Whizkid broker commit suicide over web prank

Anjool 'Jools' Malde, an Oxford graduate and a stockbroker, leapt 80ft to his death after fearing that he would lose his job after playing an intended office humor and pranks at work.

Posing as one of his clients, he left a silly message that read: "I am hot, I am hot" on a financial website. Investigators think this was probably a reference to his client being on a successful investment run. Mr Malde's client, who works for Brevan Howard, a leading hedge fund management firm, did not see the funny side and made a formal complaint to the company which runs the discussion forum.

The resulting investigation suggested that Mr Malde had impersonated the client from his office computer at Deutsche Bank which prompted the bank's bosses to send Mr Malde home on Friday pending a full investigation.

Two days later, as he prepared to celebrate his 25th birthday, Mr Malde jumped from an eighth-floor restaurant near the Bank of England. Colleagues believe he was convinced he would lose his job.

Mr Malde was working long hours at the bank's London headquarters and was often at his desk by 6am. In recent times three of his colleagues had been let go by the bank and Jools seemed very worried he might be the next to leave one friend said.

Police have found no evidence that Mr Malde had downloaded any inappropriate material on his computer or was involved in any criminal behaviour. Yesterday his distraught parents released a statement in which they spoke of their 'devastation' after losing their only child.

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Shaker Heights HS yearbook cover contains hidden F-word

Shaker Heights High School yearbook cover this year is drawn by an artistically gifted student with a creative interpretation of a crowd of "Red Raider" mascots. But to the surprise of the administrators, they discovered a hidden farewell message containing the F-word in the artwork sprawled across yearbook’s front cover.

A letter was written last week by Principal Michael Griffith to students and their families explaining that distribution of the yearbook had been suspended because "an obscenity was cleverly concealed in the cover artwork." The school needed first to fix the yet-to-be-distributed yearbooks and also offered to fix any books that had already been distributed, though it's hard to imagine anyone would have noticed the offending word without someone pointing it out.

The note also contained an apology from the student artist who said, "I cannot begin to explain the miserable feeling I brought upon myself, when I betrayed the trust of all of you, I apologize for offending anyone and everyone. It is unfortunate that I did not recognize the big responsibility and honor given to me when asked to design the cover of the Shaker Heights yearbook. I offer my sincere apologies.”

The sincere apology worked. At the Shaker graduation ceremony Thursday, the student artist received the loudest, most sustained applause of any fellow student as he accepted his diploma. It seems that yearbooks won’t hear the end of hidden obscenities, sexually-themed shocking pranks this year.

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Hotel prank brings police investigation in York

A shocking pranks that led damage to a hotel is being investigated by the York Police. It involves a phone call, a porn site and the fire alarm. The fire department was dispatched to Hampton Inn Hotel for a fire alarm activation but there was no fire.

It was the end of May when someone pulled this prank at York Hotel. The clerk told authorities she pulled the alarm because she got a call from somebody posing as an employee of the alarm company that the hotel's using and told her to set it off. The prankster directed her to go to a company site to know on how to disable alarm system which ended up being a porno site.

The clerk was told she would get a $20,000 fine if she called the fire department for the false alarm. The caller then convinced both the clerk and a guest to break a window to stop the alarm. One of the guests even agreed to help break out the front window using his truck to do so.

The alarm still did not shut off. Finally, somebody called the fire department. Police said the prank is not funny. They are trying to figure out who is responsible. It is a call that could land somebody behind bars. There are reports of similar pranks being pulled in other states with some causing as much as $50,000 in damage. Damage to the Hampton Inn was around $300. Police said the person responsible could be charged with a misdemeanor and spend up to 1 year in jail.

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Solid skimble-skamble skit for sick children

Last night after a week of outrage, ABC finally announced that it had demoted the senior manager who approved "Chaser skit about sick children" going to air. The Chaser lads were brainstorming potential skits when the unfathomable idea of ridiculing the last wishes of dying children floated and eventually was not dismissed immediately.

The first basis of a comedic value is whether it could make people laugh. You don’t need to have children to realize that there are unlikely to be any circumstances where making a mockery of sick children would be considered funny.

The satirical TV show was evidently suspended by ABC for two weeks which is good because it provided an opportunity to review why no red flag was raised before it screened.

On Monday night, the ABC’s Media Watch confirmed that the head of arts, entertainment and comedy at ABC television, Amanda Duthie, was the person who saw and approved it before it aired. She accepted responsibility for the decision to air the piece.

Hopefully this saga will make the Chaser lads reflect on the relevance of their work and what they are trying to achieve through it. Their intended funny pranks and stupid stuff stunts should stick to beating up more worthy targets people who are prominent in public life, including politicians and celebrities.

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Camera modified into a stun gun found at school

A stun gun converted device that looks like nothing more than a disposable camera was demonstrated by Macomb County Sheriff Mark Hackel. He sure can attest that the jolt it could release is far more sinister than how it looks. One of the shocking pranks that you won't consider to apply on anyone.

"It hurts, I can tell you that," Hackel said today.

The only signs that the camera had been altered were black electrical tape wrapped around part of the body and two small metal prongs, which emitted the shock when pressed against something.

The makeshift stun gun was found Monday at Dakota High School in Macomb Township, where an 18-year-old student zapped willing friends as a joke. Word got to school administrators, who confronted the student and confiscated the device.

Macomb County deputies tracked the device back to a 13-year-old who learned how to make it on YouTube.com. The 13-year-old had made several of the devices by the time he was tracked down, Hackel said. The teen's parents didn't know he'd been making them and "weren't very happy," he said.

Though neither student meant to cause real harm. Both teens could face felony and misdemeanor charges first for having an electronic weapon, then for bringing it near school property, the sheriff said.

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