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Map of 111 S. Michigan Avenue,, Saginaw, mi
Posted on 07/29/2007 1:00:00 PM PDT by BGHater
A 73-year-old man has been ordered to clean a veterans memorial with a toothbrush for taking part in a scam to solicit scrap yards for metal, saying it was to be used to build a memorial for soldiers in the Iraq war.
Philip Kolinski and another man were arrested after scrap yards reported the men soliciting metal donations for a sculpture. Detectives said the men sold the metal and kept the money.
"You certainly should be ashamed," Saginaw County District Court Judge A.T. Frank said as he sentenced Kolinski to clean the veterans memorial in front of Governmental Center on Aug. 7.
"You will have a toothbrush and bucket with a placard saying you stole from veterans," Frank said.
Kolinski pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of obtaining more than $200 under false pretenses, although he claimed he didn't know he was committing a crime. He said he agreed to haul the metal for another man, who is awaiting trial in the case.
"I just hauled it and took it to the dump yard," Kolinski said. "I feel sorry for what I did."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
I hope they will be closely supervised.
Sad to say that this will probably be declared cruel and/or unusual.
What a scroungy old POS. Somebody probably hired this old wino to pull this scam. They should both be cleaning statues with toothbrushes.
This reminds me of the guy who sold the Eiffel Tower to scrap metal dealers. Twice.
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"I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress." - Frederick Douglass
thanks for the invite but do you know how many days it would take me to hitchhike to Saginaw?
Just when I thought I’d heard of every low act imaginable, this gem comes along...
The Judge should, on appeal, order that a memorial be commissioned “To Commemorate Philip Kolinski, professional scrounge and criminal fraudster, who set a new low water mark for petty crime by stealing scrap metal from veterans of the Iraq wars.”
It should be a perfect life-size likeness in bronze, complete with placard. And, naturally, it should be made from recovered scrap metal.
Schools could then take kids on field-trips to see the Philip Kolinski memorial as a salutary lesson on what happens to dishonest people.
Give me a break!!!
> OMG!!! Senior citizen mooches $200 from poor, unsuspecting scrap dealers...
A more careful reading of the story would have told you that was convicted of a misdemeanor for obtaining “more than $200” — which probably would have taken the offense from a petty trivial matter to something of a more serious nature deserving of the court’s attention.
This was probably merely the latest in a long litany of misdeeds. People don’t “suddenly” become dishonest. At 73 yrs old he has certainly been around long enough to know right from wrong.
I have no difficulty at all with the courts taking a very dim view on every single misdeed, however small. If Society tolerates a certain level of “rot” as being acceptable, it is a matter of time before the rot spreads.
I agree with you...this will certainly make the top ten list of crimes of the century while most of the criminals in Washington (who spill more that $200 a day on the bar) go unchallenged.
> I agree with you...this will certainly make the top ten list of crimes of the century while most of the criminals in Washington (who spill more that $200 a day on the bar) go unchallenged.
I don’t see what that has to do with the price of tea in China, frankly. What’s your point?
Sure, corruption in Washington need to be chased down. That doesn’t mean that this scale of crime should go unreported as a result, tho — surely? And surely you’re not suggesting that just because this crime has been punished and duly reported, that means that corruption in Washington has gone unreported *as a result*?
You’re surely not suggesting a causal link?
My point is we shouldn’t be getting our shorts in a wad about some old guy scamming $200. It’s a matter of priorities. Many more important things to post to FR about. We both have already waisted far more time on this post than the situation warrants. You want the last word??? Knock yourself out.
> My point is we shouldn’t be getting our shorts in a wad about some old guy scamming $200. It’s a matter of priorities.
I get to hear “its a matter of priorities” all the time from the Police — like last Friday when I broke up a drunken brawl by myself. One of the drunks then got behind the wheel of his car and drove off: he was so drunk he could hardly walk (but he could certainly fight!). When I called them, the cops didn’t attend: “it’s a matter of priorities, you see...”
I think it’s a lousy excuse for complacent behavior and a really poor attitude toward crime. Yet Society seems to have accepted that there is an acceptable level of criminal behavior — and then they wonder why their house gets broken into or their car gets ripped off, and the police don’t attend. Priorities, I guess...
If that is what you *really* believe, then I’d say you’re a large part of the problem.
How’s that for the last word?
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