Local soldier killed
John “Punnyman Le went out to Lake Toxaway to do the sad story of the day – a local man was one of the five Americans killed earlier in the week in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan.
Charlie Bagwell was a Rosman High School graduate from about 10 years ago, and friends told Le he was a funny guy who played football and always wanted to be a soldier. No word on funeral arrangements, Le said.
Hacked
Russ Bowen said somebody hacked into Mountain Xpress computers and either looked at, or stole, a bunch of credit card numbers. Russ was a little unclear, and he didn’t explain why MountainX would have all these credit cards – were these people advertisers with Xpress?
Anyway, Bowen said Mountain Xpress sent out 6,500 letters advising its “clients” of what had happened. One disgruntled client told Russ that it took Mountain Xpress three weeks to notify people of what happened, and he didn’t like that. Jeff Fobes, the Mountain Xpress owner, said police are looking into it and he’s sorry about it all.
No special treatment
The Mcdowell County sheriff told WLOSers that his deputy, who is facing misdemeanor charges in the death of a 2-year-old girl, got no special treatment from the judicial system. The deputy was speeding 120 mph down Interestate 40 in response to a domestic abuse call when he smashed into a car carrying three people, including the 2-year-old.
Whatevere.
Looking for a hit-and-run driver
WLOSers said Buncombe County deputies stopped traffic and handed out fliers in Alexander, along Jenkins Valley Road, in hopes of getting new leads on an unsolved hit-and-run case from two years ago.
Tim Rice was going out one foggy morning to pick up his morning paper when somebody hit him. He died nine days later. WLOSer Terrie Fosters talked to the dead man’s parents, who said they just want somebody to come forward.
Plane crash report
The initial NTSB report on the plane crash a couple of weeks ago at the private landing strip at the Mountain Air resort in Yancey County tells us what we already know – the pilot was coming in for a landing too high and too fast. The plane bounced off the runway, then hit some other planes parked alongside the runway.
In other news…
Four wrecks on I-40 effed up traffic Friday afternoon… There’s grafitti on a bridge in southern Henderson County… It rained on Friday! Yes, that’s news because it’s been so long. But Larry Blunt asked Carolyn Ryan if the rain would help with the 9-inch rainfall deficit we’ve got going for the year. Ummm, no Larry. It didn’t rain 9 effing inches on Friday…
2 Comments
It’s not just advertisers…it’s most of the people who place classifieds or personals.
Almost all those are set up online or over the phone with credit cards.
And any company who knew what they were doing would delete the numbers a month after the ad became inactive.
The fact that they still had numbers from years ago is TERRIFYING.
That means that either their dangerously lazy, or dangerously incompetent, or a horrific combination of both.
Ash,
I was one of those folks who received a letter, and yes, I have placed classified ads with the XPress. The kicker is, it has been well over a year since I placed them. Why would they retain that information for so long? I too was pissed that I found out over three weeks after the fact. Do they not check their systems regularly? That’s three weeks that someone could have been using my CC info. Anyway, if anyone else who reads this was affected, contact the credit bureaus, place a fraud alert on your credit reports, and keep checking the account(s) you used with the XPress regularly. Things are fine so far with mine, but you never know…