Home, Sweet Home of the freak

1995 -- In Kansas City, Mo., in June, Keith Smith, 26, was convicted of strangling and stabbing to death a minister, in whose house he lived, and his housekeeper. In a videotaped statement to the police at the time of the murders, Smith said the mayhem was caused by "Chucky," the murderous doll in the movie "Child's Play."

1996 -- Earlier this year, Michael J. Lewis Sr., serving time in Missouri for a gas station robbery, called the county attorney's office just out of curiosity, to find out why he had never been prosecuted for a 1993 bank robbery with which he had been charged. The prosecutor discovered that the file had been misplaced and that only a few months remained to bring Lewis to trial before the statute of limitations would run out. In June, Lewis, already serving 10 years, plea-bargained to another 10.

1996 -- Mike Marcum, the Missouri guy who made News of the Weird in 1995 after he stole six power company transformers he said were necessary to make his time machine (so he could find out the winning lottery number and come back and buy a ticket), called a radio show from Nevada in October 1996 and said he was only 30 days away from finishing his invention. His Missouri landlord had evicted him for various electrical misadventures in his apartment.

1996 -- A 63-year-old man died in May in West Plains, Mo.; he had set himself on fire in a suicide attempt, but the pain was so great that he ran into a pond to douse the flames and drowned.

1994 -- In September, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in Washington, D.C., announced that it had issued 60 citations and $90,000 in fines for unsafe workplace conditions at the Federal Building in Kansas City, Mo., which is the regional OSHA office.

1996 -- In September, according to police in Junction City, Kan., David Bell, 30, just released from jail for car theft, walked out the door and stole another car to get home. And in October, William B. Singleton, 24, just released from jail in Belton, Mo., on a larceny charge, allegedly broke into a vending machine in the lobby of the police station and stole a 60-cent Strawberry Twisteroo while he waited for his ride to arrive.

1995 -- In March, in Rich Hill, Mo., Mr. Edgar Allen Poe, age 75; in April, in Charlestown, R.I., Mrs. Eleanor Rigby, age 80; in May, of a fall just after he reached the summit of Mount McKinley, Mr. Brian McKinley, age 37; and in Anchorage, Alaska, in September, Mr. Phillip Morris, of lung cancer at age 45.