Knucklehead Award Friday Part Thirteen

Our thirteenth winner is Reuters news service. I really have a bone to pick with Reuters. Here is the latest example of why.

PARIS, Nov 15 (Reuters Life!) - What's a television without its remote control? Not much, decided a thief in southwestern France who returned to the home from which he had just stolen a TV to pick up the remote control -- and was arrested.

The man robbed a retiree's house in the village of Mussidan, taking the TV set and some hunting rifles, police said. While the owner was reporting the theft at the local police station, the thief returned.

Alert neighbors tipped off the police and they caught the man red-handed.

"He came back to take the remote control," a local police spokesman said. "I guess there's daring and there's stupid."

Do you notice what is missing? The name of the thief. This would be perfect knucklehead material except that Reuters removed the person's name.

Reuters does this all the time. Here is another example.

LONDON — A 22-year-old man suffered internal injuries after lighting a firework he had inserted into his buttocks, paramedics said Thursday. The incident took place Sunday, when Britain celebrated Bonfire Night, traditionally marked with fireworks to celebrate the Guy Fawkes' gunpowder plot to blow up Parliament in the 17th century.

Reports differed as to whether the man used a small firecracker or a more powerful rocket.

Either way, he suffered burns and other unspecified internal injuries in the incident in Sunderland, 275 miles north of London.

Katherine Shenton, a spokeswoman for the North East Ambulance Service, said a caller reported the victim was bleeding after the device exploded in his rectum.

Several of the man's friends recorded the incident on a mobile phone. The blurry images show a man bent over with his pants down and a white flash as the firecracker explodes.

Hysterical laughter follows, with someone shouting: "Ha ha ha ha" and then an expletive.

The Times newspaper reported the man was a soldier who recently returned from Iraq. He was thought to have been imitating a scene from Jackass: The Movie, a controversial film featuring a series of edgy pranks.

He is now recovering in a Sunderland hospital after sustaining internal injuries, including a scorched colon.

Some of you may remember it as this Knucklehead of the Day award. Thanks to the Times of London I was able to name this man.

There are other examples of Reuters taking names out of stories. This story out of Italy for one, or more seriously the London bomber story. Why does Reuters do this? I don't know if I'll get find out, but Reuters News Service is our thirteenth Knucklehead of the Day.

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