Hit-and-run man found by cop dog

MARYSVILLE, Wash. (AP) – A man being sought in a hit-and-run case was caught in a doghouse by – what else? – a police dog, authorities said.

“Now he’s in our doghouse,” police Cmdr. Robb Lamoureux said.

Lamoureux said parents began calling police about 7 a.m. Monday as a vehicle rammed numerous cars in a neighborhood while children were getting ready to board a school bus in this town about 30 miles north of Seattle.

The vehicle was gone when police arrived, but officers were summoned again after the vehicle crashed through a fence. A tracking dog led officers to a man in a doghouse, Lamoureux said.

Todd Aron Fowler, 35, was being held for investigation of hit-and-run driving, second-degree assault and a drug law violation with bail set at $15,000, according to the Snohomish County Jail’s Web site.

‘Drunk’ flees cops in stolen mower

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) – Bad idea: fleeing from police in a stolen car. Terrible idea: fleeing in a stolen lawnmower.

But that’s what police say a “happy drunk” did, a decision that landed the suspect in prison for violating his parole.

Police responding to a tip about a stolen riding lawnmower spotted a man driving across a cornfield near Springfield.

“I happened to be driving south when the call went out, and lo and behold, off to the west there was this man bouncing through the cornfield with his ponytail flopping in the breeze,” said Kurt Taraba, a police officer in the suburb of Southern View.

Sangamon County Sheriff’s Deputy Jim Tapscott said authorities set up a perimeter while he and another deputy drove into the field to talk to the lawnmower driver. They identified themselves and told him to stop, but he allegedly tried to drive off.

“I thought, ‘You’re on a riding mower, and we’re in a car,”‘ Tapscott said with a laugh. “He was only going four or five miles per hour, so I got out and jogged alongside him.”

The driver finally stopped when police threatened to stun him with a Taser.

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) – You’ve roasted your holiday turkey and drained off some of the juices and fat for making gravy. Or you’ve deep-fried a delicious bird in a vat of cooking oil.

So how do you get rid of the frying oil or the gooey brown liquid left in the gunk-encrusted roasting pan?

Most holiday cooks will pour it down the drain or in the garbage, but a Tucson-based company has another idea: hand it over for recycling.

Tucson-based Grecycle has partnered with the Tucson Regional Clean Cities Coalition and Pima County Wastewater Management in its first Thanksgiving grease recycling drive to collect cooking oil and grease.

Bioengineer Michael Kazz founded Grecycle about a year ago, stockpiling “yellow grease” and converting some of it to biodiesel for his own fleet of trucks and for vehicle fleets of companies his firm is partnered with.

The fuel is approved by Environmental Protection Agency and by the National Biodiesel Board, Kazz said.