Posted on 11/19/2002 3:12:52 PM PST by Weimdog
Vandalism ends in bizarre death BY TOBY MANTHEY / Lincoln Journal Star
A Lincoln man died Sunday afternoon after being injured about 12 hours earlier when a fragment of a golf club a friend was swinging to knock over mailboxes struck him in the side of his head, police said.
Lincoln police said Brian J. Brinker, 21, was seated in the right back seat of a vehicle and two friends were in the front when the club hit a mailbox and broke. A fragment ricocheted into the vehicle, causing a "puncture-type wound in (Brinker's) skull," Police Capt. David Beggs said. He would not identify the make of the vehicle.
The man who allegedly swung the club, 23-year-old Scott R. Philips, of Lincoln, was arrested on suspicion of second-degree assault, Beggs said. Philips was in the front passenger seat. Whether Philips will be officially charged will be determined by the County Attorney's Office today or Tuesday, Beggs said.
The driver of the vehicle, Anthony M. Harman, 22, of Lincoln, was not cited or arrested.
Police said officials at BryanLGH Medical Center East called the Lancaster County Sheriff's Office at 12:21 a.m. Sunday when Brinker was brought by Philips and Harman to the hospital and was unresponsive. Surgery was performed, but Brinker was pronounced dead at 12:45 p.m.
Police do not know where the men were driving when the club fragment struck Brinker.
Harman and Philips initially said the incident happened outside the city, but later changed their accounts, police said. Authorities now believe it occurred inside the city limits, making it a police investigation.
"It's in northeast Lincoln, but we can't find it,"Beggs said. "If anyone has fresh damage to their mailbox, we'd urge them to give us a call."
Philips and Harman said they had hit three or four mailboxes before the club broke, Beggs said. Police do not know which part of the club struck Brinker.
Beggs said police have confiscated the vehicle and would obtain a warrant to search it for the club or other evidence.
Philips, 3028 Vine St., and Harman are listed as College of Business Administration students in the current University of Nebraska-Lincoln student directory. Brinker was not listed in the directory. No other information about him was available Sunday night.
It was unclear Sunday night if an autopsy would be performed on Brinker, Beggs said.
Reach Toby Manthey at 473-7395 or citydesk@journalstar.com.
Who cares about the make of the vehicle. What kind of club fails catastrophically like that?
/john
/john
Better yet, I want to know the brand of mailbox that strikes back at moronic mailbox bashers.
I'll buy a dozen.
You rang?
Yes, I'd say we have a definite Darwin Award candidate here.
So everyone had a "More Power Tooltime" Manly contest to find ways to defeat the vandals.
One guy had a swinging counterweight, so when the mailbox was hit, the beam on which it and the wieght was mounted would rotate and cream the car door.
Mine was more passive.
I bent, on a hydraulic press, a curve exactly matching the radius of a usual thin flimsy rural box, and bandsawed ends and made a nice door, and welded it all up, onto a 4" cement filled lally column.
It came out nice, looking just like the normal mailbox.
Oh. It was made of 1/4" thick 18-Nickel Maraging Steel, like they use on the Space Shuttle Boosters.
One night we heard a clank and swearing. There was a little 60 degree ding in one corner from a crowbar.
Another time we found the stub of a broken aluminum baseball bat. (I never knew they were filled with urethane..)
A local hardware store wanted to sell them for me, and the mailman loved it.
In recent years, the night riders seem to have lost interest in box-bashing.
oh well, Stupid Dies as Stupid Does.
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