New England Sun-Times

A fight over church leadership and finances spilled out of the pulpit and on to YouTube in LaPlace Louisiana. The fight at the St. Michael Baptist Church was caught on camera and later uploaded to the Internet . “It’s a disgrace. It’s uncalled for,” parishioner Vanessa Jones said. Members said the fight was the result of a dispute that started with questions about the church’s finances. “I think they have a lot of preachers using the church for personal gain,” parishioner Albert Robertson said. “We asked questions regarding finances and it was told to us that, ‘If you don’t like what I’m giving you, go back where you came from,’” parishioner Edna Robertson said. Jones said those that did raise questions were put out of the church. She said the decision affected 49 people. The distraught parishioner said her family helped found the church at its first location in Kenner. “I know they are turned over in their grave behind this,” Jones said. Members have even t...

A family shopping trip ended with a 12-year-old girl getting Tasered by a police officer inside a Victoria’s Secret in St. Louis. According to law enforcement officials, the unnamed officer came into the lingerie store at South County Center looking to arrest Dejamon Baker‘s mother on outstanding traffic tickets. However, it was her daughter who paid the price. Baker, 12, said the charge of the stun gun coursing through her body left her shaking on the floor, unable to control her limbs. The prongs of the device got stuck in the girl’s chest and stomach, and her mother struggled to pull them out, leaving the teen with two small wounds on her body. Last Wednesday, Baker, her mother, 27-year-old Charlene Bratton, and several other relatives went on a shopping trip to the local mall. Bratton had just tried on a pair of shorts and was about to purchase them when she was confronted by a St. Louis County officer. Bratton said she had outstanding warrants for her arrest f...

Oprah Winfrey is going au natural … or at least her hair is. While she’s always got a perfectly done-up ‘do while out in public, she’s gracing the September Issue of O, The Oprah Magazine with her hair “in its natural state” for the first time. In the mag, seen below, Winfrey opens up about her follicles … and says she almost chopped them all off! “I wanted to wear it close-cropped a la Camille Cosby but her husband Bill convinced me otherwise. ‘Don’t do it,’ he said. ‘You’ve got the wrong head shape and you’ll disappoint yourself.’ I took his advice,” she says. In The Makeover Issue, O also says the only beauty changes that really work are “those in which something inside the receiver clicks, aligning with that which is being received. The only way to real transformation is through the mind.” The latest issue of O hits newsstands August 7. What do you think…you like? Is that really O’s natural hair? SCOOP: ...

A pair of freaky Kansans are facing criminal charges after they allegedly swiped some K-Y Jelly from a Walmart and started having sex inside the store. The X-rated encounter Sunday evening resulted in the arrest of Julian Call, 22, and Tina Gianakon, 35, on theft and lewd and lascivious behavior charges, according to the Hutchinson Police Department. Witnesses told officers that the couple was openly fondling each other in full view of fellow Walmart shoppers (which resulted in the lewd and lascivious charges). Additionally, the pair was accused of shoplifting the sexual lubricant and other items. Municipal Court complaints filed against Call and Gianakon accuse them of engaging “in sexual intercourse or sodomy with any person or animal with knowledge or reasonable anticipation that the participants are being viewed by another.” Call and Gianakon–both of whom appeared sober–were briefly booked into the Reno County jail ...

WTF IS TETHERING? Tethering enables you to go online from your laptop or PDA using your cell phone as a modem. Verizon can no longer charge extra for tethering on non-unlimited data plans. A large number of Verizon Wireless customers will NOW be able to download apps that share a smartphone’s Internet connection with other devices, a feature known as tethering. And they won’t have to pay monthly fees to the carrier for the privilege, thanks to a government investigation. The Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday that it started the investigation after seeing reports that Verizon had pressured Google to block apps from the Android app store that gave customers tethering abilities without having to pay $20 a month for Verizon’s official tethering plan. The F.C.C. says Verizon could not block third-party tethering apps from the Android market because of rules attached to some spectrum it had purchased, whi...

Starting (today) Wednesday, 47 million women across the country will begin to have free access to contraceptives, checkups and counseling. The change is part of President Obama’s Affordable Health Care Act. Previously some insurance companies did not cover these preventive services for women at all under their health plans, while some women had to pay deductibles or copays for the care they needed to stay healthy. Women who are insured won’t have to pay co-pays anymore for birth control, certain pregnancy screenings and counseling, HIV testing and even general checkups. The change will let women choose between brand name birth control or generic without having to worry about price. HERE ARE THE 8 NEW PREVENTION-RELATED SERVICES THAT will be covered with no co-payments starting Wednesday, Aug. 1: – ...

We do NOT know if this book is gonna help what people think of the late great Whitney Houston but it’s on bookshelves now. Gospel singer BeBe Winans’ memoir based on his friendship with Whitney Houston, The Whitney I Knew , was released on Tuesday. You recall the Winans family stole the show at Whitney’s funeral with their stories and especially BEBE with his tale of “crazy Whitney.” To say he’s helping her we can’t say that but he does expand on CRAZY WHITNEY… People have this perception that being a star makes one immune to the challenges of life, and that is so far from the truth. BeBe writes about Whitney’s tendency to talk through movies and gives us the deets on a little drama at the theatre during the movie “The Prince of Tides” Near the end of the movie the woman sitting in front of Whitney turned around and said emphatically, “Can you just shut up! Please! Just shut up!” and then turned around and sat back down. I watched Whitney lean up to whisper...