David Jordan and James Cole, undergraduates at Cambridge University in the U.K., have been fined for posting a live hamster.

The pair put the hamster in a standard A5 envelope and posted it in Market Street, Cambridge, on 22 June.

Michael Taylor, prosecuting for the RSPCA, said: “The hamster had been posted in a sealed, addressed envelope which contained no food and no source of fluid.

“The postman who emptied the box made the discovery because it was trying to chew its way out of the envelope. A veterinary surgeon who examined the hamster said, had it ended up in the sorting office and its mechanical sorting drum, the creature could have been killed.” — Cambridge Evening News

Jordan was fined £750 and Cole £500, and both become today’s Stupid People of the Day.

(More information available from Daily Telegraph and from BBC: What can’t you send through the post?)

A man on a Monarch Airlines flight from Manchester, England, to Tenerife, Canary Islands, became drunk and began abusing the flight crew, and the captain diverted and threw him off the plane on Porto Santo, a tiny desert island.

The unidentified man swore at crew and passengers after being refused a bottle of wine on the four-hour flight from Manchester to Tenerife.

He became so abusive the fed-up pilot diverted the Monarch Airlines Airbus to Porto Santo island off West Africa.

After the plane touched down, the man was marched off by police and had his luggage dumped on the tarmac.

The plane and its remaining passengers then took off again for Tenerife, where it landed almost four hours late after the unscheduled stop. — BBC News

The man eventually did get off the island, after a day and a half of sobering up.

The man is said to have later travelled to Madeira and from there to Tenerife by flight for a holiday there. A police spokesperson in Madeira said he was charged by the police and he could face a prison term. Although he is in Tenerife, the legal process will continue, the police said. — Vip News

The problem? The crew cut him off after he drank too much. The man, who was unnamed in news reports, is today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

Juan Reyes, 37, of Patchogue, N.Y., was arrested and charged with child endangerment Tuesday after Suffolk County sheriff’s deputies investigating a family court case went to his home and found him passed out on the floor and a two year old boy stumbling around drunk.

A three year old also in the house at the time was apparently sober.

They managed to rouse Reyes, who was the only adult at home with the two toddlers, ages 2 and 3, according to the sheriff’s office. The deputies said Reyes appeared extremely intoxicated.

The deputies also noticed the 2-year-old was having difficulty standing, had bloodshot eyes, smelled of alcohol and was lethargic.

The toddler was taken to the hospital, where tests revealed he was legally intoxicated, with a blood-alcohol content of 0.094 percent, the sheriff’s office said. In New York, a driver is considered drunk with an alcohol content of 0.08 percent or greater.

The second child was taken into the custody of Child Protective Services.

At the time, the children’s parents were at a hospital, where the mother was giving birth. — Associated Press

This is not the man you want babysitting your children, even if as in this case he lives with you. Juan Reyes, who is being held on $5,000 bond, becomes today’s Stupid Person of the Day. He will appear in court January 3.

Frankie Coleman, wife to Columbus, Ohio, mayor Michael Coleman, pleaded guilty to drunk driving and was sentenced Wednesday to three days in jail and a six month driver’s license suspension.

Columbus is the capital of Ohio.

Dash-cam video captured Columbus’s first lady having difficulty walking a straight line after apparently slamming her car into a parked truck.

Mayor Michael Coleman made the trip to the Bexley police headquarters, coming to the rescue of his wife after she failed a breathalyzer test.

At earlier hearings her attorneys challenged the legality of that test claiming the officer’s certification had expired. Ultimately that challenge failed, setting the stage for Wednesday’s formal sentencing.

At an earlier hearing, she plead guilty to driving while impaired and failing to control her car. — Ohio News Now

The incident has pretty much torpedoed any chance Coleman had of running for governor, and for that his wife, Frankie, is today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

Two Playboy Playmates were arrested Sunday in San Antonio, Texas, when they got drunk on a flight from Denver to San Antonio and started fighting with each other, and then with other passengers. They were taken into custody, and offered to sleep with the arresting officers.

Danielle Gamba, 23, and Carrie Minter, 22, were allegedly so drunk on the plane that they were deemed a danger to themselves and others. . . .

San Antonio authorities say the episode became even more bizarre when Gamba made sexual advances toward two police officers in an attempt to avoid arrest. — Rocky Mountain News

“One of the women started saying she was a celebrity and that’s why the passenger who complained ’shouldn’t mess with her,’ and that sort of thing,” David Hebert, a spokesman for the San Antonio airport, told CBS.

Danielle Gamba and Carrie Minter are tied for today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

Mardala Derival and Mackenson Dantus, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., were arrested in Trenton, N.J., Thursday, after being accused of poisoning their three-month-old baby to death with alcohol.

Detectives with the Broward Sheriff’s Office convinced a couple accused of feeding their 3-month old baby a lethal dose of vodka to surrender to New Jersey authorities Thursday, officials said. . . .

“We spoke to them for an extended period of time and convinced them that they needed to turn themselves in,” said Elizabeth Calzadilla-Fiallo, a Broward sheriff’s spokeswoman. “Our fugitive squad detectives did a good job of convincing them that this was the best thing for everyone involved.”

The couple are accused of feeding their daughter, Makeisha Dantus, a mixture of formula, water, sugar and vodka in an attempt to quiet her on Feb. 13, 2004. The infant’s blood alcohol level was 0.47 percent, according to the Broward County Medical Examiner’s office. The legal limit for drivers in Florida is 0.08 percent.

The couple, who authorities said are Haitian immigrants, were not charged until Oct. 28, 2005. By that time, they had disappeared from Florida. Dantus told Trenton authorities that he and Derival had been staying with relatives in the city. — New York Newsday

While feeding babies very small amounts of alcohol is considered a way to “quiet crying babies” in some cultures, killing your own baby by using far too much definitely qualifies you for Stupid Person of the Day.

A man in Mount Prospect, Ill., fell over his second-story balcony and died Tuesday during a spitting contest, according to local police.

Bartosz Drobek, 23, of the 1700 block of West Palm Drive was on the balcony of his apartment smoking cigarettes with his brother and a friend about 12:30 a.m. Monday. As Drobek was getting ready to spit, he lost his balance and fell about 20 feet, hitting his head on the pavement, said Mt. Prospect Police Officer Dirk Ollech.

Drobek was taken to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge in critical condition. He was pronounced dead shortly after noon Tuesday.

Although his fall is believed to be accidental, police are investigating it. An autopsy will be conducted Wednesday. — South Florida Sun-Sentinel

No word yet on whether alcohol was involved, though I wouldn’t doubt it. Bartosz Drobek posthumously receives today’s Stupid Person of the Day award.

Scott A. Weber, 25, of Independence, Mo., a suburb of Kansas City, was sentenced Tuesday to 120 days in jail, substance abuse treatment, and three years probation in the deaths of two pedestrians in a September 2004 drunk driving accident.

Weber, who had a previous conviction for driving while intoxicated, told police he did not remember leaving a friend’s house the night Roxanne M. Bradshaw, 47, and Juan G. Avila, 32, were killed. Before leaving, he had consumed a half-pint of bourbon and taken a muscle relaxer.

Police in suburban Liberty said Weber was “incoherent and confused” and his vehicle was damaged when they stopped him that night.

Weber pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, drunken driving and leaving the scene of the crash. If he successfully completes probation, the convictions will be wiped from his record. — Associated Press

But there’s more. Prosecutors wanted to throw the book at him, but they agreed to the unusually light sentence because key evidence in the case, his car, was inadvertently sold for scrap.

The car was critical to the case because no witnesses could identify Weber as the driver, prosecutor Teresa Moore said.

The director of the city tow lot at the time of the mistake, Clay Ancell, resigned in January after he was arrested in a city-owned vehicle for allegedly driving while drunk on a suspended license. — Associated Press

That’s right, we have two drunk drivers today! One killed two people, and the other one let him get away with it. Clay Ancell, who was most likely drunk at work when the “mistake” occurred, is most definitely the Stupid Person of the Day.

You’re drunk. You pass out. You wake up with a splitting headache, and find what you drank the previous night is now all over the bed. What do you do?

If you’re one 60-year-old German man in Mülheim, you plug in a hair dryer, put it on the bed, and leave. And when you get back, your house has burned down.

A German man drank too much, wet his bed and set fire to his apartment while trying to dry his bedding, police in the western town of Muelheim said Monday.

“He was too drunk to go to the toilet,” said a police spokesman. “The next morning he put a switched-on hairdryer on the bed to dry it and left the apartment.” When the 60-year-old returned, his home and belongings were in flames.

Firemen eventually put out the blaze. — Reuters

The German, who was unnamed in news reports, is today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

Tina Marie Stebbins, of San Bernardino, Calif., said in a letter Monday that she still plans to marry Christian Leroy Lindblad, 37, who shot her and held her hostage for six days in his family’s garage. Lindblad pleaded guilty to attempted murder and was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2002.

“I love Christian today as deeply as I loved him before this awful thing happened to us,” Stebbins wrote in a victim impact statement. “We are soul mates.”

She added: “I want to tell you all that I have forgiven Christian. And I pray that Christian has forgiven me for failing him when he needed me most.”

The incident occurred at the Big Bear City home the couple shared with Lindblad’s parents. Lindblad and Stebbins had a history of domestic violence and substance abuse, according to a sentencing report. It also said Lindblad had been drinking at the time of the shooting.

Lindblad and his parents, Robert and Shirley Lindblad, tried to cover up the shooting by treating Stebbins with home remedies, according to a San Bernardino County Sheriff’s report. They also threatened her young sons and her family, the report said. — Associated Press

For wanting to get back together with this scum of the earth, Tina Marie Stebbins wins today’s Stupid Person of the Day award. But I must give an honorable mention to both of Lindblad’s parents, who tried to help him cover up his crime. They both pleaded guilty to being an accessory.

Charles Victor Thompson, 35, who had been sentenced to death in Texas, escaped from custody last Thursday by somehow getting hold of civilian clothes and a fake ID of the Texas Attorney General’s office. U.S. marshals captured him today near a liquor store in Shreveport, La., primarily because he couldn’t stop drinking.

U.S. Marshals Service spokeswoman Marianne Matus said Thompson was too drunk to be questioned about his escape and how he got to Shreveport, which is the near the border with northeastern Texas.

“He was pretty intoxicated. He was pretty impaired,” said Lt. John Martin of Harris County Sheriff’s Office in Houston. — Reuters

If you’ve escaped from prison, the last thing you want to do is draw attention to yourself, and wandering around the streets blasted is a great way to get yourself caught. Charles Victor Thompson, therefore, is today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

The Chapter arts centre in Canton, Cardiff, Wales, has paid Japanese artist Tomoko Takahashi £5000 to drink “48 bottles of beer” and walk across a beam wearing high heels until she falls off.

Unfortunately, some see her one-woman performance art show as less a comment “on the availability and use of mass-produced products”, as she claims, and more an exhortation to binge drink.

“This is stupid and dangerous and sends out the message that binge drinking is OK,” said Ramesh Patel, a local councillor, who called for an inquiry. He demanded to know why taxpayers’ money “is being wasted on trash like this”.

An Alcohol Concern spokesman said: “We’re always concerned when someone puts their health and safety at risk by drinking to excess like this.”

David Davies, a Tory member of the Welsh Assembly, said: “If anyone is daft enough to want to see a young woman getting plastered and tottering around in high heels, they can do it in just about every city centre most nights of the week. The show is probably the biggest waste of money in the world. The worrying thing is people are deciding to hand out taxpayers’ money like this when they are sober.” — Telegraph Online

I really need a job like this. Most of us have to pay to get drunk.

A candidate for public office in upstate New York was arrested twice in three hours for driving while intoxicated, authorities said Monday.

Brian E. Karst, 34, who is running for Oneida Common Council as an independent candidate was arrested Friday night by Oneida County Sheriff’s Deputy Mark Chrysler and ticketed for numerous traffic violations. Sobriety tests revealed his blood alcohol content was 0.14 percent, nearly twice the legal limit of 0.08, deputies said.

After his arrest, Karst was released to a third party.

Less than three hours later, Chrysler pulled Karst over again — driving the same car as before. This time, Karst’s blood alcohol content was 0.11, deputies said.

Deputies said Karst also was arrested for driving while intoxicated on Sept. 9. — Associated Press

You’re supposed to drink after you’re elected to office, not before. Brian Karst, you qualify as today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

At about 10 a.m. last Sunday, Leon Hollimon stole an ambulance and led police on a three-county chase around central North Carolina.

When police finally got the ambulance stopped, they discovered a deer which had been dead for a week, attached to an IV.

When they caught him, he was wearing a stethoscope, pager and had two latex gloves in his back pocket. . . .

Investigators say they’re not sure where Hollimon is from, but he has a large number of arrests in the Jacksonville, Florida area and may be from there.

They say they don’t yet know how he ended up in Lexington.

He’s currently having a mental evaluation at a state hospital in Butner. — WFMY

The day before, Hollimon had been arrested for public intoxication — in a wheelchair.

Police think the man’s odd behavior began the day before on Anna Lewis drive in Lexington.

Lieutenant Scott Nanney says officers saw the man with a wheelchair near the hospital.

“Actually he was in the wheelchair riding it in the middle of the road and intoxicated. So, that’s when officers decided to take him into jail for four hours.”

Police say the man wasn’t charged with anything in the wheelchair incident.

He was only taken to jail for his safety, until he was sober enough to leave. — WFMY

Congratulations, you’re today’s Stupid Person of the Day.

An Australian man, being pursued by police on suspicion of drunk driving, jumped into the back seat with his passengers — while the car was still moving.

Police charged the 24-year-old man with resisting arrest and driving under the influence of alcohol after he abandoned the wheel on Saturday, ignoring the police car’s siren and signals to pull over, said Sgt. Wayne Jenkinson, a police officer in the Northern Territory town of Katherine.

One of the car’s passengers suffered minor injuries when she panicked and jumped from the driverless car while it was still rolling 25 miles per hour, he said.

The runaway car then rapidly lost speed, allowing a policeman to get out of his vehicle, chase it down on foot and bring it to a halt by applying the brake.

The man, who had a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.178 percent — more than three times the legal limit of 0.05 — was also charged with driving in a dangerous manner, driving while disqualified and driving an unregistered vehicle, Jenkinson said.

Jenkinson said the driver’s hazardous maneuver was aimed at avoiding arrest.

“His cunning plan, in his muddled state of mind, was he wouldn’t be the driver,” Jenkinson said. — Associated Press

The driver, who was not named in news reports, is today’s Stupid Person of the Day.