A father who bit off part of a love rival’s finger at a children’s nativity play in England has been sentenced to 11 months in jail.
Lee Wilkinson, 40, fought with Michael Dent at Harton Primary School, South Shields, in December 2011. During the tussle he bit off the tip of Mr Dent’s left little finger.
Newcastle Crown Court heard that the pair had been involved in a long-running feud after Mr Dent had an affair with Wilkinson’s wife while he was working away. (PA)
Barack Obama the fly swatter
There was a buzz at the White House on Thursday when President Barack Obama announced the nomination of two top financial regulatory officials.
A large fly kept interrupting the President as he presented his choices to head the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as a watchdog for financial consumer products.
Under bright television lights, the fly darted around the President’s head as he spoke in the White House’s ornate State Dining Room, alighting briefly on the middle of his forehead.
“We need cops on the beat to enforce the law,” the president said. He was speaking about SEC nominee Mary Jo White and Richard Cordray, whom he renominated to continue as head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Obama broke off to swat at the intruder, which flew away.
“This guy is bothering me here,” he said, glaring at his staff.
The insect was luckier than a fly that harassed Obama in 2009 while taping a television interview. “Get out of here,” he said, before smacking and killing the fly. “I got the sucker,” he said at the time.
An animal rights group protested. (Reuters)
Hunt for 10,000 escaped crocs
South Africa has called out the police to join the hunt for as many as 10,000 crocodiles on the loose after escaping from a farm during floods and being washed into one of southern Africa’s biggest rivers, officials said yesterday.
Crocodile farmers, locals and police have trapped thousands of the reptiles, using plastic bands to tie their legs behind their backs and then piling them into pick-up trucks.
The flood gates at the Rakwena Crocodile Farm close to the borders with Botswana and Zimbabwe were opened on Sunday because it was feared that rising flood waters would crush the reptiles, releasing some 15,000 crocodiles into the Limpopo River. (Reuters)
Ohio ‘cleaning fairy’ arrested
The Ohio woman dubbed “the cleaning fairy” by local media, because she broke into a home and cleaned it without permission, was arrested after police found her shovelling snow from a driveway without the owner’s consent, police said.
Police in Elyria, a city 30 miles southwest of Cleveland, arrested Susan Warren, 53, on an outstanding warrant stemming from the separate incident last year where she entered a suburban Cleveland home, did some light cleaning and left a note charging the owner $75.
She could very well face jail time for a probation violation, but no charges have been brought for the unsolicited snow shovelling, an Elyria Police Department spokeswoman told Reuters yesterday.
Last November, Warren pleaded guilty to attempted burglary and trespassing in connection with the house cleaning incident in May. (Reuters)