The next time some simpering do-gooder tells you the world would be a safer place if we all melted our firearms down and made a great big steel bunny statue...tell them this story.
BRANDON - Willie Tarpley Jr. knew this much about his ex-wife's new boyfriend: The man was a convicted sex offender and Tarpley didn't want his children anywhere near him.
So Saturday night at about 8, Tarpley, 46, drove to his old house, grabbed one of his samurai swords, a katana, out of the garage and threatened to use the 42-inch blade to cut off the boyfriend's head.
Ok. Seems logical so far. Bad, but logical. Now, Mr. Tarpley did not cut off the boyfriend's head, but after the boyfriend tried to flee by car and hit Mr. Tarpley's Corvette...
...Tarpley reached into the open car window and plunged his sword into Alexander's body, Hillsborough County sheriff's spokeswoman Debbie Carter said.
Into his armpit. Which, if we're talking about a whopping long sharp blade, will pretty much do the trick. And it did. And remember, the victim was a registered sex offender, who apparently targeted the young.
Records show that Alexander was convicted in Polk County in 2000 of lewd and lascivious battery on a person under 16. Alexander was 18 at the time.
But I know my readers, and you, like me, are now wondering why Mr. Tarpley was running around with a katana. I mean, Florida is the Gunshine State. And this whole affair sounds pretty redneck. So why did Mr. Tarpley have a sword? Well, turns out Mr. Tarpley was one of those folks who has a little problem should he try to buy guns...
Tarpley himself is a registered sex offender, as is his wife.
Oh. Gracious. Well, for a convicted sex offender, he seemed mighty judgemental. Perhaps, though, it was one of those "lesser" offenses. You know, maybe one of those he-was-20-she-was-16 type things.
In 1988, Tarpley and his wife were convicted in a high-profile case concerning a woman who once worked for Willie Tarpley as a nude dancer. The Tarpleys were accused of kidnapping the woman, beating her, gluing her eyelids and genitalia shut and tattooing a four-letter word on her forehead...
Or maybe not. Good lord, that's pretty fucking horrifying. Can it get any damn weirder?
Duh. It's Florida. Of course it can get weirder. And it does.
Willie Tarpley was injured in a motorcycle accident in the early 1980s and lost his right leg. He wears a prosthetic limb and is skilled in martial arts.
Remember, folks, guns don't kill people. Peg-legged stripper-torturing ninjas with katanas kill people.
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