If NYC were its own country, and the NYPD was its army, it would be the twentieth-best-funded army in the world, just behind Greece and just ahead of North Korea.
14
It takes five minutes to execute someone in a gas chamber.
41
Al Capone earned $105m per year from alcohol and rackets during the Prohibition era. Today, this would be equivalent to $1.4b per year.
7
In Brazil, prison inmates can reduce their sentence by 4 days (up to 48 days a year) for every book they read and write a report on.
32
In Japan, gambling is illegal. However, they circumvent the law by giving out prizes instead of cash, which the winner can then sell back to the establishment for cash.
-3
A Missouri family sued the previous owners of a house that they had just bought after Brown Recluse Spiders "started bleeding out of the walls." An expert came in and estimated that the house was infested with 4,000 – 5,000 of the spiders.
2
Eighty percent of Americans will be the victim of violent crime at least once in their lifetime.
24