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Black Friday Comes Early For Looters

Reporting from Sacramento -- That 52-inch, flat-screen television on the family room wall may have a terrific picture, but there's a big drawback: It's an energy hog. State regulators are getting ready to curb the growing power gluttony of TV sets by drafting the nation's first rules requiring retailers to sell only the most energy-efficient models, starting in 2011.

A woman who was angry because her husband wanted her to turn up the heat pulled out a gun and shot their flat-screen TV while he cowered behind a pillow, Macomb County authorities say. The 65-year-old man called 911 Sunday night from the basement of their Washington Township home, about 25 miles north of Detroit. "My wife's got a gun. She's shooting at me," ... He told the operator that Cheryl Grucz, 61, was angry because he wanted the heat turned up. She fired a round while he hid his head in a pillow, striking the plasma TV, then went...

LOS ANGELES - Upstart American TV maker Vizio Inc. has been nipping for three years at the heels of household names such as Sony and Samsung. Quietly selling its affordable line of flat-panel sets in wholesale club stores instead of electronics retailers, it knocked its foreign competitors from the top spot in the second quarter to become the largest seller of flat-panel TVs in North America. It is too early to say the company will bring an American brand back to the top ranks of TV makers for good. But Irvine, Calif.-based Vizio is poised to benefit from a variety...

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- A rash of oven-door thefts may be linked to a recent case in which a woman bought what she thought was a flat-screen TV, only to discover that the package held an old oven door, police said. South Bend detective Sgt. Jim Walsh said police arrested a suspect Thursday they believe sold the door to the woman. Police said an oven door and packaging materials were found in the trunk of the man's car. Oven doors are an increasingly hot item in burglaries targeting vacant properties. Walsh said oven doors were among the items stolen in...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Flat-screen television sales are expected to fuel Sony Electronics' U.S. growth this year, but traditional televisions will remain a strong revenue driver, company president Hideki "Dick" Komiyama said on Wednesday. "This year the driving force is going to be the (television) display business," Komiyama, who is charged with overseeing operations at the $11 billion electronics arm of Japan's Sony Corp (NYSE:SNE - news) (news - web sites)., told a press gathering in New York. Sony Electronics expects to see revenue for flat-screen TVs, which include high-definition and other digital TV screens, increase to about 30 percent...