Patrick Kennedy

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First Enid's, then Rosemary's Greenpoint Tavern, now comes news that Williamsburg is losing another drinking institution: The Abbey.

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[TW: Suicide]

A griefer has been reportedly splicing video of himself giving explicit instructions for committing suicide into animated videos on Youtube Kids; he lets the video run for several minutes before breaking in to say "Kids, remember, cut this way for attention, and this way for results"; despite "hundreds of reports" of this in the comments for the videos, they stayed online for several months until members of the Pedimom community (run by pediatrician/mother Free N Hess) made a concerted effort to report the videos.

The Pedimom community has surfaced two videos with the suicide instructions spliced into them. They hypothesize that the griefer allows for a lengthy preroll of normal cartoons so that parents are lulled into a sense of security and walk away from their kids, never hearing the offensive material.

The videos in question have been removed from Youtube so we only have the discussions at Pedimom to go on, as well as a camera video shot of a screen while one of the videos was playing.

Four minutes and forty-five seconds into the video, a man quickly walked onto the screen, held his arm out, and taught the children watching this video how to properly kill themselves. What did I just see? Did I really just see that? I immediately turned off the video. My son’s nose stopped bleeding, and I further investigated the video in private while he went to play. I watched it again, certain that I had dreamt it up. I know YouTube had some sick videos, but I thought YouTube Kids was safe. They sure make it seem like it is.

But – no. There it was again. Four minutes and forty-five seconds into the video. The man quickly walked in, held his arm out, and tracing his forearm, said, “Kids, remember, cut this way for attention, and this way for results,” and then quickly walked off.

#YouTubeWakeUp, #ProtectOurKids [Free N Hess/Pedimom]

YouTube Kids Scare [Anonymous, Physician Mother/Pedimom]

Economist Mark Perry has updated for 2018 his chart of price changes of selected goods over the past two decades.

This graphic has been referred to a “the Chart of the Century” because it explains a lot about the socioeconomic life in the United States in just a quick glance.

During the most recent 21-year period from January 1998 to December 2018, the CPI for All Items increased by exactly 56.0% and the chart displays the relative price increases over that time period for 14 selected consumer goods and services, and for average hourly earnings (wages). Seven of those goods and services have increased more than average inflation, led by hospital services (+211%), college tuition (+183.8%), and college textbooks (+183.6%). Average wages have also increased more than average inflation since January 1998, by 80.2%, indicating an increase in real wages over the last several decades.

The other seven price series have declined since January 1998, led by TVs (-97%), toys (-74%), software (-68%) and cell phone service (-53%). The CPI series for new cars, household furnishings (furniture, appliances, window coverings, lamps, dishes, etc.) and clothing have remained relatively flat for the last 21 years while average prices have increased by 56% and wages increased 80.2%.

As various parties have noted, the goods & services that have gotten more expensive tend to be things that people need, aren’t subject to international competition, and are subject to more government regulation. The goods & services that have gotten cheaper tend to be things that people want, are subject to international competition, and are less regulated.

If healthcare & education costs had dropped as much in the last two decades as the price of TVs, toys, and software has, we’d be all set! As it is…

A 46-year-old woman died after eating at a Michelin star restaurant, and 28 others became sick with food poisoning. Morel mushrooms might be the culprit.

The diners had all eaten at RiFF, in Valencia Spain, which "conjures up innovative cuisine," according to Michelin.

According to the BBC, the woman who died had eaten at the restaurant with her husband and 12-year-old son, "both of whom also had diarrhoea and vomiting."

Officials tracked down 75 people who ate at the restaurant between 13 and 16 February, and learned that a total of 29 had suffered food poisoning, including three families.

This included a 46-year-old woman who ate out with her family on Saturday night and died at home in the early hours of Sunday morning...

Some reports have suggested that morel mushrooms may have been to blame, but officials told local media they were waiting for the test results to come back before singling out any particular ingredient.

"Regardless of the reason that may have caused this situation, I want to convey my deep regret for what happened, hoping that soon all these facts can be clarified," Bernd Knöller, RiFF's owner and head chef, said in a statement. The restaurant is closed "until the causes of what happened are established."

Image: by https://www.flickr.com/photos/berndhknoeller/ - https://www.flickr.com/photos/berndhknoeller/4014385532/, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

PHOENIX—Finally closing a sordid chapter in team history, representatives for the Arizona Diamondbacks announced Friday that the franchise had settled a civil lawsuit with the offspring of a mourning dove who died after being hit by a Randy Johnson fastball during a 2001 spring training game. “We know this was an…

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After a nearly three-year wait, the second season of the excellent Fleabag is coming soon (March 4 in the UK, May 17 in the US on Amazon). Here’s a snack-sized trailer:

If you aren’t on the Fleabag train yet (and you definitely should be), you can catch up with the first season on Amazon Prime (it’s only six 25-minute episodes). Oh, and you can catch series creator and star Phoebe Waller-Bridge in Fleabag the play in NYC starting next week.

We humbly submit, for consideration in the lede hall of fame, this gem from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune:

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Popping bubble wrap, sharpening a new pencil, catching a falling glass in the knick of time, waking up before your alarm. Some things are just really, really satisfying. If you’re of a certain age, you’ve probably spent more time than you’d care to admit staring at a TV for an extremely gratifying event to occur: when the bouncing DVD logo hits perfectly in the corner of the screen. Watch this bar crowd go absolutely bonkers celebrating this thrilling occurence:

I watched this at least 5 times and am still chuckling about it 20 minutes later. I don’t even care that it’s fake…that was beautiful. (via @StephMBuck)

In California, a young man was fatally shot by six police officers who found him unresponsive in his car with a gun in his lap.

Willie McCoy was shot about 25 times.

Bullets struck the center of his face and throat, and blew off part of his ear, his family's attorney says.

Willie McCoy was a rapper known in the bay area as Willie Bo. He fell asleep in his Mercedes while going to Taco Bell for a bite to eat, because he was tired from working in his music studio, his family says. He wasn't threatening anyone or harming anyone.

From NBC News:

Oakland attorney Melissa Nold, who said she examined the body of Willie McCoy, 20, last week, told NBC News that he also sustained injuries to his shoulders, chest and arm, during the Feb. 9 encounter with six officers.

"Overkill is an understatement," Nold said of his wounds and the number of times he was struck.

A coroner's report has not been released and Vallejo police have declined to comment further during an active investigation.

McCoy — a Bay Area rapper known by his stage name Willie Bo — had been in the recording studio in recent days, his family said. They believe he had gone to the Taco Bell for a bite to eat and was so exhausted that he fell asleep while waiting in the drive-thru.

Employees called police at about 10:30 p.m. when they saw him slumped behind the wheel of the car with the engine running, Vallejo police said in a statement last week.

Nold also called into question the officers' version of events in which they said the doors to McCoy's Mercedes-Benz were locked when they first considered retrieving the gun from his lap before he woke up.

Even if the doors were locked, the front passenger's side window was already broken and had a sheet of plastic covering it, which could have been removed, Nold said. Video of McCoy's car being towed in the aftermath from the scene shows plastic over the open window and several bullet holes in the windshield.

His car was in the drive-thru at Taco Bell when he was killed by police.

Six officers "fearing for their safety" opened fire in about four seconds, police said.

NBC News: California rapper killed in car was shot by police about 25 times, lawyer says

Duke phenom Zion Williamson is already the stuff of tall tales. One more mythic feat entered the record Tuesday during the Blue Devils’ comeback win over Louisville. While fighting Jordan Nwora for possession, Williamson’s fingertips appeared to be ... denting the basketball.

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When I spent a week in Singapore I didn't see a single graffiti tag anywhere. I did see a lot of great street art on buildings. This video profiles Singapore's most famous street artist. known as “Zero.” I remember his work well.

Image: Great Big Story/YouTube

The Democrats have started hearings on HR1, a comprehensive anti-corruption and voting rights bill, and House Oversight and Government Reform Committee member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gets to participate, which is great news for all of us.

With only five minutes on the clock, AOC asked her witnesses about the (virtually nonexistent) limits on corruption in Congress: establishing that a Congressmember can fund their campaign entirely with anonymous corporate money, use the corporate money to pay off people who have evidence of official wrongdoing, then propose legislation that benefits the companies that funded them, while holding stock in those companies and being vastly, personally enriched from their "public service."

Then, for dessert, AOC establishes that presidents have even more power to use their office for personal gain. If you thought her debut speech was amazing, well, she was just getting started.

It's not like any hearing you've ever heard, and AOC's plain-language, charming socratic dialogue leaves little room for weaseling, dissembling or disagreement. This is a broken system, and it's not hard to see how it got broken, nor what it will take to fix it. The lack of "political will" to address corruption and self-dealing in Congress isn't about "political will" at all: it's greed, pure and simple.

‘We have a system that is fundamentally broken.’ — Rep. @AOC is explaining just how f*cked campaign finance laws really are pic.twitter.com/sCwpkRzcHB

— NowThis (@nowthisnews) February 8, 2019

In less than five minutes, and with the witnesses replying with barely more than a “yes” or “no,” Ocasio-Cortez gets across to the viewer:

* just how openly corrupt the current political system is (“you’re going to help me legally get away with all of this”); the lack of meaningful safeguards against corporate capture (“Is there any hard limit that I have in terms of what legislation I’m allowed to touch … based on the special interest funds that I accepted?” “There’s no limits”) how vulnerable the office of the president is in particular to moneyed influence (“Every person in this body is being held to a higher ethical standard than the president of the United States”) and that the very people serving with her on this august committee are most probably compromised by these interests too (“We have these influences existing in this body, which means that these influences are here in this committee shaping the questions that being asked of you all”) That she does it all through the medium of a classroom game and with a sense of fun makes the whole thing even more remarkable to watch.

AOC Is Making C-SPAN Fun [Branko Marcetic/Jacobin]

MacGruber, the SNL sketch-turned-movie, was a notorious flop, raking in only $9.3 million worldwide on a budget of $10 million. In the years since, however, Jorma Taccone’s absurdist comedy has flourished, emerging as one of this century’s most prominent cult films. Now, due either to its enduring word-of-mouth buzz…

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When GOP darling Scott Walker offered to hand billions in subsidies to Chinese manufacturing giant Foxconn, he was warned: the Foxconn MO is to suck up billions in public money for ambitious megafactories, then scale them back into small, largely irrelevant facilities (or cancel them altogether).

But that didn't convince Walker: instead, he got right to business, seizing and bulldozing Wisconsinites' homes to make way for the "factory," and allowing the price-tag to rise by more than a billion dollars without blinking, even as the company started to hedge about the scale of the factory it would build in exchange for Walker's huge welfare handout.

Now the other shoe has dropped: Louis Woo (special assistant to Foxconn chairman Terry Gou), who negotiated the Wisconsin deal, has told Reuters that "In Wisconsin we’re not building a factory. You can’t use a factory to view our Wisconsin investment."

Instead of the planned megafactory with its 5,200 blue-collar jobs by 2020, now the company proposes to hire 1,000 skilled R&D researchers -- who will likely come from out of state.

But they still get more than $4 billion: so if the 1,000 jobs ever materialize, each one will have cost the state $4.1 million.

See folks, that's why you want to elect businessmen to run your governments: they know how to get real value for money!

Earlier this month, Foxconn admitted that hiring for the plant was going slowly. The company originally promised to create some 13,000 jobs in the state, but it has already fallen short of modest targets. Instead of creating a promised 260 jobs in 2018, it only created 178, making it ineligible for tax credits. The company originally promised to employ 5,200 workers by the end of 2020, but Reuters now reports that this figure is closer to 1,000.

As well as the number of jobs diminishing, the type of work is changing, too. Instead of focusing on factory work, Foxconn claims it will create higher-skilled, R&D occupations. Woo told Reuters that about three-quarters of the jobs Foxconn will create in the state will be so-called “knowledge” positions.

Foxconn may not build a factory in Wisconsin after all, says top company exec [James Vincent/The Verge]

Late in the second period of Tuesday night’s Jets-Bruins game, Bruins youngster Trent Frederic threw down with Jets wing Brandon Tanev. Tanev, perhaps lulled into a false sense of security by Frederic’s apple cheeks and youthful complexion, was truly not at all ready for the hands:

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Trump's government shutdown fiasco that ended last week without a penny for his primitive wall seems to be taking quite a toll on president – he's now lashing out at his friends at Fox – a rarity indeed. Sunday night he tweeted an insult at Fox reporters John Roberts and Gillian Turner:

Never thought I’d say this but I think @johnrobertsFox and @GillianHTurner @FoxNews have even less understanding of the Wall negotiations than the folks at FAKE NEWS CNN & NBC! Look to final results! Don’t know how my poll numbers are so good, especially up 19% with Hispanics?

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 28, 2019

And almost as rare, another Fox reporter – Julie Banderas – hit back at Trump in a series of tweets that defends her colleagues and criticizes the president:

@realDonaldTrump This is NOT right. I stand by my colleagues @johnrobertsFox and @GillianHTurner They don’t deserve this. No reporter does. They are doing their jobs and reporting the facts. They are not opinion journalists and deserve the respect from the @WhiteHouse they cover. https://t.co/ftRPauopjC

— Julie Banderas (@JulieBanderas) January 28, 2019

We can and do stand plenty of criticism every day which is fine coming from everyday viewers. Our jobs are not meant to please others. But the office of the @POTUS ought not to be the one lashing out. That’s not how this country works. That’s not how Freedom of the Press works. https://t.co/buakHRRwPO

— Julie Banderas (@JulieBanderas) January 28, 2019

By going on Twitter and insulting two of our journalists @realDonaldTrump is putting a target on their backs. In turn his followers will then attack @johnrobertsFox and @GillianHTurner in support on Twitter. Bullying journalists is not Presidential. Period. https://t.co/xayShIojYj

— Julie Banderas (@JulieBanderas) January 28, 2019

Suddenly a Fox reporter cares that the president is a bully. Where in the hell have they been for the last two-plus years?

Via HuffPost

Image: by Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

For this video, freelance animator Nick Murray Willis took the audio from football commentators and made these little animated vignettes to go along with each line. Here’s a sample:

My only complaint about this video is that it was over too quickly. Luckily Willis has done the same thing in videos for NBA, soccer, movie lines, etc.

People stuck in a 75-car pileup about 20km east of Montreal decided to get creative in passing the time pic.twitter.com/JInUxB9ed7

— CBC (@CBC) January 28, 2019

Oh, Canada! Thank you for the example you set. Just a few miles south of our mutual border, we have a Measles epidemic brewing!

U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross is puzzled as to why 800,000 furloughed federal workers need to visit food banks to keep their families from starving, when they can simply get a loan.

From Reuters:

Asked about their struggles, Ross told CNBC: “I know they are, and I don’t really quite understand why.”

“The banks and the credit unions should be making credit available to them,” he said, noting that the government would give federal employees back pay. “There really is not a good excuse why there really should be a liquidity crisis.”

Wilbur Ross is has a net worth of around $700 million, according to Forbes. Before becoming Trump's Commerce Secretary, Ross was co-chair of the Bank of Cyprus, which is a laundromat for dirty Russian money. From The Dallas News:

The country of Cyprus has a long history as a laundromat for dirty money, particularly from Russia. Cyprus is referenced 530,937 times in the Panama Papers, and the Bank of Cyprus, the country's largest bank, is referenced 4,657 times. And the cast of characters linked to the bank and President Donald Trump is troubling.

The "Amen Break" is a six-second drum sample from a 1969 song called "Amen, Brother" by a band called The Winstons. Over time it became used in over 3,000 songs.

From Great Big Story:

What do Skrillex, David Bowie, Salt-N-Pepa and basically every drum and bass track have in common? They've all used the Amen break, a four-bar drum solo that has become the most sampled loop in music history. Recorded in 1969, the six second sample originates from the song “Amen, Brother” by The Winstons, a funk and soul group from Washington, D.C. For many years, the solo was buried deep in musical archives—that is until hip-hop pioneer Lou Flores, aka “Breakbeat Lou,” featured it on his compilation, “The Ultimate Breaks and Beats.” Once producers caught wind of the solo, it took off, going on to change music forever.

Image: Great Big Story/YouTube

While 57,000 TSA employees are expected to work without pay during the government shutdown, Rep. Rodney Davis (R-Ill.), a government worker himself, thinks it's just dandy to travel first class. While sitting in his plush seat on a flight from Chicago to Washinton, D.C., a fellow traveler confronted him.

“Congressman, do you think it’s appropriate to fly first class while 57 TSA agents aren’t being paid?”"

Davis is as silent as a church mouse.

“Taking that as a yes...Taxpayers paid for this flight? Fair enough,” the passenger says.

A GOP congressman flew first class today on a taxpayer-funded flight* on day 32 of the shutdown. A fellow passenger wasn't thrilled.

*(The office bought him a coach ticket but he got upgraded for free because of how frequently he flies--on taxpayer dime)https://t.co/4UFdhVoUHP pic.twitter.com/Qmfi8dQpFE

— Akbar Shahid Ahmed (@AkbarSAhmed) January 22, 2019

Apparently, Davis bought a coach ticket and upgraded to first class using frequent flier points. But the optics are ugly, to say the least.

Via Huffington Post, who first obtained the video from the unidentified passenger.

Moon Rivas, a cyborg artist, has sensors implanted in her feet that vibrate whenever an earthquake is detected anywhere in the world. A dancer and choreographer, Rivas uses the randomly occurring vibrations to perform dance pieces like “Waiting for Earthquakes”. This video from Quartz gives a good overview of Rivas’ art and process (back when an implant was located in her arm instead of her feet).

CNN and Bloomberg both have recently updated reports on Rivas’ work.

Ribas then transforms that data into dance or music, often incorporating elements of spontaneity and uncertainty. For example, the movements in the dance “Waiting for Earthquakes,” in which the artist stands perfectly still until seismic activity occurs, can take many shapes.

“I’m a dancer and a choreographer, so I wanted to experience movement in a deeper way,” she explains. “Whenever there is an earthquake, I move according to the intensity of the earthquake. It’s a bit like a duet between the earth and myself. Earth is actually the choreographer of the piece and I’m just imitating the data that she gives.”

Her partner Neil Harbisson is also a cyborg. He was born colorblind but is outfitted with an antenna implanted in his head that vibrates when it detects colors. (via @boletrone)

During a 60 Minutes interview Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez casually mentioned that she thought that America's super-rich should pay a marginal tax-rate of 70% on annual earnings over $10,000,000 (which is a better deal than they got under Reagan); since then, the proposal has roiled the political classes and billionaire-backed news outlets, who coincidentally oppose taxing billionaires.

Though the establishments of the Democratic and Republican parties have scrambled to brand this proposal "unworkable" and "radical," there's another group of people who really like the sound of it: voters, including Republican voters.

A newly released Hill-HarrisX poll found that 59% of registered US voters support the proposal, and that breaks down to 62% of women, 55% of men, 57% of southerners, 56% of rural voters, 60% of independents, 71% of Democrats, and even 45% of Republicans.

The establishment has attributed AOC's incredible reach and influence to many factors -- her physical attractiveness, her ignorance, or some kind of witchy, indefinable charisma.

As compelling as all those dismissive reasons may be for the people who mouth them while rocking back and forth with their eyes screwed shut, there's another possible explanation that this poll bears out: "She’s preaching popular, common sense, underexpressed messages. But honestly, would a new member of Congress be so dominating the national conversation, if other Democrats were either less clueless or less beholden to their donors?"

My favorite part of this debate are the bootlickers who insist that it's impossible to tax rich people because they'll just hire procurers and enablers to hide their money in the Irish Sea, the English Channel, the Caribbean, Luxembourg, Wyoming, and Delaware.

This counsel of despair is awfully convenient for the oligarch class, but it's belied by the energy that the super-rich pour into the project of keeping the top marginal rate as low as possible. Either they're doing this because it breaks their hearts to see Uncle Sam try so hard and fail so badly to get them to pay their share, or, just maybe, they know that hidden money is a lot less useful than on-shore fortunes that you can freely claim.

In her comments to the CBS show, Ocasio-Cortez referenced tax rates that had once been in place during the mid-20th century. During the 1950s and 60s, the wealthiest Americans were once taxed at a rate in excess of 90 percent.

"That doesn't mean all $10 million are taxed at an extremely high rate, but it means that as you climb up this ladder you should be contributing more," she said.

The proposal has been met with both criticism and acceptance within the Democratic party. Republicans and conservative commentators have been universally critical, some incorrectly implying that the congresswoman wants to tax all income of the richest Americans at 70 percent.

Poll: A majority of Americans support raising the top tax rate to 70 percent [Matthew Sheffield/The Hill]

(via Naked Capitalism)

Over the past several years, police departments across the country have equipped themselves with body cameras in an attempt to increase accountability and mend relationships with communities who cited a lack of trust between themselves and the officers charged with protecting them. But many departments—particularly…

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Cardiff City’s new striker Emiliano Sala is presumed dead after the plane he was on disappeared over the English Channel while on its way from France to Wales on Monday.

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The ghost of football eras past is the gift that keeps giving.

Jose Mourinho is gone, for now, from football, and Liverpool fans are worse off for it.

For the 2 ½ seasons the self-styled Special One spent at the helm at Manchester United, Reds supporters had an easy, straightforward locus for their loathing; as well as an unending source of entertainment as they watched the Portuguese manager steer their bitter rivals into the ground.

Mid-table floundering, player mutinies, turgid football—it was a great package deal, really. And maybe, if Xherdan Shaqiri hadn’t scored that third goal in December’s hiding, or if Jürgen Klopp’s side could’ve cut down on a few of those 36 shots, or even gifted the poor Red Devils a bit more than the measly 36% they managed, then maybe, just maybe, we could’ve enjoyed the Mourinho trainwreck a bit longer.

Anyway. Spilled milk and all that.

But good ol’ Jose hasn’t left Merseysiders completely high and dry. After a vanishingly short period of self-reflection following his sacking, the 56-year-old has popped back up in the press again in an attempt to perform some legacy maintenance, somehow finding a way to talk about his abortive period of buying, mismanaging and selling Liverpool talisman and Golden Boot winner, Mohamed Salah when the two were at Chelsea from 2014 to 2016

”When [Chelsea] decided to sell him, it was not me. I bought him, I didn’t sell him, and my relationship with him was good, is good,” Mourinho told beIN SPORTS.

”I think that he doesn’t regret that move because everything went well. Everything went well for him and the progression went well for him but, at that moment, he was just a kid with a huge desire to play every week, every minute and we couldn’t give him it.”

“Lots of things have been told that are not true. People try to identify me with the coach that sold Salah; I am the coach that bought Salah. It’s completely the wrong idea.

”I played against Basel in the Champions League. Salah was a kid in Basel. When I play against a certain team, I analyze the team and the players for quite a long time and I fell in love with that kid. I bought the kid.

”I pushed the club to buy him and, at the time, we already had fantastic attacking players - [Eden] Hazard, Willian - we had top talent there. But I told [Chelsea] to buy that kid.

”He was just a lost kid in London. He was a lost kid in a new world and we wanted to work him to become better and better and better but he was more in the idea that he wanted to play and not to wait.

”So we decided to put him on loan. To put him on loan in a culture that I knew well—Italy, tactical football, physical football, good place to play. Fiorentina is a good team, without being a team with huge pressure playing for the title and we decided that move there.”

OK, bro we get it. No one’s blaming you; rather we here in red thank you for whatever you trying to style your time with Salah as being.

Also, we miss you. Pretty sure Ed Woodward and United will take you back if you ask nicely.

Don't rinse food particles from dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. If you do, the detergent won't have anything to cling to and your dishes won't get as clean.

From Mental Floss:

One of the arguments against pre-rinsing is that certain detergents are designed to cling to food particles, as the Cascade detergent brand informed The Wall Street Journal in 2015. Without a surface to stick to, your dishes won’t get as squeaky clean.

Consumer Reports offers another explanation. According to the product-testing magazine, newer dishwashers—those purchased within the last five years or so—won’t wash your dishes for very long if the sensors in the machine don’t detect much dirt in the water. “When that happens, the dishwasher gives them just a light wash, and items come out less than sparkling,” Consumer Reports's Ed Perratore wrote in 2016. “To avoid that lackluster result, don’t rinse; just scrape off bits of loose food.”

There’s also a major environmental factor to consider. One mind-blogging statistic from Consumer Reports states that the average person wastes 6000 gallons of water a year by pre-rinsing. Most dishwasher machines use just 3 to 5 gallons of water per load, while the average person uses about 27 gallons when washing dishes by hand, according to The National Resource Defense Council.

Image: Andrey_Popov/Shutterstock

About 30 years ago, the Menendez brothers of Beverly Hills murdered their parents, collected a hefty life insurance policy, and then went on an 8 month spending spree. The brothers bought cars, watches, opulent vacations, restaurants (what?!), and… courtside tickets to see the Knicks play. Incidentally, a photo of Mark Jackson from that game was used as his 1990 basketball card, and you’ll never guess who was in the background…

The guy who found it, Stephen Zerance, isn’t an NBA fan but a fan of true-crime. He’d read in court documents the brothers had bought the tickets and went looking for proof. When archival photo and video searches were fruitless, he thought about basketball cards. After looking on eBay, Zerance found his match and announced it this past August, 29 years after the murders. It’s some sort of real-life Time Travelers in Historic Photos bananas coincidence.

As an aside, I learned while writing this post the Menendez brothers weren’t initially considered suspects and got caught after one of the brothers admitted the murders to his psychologist, who told his mistress (the psychologist’s, not the brother’s), who told the cops. Eventually, the affair between the mistress and the psychologist ended, perhaps on account of the stress related to being an ancillary part of a high profile murder case, and likely badly as evidenced by the fact the mistress attended the Menendez trial as a witness for the defense with the intention of impugning the character of the psychologist. What a ride.