Comedian Suffers Self-Induced Lead Poisoning

A 49 year old comedian has taken himself off the comedy club circuit:

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Richard Jeni, a standup comedian who played to sold-out crowds, was a regular on the "Tonight Show" and appeared in movies, died of a gunshot wound in an apparent suicide, police said Sunday.

Police found the 49-year-old comedian alive but gravely injured in a West Hollywood home when they responded to a call Saturday morning from Jeni's girlfriend, Los Angeles Police Officer Norma Eisenman said.

Eisenman said the caller told police: "My boyfriend shot himself in the face."

Jeni died at a nearby hospital.

In reporting the story on the radio yesterday, they played an excerpt from one of Jeni's live shows which was basically a 30 second anti-Republican, anti-Christian, anti-Bush, anti-right wing paranoic rant, which confirmed for me the suspicion that Jeni suffered from mental illness.