The week in review
Worst week for the Fourth Amendment: Sans search warrants, Verizon turns over millions of phone records to the National Security Agency, the Guardian reports. Also without search warrants, the NSA is mining data from the servers of Internet giants like Google, FaceBook, and Microsoft in a top-secret program called PRISM, the Washington Post reports.
Worst mailbox pilfering: Two men from Charlotte, North Carolina— Getony Barnett, 28, and Jeremy Brown, 29— plead guilty June 11 to stealing $300,000 in checks from mailboxes in central Virginia, altering them, and cashing them, according to a release.
Worst unlocked car pilfering: Crozet and Ivy subdivisions are hit with a rash of break-ins since May in which cash, electronics, and in at least one case, Snickers, have been taken from vehicles.
Worst insurance fraud: Graham Hutson Messer, 32, is sentenced to seven months in prison and ordered to repay $60,000 in insurance premiums that he claimed he was paying but instead embezzled from clients, including Piedmont House in Charlottesville, a transitional facility for men leaving prison, according to the DP.
Latest in Crozet attempted insulin murder: Theresa Lynn Brady, 34, is sentenced to two years and 10 months June 4 for trying to inject her sleeping husband with insulin in August. In a statement, she says she felt "debilitating despair" in living in a house that was "like a war zone and a prison instead of a safety net." K. Burnell Evans has the story in the Daily Progress.
Latest Council candidate revelation: Buford Middle School teacher Melvin Grady served three months in jail for driving with a suspended license for the third time in 2006, the Progress reports.
Latest in the McDonnell/Star Scientiific scandal: Delegate David Ramadan (R-Loudoun), a jeweler, is subpoenaed by the federal grand jury looking into Governor Bob McDonnell's ties to nutritional-supplement company owner Jonnie Williams, according to the AP.
Longest sentence: A Nelson jury recommends 120 years in prison for James Jessup after finding him guilty of aggravated sexual battery, forcible sodomy, and object penetration of a teen on June 10. He'll be sentenced in August, NBC29 reports.
Biggest June 11 primary ballot: Charlottesville's, with five City Council candidates, commonwealth's attorney, commissioner of revenue, along with attorney general and lieutenant governor, the results of which are not available as the Hook goes to press.
Most kids along in eluding police: Five, ranging from one to 10 years old, are in the 1999 black Ford Expedition driven by Shannon D. Burton, 31, from Waynesboro into Albemarle, where he stops on Plank Road in North Garden, according to a release. Burton was wanted on a grand larceny warrant, and has been charged with one felony count of eluding police, five felony counts of child endangerment, and a misdemeanor count of aiding and abetting a fugitive. Also in the car is Jonathan Woodard, 29, from Maryland, who was wanted on a felony probation violation, and picks up five child endangerment charges as well. The children are unharmed, and both men are being held in Albemarle Charlottesville Regional Jail without bond.
Most inconvenient for RIC travelers: Richmond International Airport is evacuated for nearly four hours Tuesday morning, June 11, because of a phone threat.
Biggest bummer: The Cavs lose 6-5 to Mississippi State June 10 in the Super Regional at Davenport Field, squashing hopes of going to the College World Series in Omaha after a 50-12 season.
Biggest merger: Union First Market Bank acquires Charlottesville-based StellarOne for $445.1 million, creating the largest community bank in Virginia, the DP reports.
Newest UVA anniversary: June 10 marks one year since the ouster debacle of President Teresa Sullivan engineered by Rector Helen Dragas.
Best poaching: UVA law prof James E. Ryan is named dean of Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Best ghost hunting: The Twisted Paranormal Society based out of Fisherville spends the night June 8 at Swannanoa on Afton Mountain, the 1902 mansion built by Richmond railroad man James Dooley, NBC29 reports. No word on what the investigators found.