NEWS & BLUES

Curses, Foiled Again

British authorities uncovered a terrorist plot to bomb Jewish sites after the couple planning the attacks got into an argument that resulted in police being called to intervene. Prosecutor Bobbie Cheema said Shasta Khan, 38, told officers Mohammed Sajid Khan, 33, was “a home-grown terrorist” and proceeded to “spill the beans” about his terrorist activities while denying any involvement herself. Officers then searched the home and found beheading videos, al-Qaeda propaganda, bomb-making guides and addresses in Manchester’s Jewish community. Mohammed Khan pleaded guilty, and Shasta Khan was convicted on three terrorism-related counts. (Associated Press)

Sheriff’s investigators accused Zackary Dexter Pace, 24, of robbing the fast-food restaurant where he worked in Jefferson County, Ala., after his co-workers recognized him because his disguise was so bad. “Just about every employee in there called him by name and thought he was joking around,” Chief Deputy Randy Christian said, until he showed a gun and grabbed cash. He fled but returned three days later while detectives were interviewing witnesses. “He showed up just to see how everyone was doing, and we arrested him,” Christian said. “So obviously, not the smartest man in the world.” (The Birmingham News and WBRC-TV)

School Daze

To celebrate the end of the term, a private girls’ school in Sherbooke, Quebec, hired hypnotist Maxime Nadeau to entertain a group of 12- and 13-year-old girls by putting some in a trance while others watched. When the show ended, several girls in the audience who’d fallen under Nadeau’s spell remained mesmerized. Nadeau, who received about 14 hours of instruction in basic hypnotism, couldn’t snap them out of it and had to call the hypnotist who trained him. 

Richard Whitbread, who drove an hour to College du Sacre-Coeur to release the girls, said he found several girls still under the effects of “mass hypnosis.” He made them think they were being re-hypnotized and then awakened them. School administrators said they learned after the fact that hypnosis isn’t recommended for people younger than 14 because they’re particularly susceptible to suggestion. (CBC News)

Fireworks Follies

Despite extreme fire danger and risk of wildfires that prompted nearby towns and villages to ban the use of aerial fireworks, Mayor Bryan Olguin of Peralta, N.M., refused to join them. His wife runs a fireworks stand where fire officials said aerial fireworks are sold. “I’m selling them because when somebody’s starting a fire from fireworks, it’s usually from irresponsibility,” Olguin said. “I can’t take responsibility for stupidityness.” (Albuquerque’s KOB-TV)

Not-So-Petty Theft 

Margo Reed, 54, pleaded guilty to stealing $163,582 from three public library branches in Yonkers, N.Y., over a seven-year period. Reed was responsible for depositing fines collected for overdue books (10 cents for most, 50 cents for new ones). She said she would regularly alter the paperwork with correction fluid and pocket the difference, usually $100 or more each time. A new business manager discovered the theft when he observed the alterations, which he said were obvious but never noticed because everyone trusted Reed as a longtime, conscientious employee. “It’s like no one was checking the checker,” business manager Stephen Force explained. (The New York Times)

Instant Karma

A man trying to skip out on his bar bill by jumping over a fence outside a Hilton Garden Inn in Manchester, N.H., failed to clear the metal spike fence and impaled his leg on one of the spikes. Rescuers found the man balancing on the other leg. “He was actually in pretty good shape,” Lt. Max Chiasson of the Manchester Fire Department said. “He was texting and making phone calls.” Eight firefighters used saws, hydraulic cutting tools and a cutting wheel to remove about 18 inches of the metal fence with the spike that pierced his leg, so he could be taken to the hospital with part of the fence attached. (Manchester’s WHDH-TV)

Our Bad

A Government Accountability Office review of the current military Base Realignment and Closure program found that its estimated implementation cost had risen from $21 billion when it was approved in 2005 to $35 billion by Sept. 30, 2011. Most of the 67 percent bump “was largely due to increased construction costs,” the GAO said while attributing some to miscalculations and misjudgments. One example is adding $347 million to the estimated cost of realigning supply and storage facilities around the country after one request for a 20,000-square-foot Georgia facility turned out to be a misprint. It should have been 200,000 square feet. (The Washington Post)

After North Carolina Gov. Beverly Perdue vetoed a measure to legalize fracking in the state, the Senate overrode her veto. The House seemed likely to sustain it, however, especially after Rep. Becky Carney spent the day lobbying fellow Democrats to uphold the veto. The House did override the veto, however, by just one vote: Carney’s. She pushed the wrong button on the voting machine. She realized her mistake but couldn’t correct it because House rules don’t permit members to correct a mistaken vote if the change would affect the bill’s passage. Fracking is now legal. “I feel rotten about it,” Carney said, “but I take responsibility for my vote.” (Raleigh’s WRAL-TV)

Leaps of Faith

Twenty-one people attending a motivational event in San Jose, Calif., suffered second-degree and third-degree burns while walking across hot coals. Three needed treatment at hospitals, and one witness reported he “heard these screams of agony. . . like people were being tortured.” The 10-foot-long walk over burning coals aims to helps participants “understand that there is absolutely nothing you can’t overcome,” according to the website of motivational speaker Tony Robbins, 52, who hosted the four-day event, titled “Unleash the Power Within.” Explaining, “We have been safely providing this experience for more than three decades,” Robbins Research International said 6,000 attendees made it safely across the coals. (Associated Press)

Avoirdupois Justice

Obese people may seek greater protection against discrimination in Montana. The state Supreme Court ruled, 4 to 3, that if a person’s weight is outside the normal range and affects one or more body systems, the condition may constitute a physical or mental disability under the state’s Human Rights Act. (Helena’s Independent Record)

Homeland Insecurity

The Transportation Security Administration fired eight screeners at New Jersey’s Newark Liberty International Airport after surveillance cameras caught them sleeping or violating other standards. TSA added they’re reviewing photographs of screening supervisors who appear to be sleeping in front of monitors used for detecting explosives and other threats. (Newark’s The Star-Ledger)

An organization of former NASA astronauts and scientists proposed launching a privately funded space telescope so it can locate and track small asteroids capable of wiping out a city or a continent. NASA and astronomers currently scan space routinely, monitoring near-Earth objects at least two-thirds of a mile across that are considered major killers. But the nonprofit, Mountain View, Calif.-based B612 Foundation warned more attention should be paid to the estimated half-million smaller asteroids, such as the one that exploded over Siberia in 1908, leveling more than 800 square miles of forest. “We’re playing cosmic roulette,” B612 chairman and former shuttle astronaut Ed Lu said. “The laws of probability eventually catch up to you.” (Associated Press)

Slightest Provocation

Police arrested Martin Valey-Cruz, 24, in Stamford, Conn., after a man reported the suspect stabbed him twice in the head. The victim said Valey-Cruz didn’t like the music he was playing. (Stamford Advocate)

One More Thing to Worry About

Potting soil caused a porch fire in Wheeling, W.Va., according to fire officials, citing spontaneous combustion caused by potting soil’s ingredients and the right combination of high humidity, extreme heat and dry soil. Although there’s no fire-hazard warning on potting soil bags, Assistant Chief Ed Geisel said he has been a firefighter for 33 years “and within the past four to five years, I’ve seen more instances.” He noted most fires are small and quickly contained by homeowners or passers-by, “but this particular one got a little further along before anyone noticed or we were able to get there.” (Steubenville, Ohio’s WTOV-TV)

Drinking-Class Hero

Britain’s Court of Appeal ruled that Belgian-owned Anheuser-Busch and the Czech brewer Budejovicky Budvar NP can both continue to sell beer in Britain using the Budweiser trademark. Both brewers had been granted the right to use it in 2000 after a ruling that British beer drinkers were aware of the difference between the two Buds. (Associated Press)

News and Blues is compiled from the nation’s press. To contribute, submit original clippings, citing date and source, to Roland Sweet in care of The New Times.