"Ohio prosecutor indicts 'Punxsutawney Phil' for meteorological fraud "

Hey, if the Italians can convict scientists for failing to predict earthquakes and Romanians can fine fortunetellers if their predictions don't pan out, well, prognosticator Phil should have seen this coming.

From the Christian Science Monitor:

An Ohio prosecutor indicted 'Punxsutawney Phil' today for felony misrepresentation of spring. The groundhog deliberately misled the public to think winter was on its way out, and now the Ohio prosecutor is calling for the rodent's death. 

Famed groundhog Punxsutawney Phil might want to go back into hibernation.

Authorities in still-frigid Ohio have issued an "indictment" of the furry rodent, who predicted an early spring when he didn't see his shadow after emerging from his western Pennsylvania lair on Feb. 2.

"Punxsutawney Phil did purposely, and with prior calculation and design, cause the people to believe that spring would come early," Mike Gmoser, the prosecutor in southwestern Ohio's Butler County, wrote in an official-looking indictment.

Gmoser wrote that Punxsutawney Phil is charged with misrepresentation of spring, which constitutes a felony "against the peace and dignity of the state of Ohio."
The penalty Phil faces? Gmoser says — tongue firmly in cheek — is death....MORE