Lightning Strikes Twice: Wannabe Murderer Butt-Dials His Almost-Victim

from the what-an-ass dept

There's a saying that goes: lightning never strikes the same place twice. That saying is complete garbage, of course, as Casey Wagner, the twice-struck target for God's unholy wrath will happily tell you, but the point is that rare stuff is rare. And on the list of stuff that I would think would be especially rare would be murder-plotters butt-dialing the worst possible people while discussing their nefarious plans. We discussed this back in May, when a Florida man ass-rang 911 in the midst of a lovely little death-brainstorming session. I remember reading that just a few months ago and thinking, "Well, that's certainly a once in a lifetime occurrence."

As it turns out, it was a once in a few months occurrence, since the same damn thing happened again, only worse. This time, we have an Arkansas man who happily discussed murdering his former employee just after he butt-dialed his intended victim.

Jonesboro police arrested Larry Barnett, 68, on Thursday after being contacted by a Paragould man. The man told Detective Jason Simpkins he received a phone call at 12:30 p.m. from Barnett. He said it appeared Barnett had “unknowingly made” the phone call. The intended victim said he overheard Barnett give another man directions to his home in Paragould. During the call, which lasted approximately 1.5 hours and was ongoing when he contacted police, the victim said he overheard Barnett say, “I don’t care if you have to burn his house to the ground with him in it. I don’t care what you have to do, make it look like an accident.”
Now, I can't be certain that it was an errant rear-cheek that did the dialing on this, but I'd like to think we're going to see a defense argument for Barnett that states that his posterior was attempting a confession and should not be punished along with the rest of this jackass's body. On the other hand, anyone dumb enough to accidentally call their victim while discussing a murder plot is probably too dangerously idiotic to be allowed to walk around in public, even putting the whole murder thing aside.

Chalk up another dumb criminal whose ass got his ass in the clink!

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Filed Under: butt dial, murder plot


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  • icon
    Ninja (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 2:50am

    One could say Mr Barnett was screwed. Anally speaking.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Dec 2013 @ 4:13am

    What a dumb ass.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Dec 2013 @ 4:27am

    Butt dialing is not a rare occurrence, still for you to get the drop on someone trying to kill you by pure chance is I would like to believe rare indeed.

    Employer and employee relations recently have gone downhill, God now you have kill them, firing someone is not enough.

    Just don't give the other cheek.

    Were the cheeks fighting each others so one decided to put the other in jail?

    I know there is a lot of jokes to be had in this one.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    RyanNerd (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 4:39am

    Hearsay unless he recorded the audio

    Perhaps the victim staged his home to look like it had been burglarized and the gas tampered with in order to frame his former boss.
    I'm guessing this may be the defence attorney's argument.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Bergman (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 5:21am

      Re: Hearsay unless he recorded the audio

      Even if the victim didn't, odds are the NSA did. Plotting a murder trips all kinds of terrorism filters.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      WysiWyg (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 8:29am

      Re: Hearsay unless he recorded the audio

      Since the call was "ongoing" when he called the police, odds are they got an earful of murderin'-plans. ;-)

      And no, it's not hearsay. Hearsay is if you or I would testify, the man is most definitely allowed to testify about what he heard. True, it's not as good as an actual recording, but it should be enough.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Sunhawk (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 5:28am

    Sure, they don't have a recording of the contents, but a quick subpoena to the phone company (the proper way to do things, NSA) would show that the call was made...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    silverscarcat (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 5:57am

    Okay, seriously...

    WHY do people put their phones in their BACK pockets?!

    You sit on that spot, you dumbasses!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      ltlw0lf (profile), 5 Dec 2013 @ 7:10am

      Re: Okay, seriously...

      WHY do people put their phones in their BACK pockets?!

      The article never stated that the phone was in his back pocket, so I think this might be Tim editorializing the story again.

      I suspect, and this is only speculation based on my previous experiences with "butt-dialing", that he was looking up the contact information for the target on his phone and accidentally hit the call button. I've done the very same, though not for the purposes of calling in a hit, but when a friend asks me for info for another friend (I don't give out contact information unless I know that the person whose contact information I am giving authorized it.) Usually I realize that I called the number on accident, but at least two times I've had friends call me and tell me that I accidentally called them.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Brazenly Anonymous, 5 Dec 2013 @ 6:00am

    New voice activation feature?

    Kill will now be accepted by smartphones as a synonym for call when followed by a valid contact name. No verification will be required.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Dec 2013 @ 6:51am

    That defense has worked before

    "but I'd like to think we're going to see a defense argument for Barnett that states that his posterior was attempting a confession and should not be punished along with the rest of this jackass's body."

    A defense like that has worked before. A man reached their arm into a window to steal some jewelry on a table within reach of the window, but was quickly caught and arrested. At the trial his lawyer argued that it was all the man's arm that did it, not the rest of the man, it would therefore be wrong to punish the rest of him.

    The judge agreed and sentenced his arm to 3 years in jail and said the rest of him can come with the arm or not. And then the judge and rest of the court room was shocked to see the defense lawyer help the defendant remove their prosthetic arm, and walk out of the court room a free man.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    roarshock44, 5 Dec 2013 @ 7:29am

    another theory.

    the old fellow doing the plotting has hearing trouble and has an ear bud for his phone.  his old ear bud fuzzed out on him and he bought a new one.  the new ones have a little inline button on the cord that conveniently re-dials the last number you dialed, whether you want it to or not.  thoroughly useless most of the time for consumers and hugely annoying, but i'm betting the nsa gets some benefit from it and has companies install them.

    so he wrapped the ear bud wiring around his phone like he always did, and the compression dialed the last call he made: the intended victim.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Dec 2013 @ 9:34am

    I blame Sir Mix-a-lot... (though I don't really know if the perp has a big butt)

    Does this qualify as a "BUTT-FUMBLE"???

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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