Personal Injury News, from around Iowa

In Burlington, Iowa a corn snake called Naja has died after living 45 years. Naja was kept in a science class at Horace Mann Middle School. The science teacher, Joe Desy wrote an obituary for Naja and noted that it, he or she, you pick, lived in the classroom from 1972 until 2002 when the teacher retired. The Register noted, "Desy wrote in an obituary that Naja's early years were spent ridding Iowa farmlands of small rodents. At about the age of 8, the snake came to the school and was "resident reptile and teacher of all things good and true about snakes."

In Fairbanks, Iowa there was a fire on October 7^th that caused a property loss at a manufacturing business. The investigation concluded that a 4-year-old boy playing with a "small torch" had been in a storage area getting firewood when the fire began.

And in Atlantic, Iowa a combine caught fire and a 59-year-old man, Mark Brown died. There are few details about how the fire started, why Mr. Brown wasn't able to get away or whether there was a malfunction of the engine. For those of you who don't know what a combine is, it's a large piece of farm machinery, which is driven in the fields and harvests corn, cotton and soybeans. Combines are extremely expensive pieces of machinery costing well over $100,000 to probably over $250,000.  If you're interested in more you can visit John Deere University online. Having grown up in Rhode Island I have always been fascinated with farm machinery. I've never been able to figure out how to make money at it, but it's a fascinating profession. 

Apparently an angry mom fed hot tortillas to her son and has now been charged with child endangerment. The things we do for love.