4BETTER OR WORSE- The week in review
Worst crash: The driver of a teal '93 Geo Metro, who was being pursued by a Louisa County deputy sheriff for reckless driving and having no tags, is killed when he crashes into a tree on Route 22 in Albemarle May 26 and the car bursts into flames. At press time, police had not identified the driver.
Worst t-bone crash: A Ford Explorer seriously injures the female driver of a Hyundai leaving Fashion Square Mall May 26. Jorge Avila, 37, is charged with DUI, malicious wounding, failing to stop for a red light, and no driver's license.
Worst alleged post-crash behavior: Culpeper resident Fielding Taylor Kines, 38, is charged with felony manslaughter after police find the body of his girlfriend's son, eight-year-old Orion Bickings, in the trunk of Kines' car, according to an AP account. Police say Kines threw the child's body into the trunk of his wrecked vehicle May 16.
Worst charges: Scottsville resident Barry Lee Powell, 28, is charged with forcible sodomy of a child under the age of 10 in an alleged May 9 incident.
Most homeless: At least 35 people will be out on the streets when the Hope Community Center closes this week, after running afoul of city zoning and fire regulations. Seth Rosen has the story in the Daily Progress.
Most unusual shelter solution: Charlottesville considers buying a $10,000 yurt for tent-dwelling Angus Road resident Pauline E. Mallard, according to another Rosen report. Mallard, 79 and wheelchair bound, once lived in a station wagon on the lot where her house burned down in 1978 and has vexed her neighbors for decades with her unkempt property.
Most un-teacherly behavior: Staunton teacher Heidi Marie Dorn, 34, is charged with three felony counts of threatening to bomb Shelburne Middle School and four felony counts of threatening to do bodily injury, NBC29 reports. Dorn is accused of leaving threatening notes in the school on three occasions in February.
Most surprising 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision: A panel rules 2-1 May 20 that Virginia's law banning partial-birth abortions is still unconstitutional, after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a similar federal ban and instructed the Richmond-based court to take another look at its decision.
Most patents: Seventy-five UVA inventors received patents in 2007, according to a release.
Most dedicated Miller's patron: Reyn Louise Snelling, 45, is arrested the early morning hours of May 25 when police respond to an alarm inside the then-closed-for-evening Downtown Mall watering hole. WCAV has the story.
Latest in the UVA football player credit card-theft saga: J'Courtney Williams, 19, a former first-year linebacker, and Lester Guy Spellman III spend four days in jail starting May 22 for stealing another student's ID and using the card to rack up vending machine food charges, according to Tasha Kates in the Progress.
Latest Charlottesville Fire Chief Charles Werner honor: He's elected chair of the Department of Homeland Security's executive committee that makes sure emergency responders can communicate.
Worst pit bull mauling: Two-and-a-half pound Pomeranian Shelby is killed May 22 in the Woodlake neighborhood when a pit bull knocks down her owner, Beverly Lecuyer, and tears into the small pooch, Brian McNeill reports in the Progress.
Worst spewing: A construction crew slices a pipe under the intersection of U.S. 29 and East Rio Road May 22, sending 40,000 gallons of water spurting 15 feet in the air, according to a DP account.
Worst literary loss: UVA writing prof and former Virginia poet laureate George Garrett, 78, dies May 25 in his Rugby Road home.
Fondest farewells: Plan 9 and Satellite Ballroom on the Corner turn off the lights for good May 24.
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