Hard Boiled News

True Crime and News of the Weird from around the Globe

Jaguar Escapes at New Orleans Zoo, Kills Seven Other Animals

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Valerio the jaguar killed four alpaca, a fox and an emu before being tranquilized

NEW ORLEANS — Animal instinct can’t be caged.

A 3-year-old jaguar escaped its enclosure at a Louisiana Zoo and rampaged through the nearby habitats of several other animals, killing four alpaca, an emu and a fox, before being sedated with a tranquilizer dart.

The male jaguar, named Valerio, got out of its habitat at around 7:20 a.m. Saturday morning, officials at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans said, and was on the loose for about an hour before zookeepers were able to stop him.

“Our animals are our family. We are devastated by this loss,” the zoo said in a statement. The zoo was closed Saturday while officials conducted an investigation.

The zoo said they believe the wild cat got out of its habitat through a break in its roof. A second jaguar living in the enclosure — a female named  Ix Chel — remained in a separate indoor habitat during the incident.

After Valerio got out, he killed the alpaca named Noel, Micia, Alexandria and Lil Melody, as well as a fox named Maggie May and an emu named Elmo. Another alpaca named Daisy and two foxes named Copper and Rusty, were injured but survived.

The zoo said that veterinarians responded immediately after Valerio broke free, but it took some time to prepare the tranquilizers and to get a good line of sight to dart the cat. Once darted, Valerio was sedated within minutes. The cat was moved to a secure location at the zoo and was in good health.

“Nothing is going to happen to the jaguar itself. Unfortunately, it was doing what jaguars do and we are not going to euthanize the jaguar over this,” said Joel Hamilton, the zoo’s vice president.

Valerio was born in March 2015 at San Diego Zoo and moved to Audubon Zoo in New Orleans last October.

(Visited 39 times, 1 visits today)

‘Nigerian Prince’ Scammer Caught in Louisiana and He Sure as Hell Ain’t Nigerian

By HardBoiledNews Staff 1 Comment

Michael Neu played a role in duping victims out of $250,000 in a ‘Nigerian Prince’ scam

SLIDELL, Louisiana — Ladies and gentlemen, here is your Nigerian prince.

Police in Louisiana have zeroed in on a 67-year-old local man who they say played a key middle-man role helping dupe hundreds of people out of $250,000 through the notorious Nigerian prince email scam.

Michael Neu, of Slidell, allegedly served as a go-between between the victims and the foreign-based hoaxters, receiving payments into his accounts and then wiring the money overseas and keeping a cut of the cash.

The scam consists of sending dubious emails from a “Nigerian Price” who claims you are the beneficiary of a will and stand to inherit a large sum of money. They ask their marks to send personal financial information and make a security deposit to “prove” they are the beneficiary. While most people delete such emails, police say enough people fall for it to make it lucrative.

Slidell Police say they caught wind of Neu in May 2016, when contacted by authorities in Dodge City, Kansas where one of the victims lived.

Following a long-running investigation, with the aid of the Secret Service, they determined Neu had gotten roped into the scam through a “romance scheme.” He met a woman on Facebook named Maria Mendez, who investigators believe likely doesn’t exist, and she convinced him to help process payments for a cut of the action.

Mendez would then send out would thousands of emails to unsuspecting recipients each day,  consisting of “Nigerian Prince” scams, fraudulent IRS scams, reshipping scams and advance pay scams. When someone would fall victim to one of the scam’s, Mendez would  direct them to wire or mail money to Neu.

He would then transfer the money to “Maria Mendez” in Nigeria via Western Union or MoneyGram. He said he was conducting around three to four such transactions each week.

 

Neu being arrested in November

Investigators say  scammers use people like Neu as a middle man in an attempt to conceal their true identities, and to launder money. At first they believed Neu was a dupe himself but under questioned they discovered he was a willing participant who said he “needed the money.”

They say Neu had over 10 bank accounts, most of which had been frozen or closed because bank officials suspected fraudulent transactions. Western Union also banned Neu from using their wire transfer services, forcing him to use other companies, cops said.

In all, detectives estimate Neu made over $250,000 worth of fraudulent transactions, but believe the figure could be substantially higher.

(Visited 3,877 times, 1 visits today)

Man Seeking Voodoo Doctor Wrecks Car, Strips Off Clothes, Blames Snakes

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Kevin Bolton Crashed at the Slidell Airport after an imagined police chase

SLIDELL, Louisiana — It’s a pretty good bet drugs were involved.

A man on his way to find a “voodoo doctor,” crashed his car through a fence at a Louisiana airport and was later found stripped down to only his underwear because he claimed snakes had been crawling up his pants, police said.

Kevin Bolton, 43, of Hattiesburg, Mississippi said he had been running from police when he slammed his Chevy Tahoe through the fence of the Slidell Municipal Airport Monday morning and causing a telephone pole to fall on his car.

Police, however, say no law enforcement agency had been pursuing Bolton. Things got even weirder after the crash.

Bolton then fled into the woods near the airport, but turned up a couple of hours later in a nearby subdivision clad in only his underwear, cops said.

Bolton

“Bolton alleges that he had to strip off his clothes because snakes were crawling up his pants,” the Slidell police said in a statement.

Cops said they believed Bolton was under the influence of some type of narcotic. He was booked on charges of careless operation of a motor vehicle and hit and run.

(Visited 881 times, 1 visits today)

Trial Starts in Horrific Drowning of Couple Tied to Weights and Thrown Off Bridge

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Prosecutors say Lakeitha and Kenneth Joseph were still alive when they hit the water

NEW ORLEANS — A Louisiana jury heard the horrific details of a drowning of a couple who were tied to 30-pound kettle bells and thrown off  bridge to a nightmarish death.

Prosecutors in New Orleans laid out the terrifying final hours of Kenneth and Lakeitha Joseph’s lives in opening statements Tuesday in the murder trial of Horatio Johnson.

Authorities allege that Johnson, who is Kenneth Joseph’s cousin, put together the elaborate plot to kill the couple that began with them being beaten with chairs in a Metairie recording studio on the night of Feb, 18, 2014, and ended with them being thrown off a bridge into the murky waters of the Intercoastal Waterway.

“They were helpless, unable to help each other, only able to watch each other drown,” Orleans Parish prosecutor Kevin Guillory told jurors, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

The couple were reported missing the next day after failing to return a van to a relative. The van was later found near Atlanta with blood splattered all over its interior.

Lekeitha Joseph’s body surfaced on March 10, 2014, and her husband’s body was found 12 days later. Their bodies were still bound by the blue nylon rope that allegedly been used to tie them to the heavy weightlifting bells.

While prosecutors laid out in fine detail how the killings happened, they didn’t discuss motive. Johnson faces life in prison if convicted.

Horatio Johson faces life in prison for the murder of his cousin and his cousin’s wife

Two others face charges in the case. Amir “Blue” Ybarra, who operated the recording studio, has been a fugitive wanted on obstruction charges since May 2014. Steven Bradley, 31, is awaiting a separate trial on murder charges.

Two others have already pleaded guilty to charges in the case. Prison guard Brittany Martin has admitted to his role in the killing and faces up to 40 years when he is sentenced. Frank Mike Jr., admitted dumping the blood-stained van after being told by Bradley that  they “had to pull off a little move” using the vehicle.

Guillory told the jury that when the Josephs went to meet Johnson at Ybarra’s recording studio, they were lured inside one by one, where they were beaten with chairs.

Prosecutors said they would present video surveillance footage from a Walmart showing  Johnson and Martin purchasing a “murder kit,” of gloves, shoes, hoodies, degreaser, the nylon rope and kettlebells, using Lakeitha Joseph’s credit card.

They then drove the couple to Paris Road Bridge in Chalmette, and threw them in the water to die.

Johnson’s attorney, Bradley Phillips, argued that prosecutors had ignored piles of other evidence in pointing the finger at his client, and had largely built their case around the testimony of Martin and Mike, who he said had changed their stories several times and should be considered unreliable witnesses.

“They are people with literally everything to lose — their life,” he said. “They ignored mountains of other things, and they created a narrative, and that’s exactly what the evidence is going to show.”

(Visited 2,717 times, 1 visits today)

Fugitive Accidentally Turns Himself in By Flagging Down Cop for a Ride

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Jansen Simon should be charged with being criminally stupid

RACELAND, Louisiana — Criminal mastermind, he wasn’t.

Police caught up to a wanted fugitive in Louisiana when he flagged down a passing patrol car after his friends dumped him out on the side of the road.

The Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s office says Jansen Simon made their jobs easy early Sunday morning, when he signaled a passing deputy to stop.

Simon, 30, had been wanted since 2013 on charges that he hit a man on the head with a hammer during a bar fight, fracturing his skull. He fled the scene and had been on the lam ever since. He also had been wanted on two contempt of court warrants as well.

When Simon stopped the deputy along the road in Raceland, he explained that his friend shad abandoned him and he needed a lift. But when the deputy checked Simon’s ID and ran it through the system, he ended up in cuffs instead.

Simon was charged with second-degree battery and two counts contempt of court and is being held without bail.

 

 

(Visited 53 times, 1 visits today)

‘Sons of Guns’ Reality Star Sentenced to Life in Prison for Child Rapes

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

‘Sons of Guns’ ran from 2011 until 2014 on the Discovery Channel

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana — A former star of the reality show “Sons of Guns” will spend the rest of his life behind bars after being found guilty of repeatedly raping two young girls.

Will Hayden, 51, was convicted in April of raping the two girls — one in the early 1990s and the other in 2013 and 2014 — when they were just 11- and 12-years-old. The younger woman, who is now 15, testified that Hayden raped her repeatedly over the course of two years.

“One test of society is how it treats those who are at the dawn of life, the children,” East Baton Rouge Parish District Attorney Hillar Moore said.

Hayden and his family were stars of the show “Sons of Guns” which featured their Louisiana custom gun business, Red Jacket Firearms. The show ran from 2011 until 2014 on the Discovery Channel and was cancelled after Hayden was arrested on the rape charges.

The judge sentenced Hayden to concurrent life terms on the aggravated rape convictions, as well as 40-years for forcible rape. Hayden will not be eligible for probation, parole or a suspended sentence, the judge ruled, meaning he will spend the rest of his days behind bars, the Baton Rouge Advocate reported.

The reality show star testified in his own defense in the case to deny that he had raped the girls. His attorney says he is planning to appeal the verdict.

He also faces charges of aggravated incest involving his oldest daughter, Stephanie Hayden, who co-starred on the show. In 2014, she told Dr. Phil that her father once came into her bedroom one night when she was child, stinking drunk and pinched and kissed her while trying to take her clothes off. She told the talk show host she managed to escape and that he never did it again.

(Visited 3,539 times, 1 visits today)

‘Swamp People’ Star Busted for Illegally Hunting Gators

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

NOBLE, Louisiana — A former star of the reality show “Swamp People” has been arrested on charges of illegally catching and selling alligators and other animals.

The Sabine Parish Sheriff’s office said Roger Rivers, Jr., 42, and four others who worked for him, were busted after a year-long investigation by wildlife officials into allegations that they were illegally hunting gators, according to KTBS-TV.

Rivers, who appeared in the fifth season of the History Channel show which follows a group of gator hunters around Louisiana, is well known locally for living off the land.

According to his bio for the show:

“Roger Rivers spends every day on the hunt for food for his family of five. Whether it’s hogs, turtles or gators, Roger hunts them and never comes home empty-handed.

“However, Roger has one problem: an addiction to hunting big gators. Every year is a quest for him to capture the biggest gators in the swamp. Last year, he was able to come home with a 14-foot monster that nearly took his life when it pulled him overboard.”

Police say Rivers was booked into the Sabine Parish Detention Center on eight charges, including selling alligator snapping turtles, taking alligators and selling them without a license, selling alligator meat illegally and marijuana possession.

He was released on $10,000 bond.

Also arrested were Joseph Wilson Meshell, 66, and his three sons, Joseph Wilson Meshell Jr., Jessie Lee Meshell, and Michael Meshell, who all allegedly worked for Rivers.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries agents launched the investigation after receiving a tip about out-of-season hunting and the sale of animals harvested from those hunts.

 

(Visited 1,018 times, 1 visits today)

Dead Giveaway: LSU Lineman Busted Wearing His Number During Burglary

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

 

Adrian Magee played three games as a freshman

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana  — He’ll be swapping his playbook for a copy of the penal code.

An offensive lineman for LSU got busted burglarizing an apartment while wearing clothes bearing his own uniform number, cops said.

Adrian Magee, 20, is accused of making off with an Xbox gaming console, six Xbox games, Gucci flip flops, an Onyx bluetooth speaker, and $1,200 cash from the apartment.

He might have gotten away with it, had the 6-foot-5, 309-pound lineman not stuck his head in through the apartment doorway to ask the victim after he returned if he had been robbed, cops said.

The man whose apartment it was, being a huge LSU fan, immediately recognized Magee mainly because he had on a pair of shorts emblazoned with his uniform number, No. 73.

When the victim said he planned to review surveillance tape to see if he could identify who the culprit was, Magee left and soon returned with the stolen items and admitted he was responsible.

Magee, who played three games as a freshman last season, has been suspended indefinitely by the tea,.

 

(Visited 28 times, 1 visits today)

Couple Busted in Old School ‘Pigeon Drop’ Con Targeting Elderly Women

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Vanessa Favors and Milous Brown keep their scams old school

KENNER, Louisiana — A con artist posing as a devoutly religious woman and her boyfriend have been charged with running an old-fashioned “pigeon drop” scam to bilk an elderly woman out of her cash.

Police say Vanessa Favors, 61, of Atlanta, Georgia., and Milous Brown, 74, of Birmingham, Alabama, were busted after targeting a 65-year-old woman at a store in Kenner, Louisiana, but say they have been arrested for running similar scams in the past.

“We certainly believe they are traveling and preying on the elderly to scam them,” Kenner Police Lt. Brian McGregor told the New Orleans Times-Picayune. “We’ve also been in contact with other police jurisdictions who are reviewing similar cases.”

In a “pigeon drop”con, scamsters typically pretend to find a bag, wallet containing a large sum of cash, and approach their mark asking if the bag belongs to them. The fraudsters then propose splitting the money, but only after agreeing to a complicated arrangement in which the victim hands over cash as security while a lawyer ensures their keeping the money is legal.

In this case, Favors is charged with approaching the woman outside a Kenner grocery store. Favors, who was carrying a bible, asked the woman if she dropped her bag and then opened a purse holding a large wad of cash.

Favors offered to share the money for a fee and got the woman to agree to drive to a nearby where Favors said she planned to contact an attorney, cops said. On the drive over, cops say Favors began reciting biblical verse loudly, distracting the victim while she stole her wallet.

When they arrived at Wal-Mart, Favors took the handbag and the victim’s wallet inside where she met with Brown and quickly ran up several hundred dollars worth of items on the woman’s credit cards.

It was only after Favors did not return that the woman became suspicious and realized her wallet was gone.

Police believe the couple pulled off a similar scam on a 69-year-old woman outside a Winn Dixie in Kenner in 2013. Investigators believe other victims may have been targeted in and around New Orleans but may not have come forward because they were embarrassed.

(Visited 81 times, 1 visits today)

A Whole Life of Crime: Man Arrested for 60th Time in Louisiana

By HardBoiledNews Staff Leave a Comment

Ellis Ray Kitchen has made a whole life out of crime

ALEXANDRIA, Louisiana — Old habits die hard.

A career criminal in Louisiana has been busted for the 60th time — and the third time in month — for shoplifting, police said.

Ellis Ray Kitchen, 68, was arrested on Wednesday after he bolted from a shopping mall with property he had stolen from one of the shops there, the Alexandria Police department said.

When officers arrived, Kitchen allegedly dropped what he had stolen and ran, but when they caught up with in the mall parking lot, they found other property he had taken from another business.

Four days earlier, Alexandria cops busted him at the same shopping mall for trying to walk off with a tool set without paying.

Following the second arrest, Kitchen, who police say appears to be homeless, was booked for the 60th time into the Rapides Parish Detention Center.

Kitchen had previously been busted on Christmas Eve for trying to walk out of a local shop in Alexandria with items he hadn’t paid for.

Kitchen’s rap sheet in the area dates back to at least 1991, parish records show. Many of the arrests have been for theft and Kitchen has been listed as a habitual offender since 2012.

He is also a level three registered sex offender. In 1981, he was convicted of raping a woman and in 1986 he sentenced to five years for attempting to rape a woman.

 

(Visited 118 times, 1 visits today)