Company to reprint yearbooks after head switching

McKINNEY, Texas - School officials say they are appalled by altered photos — including heads on different bodies — in hundreds of McKinney High School yearbooks delivered this week.

Besides the head and body switching, some necks were stretched, one girl's arm was missing, and another girl's head was placed on what appeared to be a nude body, with the chest blurred.

A spokeswoman for Minnesota-based Lifetouch National School Studios Inc. said the alterations were "an unfortunate lapse in judgment" by an employee but didn't believe it was malicious.

The high school had required Lifetouch to make heads the same size and eyes at the same level in all student photos, company spokeswoman Sara Thurin Rollin said Saturday. The request was "unusual and definitely very particular, but that's not to suggest what happened here is acceptable," she said.

Rollin declined to say if the company fired or reprimanded the employee who altered the images. She said Lifetouch is taking full responsibility for the altered pictures, about 30 in all, and will pay to have the publication reprinted before the seniors graduate.

Lori Oglesbee, the school's yearbook adviser at McKinney High School, said the yearbook staff would spend the weekend rebuilding the yearbook.

McKinney is about 20 miles north of Dallas.

Source ~ AP

2 Colo. men exchange Taser shots over parked van

BOULDER, Colo. - It wasn't exactly pistols at 30 paces, but police say a security company supervisor and a restaurateur shot each other with Tasers in a "bonehead" confrontation over parking.

Officers said neither man needed medical attention after the Saturday confrontation, but Harvey Epstein, co-owner of Mamacitas restaurant, was arrested on suspicion of felony menacing and using a stun gun.

A police report said Epstein and Casey M. Dane, a supervisor for Colorado Security Services Inc., were arguing over a metal boot that one of Dane's guards had clamped on a wheel of a van parked behind Mamacitas.

Dane told police he was afraid Epstein was going to hit him with a 2-foot-long pair of bolt cutters. Epstein told police he had only tried to remove the boot with the bolt cutters and hadn't threatened anyone with them.

Epstein told police Dane put his hand on a holstered pistol and threatened to shoot him. Dane told The Associated Press by telephone that he did put his hand on the holstered pistol but never threatened to shoot Epstein.

Both men drew Tasers.

"They shot each other," Police Sgt. Pat Wyton told the Camera newspaper. "It was just kind of a bonehead deal."

The guard claimed the van, owned by a Mamacitas employee, was on property he was hired to patrol. The van owner denied that.

Epstein, 36, told the AP in a phone interview Sunday he took out his Taser only after Dane pointed his at him and his mother, who was also outside. Epstein also said Dane repeatedly told him he was a police officer and that failing to comply with his orders was a federal offense, allegations that Dane denies.

Source ~ Yahoo News

Big, hairy pig attracted gawkers in Wisconsin

VIROQUA, Wis. - A steady stream of vehicles pulled along the shoulder of the road to get a look at it: an enormous, hairy pig that apparently had been struck and killed by a vehicle.

"I took a look to see if it had any tusks," Andy Sherry of Viroqua said. "If it did, somebody got to them before I did. It was really a big, big pig."

Large populations of the hard-to-find, feral animals are thought to live in southwestern Wisconsin.

The animal was found on the highway five miles south of Viroqua 61 Friday morning. It appeared to have been dragged from the center of the road, and it had a severe head wound.

Vernon County chief deputy Jim Hanson said a semi driver hit the 450- to 500-pound sow early Friday and apparently didn't have reportable damage. He said a removal company took care of the carcass.

"It's not a real common occurrence," he said.

The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources considers feral pigs an exotic species that poses a threat to the environment and to agriculture. Anyone with a small-game license is allowed to hunt them at any time of the year.

Souce ~ Yahoo News

Half-eaten Snickers bar implicates hungry burglar

JONESBORO, Ark. - Police say DNA found on a half-eaten candy bar helped them zero in on a robbery suspect.

Detective Jason Simpkins says Brian D. Bass' DNA matched the sample found on the bar left on the counter at Cato Animal Hospital during a January robbery. Bass was being held in jail Friday on $50,000 bond.

Bass was on probation after he served time on a firearms possession charge. Simpkins said the state had his DNA on file.

Police say Bass is facing felony commercial burglary and theft charges. The public defender's office says Bass, 39, doesn't have an attorney yet.

Source ~ Yahoo News

"Snake man" slithers out of Austrian prison cell

VIENNA (Reuters) - A man has escaped from his Austrian jail cell by squeezing through a food hatch in the door, police said on Wednesday.

The 19-year old Kosovan, who weighed less than 55 kilos was being held at the prison in Linz for entering the country illegally, police spokesman Alexander Niederwimmer told APA news agency.

How he got through two further doors or possibly over the prison wall is being investigated, said Niederwimmer, calling the escapee "a snake man".

(Reporting by Paul Bolding; editing by Keith Weir)

Source ~ Yahoo

Police say men trying to steal power lines shocked

CONFLUENCE, Pa. - Two Somerset County men are charged with trying to steal live power lines that were still attached to a transformer and utility poles.

Police said Kevin Lee Lytle, 27, and Daniel Jay Basinger, 24, both of Confluence, were shocked during the theft attempt on May 3 in Lower Turkeyfoot Township.

Both were charged Wednesday, but only Basinger was well enough to attend his arraignment on the attempted theft charge.

Police say the incident disrupted power to area residences for about five hours. Penelec Power Co. owns the lines which suffered $1,500 damage.

The Associated Press could not immediately reach either man for comment.

Solar bra brings conservation closer to the heart

TOKYO (Reuters) - Ladies, take your battle for the environment a little closer to your heart with a solar-powered bra that can generate enough electric energy to charge a mobile phone or an iPod.

Lingerie maker Triumph International Japan Ltd unveiled its environmentally friendly, and green colored, "Solar Power Bra" on Wednesday in Tokyo which features a solar panel worn around the stomach.

The panel requires light to generate electricity and the concept bra will not be in stores anytime soon, said Triumph spokeswoman Yoshiko Masuda, as "people usually can not go outside without wearing clothes over it."

But it does send the message of how lingerie could possibly save the planet, Masuda said, adding that the bra should not be washed or sunned on a rainy day to avoid damaging it.

Being eco-friendly is now fashionable in Japan, and the "Solar Energy Bra" follows the company's other green-themed undergarments that include a bra that turns into a reusable shopping bag and one that featured metal chopsticks to promote the use of reusable chopsticks.

"It is very comfortable and I can really feel involved in eco-friendly efforts as well," model Yuko Ishida said.

Source ~ Yahoo News

Man jailed when daughter fails to get diploma

CINCINNATI - A man ordered by a judge to make sure his daughter hit the books has found himself in jail because she failed to earn a high school equivalency diploma.

Brian Gegner, of Fairfield, was sentenced last week to 180 days in jail for contributing to the unruliness or delinquency of a minor.

He was ordered months ago to make sure his 18-year-old daughter Brittany Gegner, who has a history of truancy, received her GED — something that hasn't happened yet.

Brittany Gegner, who said Monday that she plans to take a required GED test this month, said her father shouldn't be blamed for her failure because she has been living with her mother.

"It was my wrongdoing, not his," said Brittany Gegner, whose fiance and 18-month-old daughter also live at her mother's home in nearby Hamilton. "He shouldn't have to go to jail for something I did."

Her mother agrees.

"Brittany is almost 19 years old now and I think it's unfair to put her father in jail," said Shana Roach. "She's an adult now, and it's not right to rip an innocent man from his home."

Butler County Juvenile Court administrator Rob Clevenger Jr. said Monday that the court still has jurisdiction in the case because Brittany Gegner was a juvenile when the truancy problems began and when the charge against Brian Gegner was filed in 2007.

A hearing on a motion filed by Brian Gegner's attorney to reconsider the sentence is scheduled for Friday. Messages seeking comment were not returned Monday at the offices of defense attorney Tamara Sack and the Butler County prosecutor.

Brian Gegner's wife, Stephanie Gegner, said she and her husband are afraid he will lose his job if he remains in jail. She said they tried to keep his daughter in school.

"You'd take her to school and she'd go out the other door," Stephanie Gegner said.

Source ~ LISA CORNWELL, Associated Press Writer

Australian fined for buckling in beer, not child

DARWIN, Australia - An Australian man has been fined after buckling in a case of beer with a seat belt but leaving a 5-year-old child to sit on the car's floor, police said Tuesday.

Constable Wayne Burnett said he was "shocked and appalled" when he pulled over the unregistered car Friday in the central Australian town of Alice Springs.

The 30-can beer case was strapped in between two adults sitting in the back seat of the car. The child was also in back, but on the car's floor.

"The child was sitting in the lump in the center, unrestrained," Burnett told reporters Tuesday.

"I haven't ever seen something like this before," he said. "This is the first time that the beer has taken priority over a child."

The driver was fined 750 Australian dollars — about $710 — for driving an unregistered and uninsured vehicle and for failing to ensure a child was wearing a safety belt.

Source ~ AP and Yahoo News

Man says JetBlue made him sit on toilet

NEW YORK - A New York City man is suing JetBlue Airways Corp. for more than $2 million because he says a pilot made him give up his seat to a flight attendant and sit on the toilet for more than three hours on a flight from California.

Gokhan Mutlu, of Manhattan's Inwood section, says in court papers the pilot told him to "go 'hang out' in the bathroom" about 90 minutes into the San Diego to New York flight because the flight attendant complained that the "jump seat" she was assigned was uncomfortable, the lawsuit said.

Mutlu was traveling on a a "buddy pass," a standby travel voucher that JetBlue employees give to friends, from New York to San Diego on Feb. 16, and returned to New York on Feb. 23, the lawsuit said.

Initially, Mutlu was told a flight attendant had taken the last seat on the plane, but then he was advised she would sit in the employee "jump seat," meaning he could have the last seat, the lawsuit said.

The pilot told him 1 1/2 hours into the five-hour flight that he would have to relinquish the seat to the flight attendant, court papers say. But the pilot said that Mutlu could not sit in the jump seat because only JetBlue employees were permitted to sit there, the lawsuit said.

When Mutlu expressed reluctance to go sit in the bathroom, the pilot, who was not named in the lawsuit, told him that "he was the pilot, that this was his plane, under his command that (Mutlu) should be grateful for being on board," the lawsuit said.

When the aircraft hit turbulence and passengers were directed to return to their seats, but "the plaintiff had no seat to return to, sitting on a toilet stool with no seat belts," court papers say.

Some time later, a male flight attendant knocked on the restroom door and told Mutlu he could return to his original seat, court papers say.

Mutlu's lawsuit, filed Friday in Manhattan's state Supreme Court, says JetBlue negligently endangered him by not providing him with a seat with a safety belt or harness, in violation of federal law.

A JetBlue spokesman declined comment on the lawsuit Monday.

Source ~ Yahoo News

Woman mistook naked thief for husband

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - A Malaysian woman woke up to a real-life nightmare, discovering that the naked man who had slipped into her bed in the middle of the night was a thief, not her husband, a newspaper said on Tuesday.

The 36-year-old housewife was asleep when the thief, noticing that her husband was fast asleep on the couch, quietly stripped off and lay down beside her, the Star newspaper said, quoting a police report filed in the eastern state of Terengganu.

The dozing woman's suspicions were raised when she spoke to him and his voice sounded strange, the paper said.

"She then went to another room and found her husband fast asleep on the couch. That's when she screamed, causing the thief to flee by leaping out the window together with the stolen items," it added.

Source ~ Yahoo News