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An argument at a south Hilton Head Island nightclub spilled over to a north-island all-night breakfast restaurant, where a group of up to 15 women fought, some using their high heels as weapons, according to a Beaufort County sheriff’s report released today. The fight occurred just after 5 a.m. Saturday in the parking of Huddle House, 40 Palmetto Parkway. Several of the women had been in an argument earlier in the evening at Club Life, 81 Pope Ave., the report stated. When officers arrived, the people involved in the fight were uncooperative with the deputies and left the area, authorities...

Fingerprints on a sex toy dropped at the scene of a car break-in may help link suspects to the crime, according to a Beaufort County Sheriff's Office report filed Thursday. Deputies responded to a call Monday morning about a possible car break-in at North Forest Beach on Hilton Head Island. Deputies arrived to find two male suspects running from a black Pontiac Grand AM. The rear driver's-side door was open, and the driver's side window was rolled down, the report states. According to the report, upon seeing the deputies, the men dropped an unknown item, later discovered to be the...

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- It wasn't what Nick Lawrimore was casting for when he went to his "secret fishing spot" on the Chattahoochee River in Atlanta, Georgia, but experts say he made a rare find anyway. Lawrimore was getting ready to wade in about 11 a.m. Tuesday when he spotted an 8-foot alligator in the river, which is frequented by Atlanta-area nature lovers, fishermen and kayakers. Lawrimore said the gator was about 5 feet away, swimming after a large carp. He said he rushed back to his car to tell his father, who came down to the riverbank to see...

A 25-year-old Hilton Head Island man is accused of breaking into an apartment and then calling his mom for a ride home from the crime scene. An alert neighbor heard someone scurrying around in an upstairs apartment at Cordillo Courts, 104 Cordillo Parkway, and followed the pair all the way to New Orleans Road, where a deputy caught up to them, according to a Beaufort County Sheriff's report. Isaac Talavera, Jr., 25, of 26 Forest Cove, was charged with second-degree burglary after officers found 13 pairs of socks, two cell phones, two tank tops, cigarettes, car keys, a watch and...

An island man showed up to the Town of Hilton Head Island Municipal Court ready to plead his case in slurred, excited speech, with beer on his breath, authorities said.The 22-year-old man spoke loudly when he entered the courtroom, which at 2 p.m. Wednesday was filled with people settling traffic violations with deputies. The judge had called in sick, so no formal proceedings were taking place."It was obvious something was wrong with him," said Capt. Toby McSwain of the Beaufort County Sheriff's Office. "He appeared to be grossly intoxicated, so they locked him up." When a deputy checked on him...

My all 24 Saturday edition continues. Of, course 24 is a conservative show. Here’s ten reason why: 10. It makes liberals uncomfortable. You don’t hear Laura Ingram getting all squirmy in her chair over it. The show makes Charlie Rose and Stephen King squirmy. Now they know how we feel except for Turner Classic Movies and this single hour a week out of thousands. 9. The words “patriot,” “country,” and “traitor,” are frequently used in the same sentence without a hint of a Jon Stewart-style-smirk. Haven’t seen that since we lost The Duke. …. (Sorry for the pause, but you...

Nine-year-old Jackson Puckey was Gerald Ford's "biggest fan." As South Carolina mourned the death of 38th U.S. President from afar, Ford's passing has been "very difficult" for the Hilton Head Island boy, said Jackson's father, Dennis Puckey. Jackson, an aspiring "presidential buff," became interested in the former president in 2004 as a first-grader at Hilton Head Preparatory School when he was assigned, during the 2004 elections, a report on any U.S. president. Only 7-years-old at the time, Jackson chose Ford because he played football at the University of Michigan, the school where both of Jackson's grandfathers graduated. As part of...

SAVANNAH, Ga. - A Savannah man went to jail this weekend for impersonating a sheriff's deputy so he could go bowling. Jeffrey Eugene Ferguson, 46, pulled up to a gate at Hunter Army Airfield on Saturday and showed a guard a driver's license that was cracked in half, police said. When the guard requested a second form of ID, Ferguson pulled out a Chatham County sheriff's lieutenant badge. The guard called Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police, who responded and discovered Ferguson's license had been suspended for failure to pay child support, according to police Sgt. Mike Wilson. Ferguson, who was jailed on...

Two troubling statistics fueled the creation of "The War," the 14-hour documentary about World War II from acclaimed filmmaker Ken Burns. Burns thought he was done with war movies after his series, "The Civil War." But he changed his mind after realizing that America was losing its grip on the facts of World War II. "It was really a couple of statistics that got me," Burns said. "One was that we're losing a thousand (World War II) veterans a day, and the other is that our children just don't know what's going on."Burns said he was astonished at the number...

Warner Bros. has set "Open Water" director Chris Kentis and producer Laura Lau to handle a movie about the famous events surrounding the survivors of the U.S.S. Indianapolis in World War Two. Based on Douglas Stanton book "In Harm's Way", the film "Indianapolis" follows the survivors of the ship which was sunk by the Japanese after delivering materials used in the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Floating for five days in the Philippine Sea, the 900 survivors were reduced to 317 by the time of rescue from the shark-infested waters. Variety reports that Kentis will direct and co-write the...

Steve Irwin, 1962-2006 I’d just filed a column for The Australian when I got the first e-mail from Down Under - about reports of an accident involving the Crocodile Hunter. All journalists, on hearing breaking news of a famous person’s injury, assume the announcement of death will follow shortly, President Kennedy and the Princess of Wales being merely the most obvious proof of the wisdom of this rule. But, in the early hours of Monday morning Eastern time, when my editor in Sydney told me my piece was being held because Steve Irwin had been killed by the barbed tip...

Islamic school leases space in Caldwell Memorial Presbyterian Church in Charlotte With membership and contributions plummeting, the session of Caldwell Memorial Presbyterian Church voted unanimously in April to lease the congregation's largely unused gymnasium and education building to the Charlotte Islamic School in Charlotte, N.C. Islamic school leases space in Caldwell Memorial Presbyterian Church in Charlotte. Encouraged by the congregation's pastor, Dr. Charles McDonald, the session figured the 14-month lease was both an act of toleration and a budget-booster. But toleration turned out to be a one-way street. At the insistence of the Islamic school and with the acquiescence of...

Captive in Baghdad The harrowing account of a courageous reporter. By Bill Roggio Jill Carroll, the Christian Science Monitor reporter who was kidnapped by insurgents in Iraq last January and was released 82 days later, has begun to tell the story of the long days she spent in captivity following her kidnapping. In a series called Hostage: The Jill Carroll Story, Jill provides a first-person account of her kidnapping, the murder of her interpreter, and her initial days in captivity. This is a fascinating look at the thoughts and feelings of a victim in a kidnapping plot, and at the...

Beachgoers tried to rescue University at Albany president BY DANIEL BROWNSTEIN, The Island PacketPublished August 14, 2006 The president of University at Albany in New York died in a possible drowning at South Beach on Sunday. Kermit L. Hall, 61, and his wife, Phyllis, were rescued by beachgoers between 75 and 100 yards offshore near the heel of the island at about 2:20 p.m., authorities said. Kermit Hall was unresponsive, prompting two bystanders to perform CPR until emergency crews arrived at the scene. "We don't know if it was a heart attack in the water or if he drowned," said...

It appears that the Northern invasion of the South is complete -- at least it is on a patch of land known as Delta Plantation in Jasper County. There, a diehard rebel named Henry E. Ingram Jr. made his last stand against the onslaught of Yankees, only to be thwarted by a man from Long Island, N.Y., and now -- gasp -- a French Canadian. Ingram promised to keep Yankees out of Delta Plantation in Jasper County when he bought 1,700 acres there in 1998. His resolve to keep them out still is strong, but the covenants he put on...

Guess who's coming to dinner? Couple shun scaly visitor BY BEN CRITES, The Island Packet Published Wednesday, June 7, 2006 SUN CITY HILTON HEAD -- Use the peephole. You never know who -- or what -- will knock on your front door. Photo: A 6-foot-long alligator climbs within inches of the doorbell after knocking into the front door of Roslyn and Robert Loretta's home on Penny Creek Drive in Sun City Hilton Head on Friday night. The reptile apparently was enticed into the couple's yard by the smell of teriyaki chicken. Richard Holinski/Special to the Packet For the Lorettas, it...

Jason Apuzzo of the Conservative film & entertainment blog LIBERTAS has posted a link to On The Fence Films' incredible 4.5 minute docuentary on the organization and support for the massive May 1 rallies held across the country. It is extremely revealing. Link to video HERE.

The LA Daily News caught up with That '70s Show star Wilmer Valderrama and asked him about Warner Bros. Pictures' upcoming adaptation of the TV series CHiPs. Valderrama will play Ponch, the character played by Erik Estrada in the series, and says the movie won't make fun of the show. "What we're doing is, we're having fun with it, but we're not making fun of 'CHiPs.' A lot of the remakes that have happened in the last couple of years have failed because they make fun of their franchise. You can't be making fun of something that at some point...

The mercury is rising, the flowers are blooming and the beach season is about to begin. Spring is here -- known as one of the more pleasant times to be in the Lowcountry. It's not too hot, not too cold and the tourists aren't quite in full force. But the change of the season has ushered in a slew of unwelcome guests -- and no, they're not from Ohio. They are those tiny black critters that attack in swarms and chew holes in human skin, causing itchiness, welts and overall aggravation. Commonly referred to as no-see-ums, sand gnats, sand flies,...