Trending Facts

After 14 years at Chipotle, manager Jeanette Ortiz filed a workers' compensation claim for carpal tunnel syndrome. Within months, she was accused of stealing $626 from the safe - caught on video, they said. When she asked to see the footage, Chipotle told her it had been destroyed. A jury awarded her $7.97 million.

Five University of Georgia Kappa Alpha Theta sisters pulled over on a rural Georgia road on March 15, 2024, when they spotted Cori Craft's SUV sinking into Brier Creek - wading in, freeing her and both sons, then watching Clarke Jones drop to her knees and perform CPR on a four-year-old whose lips had turned blue. About a minute and a half later, he opened his mouth and started crying. The sheriff's office made all five honorary deputies.

A homeless man in Kansas City named Billy Ray Harris found a $4,000 diamond engagement ring in his panhandling cup in 2013 - accidentally dropped there by a woman named Sarah Darling. He kept it safe and returned it. Her husband launched a fundraiser that raised over $190,000, and the TV coverage reunited Harris with his sister, who hadn't seen him in 16 years.

Keanu Reeves was set to earn over $200 million from The Matrix sequels. He gave $75 million of it to the special effects and costume crews. His reason? "They were the ones who made the movie." Then he bought every stunt performer a custom Harley Davidson.

"Roar" (1981) is the most dangerous movie ever made. The cast spent 11 years living with 150 untrained big cats - no cages, no tranquilizers. Melanie Griffith needed facial reconstructive surgery. The cinematographer was scalped by a lion (220 stitches). At least 70 crew were injured. No animals were harmed.

Two young Australians bought a lion cub from Harrods for 250 guineas in 1969 and raised him in a Chelsea furniture shop. When he grew too big for city life, they released him into the wild in Kenya. A year later, they flew back to find him. They were warned he might not remember. Christian recognized them and sprinted to embrace them.

Jessica Vincent paid $3.99 for a swirled glass vase at a Goodwill in Hanover County, Virginia. She recognized the "Venini" signature on the bottom and posted it to an Italian glass collecting Facebook group - experts identified it as a rare Carlo Scarpa Pennellate vase from 1942, one of only two known in that color. It sold at Wright auction in Chicago for $107,100.

Dr. Dre was about to become hip-hop's first billionaire when Apple bought his company Beats for $3 billion in 2014. Then he posted a video bragging about it, and Tim Cook used the leak to shave $200 million off - landing Dre just under a billion.

After Hal Goldblatt was struck by a car in a crosswalk and suffered a traumatic brain injury, his family took out loans to pay for his care while Progressive Insurance stalled their claim for months - because the request arrived on a plain form letter instead of attorney letterhead. A Clark County jury awarded $101 million: $1 million compensatory, $100 million punitive. Progressive had rejected a $1.9 million settlement offer without making a single counteroffer.

Bob Ross painted roughly 30,000 works in his lifetime - nearly triple Picasso's output. For each of his 381 TV episodes, he painted three versions of the same scene: one before the camera, one on air, and one for his books. Today, 1,165 of those originals sit in cardboard boxes in a Virginia warehouse owned by Bob Ross Inc., which has never sold a single one. The Smithsonian holds four.

The US military spent $2.7 billion on a giant missile defense blimp called JLENS. On its second day of active duty, it broke free. It dragged 6,700 feet of cable across Pennsylvania. Knocked out power to 30,000 people. F-16s were scrambled but couldn't stop it. It deflated in a field. State police secured it. The program was quietly shelved.

Singaporean photographer Chuando Tan just turned 60. He has been modeling since he was 15. He has nearly 2 million Instagram followers. Most of them found him because they refused to believe his birth year. He was born on March 3, 1966. He looks like he is in his 20s. The internet has been demanding his birth certificate since 2017.

Garrett Morgan patented the safety hood in 1912 and had to hire a white actor to demo it - buyers refused to deal with a Black inventor. When an explosion trapped workers 120 feet under Lake Erie in 1916, Morgan descended into the tunnel at 3am wearing his hood and pulled 8 men out alive. The press barely named him. He later sold his traffic signal patent to GE for $40,000.

Hikers called the cops when they found a body melting out of an Alpine glacier in 1991. Police treated it as a routine mountain casualty. Carbon dating later revealed the man had been dead for 5,300 years. A decade later, X-rays found an arrowhead in his shoulder - he had bled to death in minutes.

When his sister Kim was diagnosed with leukemia in 1991, Keanu Reeves put his career on hold, sold his home to move closer to her, and spent a decade cooking her meals, cleaning her house, and personally administering her medications. Kim told PEOPLE magazine in 1995: "My brother is my prince." She survived.

An unarmed Syrian-born fruit seller crouched behind a parked car, sprinted out, and tackled an attacker threatening 1,000 Jewish revellers at a Hanukkah celebration on Bondi Beach - taking two hits in the process. The Jewish community launched a GoFundMe that raised A$2.64 million for him. He reportedly asked the organisers: "Do I deserve it?"

A Virginia woman bought a napkin-sized landscape at a West Virginia flea market in 2009 for $7. She wanted the plastic cow and the doll in the same box. Two years later she learned the little painting was a genuine Renoir worth $100,000. Then the FBI showed up. The museum had reported it missing in 1951.

For over two decades, Bill Murray has operated with no agent, no manager, and no publicist. The only way to offer him a role is to call a 1-800 number and leave a voicemail - which he checks when he feels like it. Sofia Coppola spent five months doing exactly that before landing him for Lost in Translation. He missed Monsters Inc. because nobody got through in time.

A neighbor's dog attacked 4-year-old Jeremy Triantafilo in his Bakersfield driveway, biting his leg and dragging him. His cat Tara streaked across the frame, body-slammed the dog, and chased it off the property. Jeremy needed 10 stitches. The security footage went viral with over 21 million views in days.

When a speeding GMC truck crashed through a bridge fence and plunged upside down into Utah's Jordan River in 2014, Leo Montoya Jr. was the first person to jump in - then shouted at frozen bystanders until more than a dozen strangers waded in beside him. Together they physically flipped the submerged vehicle upright, held one boy's head above water, and got all three trapped teenagers out alive.

On September 11, 2001, a yellow Labrador named Roselle was asleep under her owner's desk on the 78th floor of the North Tower when Flight 11 struck 15 floors above them. She guided her blind owner, Michael Hingson, and 30 others down 1,463 stairs to safety. They emerged onto the street just as Tower Two collapsed. She led them 40 more blocks uptown. Everyone survived.

A stray puppy was smuggled onto a troopship in a coal bin in 1917. He served 18 months in the WWI trenches, warned his regiment of mustard gas attacks, located wounded men in No Man's Land, and bit a German spy's leg until soldiers arrived. He is the most decorated war dog of WWI and the only dog promoted to sergeant through combat. His body is at the Smithsonian.

Bank of America tried to foreclose on a Florida home that had no mortgage and no debt. Warren Nyerges had paid cash for it. He sued. The judge ordered the bank to pay his $2,500 legal fees. The bank ignored the ruling for five months, so his attorney pulled up to a branch with sheriff's deputies and a moving truck and started seizing the furniture. The bank wrote the check within an hour.

When a crash on I-30 in Fort Worth ejected a 1-year-old girl and her mother and pinned the baby under the overturned SUV, 20-30 strangers and two police officers lifted the vehicle together. Sgt. Ryan Nichols started CPR on the unresponsive infant while Officer Edwin Bounds cleared her airway. She came back - first a hum, then a cry. Both survived.