Broken mouse causes system crashes?

I'm using a Microsoft Intellimouse with the optical laser. This is one of the early ones; it only has two buttons and a wheel. Anyway, today I was trying to clean dirt out of one of the seams on the mouse and apparently I must have cracked part of it open and broken something without knowing. Whenever I try to use it, it'll respond for maybe two seconds then stop, then regain response two seconds later and stop, repeating this cycle. During these mouse freezes, the keyboard works fine. That is, until the system flat-out crashes within 3 minutes. This mouse comes with a PS/2 adapter, which I usually have it using. When I rebooted, Windows told me that it didn't detect a PS/2 mouse. I took out the PS/2 adapter and used it in a USB port and while the computer would detect the mouse, the mouse would stop functioning after about 5 seconds and the system would quickly stop responding entirely.

Right now I'm using a simple, normal two-button no-wheel PS/2 mouse and it's working fine, so I highly doubt it's a problem with my system. I'm convinced that the mouse itself is just broken and I'm planning on going out and buying a new Intellimouse in a couple of days.

What I want to know is this: Is it normal or unusual for a broken mouse to lock up the entire system?

Yep, I just went out and bought an Intellimouse Optical, and it works fine. Thanks for replying!