Daily Rotten Archives February 17, 2004 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 South Korean A-Team executed in 1972 Korea Times | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "Four members of a commando group trained to assassinate former North Korean leader Kim Il-sung in the late 1960s were executed at an Air Force unit in Seoul in 1972, according to a former airman on Monday... A former Air Force staff sergeant, identified only as Kim, 58, claimed that he led a firing squad that executed the four members of 'Unit 684' after they were sentenced to death by a military court... The secret unit was brought into the spotlight by the recent film Silmido... The movie led the Defense Ministry to admit the existence of the unit early this month. A military authority also confirmed that the four were executed at the shooting range of the Air Force unit and then cremated." Read article... Federal prosecutor sues Ashcroft Newsday | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "A federal prosecutor in a major terrorism case in Detroit has taken the rare step of suing Attorney General John Ashcroft, alleging the Justice Department interfered with the case, compromised a confidential informant and exaggerated results in the war on terrorism. Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard Convertino of Detroit accused the Justice Department of 'gross mismanagement' of the war on terrorism in a whistleblower lawsuit filed late Friday in federal court in Washington... The suit is the latest twist in the Bush administration's first major post-Sept. 11 terrorism prosecution, which is now in danger of unraveling over allegations of prosecutorial misconduct... Convertino also accused Justice officials of intentionally divulging the name of one of his confidential terrorism informants (CI) to retaliate against him." Read article... Argentina village selling souvenir Nazi star maps Chicago Sun-Times | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "The bookshops of Bariloche, an Alpine-style town on the edge of the Argentine Andes, are running out of copies of their new best seller - a guide to the homes of senior Nazis who found refuge there after World War II. The author and publisher of Nazi Bariloche, Abel Basti, said: 'It is a serious investigation, presented in nontraditional format, which seeks to demonstrate that Bariloche was a Nazi stronghold.' ... It is no secret that many Nazis fled to Argentina following the Allied victory in 1945." Read article... Racist reality show popular in Austria Guardian UK | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "Family Swap has been a huge hit for ATV-Plus since it launched last year, and the broadcaster has just announced plans to extend the six-month run and expand the show to an hour... One recent episode followed working-class supporters of Austria's far-right leader Jorg Haider, who trade one family member with an immigrant family from Turkey. In the show, Gerda, the mother from the far-right family, was shown asking her host: 'Are you a Turk or a Tschusch (a derogatory term meaning scumbag)?' 'Neither. I am human,' Dursun Salman responded, adding he was of Turkish heritage and proud of it. This provoked a further torrent of racist abuse from Gerda. Salman's 35-year-old girlfriend, Melike Sanalmis, endured even worse abuse while living with Gerda's family. Well-educated and speaking excellent German, she tried to reason with her hosts to make them question their prejudices. But the exchange was so heated that Sanalmis had to back down. Shortly after the series started she took her six-year-old son out of the programme - saying the environment was harming his development." Read article... Assassin freed in Mission: Impossible-style prison break Sydney Morning Herald | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "The man accused in the sensational murder of India's 'Bandit Queen' escaped from a high-security prison in New Delhi with the help a group of bandits dressed as police, officials said. Sher Singh Rana, being held for the July 2001 murder of Phoolan Devi, literally walked out of Tihar jail with a 'police' escort - who turned out to be fellow bandits come to free him... 'At 7am we handed Rana over to a policeman from Uttaranchal as he showed us a warrant saying he had come to collect Rana to produce him before the court,' said a warden, who did not want to be identified. 'There were other "policemen" waiting near a police van. We did not suspect a thing ... Later we got a shock when another police party turned up at the gates of Tihar with a warrant to take Rana away.'" Read article... Body piercer trades tongue ring for underage threesome Alamogordo Daily News | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "Jovan Edwards owned Custom Choices when the teenage girl walked into the White Sands Mall store. She wanted to buy a tongue ring, court records state. Edwards, according to those records, responded, 'If you have sex with me, I’ll give it to you.' Later that evening, the documents cite, Edwards drove her and a second teenage girl (one 15, one 17) back to his business after having a 'threesome' with them. Inside, he then made good on his promise and gave her a green tongue ring... One mid-teen victim during the 'threesome,' the warrant stated, remembered seeing 'dark-colored boxers bearing the cartoon character Scooby-Doo, and some with smiley faces' in Edwards' apartment bedroom." Read article... Police attempt to thwart gangbang Aftenposten | Submitted by: tarquin "Police in Trondheim have tried to stop a convicted pimp from organizing a group sex event on Saturday that's billed as the city's first 'gangbang.' The organizer responded by dropping the event's entry fee. Tom Ketil Krogstad, who earlier was sentenced to a 16-month prison term for pimping activity, claims he's doing nothing illegal... Krogstad, known for being a promoter of organized sex-related events through his Club4 operation, willingly reveals that Saturday's event will involve two Norwegian women aged 26 and 35 and up to 40 men." Read article... Mormon underwear auctioned on eBay Deseret News | Submitted by: Provo Pinko "A pair of sacred religious undergarments worn by LDS faithful sold for more than $1,000 in an Internet auction Sunday... [Andrew Moody] said members of the LDS Church are angered by his auctions because he is selling something held sacred by the church's nearly 12 million members. 'They have the right to call anything they want sacred,' Moody said. 'However, I don't believe these are sacred, so I have no problem with selling them to whomever. Just because Hindus view cows as sacred doesn't mean I'm going to stop eating hamburgers and juicy steaks.'" Read article... Woman finds unearthed grave in cemetery WCPO-TV 9 Cincinnati | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "When [Tamika Johnson] went to visit her boyfriend of five years who was murdered in December what she found next to his grave was a foot and some bones that resembled vertabrae sticking out of a mound of soil. 'I got in the car and I sat there for about a half hour shocked, so I went to the store and got a camera and came back and took pictures,' said Johnson... Police do not believe there is anything criminal about the incident, but perhaps bad maintenance, they will go to the department of commerce that oversees cemeteries." Read article... Wedding stalled due to leprosy scars Calcutta Telegraph | Submitted by: Hare Krishna "The marriage of Balai Saha to Tulsi last Wednesday ended in a nightmare with the groom being accused of not telling the bride or her relatives that he was suffering from leprosy. The relatives of the 19-year-old bride from Bethuadahari demanded that Saha, of Shantinagar Colony 70 km from Calcutta, pay Rs 4,00,000 for hiding some scars that they had seen on his body. Tulsi’s relatives finally managed to make the 30-year-old groom pay Rs 50,000." Read article... Ben & Jerry's tycoon takes on electronic voting Wired | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "The Computer Ate My Vote campaign, which raised $100,000 in its first two days of fundraising last week... is focusing on e-voting regulations at the state level because a bill before U.S. Congress to mandate a voter-verified paper trail has stalled. Representative Rush Holt's (D-New Jersey) HR 2239, also known as the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003, would have amended the Help America Vote Act of 2002, or HAVA, to require electronic voting machines to produce a paper trail... The bill currently has 118 sponsors, but it is stuck in the House." Read article... Electronic voting system crashes, Congress goes home Atlanta Journal-Constitution | Submitted by: Reid Fleming "The electronic voting machines in the House of Representatives malfunctioned Tuesday, forcing legislators to postpone a vote on the amended fiscal year 2004 budget. House Clerk Robbie Rivers said about half of the machines weren't working Tuesday morning. Legislators initially voted by a show of hands on a few bills. But Rep. Tom Buck (D-Columbus), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said it would be too time-consuming to vote by hand given the number of amendments expected to be considered... Because of the glitch, the House recessed for the day shortly after returning from lunch." Read article...