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In North Carolina, a 79-year-old woman died of a heart attack apparently caused by terror. The 20-year-old man who broke into her house while fleeing the cops after a botched bank heist (It was not his day) stands accused of scaring her to death. According to prosecutors, he could be charged with felony murder: causing another person’s death while committing or fleeing from a felony crime, even if it is unintentional.

Does this mean that if an audience member has a fatal coronary while watching a horror movie, his heirs could sue the filmmakers? True, screening movies is not a felony, but what if the movie were criminally bad and produced by Ponzi schemers?

Scientific American asked Martin A. Samuels, chairman of the neurology department at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, if it is medically possible for someone to be frightened to death.

Is it possible to literally be scared to death?
Absolutely, no question about it.

Really? How does that happen?
The body has a natural protective mechanism called the fight-or-flight response, which was originally described by Walter Cannon [chairman of Harvard University’s physiology department from 1906 to 1942]. If, in the wild, an animal is faced with a life-threatening situation, the autonomic (involuntary) nervous system responds by increasing heart rate, increasing blood flow to the muscles, dilating the pupils, and slowing digestion, among other things. All of this increases the chances of succeeding in a fight or running away from, say, an aggressive jaguar. This process certainly would be of help to primitive humans, but the problem, of course, is that in the modern world there is very limited advantage of the fight-or-flight response. There is a downside to revving up your nervous system like this.

Speaking of Thriller: Michael Jackson is auctioning off stuff from his Neverland Ranch. This glove covered in clear Swarovski crystals is expected to fetch £7,000++.

P.S. Inspired by Joaquin Phoenix’s recent appearance on Letterman, the Daily Beast has prepared a compilation of great talk show trainwrecks. Most of them occurred on David Letterman’s show. What is it about Dave that brings out the nuttiness?