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HELLO, KITTY Last week, a new animal joined the Mid-South’s pantheon of fantastic beasts. On behalf of Hugh Manatee, Zimm the Escape Monkey, Barksdale Beaver, Midtown Coyote, Murder Owl, #PipeKitty, Frayser Bear, and the Alleged Albino Raccoon, Fly on the Wall proudly introduces the Hernando Cat-Like Animal (HCLA).
“Poopline,” Amazon, & Weirich
“I’m Scott Madaus live in Hernando, Mississippi, where there’s been spottings of a cougar …” October 19-25, 2017
Edited by Toby Sells
f ly on the wall
The HCLA received a lot of coverage, but nobody covered this presumed cougar quite like Fox13’s Scott Madaus. Here’s his report in comic book form with captions.
“And that’s not it. That looks like a house cat. But we’re just feet away from where a local man rolled his cellphone video on what some say is a cougar …” And what others call the Hernando Cat-Like Animal.
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Questions, Answers + Attitude
By Chris Davis. Email him at davis@memphisflyer.com.
W E E K T H AT W A S By Flyer staff
Pipeline to river protested, locals push for HQ2, Weirich involved in Lake County case. N EW PATH O N STATU ES The mostly white Tennessee Historical Commission (THC) voted down the city’s request last week to remove a statue of slave trader and Ku Klux Klan founder Nathan Bedford Forrest from a prominent Memphis park. But the THC voted to approve the city’s declaratory order to pursue a decision from an administrative law judge. The judge will decide, likely by November, if the 2013 law prohibiting the removal of war monuments is relevant to the Forrest statue. “It’s a monument to Jim Crow,” said Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland during nearly two hours of testimony before the vote. The move brought some to wear black and protest at FedExForum ahead of a Grizzlies game Friday night. See more on the vote in this week’s “Last Word.” P US H I N G AGAI N ST TH E “PO O P LI N E” State officials granted a 30-day delay last week of a project that would dump 3.5 million gallons of wastewater from Haywood County into the Mississippi River north of Memphis at Randolph. The pipeline would carry an estimated 3 million gallons of wastewater every day from a new factory that would be built on the Memphis Regional Megasite. It would also carry about 500,000 gallons of treated sanitary wastewater from the city of Stanton, Tennessee. Opposition to the plan has risen, including a Facebook page called “Say No to the Randolph Poopline,” and from Shelby County Commissioner Terry Roland. U P- S K I RT VI D EOS TR AP TR OTTE R Rick Trotter, the former Memphis Grizzlies announcer, was indicted Thursday on four counts of unlawfully photographing women under their skirts at a church where he was a worship leader, said Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich. Downtown Church officials allege Trotter used his church-issued cellphone to take videos under a woman’s skirt as he kneeled behind her during a church service. Police found other up-skirt videos of church-goers on Trotter’s laptop. The victims’ ages ranged from 29 to 63. Trotter admitted his guilt to police and church officials.
M E M P H I S D E LIVE R S O N AMA Z O N Memphis Delivers, a new grassroots campaign by a coalition of community organizations, is launching a campaign to lure Amazon’s new headquarters to Memphis. The campaign, led by DCA, kicked off last week with the hashtag #MemphisDelivers and lighting up Big River Crossing in Amazon orange. WE I R I C H C ITE D I N M U R D E R R EVE R SAL A murder conviction in Lake County was overturned recently due, in part, to the actions of Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich, whose actions, along with some others, were described as “inexplicable and improper” by a judge. A veteran Memphis Police Department lieutenant, Anthony Carter, was set to testify for the defense in a murder trial as an expert on gangs. Lake County District Attorney C. Phillip Bivens called Weirich about the situation, which she said was “unusual.” Weirich called then-MPD director Toney Armstrong — Carter’s boss — about the issue. Later, Carter’s commander and chief confronted him about it. Not wanting trouble, Carter rescinded his offer to testify, saying contact with his higher-ups “just took the steam out of me even wanting to get involved.” For this and other reasons, the Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, overturned the trial court’s conviction and remanded the case for a new trial. Longer versions of our “Week That Was” stories and even more local news can be found at memphisflyer.com.