Have you reached the age of 23? Have you been arrested yet? If not, you are some sort of weirdo and/ or nerd. That is the scientific conclusion which must be draw from a new study that proves that getting arrested is no big deal now, mom, get off my back.

Mark Meckler (pictured) is the co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots and a big shot national Tea Party Leader. He supports Second Amendment rights, if you know what we mean. What we mean is he has been arrested for trying to carry a gun on a plane.

In a new GQ profile, Nick Nolte upended one of the great tales of the internet age, revealing that his famous wacked-out mug shot—taken after he passed out while driving on the Pacific Coast Highway—was not actually a mug shot, but a Polaroid he willingly posed for after a cop asked for a picture. Is it true? As true as any recollection Nick Nolte has about his drug-induced catatonic episodes. Which is to say no, it's not true.

The thing that some people don't understand about crime is that you have to put some thought into it. You can't just run around willy-nilly doing stupid idiot crimes and expect to get rich and famous and live a life of leisure outside the walls of a prison. You have to plan shit. You can't just, you know, steal $285,000 and hope that nobody notices.

The FBI has files from a phone-monitoring company whose notorious software was on iPhones, Android phones, Nokias and BlackBerries. But since the files are being used "for law enforcement purposes," the feds won't talk about their contents. So you can't know what secrets the feds have gleaned from your phone, because that's a secret.

Germany—and, more importantly, Germany's Christmas spirit—is under attack by a man who dresses like Santa, but is, in fact—you guessed it—a Grinch. Of roofies.

Here's one way to avoid being imprisoned for life on a felony charge: Try to be in jail on a less-serious misdemeanor charge at the same time that the felony crime occurs. This strategy worked for LaDondrell Montgomery, whose armed robbery conviction was just overturned by a Harris County, Texas judge.

Investigators are still trying to piece together why 22-year-old part-time student Ross Truett Ashley ran up to Virginia Tech police Officer Deriek Crouse during a routine traffic stop and shot him, then took his own life. After all, he was "nice."

[UPDATED WITH VIDEO] "It was shooting crazy," said one bystander of a freak shooting spree at the corners of Hollywood Blvd. Sunset Blvd.* and Vine St. — the Crossroads of Forgotten Dreams — this morning. According to the LA Times report, a gunman started firing randomly at passing cars at 10:30 a.m., hitting one man in a Mercedes in the head and grazing another in the leg. Bystanders waved over two cops who were working on a movie shoot down the street, and they fired on the shooter, killing him. Way to go, LAPD!

When reports came yesterday that a two people had been shot at Virginia Tech, everyone thought the same thing: not again. In that sense, the campus is "lucky"—it was an isolated incident and not another unfathomable massacre. But it's still not clear what exactly, happened.

Here's your bleak and/or infuriating tale of mortally dangerous desperation of the day: Tulsa police arrested a woman for attempting to make meth inside a Walmart store yesterday. Elizabeth Elisha Halfmoon was in the store for six hours. When police finally noticed her, she was "mixing sulfuric acid with starter fluid in a bottle."

More than a year ago, the music blog Dajaz1.com was shut down for supposedly abetting online piracy. The feds gave no warning, no due process, no trial, and kept all supposed court orders under seal. But that's not the even the most fucked up part.

Back in the halycon days called "the 1990s," you could beat up a man, rip the expensive athletic shoes off his feet, and carry your lace-up trophies away without being caught. No iPhones, no problems. No more!

TrendAlertWatch! Criminals are stupider than ever. Hot on the heels of the Anthony Miranda affair — the guy who tried to hold up a UFC fighter and wound up with a face like a turnip and a hole in his leg — comes the tale of marauding brainiac Timothy Randall Clark, who chose to shoplift at a Maryland Wal-Mart during their annual "Shop with a Cop" Day. ("Shop with a Cop" Day is a community program that brings law enforcement and needy children together for a fun afternoon of shopping and gun-cleaning demonstrations. Or something like that. I don't know! This is America.)

James R. Matthews, the Republican commissioner of Pennsylvania's Montgomery County and brother to sputtering blowhard Chris Matthews, was arrested this morning on perjury charges. Yes, Chris Matthews' brother is a Republican politician.

This is Anthony Miranda, 24, an enterprising but unlucky young Chicagoan who on Friday learned the hard way that choosing your victim is the most important part of any robbery.

Lots of people enjoy traveling from their far-flung American hometowns here, to the "Big Apple," the "City That Never Sleeps," a place "Where Stars Are Born," and "You Will Probably Get Robbed." Please, gentle tourists, heed this Public Service Announcement: Do not let anyone "borrow" your credit card, here in "Gotham."

Let's start with the good news: Michelina Lewandowska, a 27-year-old mother from Leeds, England, is physically fine after enduring a 300,000-volt tasering, imprisonment inside a computer box, and subsequent vivisepulture — aka premature burial — all at the hands of the father of her young son. The bad news is everything that comes after the word "fine" in the previous sentence. The father, 25-year-old Marcin Kasprzak, had a simple motive: He had grown bored with her.

Irina Kristy, an easy-grading college math professor with an impenetrable accent who has taught at Boston University and Suffolk University since 1987, has been arrested for allegedly running a crystal meth lab with Grigory Genkin, her 29-year-old son, out of their home in Somerville, Massachusetts. (This is the part in the post where you point a finger at your screen and shout, "Breaking Bad! Breaking Bad!" even though it bears only a passing resemblance to the AMC series. So please stop.)

Former Penn State defensive coordinator and accused pedophile Jerry Sandusky needs to ask his hired private investigator (or a psychologist) to investigate why he continues talking to the media when he really should just shut the fuck up. Unless he wants us all to think he's guilty?