• Oh, no, Elmo! Street performer busted for trying to bilk Girl Scouts

     

    By Tom Hays, Associated Press

    A homeless man with a history of playing an evil version of the "Sesame Street" character Elmo from coast to coast was charged Wednesday with trying to extort $2 million from the Girl Scouts. 

    Dan Sandler, arraigned on attempted grand larceny and other charges, pleaded not guilty, and a judge ordered him held on $200,000 bail. 

    Prosecutors in Manhattan alleged that the defendant, who also goes by the name Adam Sandler, last year began sending and leaving harassing emails and voice mails for a Girl Scouts supervisor he met while working a temp job at the nonprofit. They said that when the supervisor told him to stop contacting her, he threatened to spread false rumors about sex abuse in the organization unless it gave him a high-paying position or made him a millionaire. 

    San Francisco Police Dept. via AP

    Dan Sandler, who also goes by the name Adam Sandler, is seen in a May 10, 2013 booking photo.

    "I want a telecommute job from home of life at 150K," prosecutors say he wrote in one of several rambling emails. "Or a two million dollar cash settlement. As you know, the newspapers like to cover my evil Elmo scenario." 

    Sandler also cautioned, "How you treat me as a person will go a long way in regards to how I treat the Girl Scouts in the press, on the Internet and on u-tube," authorities said. Attached to another email was a photo of an Elmo costume stuffed in the trunk of a car, titled "Interstate Kidnapping of Elmo." 

    The emails "became increasingly alarming and bizarre," said Assistant District Attorney Lauren Littman. 

    Defense attorney Lawrence Gerzog, arguing for lower bail, told the judge that his client has "mental health issues" and that his rants were never a real threat. 

    There was no immediate response to a message left Wednesday with the Girl Scouts. 

    Sandler, 49, was accused last year of going on an anti-Semitic tirade while in a furry red Elmo costume in Times Square, where hustlers often dress up as pop culture characters and try to make a few bucks posing for photos with tourists. He pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct and was sentenced to two days of community service. 

    He left New York and took his Elmo act to San Francisco, where he lived in a car, authorities said. He was arrested there on a warrant in the New York extortion case on May 9. 

    He told an investigator following his arrest that he was being followed by the State Department, authorities said. 

    © 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

  • Skateboarding cad swipes cash from Girl Scouts

    View more videos at: http://nbclosangeles.com.

     

    By Chloe Stepney, NBCLosAngeles.com

    A boy riding on a skateboard snatched more than $550 from a Girl Scout troop Sunday as he rolled by their cookie stand at a San Bernardino County, Calif., grocery store.


    After a full day of selling cookies outside of a Stater Brothers store in Phelan, the scouts began breaking down their selling stand, police said.

    They were nearly done with the task when the teen, who had lingered near the girls' stand, reached out and grabbed their money bag, which contained $552, San Bernardino County Sheriff's Cpl. Randy Naquin said.

    Read more at NBCLosAngeles.com

    One of the girls ran after the thief, but fell down while running and sustained minor scrapes.

    The Girl Scouts told sheriff's investigators that they do not know the boy who stole their money, Naquin said.

    The boy (seen in surveillance video above) was described by Naquin as a white juvenile, wearing a blue beanie and blue-and-grey striped shirt.

    However, Stater Brothers shared surveillance footage with the Sheriff’s Department, which is working to determine whether the video is good enough quality to assist in identifying him, Naquin said.

    “Phelan is a very small community, and pretty much everybody knows each other,” said Naquin, who said a clear photo of the suspect will help officers identify and arrest the culprit.

  • Lawmaker: 'Radical' Girl Scouts out to destroy 'American family values'

    An Indiana lawmaker blasts Girl Scouts as a "tactical arm of Planned Parenthood." WTHR's Kevin Rader reports.

    By NBC News and msnbc.com staff

    There's an agenda behind those cookies the Girl Scouts sell, one bent on promoting communism, lesbianism and subverting "traditional American family values," according to an Indiana lawmaker.

    That's the reason Rep. Bob Morris, a Republican representing Fort Wayne, insists he won't go along with a resolution meant to honor the Girls Scouts on the organization's 100th anniversary. 

    Morris owns a chain of nutrition stores, but it's not the fat and sugar in Girl Scout cookies that have him riled up.

    "After talking to some well-informed constituents, I did a small amount of Web-based research, and what I found is disturbing," Morris wrote Saturday to Republican House colleagues in a letter obtained by the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette.

    Morris alleged that the Girl Scouts of the  United States of America and the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts "have entered into a close strategic affiliation with Planned Parenthood," which he claimed is trying to "sexualiz(e) young girls through the Girl Scouts."

    Even worse, he wrote, only three of the 50 role models promoted by the Girl Scouts have even "a briefly-mentioned religious background."

    "All the rest are feminists, lesbians, or Communists," he wrote.

    State of Indiana

    Indiana state Rep. Bob Morris, R-Fort Wayne, accuses the Girl Scouts of celebrating feminists, lesbians and communists.

    As proof, Morris notes that the "radically pro-abortion" Michelle Obama is honorary president of Girl Scouts of America, which "should give each of us reason to pause before our individual or collective endorsement of the organization."

    After learning all this, he wrote, he pulled his two daughters out of the Girl Scouts and instead put them in American Heritage Girls Little Flowers, a parent-run group best described as a center for recovering Girl Scouts.

    Michelle Tompkins, a spokeswoman for the Girl Scouts, responded to Morris' assertions by telling NBC station WISE of Fort Wayne, "Not only is Rep. Morris off the mark on his claims, it's also unfortunate in his limited research that he failed to discover that, since 1917, every first lady has served as the honorary leader of Girl Scouts, including Nancy Reagan, Barbara Bush and Laura Bush."

    "We believe that leadership is about hearing from all sides of an issue before making up one's mind," Tompkins said. "We only wish we had the chance to speak with the freshman representative before he distributed his letter."

    For its part, Planned Parenthood of Indiana called Morris' comments "inflammatory, misleading, woefully inaccurate and harmful," saying he'd insulted not only it but also the Girl Scouts and Obama.

    "Planned Parenthood currently has no formal partnership with the Girl Scouts, but supports their mission and recognizes their century of contributions to our society," the organization said in a statement to NBC station WTHR of Indianapolis.

    NBC stations WISE of Fort Wayne, Ind., and WTHR of Indianapolis contributed to this report by M. Alex Johnson of msnbc.com. Follow M. Alex Johnson on Twitter and Facebook.

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  • Hand in the cookie jar: Girl Scout official plundered $311,000

    By msnbc.com staff

    A former finance director at the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York on Tuesday admitted stealing more than $300,000 from the organization.

    Yaasmin Hooey, 35, of New York used the cash for cruises, cosmetic laser procedures and a $13,000 diamond ring. She also spent $18,000 in bars and restaurants, according to the District Attorney's Office.

    She pleaded guilty to second-degree grand larceny.

    'Personal expenses'
    Hooey admitted forging the signature of the organization's then-chief executive and writing 65 checks to herself from a payroll account. Nine wire transfers also moved money from two of the nonprofit's bank accounts to Hooey's own.

    In addition, she used some of the money for "personal expenses" including groceries, a gym membership, clothing and commuter train tickets.

    "It was an enormous violation of the trust the Scouts places in her as their director of finance, as well as the trust of the many girls that the organization serves," Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said in a statement. 

    Hooey admitted stealing $311,568 between September 2008 and December 2010.

    She will be sentenced in the New York Supreme Court on March 6.