xxxNews Of The Weirdxxx

Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.

(NOTE: Chuck Shepherd needs to revisit the roots of “weird” and engage in two more weeks of reflection. Before he left, he picked out some golden oldies to tide you over.)

Ronnie Darnell Bell, 30, was arrested in Dallas in 1998 and charged with attempting, all alone, to rob the Federal Reserve Bank. (In the movie “Die Hard With a Vengeance,” knocking off the New York Federal Reserve Bank required a small army of men and truckloads of weapons.) According to police, Bell was initially confused because there were no tellers, so he handed a security guard his note, reading, “This is a bank robbery of the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank, of Dallas, Texas, give me all the money. Thank you, Ronnie Darnell Bell.” The guard pushed a silent alarm while an oblivious Bell chatted amiably, revealing to the guard that only minutes earlier he had tried to rob a nearby Postal Service office but that “they threw me out.”

Author-athlete Sri Chinmoy sponsored an endurance race for runners in New York City in 1998, won by Istvan Sipos of Hungary, who finished the 3,100-mile course in 47 days (running from 6 a.m. until midnight). Four other runners competed on the concrete grounds of a Queens school, circling the facility about 115 times every day (only prizes: a trophy and a photo album). Said one runner, “To me, what the race is all about is the blossoming of the human spirit,” but according to the wife of another, the runners are “nuts.”
Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, Fla. 33679 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd

NEWS OF THE WEIRD