Curses, Foiled Again
After Domonique J. Loggins, 21, punched his 20-year-old girlfriend in the face during an argument while she was driving, the woman parked at a police station in suburban Joliet, Ill., and went inside to report the incident. When officers came outside, Loggins fled. He ran across a bridge and into a park, where, according to Deputy Chief Mike Trafton, “about 60 squad cars were parked.” Thirty Joliet cops and officers from other departments were in the park for a training session on “being prepared for any situation.” Loggins was quickly captured. After being handcuffed, he took off again, only to be recaptured by a police commander returning to the training session from lunch. (Chicago’s WLS Radio)

• When a man wearing a jacket hood over his face entered a bank in Columbus, Ohio, a bank employee informed him of the bank’s “no hats, no hoods” policy. Apparently hoping to avoid attracting attention, the man lowered the hood, according to FBI Special Agent Harry W. Trombitas, but then robbed the bank. Because his hood was down, however, surveillance cameras got a clear picture of his face. (The Columbus Dispatch)

Flight-Plan Follies
Dan Reeves spent nine years and $40,000 building a two-seater, single-engine airplane in the basement of his home in Cumberland County, Pa., assembling pieces as they arrived. When it was finally ready to fly, he had to spend another $5,000 to knock down a basement wall—the only way he could get the full-size plane out. (Harrisburg’s The Patriot-News)

Slightest Provocation
James Dillard, 40, a barber in Trenton, N.J., bit the ear of a 24-year-old customer nearly in half after he complained Dillard was taking too long to cut his hair. (Trenton’s The Times)

• Police arrested Joseph Hayes, 48, in South Memphis, Tenn., after he threatened the host of a child’s birthday party with a gun because his children didn’t get any cake or ice cream. According to a police affidavit, Hayes yelled at the victim, “Y’all didn’t save my kids no damn ice cream and cake,” then left the party but returned with a small handgun, which he showed to the victim. “I ain’t scared to go to jail,” he told her. “Just take care of my kids.” (Memphis’s The Commercial Appeal)

• When a 33-year-old man showed up at his girlfriend’s ex-boyfriend’s apartment in Hoquiam, Wash., carrying a dead animal and looking for his girlfriend, the ex asked the man why he was carrying a weasel. He told police the man replied, “It’s not a weasel; it’s a marten,” and then punched him in the nose and fled. Explaining that the dead animal was actually a mink, police Chief Jeff Myers said the attacker was later arrested. (Associated Press)

• Dechko Ivanov, 37, who posed as a living statue called the “Invisible King” in London, attacked rival street performer Rumen Nedelchev, 45, known as the living statue “Silver Wizard,” while Nedelchev was posing for tourists. According to testimony at Inner London Crown Court, Ivanov used a concrete block wrapped in a bag to bash his fellow Bulgarian and housemate “within a whisker” of death because Nedelchev had beaten him to a prime spot and stolen his audience. (Britain’s Daily Mail)

No.1 News
The National Sept. 11 memorial is scheduled to open in New York City in time for the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks, but despite taking nine years to plan, the 8-acre memorial site won’t have bathrooms because the developer of the $500 million project omitted them. City officials meeting to come up with a solution to the oversight nixed using portable toilets before deciding they would simply inform visitors about the lack of bathrooms and tell them to make sure they go before their visit. (New York’s WPIX-TV)

• A man fell down a 30-foot embankment while urinating on the side of a road in King County, Wash., and had to wait several hours before rescue crews could locate and save him. King County fire official Dave Nelson said rescuers at the scene noticed no drug or alcohol impairment, and a TV news crew reported a passing car had startled the unidentified man. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer)

When Guns Are Outlawed
After buying a can of beer from a gas station in Burton, Mich., a 45-year-old man was walking home when an unknown man pulled a knife on him and demanded money. The victim responded by swinging the bag containing the beer and hitting the attacker in the side of the head. The suspect ran off. (The Flint Journal)

• After Joshua Monson, 27, stabbed his attorney in the neck with a pencil during a court hearing in Snohomish County, Wash., he got a new attorney, whom he promptly stabbed in the neck with a pencil. (Seattle’s KIRO-TV)

Guilty with an Explanation
Authorities in Will County, Ill., arrested Joshua Price, 26, for leaving a flash drive with child pornography on it at a Joliet Junior College computer lab. They searched his home and found more child pornography and some 1,700 photos of dismembered women. Sheriff’s Detective Joseph Fazio testified that Price told him the porn was “the only thing that kept him from killing his wife and children.” (Chicago Tribune)

• Lawyers for Dalia Dippolito, 30, charged with hiring a hit man to kill her husband of six months, claimed the couple staged the incident to get them a reality television show and that she never intended to actually kill him. “It was a stunt that Michael Dippolito, whether he’ll admit it or not, hoped to capture the attention of someone in reality TV,” defense attorney Michael Salnick declared in his opening statement at his client’s trial in West Palm Beach, Fla. (ABC News)

Attention Grabber
The Benton Franklin Health District in Kennewick, Wash., voted to endorse a colorectal-cancer awareness campaign but then voted to withdraw its endorsement after receiving complaints that its billboards were in bad taste. The billboards announced, “What’s up your butt?” (Kennewick’s The Tri-City Herald)

It’s Now or Never
Budapest’s City Council declared Elvis Presley an honorary citizen of the Hungarian capital and named a small park after him in gratitude for his support of Hungary’s 1956 anti-Soviet uprising. During an appearance on TV’s “The Ed Sullivan Show,” Presley sang a gospel song, “Peace in the Valley,” which Sullivan said reflected Presley’s concern for Hungarians after the short-lived, quickly crushed rebellion. (Associated Press)

Compiled from the press reports by Roland Sweet. Authentication on demand.