An 18-month-old boy survived after falling seven floors and bouncing off a Paris café awning into the arms of a passer-by, witnesses yesterday.
“My son saw a little boy on a balcony. He had gone right outside the railing... I said to myself I mustn’t miss him,” the toddler’s saviour, local doctor Philippe Bensignor, told AFP, recounting Monday’s drama.
“I had time to move from side to side to get in the right position,” he added. “The little boy was fine. He cried a little bit but calmed down straightaway.”
An official involved in investigating the incident said the boy had been left alone in the family apartment in northern Paris with his sister by their parents, who were taken into custody afterwards. (AFP)
Girl, 10, gives birth
A girl of 10 has had a baby in southern Spain.
Social workers are deciding whether to let the mother and her family retain custody of the baby, born last week in the city of Jerez de la Frontera.
Micaela Navarro, the Andalusia region’s Social Affairs Minister, said that the father of the baby was also a child. She refused to give further details, such as the sex or health of the baby.
Spanish newspapers said the mother is of Romanian origin. The daily Diario de Jerez quoted medical staff who treated the girl as saying they were told by her mother that giving birth at such a young age was common in their country. (AP)
Man charged over Halloween mask
A man faces charges of wearing a mask or hood in public after police arrested him on Halloween night and charged him under a rarely used old law designed to combat the Ku Klux Klan.
The News & Observer of Raleigh reports that 20-year-old Lawrence Marqueal Rogers was cited for wearing a red bandana that police said concealed everything but his eyes.
He was then arrested when he donned the garment again. The man was being held in jail on a $7,500 bond.
The University of North Carolina School of Law said the 1953 ban on people aged 16 or older wearing masks or hoods was adopted to curtail the activities of the Ku Klux Klan, the secretive white supremacist group whose members wore distinctive pointed hoods to conceal their identities.
At least 17 other states have similar laws. (AP)
Mothers strip
Mothers from a small Highland community have stripped naked for a calendar to raise money for a young boy fighting cancer, it was revealed.
Twelve women from the Sutherland village of Brora have joined together to help eight-year-old Zander Heneghan, who is battling a rare form of the disease.
Proceeds from the 2011 Zander Calendar will help pay for his 10-hour weekly round trips to hospital, and fund research into his condition. Zander’s mother Anne-Marie manages a children’s day care centre in the village. (PA)
Photo finish
A thief was captured in a family’s holiday photograph as he stole their bag in front of the Wisconsin State Capitol.
John Myers had set the self-timer on his camera and, as he ran into the frame with his wife and two children, Glenn Lambright grabbed the bag containing his wallet and other items.
Mr Myers checked his camera and found a photo with a man picking up the bag in the background. Police were then able to trace him. (PA)
Deadly role
An actor playing the role of a masked gunman was shot dead by a village watchman in the Philippines who mistook him for a real criminal.
Guard Eddie Cuizon tried to stop Kirk Abella, who was wearing a ski mask and carrying a toy gun, and shot him just as the actor was directed to speed away on a motorcycle.
Mr Abella, 32, was one of the actors in the movie, Going Somewhere, being filmed by British director Alan Lyddiard in Cebu. (PA)
Jobless woman cashes in on Obama’s words
A woman who complained to President Barack Obama about the difficulties of getting a job has sold his hand-written reply for $7,000.
It told Jennifer Cline, 28, from Michigan “things will keep getting better”.
Mrs Cline got Mr Obama’s two-sentence note in January after writing to him detailing her family’s situation. The former pharmacy technician has been unemployed since losing her job in 2007 and suffers from skin cancer.
She said she sold the note because she and her husband want to buy a home, and that her family was more important than a piece of paper. (AP)