"Morally ambiguous" Slurpee Cup Convicted as Culpable

Last week 36 year old Brendan Whitmouth was arrested and charged with an armed assault taking place on Tuesday at a 7/11 convenience store in South Yarra. Today his case was heard before the Magistrate's Court in Melbourne.

Brendan Whitmouth's defence argued in court that his reasoning leading up to an attempted heist of a 7/11 store in South Yarra was severely impaired by "morally ambiguous" messages on the side of a Slurpee cup he had purchased at the store. The cup was presented as evidence, and, along with containing the phrases "SLURPED TOO FAST! BRAIN FREEZE!" and "Drink it down at the machine then go back for more!", the regular sized standard issue Slurpee cup instructed him to:

"Go on a Slurpee ramage. Grab a gun and demand the 7/11 attendant provide you with a lifetime supply of Slurpee! If they refuse, blow their fucking brains out!"

His defence team argued that "nobody would have expected such subversive messages to be found upon the innocuous Slurpee cup. Surely some clemency would be appropriate in such a situation."

The person in attendance at the 7/11 store testified that Mr Whitmouth had seemed "dazed and confused" as he held him at gunpoint, suggesting that it might have been "the taurine speaking", as Mr Whitmouth ordered him onto the floor when he did not consent to supplying him with a lifetime's worth of Slurpee. Mr Whitmouth then shot him once in the arm, and ran from the store. The attendant added that "he wasn't so bad, he did say please the first time - before he ordered me on the floor and shot me..."

Magistrate Flixotide took the somewhat unprecedented step of asking for a sample of the Slurpee Mr Whitmouth had consumed to be tested in order to determine "its ability to affect rational judgements". The attendant assured her that this would be simple as "we only refresh the Slurpee mixture each month...or whenever dead rats or pigeons get stuck in there..."

Ms Flixotide also sampled some herself, admitting before the court that "it is refreshing and flavoursome", as she slurped greedily like some sort of mosquito/vacuum cleaner hybrid, causing a five minute adjournment as she suffered from the aforementioned "brain freeze".

The hearing will continue for another five days before the Court makes a judgement.