Curses, foiled again
Four men trying to steal a pickup truck in Jefferson County, Ark., didn’t get very far because it wouldn’t run. Undeterred, they were pushing the vehicle when a sheriff’s deputy spotted them near the county jail. Sheriff’s officials told the Pine Bluff Commercial that the vehicle wouldn’t start because it was being used for parts.

    Police released a surveillance video showing a man entering a gas station in Tacoma, Wash., carrying a stick spiked with nails and demanding money. The man hit the clerk in the hand with the stick, but the clerk punched the wouldbe robber in the face. He dropped the stick and fled with a bloody nose and no money.

Problem solved
Encouraging people to die at home rather than in a hospital could solve Canada’s impending shortage of hospital beds, according to University of Alberta researcher Donna Wilson. Sixty-one percent of Canadians now die in hospitals, down from 80 percent in 1994, but Wilson suggested the number drop to 40 percent because baby boomers could double the death rate in the next 20 years, tying up beds for those needing life-saving treatment or surgery.

First Amendment follies
Authorities said Henry Gasiorowski, 60, was shot in the arm and back while hunting in Forestburgh, N.Y., when he sat behind a turkey decoy and began making turkey calls. The Times Herald-Record reported that a hunting companion heard the calls, saw what he thought was a turkey and opened fire.

Young love
A judge sentenced William Wagner, 26, to serve one to four years in prison after he admitted he rode his bicycle 180 miles from Maryland to Scranton, Pa., to have sex with a 15-year-old girl he met through the social networking Web site MySpace.

Slightest provocation
Authorities in Wayne County, Mich., accused Ava Maria Gordon, 42, of stabbing her father to death after an argument that started when he objected to her eating a dinner roll that he had marked with a note asking her not to eat it.

Instant karma
Tom Riall, a senior executive at a firm that installed speed cameras at around 4,500 locations throughout Britain, was banned from driving for six months after he was recorded driving at 103 mph on a 70 mph limit highway.

Compiled from the nation’s press by Roland Sweet. Submit items, citing date and source, to P.O. Box 8130, Alexandria VA 22306.