Republican Faust: The Rise and Fall of Mike Connell - 1

Blunt Force

At about 6 p.m. on Friday December 19, 2008 a single-engine 1997 Piper Saratoga aircraft, with only the pilot aboard, crashed into a residential area in Uniontown, Ohio as it was preparing to land at Akron-Canton airport. Upon arriving to the scene, fire crews found only burning wreckage of the plane scattered between homes on Charolais Street. The pilot had been thrown upon impact and had died instantly of massive blunt force trauma, his belongings scattered in the yards.

First responders arrived on the scene immediately after the crash. Even then, irregularities began. Simon Worrall in an article The Mysterious Death of Bush's Cyber-Guru, writes of those first minutes:

Capt. Lorin Geisner of the Greentown Fire Department was the first person to arrive at the scene. “We received a 911 call, so we contacted the tower and asked what size plane it was and how many souls were on board,” he recalls. “But we were informed that the tower was in lockdown and that no information was available.”

This was to be the first of many abnormalities in a case that would send shock waves through the blogosphere with speculations of sabotage and foul play. In the bewildering reality-bending world of conspiracy theories, the events that surround the Connell crash belong in a class all their own.

Buy This Dad a Beer

Boy, 10, crashes drunk passenger's van after hitting 90 mph

OCTOBER 7--Meet Randy Lewis. The Tennessee man was so plastered Sunday afternoon that he directed a 10-year-old boy to drive his van, which eventually crashed after the child hit speeds of upwards of 90 mph. Lewis, 43, was charged with drunk driving, reckless endangerment, and child abuse.

A female friend, Paula Evans, was hit with reckless endangerment and child abuse charges. According to a Sullivan County Sheriffs Office affidavit, when officers responded to the vehicle crash site, they discovered that the totaled 1995 Ford Windstar van (which had flipped on its roof) had been driven by the 10-year-old. The boy was one of three children in the auto; all five of the van's inhabitants were treated for injuries at a local hospital. 

Lewis, pictured in the below mug shot, had cocaine in his system and a blood alcohol content of .26, more than three times the state limit, according to the sheriff's affidavit. He admitted drinking "at least 15 beers, along with some liquor," cops reported. For her part, Evans was spotted by sheriff's deputies shoving pills in her mouth while seated near the overturned van. In a subsequent hospital interview with police, Evans recalled having told Lewis that "the boy was too young to be driving." Lewis is being held on $50,000 bond in the Sullivan County jail, where he has presumably changed out of his unfortunate "Buy This Dad a Beer" t-shirt.

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/1007081beer1.html