Juicy headline

Picked up a copy of Los Angeles Daily Journal, Orange County Edition, and was intrigued by this story. The evidence seems lopsided:

Anaheim police officers arrested Ferguson at his home in August 2023 after receiving a report of a shooting. Ferguson told officers at the scene and his court clerk via text that he shot his wife, Sheryl, after the couple returned home from dinner, according to affidavits filed in 2023 by Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer’s office.

Seeking more information I found this:

The couple’s adult son called 911 to report the shooting. A court filing from prosecutors states Ferguson texted his court clerk and bailiff minutes after the killing: “I just lost it. I just shot my wife. I won’t be in tomorrow. I will be in custody. I’m so sorry.”

…

Earlier that day, Ferguson had been drinking when he argued with his wife about finances during dinner at a local restaurant and later while watching “Breaking Bad” at home with their adult son, said prosecutor Seton Hunt. At one point in the evening, Ferguson made a gun hand gesture toward her, and she later chided him to point a real one at her, Hunt said.

Ferguson proceeded to do so and pulled the trigger, Hunt said.

Just a strange little story in California. Reminded of Hemingway in A Moveable Feast while he’s on a road trip with Scott Fitzgerald:

While waiting for the waiter to bring the various things I sat and read a paper and finished one of the bottles of Macon that had been uncorked at the last stop. There are always some splendid crimes in the newspapers that you follow from day to day, when you live in France. These crimes read like continued stories and it is necessary to have read the opening chapters, since there are no summaries provided as there are in American serial stories and, anyway, no serial is as good in an American periodical unless you have read the all-important first chapter. When you are traveling through France the papers are disappointing because you miss the continuity of the different crimes, affaires, or scandales, and you miss much of the pleasure to be derived from reading about them in a cafe. Tonight I would have much preferred to be in a café where I might read the morning editions of the Paris papers and watch the people and drink something a little more authoritative than the Macon in preparation for dinner. But I was riding herd on Scott so I enjoyed myself where I was.

In the same paper:

I found this phrase vivid:

“We had a phrase in dependency: ‘Clear is kind,” she said. “If you’re clear about what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and what orders mean, people are more likely to comply.”