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Small-Town Government | The Job of the Researcher

News of the Weird by Chuck Shepherd

By News of the Weird by Chuck Shepherd

Published June 19, 2017

Small-Town Government | The Job of the Researcher

The ex-wife of Deputy Sheriff Corey King of Washington County, Georgia (largest town: Sandersville, pop. 5,900), filed a federal lawsuit in January against King after he arrested her for the "crime" of making a snarky comment about him on Facebook (about his failure to bring the couple's children their medicine). King allegedly conspired with a friendly local magistrate on the arrest, and though the prosecutor refused the case, King warned the ex-wife that he would still re-arrest her if she made "the mistake of going to Facebook with your little (excrement) ... to fuss about." [WMAZ-TV (Macon), 2-7-2017]

A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration "bioacoustic research" team recently reported recording and listening to about 2 million underwater sounds made over a four-month period by various species of dolphins ("whistles," echolocation "clicks," and "burst pulses") and can, they believe, distinguish the sounds to match them to a particular dolphin species (among the five most prevalent) -- with 84 percent accuracy. The team built a computer algorithm to also make estimating dolphin populations much easier. [Hakai Magazine, 2-16-2017]

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