"Court OKs trial for girl who texted boyfriend urging suicide"

AP:  A teenager who sent her boyfriend dozens of text messages encouraging him to take his own life and told him to "get back in" a truck filled with carbon monoxide fumes must stand trial for involuntary manslaughter, the state's highest court ruled Friday.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled Friday that a grand jury had probable cause to indict Michelle Carter, then 17, in the 2014 death of Carter Roy III, 18.

Carter's lawyer had argued that her texts were free speech protected by the First Amendment and didn't cause Roy to kill himself.

But the court, in a strongly worded decision, said the grand jury heard evidence suggesting that Carter engaged in a "systematic campaign of coercion" that targeted Roy's insecurities and that her instruction to "get back in" his truck in the final moments of his life was a "direct, causal link" to his death.

"In sum, we conclude that there was probable cause to show that the coercive quality of the defendant's verbal conduct overwhelmed whatever willpower the eighteen year old victim had to cope with his depression, and that but for the defendant's admonishments, pressure, and instructions, the victim would not have gotten back into the truck and poisoned himself to death," Justice Robert Cordy wrote for the court in the unanimous ruling.

The case drew national attention after transcripts of text messages Carter sent to Roy were released publicly, showing her urging him to follow through on his plan to kill himself and chastising him when he expressed doubts.

"I thought you wanted to do this. The time is right and you're ready, you just need to do it!" Carter wrote in one message.

"You can't think about it. You just have to do it. You said you were gonna do it. Like I don't get why you aren't," she wrote in another message.

Karoshi: death from overwork

"Japan has no legal limits on working hours, but the labor ministry recognizes two types of karoshi: death from cardiovascular illness linked to overwork, and suicide following work-related mental stress.

A cardiovascular death is likely to be considered karoshi if an employee worked 100 hours of overtime in the month beforehand, or 80 hours of overtime in two or more consecutive months in the previous six.

A suicide could qualify if it follows an individual's working 160 hours or more of overtime in one month or more than 100 hours of overtime for three consecutive months.

Work-related suicides are up 45 percent in the past four years among those 29 and younger, and up 39 percent among women, labor ministry data show."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/death-overwork-rise-among-japans-vulnerable-workers-011205871--business.html

"'Suicides' over Ashley Madison hack"

"Two individuals associated with the leak of Ashley Madison customer details are reported to have taken their lives, according to police in Canada."

The police revealed the news at a press conference in Toronto but gave no further information about the deaths.

Ashley Madison's Canadian parent company Avid Life Media is offering a C$500,000 (£240,000) reward for information about the hackers, they added.

He also explained that the hack had already led to a series of "spin-offs of crimes and further victimisation".

"Criminals have already engaged in online scams by claiming to provide access to the leaked websites," he said.

"The public needs to be aware that by clicking on these links you are exposing your computers to malware, spyware, adware and viruses."

The unfolding of the hack was also detailed at the conference - from the moment on 12 July when several Avid Life Media employees logged in to their computers and were confronted by a message from the hackers.

This message was accompanied by music - AC/DC's "Thunderstruck", said Mr Evans.

suicide in ASL

There are a lot of ways to convey the idea, most involve the word "kill" that looks so much like the word "immigrate" or "move under" and nothing at all like the word "die," one of my all-time favorite words.

Some dictionaries do not have the word "suicide." I suppose it's just one of those words that does not occur when people are compiling a dictionary, or perhaps too unpleasant a word to include. Seeing the specific ways to off oneself;  holding a two finger gun to the head, you can imagine the gun needn't be held at the temple. Some people do this in real life by holding the gun under their throat. And then there is slicing the wrists, a word that goes by so quickly it can be missed. Seeing those two specific ways suggests other ways the idea can be pantomimed specifically to depict choking, hanging by an invisible noose, tilting your head and sticking out your tongue, stepping in front of a train, electrocution, jumping off a bridge, walking into a lion's den, holding an asp to one's neck, seppuku, driving a car off a cliff, eating until you explode, what have you.

Kill myself (suicide)


Shoot myself in head (suicide)


Cut both my wrists (suicide)


Myself kill (suicide)

Self individual kill (suicide)

Kill me (suicide)

Name world kill yourself s-u-i-c-i-d-e prevent day I stand support
with u-n-i-t-e-d  n-a-t-i-o-n-s

Drudge: "Doubtfire Did It"

"Robin Williams resented having to work on films such as the second Mrs Doubtfire but felt compelled in order to keep money coming in, a close friend of the actor has told the Telegraph."

Williams, who had been working on four projects when he was believed to have taken his own life this week, was said to have been dreading making more films as they "brought out his demons".

According to reports, Rush Limbaugh made allusions to Robin Williams money troubles, on yesterday's show, drawing some pushback from both the left and the right.

Limbaugh then refers to a news story that addressed Williams’s humiliation at having to take television roles and movie gigs that were beneath him to pay off his debts and costly divorces.

“He had it all, but he had nothing. He made everybody else laugh but was miserable inside. I mean, it fits a certain picture, or a certain image that the left has. Talk about low expectations and general happiness and so forth,” says Limbaugh.

Were I 'am now, in Florida, I can't get a good reception of the Rush Limbaugh show. On Monday, as a matter of fact, I downloaded the android app, but, when I went to join, I had a change of heart. I thought $6.95 a month was too much. I got to get a job first.

Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton

I was watching American Pickers on t.v. where Mike was negotiating for a small copper still. The owner appeared interested in discussing the still but seemed not so interested in selling. Mike did not buy the still but the owner asked, "Do you know who Popcorn is?" And Mike answered in the affirmative and before they moved on to picking through other items the seller mentioned Popcorn died recently. Mike goes, "Oh," and they move on to picking through other items. It was clear the owner really did not intend to sell the still. So why the fuss about a tiny still?

How would Mike know Popcorn Sutton, I wondered. Curious, I looked. 

All per Wikipedia. Known for always wearing his hat and his bib overalls. Sutton, (perfect name) wrote a self-published book about making moonshine Me and My Likker along with a self-produced home VHS video about related activities, This is the Last Dam Run of Likker I'll Ever Make, which quickly became a cult classic and the source material for a documentary by television producers in Boston The Last One, which received a Southeast Emmy Award, and further, later used by Discovery Channel for their show the Moonshiners.  This photograph is titled "the day before Marvin "Popcorn" Sutton killed himself" taken by Andy Armstrong.

Wiki   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Sutton

This is the Last Dam Run of Likker I'll Ever Make full movie YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yp56sT66D1U

You really should see the first photo in Google images. I almost posted it, but this one is better. More respectful. 

Google images [popcorn sutton]  http://tinyurl.com/mqh3ay3

Popcorn Sutton was thirty-two years old.

Kidding. He was sixty-three years old. But why did he off himself? Reading that made me sad. Why, Popcorn, why? What was so impossible that suicide was the rational thing to do? 

He killed himself by carbon monoxide poisoning to avoid federal prison term due to begin a few days later. They finally caught up to him. He had scrapes with the law previously, probation and such, and he always insisted he run his last run of moonshine, that he aint gonna do it anymore, that he's getting too old to be doing that stuff.

Hank Williams announced a partnership with his widow Pam Sutton to distill and distribute a brand by his name, Popcorn Sutton's Tennessee White Whiskey marketed as being produced in stills of Sutton's design. They were sued by Jack Daniel's Properties, Inc. because their bottles were too closely resembled. They wanted all bottles removed and profits from sales of those bottles turned over to Jack Daniel's. Rough.

Let's look. 

So? Well, yeah. But so? Well, yeah. I'm conflicted. Come on, the guy died. 

Bastards. 

It's business. 

Business is bastardly and so is law sometimes. Jeeze those people are touchy.

I hate this story. It hurts my American heart. Can't a guy just make whiskey? No. He cannot. He must dance around and hide his activities.

from Cheeseburger.com

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