The two budding young rocket scientists that went on a shooting spree on Route 64 are in custody. Police went to Crozet’s Yonder Hill Farm to make the arrest around 5am this morning, only to have a guy with a handgun come at them. (That was presumably the second suspect.) They shot him, natch; he’s in the hospital now. Then they arrested 19-year-old WAHS alumnus Slade Woodson. These two dopes used Woodson’s own orange 1974 Gremlin on their little adventure, which was caught on camera at the bank that they shot up yesterday morning and eventually abandoned up 29N near Greene. Woodson’s already got a record (read as: fingerprints on file), convicted of auto theft and arson a year ago. He was stealing trucks, driving the hell out of them, ditching them and burning them. Presumably charges against the second guy will be coming soon, at least for threatening a cop with a gun, and I’d bet the shootings, too.
Either these guys were drunk out of their minds or they are two of the dumbest bastards ever to the walk of the face of the earth. I vote for “both.”
2:30pm Update: The Hook reports that the gunshot victim is not a suspect, and that there were five people in the house when the police showed up at 4:48am. It looks like it’ll be a few days until enough of this story comes out that we’ll began to piece together a proper narrative.
Too bad for the friends on his MySpace pages:
http://www.myspace.com/lostbogger
http://www.myspace.com/bakyrdbogn
I doubt even “Tom” wants to be his pal now.
Let’s hear it for 4-wheelers, rebel flags and Daisy-Dukes!
I was just poised to ask, rhetorically, how long it would be before (if the suspects turned out to be white) someone invoked the phrase “just some good ol’ country boy fun” to rationalize this incident. And then I looked at the myspace page and saw that my work was essentially already done.
Just two good ol’ boys. Never meanin’ no harm. Beats everything you ever saw. Been in trouble with the law since the day they was born.
Straightening the curves, flattening the hills. Someday the mountain might get them but the law never will.
[Oh wait; never mind about that last bit.]
“As a high school student, Woodson was a member of the junior varsity football team and an accomplished pole-vaulter for the indoor track team, according to past reports in The Daily Progress.”
Look at it this way; Afton may have lost a potentially productive member of society following Woodson’s irresponsible action. But the regional jail has GAINED an accomplished pole-vaulter.
The jail’s track team must be PSYCHED.
I bet he tips a mean cow, too. But now he’ll be limited to practicing that hand-eye coordination with his “soap-on-a-rope”.
giving us white folks a bad name for sure…
Seems like a good skill to have in jail. If he escapes that way, they can’t say they weren’t warned.
he might be vaulting a lot of poles in jail from now on
Colfer wins the thread. :)
It wasn’t exactly “near” Greene County. I saw the Gremlin sandwiched between two cop cars on the southbound lane of Rt. 29 just past Polo Grounds Rd/Rio Mills Rd on my way from work yesterday evening probably around 5:46/6pm.
WHY is this local story all over the national news?? -Way too much attention for this local screw-up.
Random shootings instill fear and fear gets ratings. Still, the cell-phone talkers and speeding 18-wheelers are one of the most likely ways we might suffer a random death. But fear of a boogey man sells.
Charged, not convicted - I know “the evidence is overwhelming” nevertheless………………….
What Family Guy said is spot on. Lily livered people scared crapless to go outside after this, then they probably think nothing of getting behind the wheel texting on a cell phone while driving over the speed limit. Still, this IS a serious situation, just not nearly as serious as the breathless media frenzy made it out to be.
I’ll risk my win and say I wondered if I might have heard about this odd mixture of pole vaulting & prison before. I think it hit the odd news section of a weekend NPR show or something:
UK NEWS
PRISON OFFERS INMATES POLE-VAULTING LESSONS
Saturday November 3,2007
By Jo Willey
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/24035
…
“But yesterday taxi driver Mike Lee, whose firm is used by the prison, said: “It struck me as funny that prisoners are being taught to pole vault. Next they will be teaching them rock climbing and ladder making.” Mr Lee, 60, of Weymouth, added: “Let’s hope they don’t get too good at it.”
Then the kicker:
“At a jail in New Mexico in 1987, seven men – including two murderers – pole-vaulted over the wall.”
The “Dukes of Hazzard” they are not. Bo and Luke never went around trying to hurt innocent folks.
These are thugs, not “good old boys.”
This would be the 2nd set of dumb and dumber criminals lately. A few months ago the other pair murdered the young lady and then parked their car in their own backyard. duh.
I believe they’re all going away for about 100 years or so.
And I must say, though not a big fan of law enforcement, they did do one hell of a job this time.
Yes, 29 made this the most “sensational” story of the century. Poor Henry Graff couldn’t even catch his breath while reporting it he was so excited!