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theweaselkingIt'll be a long time before Judge Randy Anglen can enjoy a cold bottle of beer.
On a Tuesday in late May, Anglen - Hollister's municipal judge and a practicing attorney for 14 years in Taney County - came home from work, had dinner and grabbed a Miller Lite from the fridge. He slipped it into a cooler sleeve, twisted off the top and drank the beer over the next few minutes. He drained the last bit into the sink so he could put the bottle in his recycling bin.
When he set the dark brown bottle on the counter, he heard a "plop" as something dropped from the neck to the bottom of the bottle. He pulled the bottle out of its sleeve. When he peered into it, the first thing he saw was a long tail coiling around the inside of the bottle.
Then he saw the rest of the mouse.
A big, whole dead mouse.
[...]
The next morning, a Miller representative told him to pack the bottle in dry ice and mail it to them, so "they could determine if it was a mouse," Anglen said.
"The first thing I said was, 'I'm an attorney, and that's the evidence."
The representative told Anglen that it might be a clump of algae in the bottle.
"I've never seen algae with four little feet and a tail and a head and gray fur," Anglen said.
[...]
"The mouse appeared not to have gone through the pasteurization process."
[...]
Anglen said he thinks it's significant that the beer hissed with carbonation when he opened it and that it came from a sealed 18-pack box recently purchased. And [...] the mouse had no broken bones.
But Anglen said he knows that his credibility will be tested.
"I'll do whatever they want including taking a lie-detector test," Anglen said. "They need to know that I've got other things to do besides hatching a scheme to defraud Miller by putting a mouse in my beer."
On a Tuesday in late May, Anglen - Hollister's municipal judge and a practicing attorney for 14 years in Taney County - came home from work, had dinner and grabbed a Miller Lite from the fridge. He slipped it into a cooler sleeve, twisted off the top and drank the beer over the next few minutes. He drained the last bit into the sink so he could put the bottle in his recycling bin.
When he set the dark brown bottle on the counter, he heard a "plop" as something dropped from the neck to the bottom of the bottle. He pulled the bottle out of its sleeve. When he peered into it, the first thing he saw was a long tail coiling around the inside of the bottle.
Then he saw the rest of the mouse.
A big, whole dead mouse.
[...]
The next morning, a Miller representative told him to pack the bottle in dry ice and mail it to them, so "they could determine if it was a mouse," Anglen said.
"The first thing I said was, 'I'm an attorney, and that's the evidence."
The representative told Anglen that it might be a clump of algae in the bottle.
"I've never seen algae with four little feet and a tail and a head and gray fur," Anglen said.
[...]
"The mouse appeared not to have gone through the pasteurization process."
[...]
Anglen said he thinks it's significant that the beer hissed with carbonation when he opened it and that it came from a sealed 18-pack box recently purchased. And [...] the mouse had no broken bones.
But Anglen said he knows that his credibility will be tested.
"I'll do whatever they want including taking a lie-detector test," Anglen said. "They need to know that I've got other things to do besides hatching a scheme to defraud Miller by putting a mouse in my beer."