"I got arrested in 'Sitting Ducks, '" when a cop on the Upper East Side spotted him defiling a mailbox.

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The British army's introduction in 1857 of rifle cartridges believed to be greased with a mixture of beef and pork fat defiling substances to Hindus and Muslims sparked thousands of discontented Indian soldiers to rise up against British rule.

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Many of them, including their highest religious authority, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, put the blame for defiling those holy sites fairly equally between American troops and the militiamen of the Iraqi Shias' rebel leader, Muqtada al-Sadr, who is wanted for the murder of another Shia cleric.

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Mr. ZEV YAROSLAVSKY (Supervisor, Los Angeles County): Where we have tried to protect the ridge lines of the mountains from gaudy, ugly and defiling developments where the occupant of the home would have a 360-degree view, but that the rest of the world would have to look at that gaudy building.

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