Woman Leads Cops on 100mph Chase —to Preferred Jail

(Newser) – So maybe you've been drinking and maybe you're speeding a little, but what to do when a cop tries to pull you over—presenting you with the very real prospect of doing a little time in a less-than-desirable county jail? Step on the gas, and lead police on a merry little car chase to the county that houses your preferred incarceration facility. That is the alleged tale of 34-year-old Oklahoman and prison connoisseur Luz Avilla, who police say was 5mph to 10mph over the limit when an officer in Grady County tried to pull her over.

Says a police spokesperson, "Instead of pulling over, the driver accelerated to speeds approximately 90 to 100 miles per hour." Apparently, Grady County jail is the worst. "She wanted to go to jail in Caddo County was her explanation as to why she did not pull over," the spokesperson says. Avilla also apparently did not want to get out of her vehicle, reports News9 via Gawker, and it took an officer with a drawn gun and a bunch of backup to persuade her. For posterity, the entire incident was recorded on the cop's dash cam. Avilla is facing a raft of charges including DUI and eluding police.

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Woman's DUI Leads to Ridiculous Chain of DUIs

(Newser) – It would be comical if it weren't so pathetic: Police in Readington Township, NJ, have reported the most bizarre chain of events, beginning with a 1:45am stop on Monday. A patrolman pulled over a car that was swerving, and smelled alcohol emanating from it, reports the Express-Times. The driver, Carmen Reategui, 34, failed the field sobriety tests he administered. So she was hauled off to police HQ, where she made a phone call ... to Nina Petracca, 23, who came to collect her.

Except the patrolman Petracca spoke to thought she seemed a little intoxicated, and after learning she had driven herself to the station, administered the same sobriety tests to her in the lobby, reports the Hunterdon County Democrat. She failed. And the story gets wackier, first, because Petracca was carrying seven Vicodin in an unlabeled container, so her DUI charge has now been married with a possession charge. Second, because she and Reategui decided to call Ryan Hogan, 33, to pick them up. And, yes, the patrolman smelled booze on him, and he failed his tests. The Democrat reports that someone sober ultimately picked all three of them up. They have January court dates.

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Botched Church Robbery Leads Cops to Alleged Killer

(Newser) – Billy Varner has an odd idea of keeping a low profile. The 54-year-old Chicago-area man was wanted in connection with the deaths of his mother and girlfriend, but that didn't stop him from allegedly walking into a Catholic Church in the middle of Saturday evening mass wielding a shotgun and attempting to rob the place, the Lake County News-Sun reports. To be fair, the church was in Williston, ND, almost 1,000 miles away from his home in Antioch, Ill. But it turns out he'd picked the wrong church to mess with.

"The parishioners in the church chased him out and gave a good description," Antioch's police chief said in a press conference. "The suspect fled the scene, and several church goers followed." This strange chase ended when police "intercepted" Varner's tan conversion van and arrested him "without incident." They soon learned that he was wanted for questioning, and Varner was today charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of Dorothy Varner, 82, and Peggy Henderson, 61. As for the cause of death, police will only say that it was "suspicious," reports the Chicago Tribune.

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Macabre Clue Leads Police to Suspected Thief

(Newser) – This month's entry in the annals of truly stupid criminals: Police in Arizona say they found a would-be thief thanks to the suspect's own severed finger, the Arizona Republic reports. Joshua Allen Goverman, 29, allegedly tried to steal copper wiring (value: $300) from an air conditioning truck Oct. 7 but apparently lost his finger in the process. He then, for some reason, left the finger behind. In the morning, the victim went to his truck and "got quite a surprise," a police news release says. "A cut-off finger that was caught up in the wiring."

The grossest quote we've heard in a while, from a Glendale cop: "They took a Popsicle stick and were able to attach it to that finger, and they were able to roll that finger and get a print on that finger." That led them to Goverman, who was indeed missing a finger. This being 2013, they also reviewed his Facebook account, and found an image the criminal genius had posted prior to his arrest "of his hand with the missing portion of his finger." He gave detectives the same story he'd posted on Facebook: that the finger was severed while he was fixing a car. But he apparently 'fessed up after police actually showed him the finger and ended up getting booked on theft charges. "I can't believe he didn't come back and get the finger," the truck's driver marvels to KPHO. "I would've come back and got the finger."

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ABC News Leads The Way In A Long Summer Of Women-In-Peril Stories

Enlarge Jill Belsley/ABC News

Jaycee Dugard talks to ABC's Diane Sawyer.

Jill Belsley/ABC News Jaycee Dugard talks to ABC's Diane Sawyer.

Spend a moment watching the news these days and it's obvious; we love our damsel in distress tales. But even I didn't predict 15 million people would show for ABC News latest blockbuster story of a cute, young blonde woman subjected to a horrible crime: top anchor Diane Sawyer's exclusive interview with Jaycee Dugard, who was kidnapped at age 11 and held for 18 years.

It was popular because it fell in doldrums of summer, when there's a lot of reality TV and reruns. And it sums up the zeitgest of the summer. Exhibit A: accused child killer Casey Anthony, whose acquittal inspired a flood of women-in-peril stories across every network and cable channel.

From the beginning, the Casey Anthony story has been a priority for ABC News, which paid her $200,000 for video and pictures years ago. When Anthony was acquitted, ABC News pulled out all the stops: they whisked the first juror willing to speak on camera to Disney World. Celebrity anchor Barbara Walters chatted up her attorney Jose Baez. And now the network has made another move which looks like ABC is trying to corner the market on women in peril stories. They've hired Elizabeth Smart, who was kidnapped at age 14 back in 2002 and found nine months later.

In her first appearance as a contributor on ABC Thursday morning, Smart talked about missing children in general, while also complimenting Dugard for speaking out. But her hiring raises an important question: Is this a signal ABC will cover more women-in-peril stories — crimes that really aren't that common?

For many years, critics have complained about the emphasis news outlets place on crimes which happen to young women — often pretty, often white and usually middle class. It even has a nickname: Missing White Woman Syndrome.

ABC is dipping deep into that well. According to Broadcasting and Cable magazine, the network's evening newscast spent almost 23 minutes covering the aftermath of Anthony's verdict last week, more than double what was on NBC and about four times what was on CBS.

When I talked to ABC spokeswoman Julie Townsend, she insisted the confluence of Smart's hire, the Dugard story and the Casey Anthony coverage was a coincidence. She said, in her words, "These are the kind of stories that are riveting; people want to hear about them from people who have experienced these issues firsthand."

In today's landscape of morning newscasts and true-crime network TV newsmagazines, such women-in-peril stories have turned crime news into melodramatic, real-life soap operas.

And just like on the best soaps, it doesn't matter if the woman at the heart of the tale is a heroine or a villain, as long as her story is so frightening and compelling people can't stop watching.

Eric Deggans is the TV and media critic for the St. Petersburg Times.

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