody Nunn, 25, had assaulted him in the past, so he grabbed his gun and went outside. Leatherman told police that he accidentally dropped the gun while hiding it behind his back and shot himself in the derriere. Nunn and Leatherman’s friends took him to a local hospital. When police arrived, Clark said Nunn was drunk and disruptive. He was arrested on suspicion of disorderly conduct. Leatherman was released from the hospital later Thursday. There were no phone listings for Leatherman or Nunn*.
*Well of course not! Can you imagine the calls they got when they were listed?
In Wednesday’s Daily Breeze — the South Bay’s choice for 113 years — staff writer Andrea Woodhouse brings the news that barflies in Hermosa Beach are being targeted by political activists brought in by bar owners seeking to influence city council-hopefuls on issues related to boozing in the bay.
The patrons at Hermosa Beach bars got more than wasted these past few weeks.
They’ve also been schooled on the local political scene from workers recruited by bar owners to register voters and collect contact information so they can be steered toward City Council candidates likely to fight for their right to party.
You’ve got to love any city where bar owners are a “powerful lobbying group” and local drunks are considered key constituents.
Here’s the ad campaign organizer John Gurrola wrote, according to Woodhouse:
To help advocate for bar and restaurant owners, Gurrola earlier this month posted an ad on an online classified service, craigslist.org, calling for “energetic, attractive, approachable and outgoing” people willing to talk to revelers outside Hermosa hot spots like Sangria, Blue 32, Dragon and Hennessey’s about voting in the upcoming election.
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In other Hermosa Beach-bar-news, details the impending sale of the town’s landmark Mermaids bar. (If there is a better journalism job than covering bars in Hermosa Beach, California, I’d like to know what it is … )
The regulars at the Mermaid, the iconic, wood-paneled, Naugahyde-
upholstered watering hole in Hermosa Beach, must be be crying in their beers.
The Strand-front property housing the landmark bar in Hermosa Beach has hit the market for $27 million, nearly three months after longtime owner Quentin “Boots” Thelen died, said his stepdaughter, Diana Albergate.
Thelen’s six heirs, including Albergate, didn’t struggle with their decision to sell - with the estate tax man knocking, they didn’t have a choice, she said.
“We hate to have to do this, but the federal government demands its unfair share,” Albergate said.
Also for sale is an adjacent 6,900-square-foot building that faces Pier Plaza and houses four businesses - Mexican restaurant Cantina Real, Lappert’s Ice Cream, Avanti Jewelers and Pier Surf. The family is asking $6.5 million for the property.
Sipping a vodka tonic at his favorite drinking spot, Tom Barnett said he was stunned to hear the Mermaid’s land was for sale.
As change swirled through the city’s gleaming Pier Avenue during the last half century, the Mermaid has remained a constant, with good drinks and great people, he said.
“I just can’t believe they’re going to do this,” the 73-year-old said. “It’ll break my heart.”
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (Reuters) — South African President Thabo Mbeki shrugged off opposition calls to fire his health minister on Monday after a newspaper reported she is an alcoholic and still drinking despite having a liver transplant.
Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, dubbed “Dr. Beetroot” by opponents for advocating garlic and beetroot to fight AIDS, had a liver transplant in March as a result of a long-running battle with hepatitis, her doctor said at the time.
But the Sunday Times newspaper said the minister had alcoholic liver cirrhosis from years of excessive drinking when she had her transplant, and used her position to secure a new liver while hiding her alcoholism from the public.
As part of a five-month investigation into the health minister’s conduct that has prompted calls for her dismissal, the newspaper quoted witnesses who said Tshabalala-Msimang continued to drink since recovering from the operation. The paper also said she was convicted of stealing a watch from a patient while superintendent of a Botswana hospital in 1976.
There’s something about the name “Flesh Club” that makes it sound more horror-movie than house of ill repute.
The 12-year battle to shut a notorious strip joint in San Bernardino got a major boost Thursday when a judge issued a tentative order closing the Flesh Club and fining the owner $25,000.
“Lewdness is lewdness, and covering it with a patina of ‘free expression’ is a fiction which the law will not tolerate,” San Bernardino County Superior Court Judge Donald Alvarez wrote in a 15-page statement that detailed sexual activity at the club.
Wondering where the Flesh Club is located?
The club has been especially annoying to local leaders not just for allegations of prostitution but also because it sits on Hospitality Lane, the one thriving district of hotels and restaurants in a struggling city.