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| Humor Laughing Out Law From Lawyers, for Sooth! | Police Worked | Ill Suits | Perilized Prosecutions | Cartoon Gallery Police Worked #1 "We're seeing these kids getting more and more developed on these things, and we wanted to put a stop to it," said the community/school liaison officer for the local public safety department. "It was out of control. People could get hurt." Police became alarmed when they discovered what one officer called a bazooka built by an inventive high-school sophomore. The device could shoot a plastic bullet through its barrel. The air-compressed device came complete with a trigger, valves, and safety switches. "Except for a firing pin and explosion, it was a gun," one officer said. He acknowledged that he and fellow officers thought the student's creation was imaginative, though none of them would want to face the device in a dark alley. As for the far-flinging potato launchers, officers began confiscating them last summer when they noticed children testing them in area parks. Law enforcement privately marveled at the devices, which, according to Internet ads, can send a potato flying 200-plus yards. Fashioned out of regular PVC plumbing tubing, most potato launchers are fueled by hair spray. A chamber filled with hair spray is ignited, and the explosion shoots the potato through the pipe. "It basically comes down to a boys-and-their toys kind of thing," says the owner of one Wisconsin spud-gun outlet. "If it goes boom and throws something, guys like it." The farther the object is flung, the better. Some estimates have more advanced potato launchers flinging objects some 400 yards. Closer to the category of BB guns and paintball guns, potato launchers are meant to be recreational items. So sellers don't have to beware. The Michigan community, for example, is just banning the shooters on public property, which is a common restriction around the country. But those who violate the ordinance, which prohibits the shooting or launching of projectiles or dangerous weapons in the park, can face a $500 fine and/or ninety days in jail. "These things actually do have a fair amount of power," the Wisconsin spuds entrepreneur reports. "I would not want to be on the receiving end of one." The Michigan teen with the bazooka launcher didn't even get a ticket. He was caught before police announced their zero-tolerance policy. The student had initially planned to make a water cannon but then decided to fit his device for a five-inch plastic bullet. The liaison officer says the student should have stuck to his original plan-water ammunition. "There's nothing we can do with that."
#2 The same judge sentenced beer bottle throwers to spend sixty days in jail or—because of their uncivil behavior toward an onlooker—to dress like females, including makeup and wigs, and walk along Main Street for an hour. They chose to dress up. Not surprisingly, a large crowd turned out to view the spectacle. One onlooker threw a plastic bottle at them. The judge maintains that his alternative sentencing helps deal
with overcrowded local jails. The police are not available for comment.
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