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ORLANDO, Fla. -- Surveillance video of a bank robbery surprised detectives when it showed the bandit holding a gun in a strange manner, even backward during the holdup. "(The robber) is holding it in a manner that he's probably not familiar with handguns and was afraid it was going to go off," Orange County sheriff's Detective Jason Sams said. "If that was a fake gun, he would be holding it normally because he wouldn't care." Investigators said the bandit was wearing a new Cleveland Indians baseball cap when he walked into the Fifth-Third bank on the corner of University Boulevard...

MIAMI BEACH, Fla., May 24 (UPI) -- A former employee of Florida's Mount Sinai Medical Center faces criminal charges after admitting to performing oral sex on a patient, police said. Hialeah, Fla., resident Pedro J. Gonzalez, 27, was charged with sexual battery, Miami Beach police said. The hospital fired Gonzalez after the April 30 incident, The Miami Herald reported Thursday. Gonzalez's hospital duties included wheeling patients through the building. ''Even an isolated incident is unacceptable. We worked very closely with the Miami Beach police on this matter, and will continue to assist the authorities until a proper resolution is achieved,''...

Giant pythons capable of swallowing a dog and even an alligator are rapidly making south Florida their home, potentially threatening other southeastern states, a study said. "Pythons are likely to colonize anywhere alligators live, including north Florida, Georgia and Louisiana," said Frank Mazzotti, University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences professor, in his two-year study. The pythons thriving in Florida are mostly Burmese pythons from Myanmar that were brought over as pets and then turned loose in the wild. From 2002-2005, 201 of the beasts were caught by state authorities, but in the last two years the number...

A 43-YEAR-OLD German decided to settle his imminent divorce by chainsawing a family home in two and making off with his half in a forklift truck. Police in the eastern town of Sonneberg said the trained mason measured the single-storey summer house - which was some eight metres long and six metres wide - before chainsawing through the wooden roof and walls. “The man said he was just taking his due,” a police spokesman said. “But I don't think his wife was too pleased.” After finishing the job, the man picked up his half with the forklift truck and drove...

German driver's car directs him into toilet 23 October 2006 BERLIN: A German motorist followed the command "Turn right now" from his navigation system and crashed into a small toilet hut by the side of the road - about 30 metres before the crossing he was meant to take. The overly obedient 53-year-old from Freiburg drove his sport utility vehicle off the road onto into a building site, up a stairway and into the small toilet shack, police in the eastern town of Rudolstadt said on Sunday. It caused 2000 euros ($NZ3843) worth of damage to the stairway, 100 euros...

A WIFE aged 65 chopped off her dead husband’s willy in hospital — so she could keep it in a pickling jar as a souvenir. Uta Schneider used a butcher’s knife to hack off the “treasured” manhood. She wrapped it in foil and put it in a lunchbox — next to gherkins. But she was spotted by a nurse and arrested in Stuttgart, Germany. She is accused of mutilation. Uta was wed to Heinrich, 68, for 35 years. She told police: “It was his best asset and gave me so much pleasure. “I wanted to pickle it for eternity —...

Police: UCF Student Set Dorm Fire To Meet Women   POSTED: 11:46 pm EDT July 19, 2006 UPDATED: 11:55 pm EDT July 19, 2006   A student at the University of Central Florida is accused of setting a fire on campus as a way to meet women, according to a Local 6 News report. Police said Matthew Damsky admitted to lighting a couch on fire at the Academic Village Dorms last week Damsky told officers he hoped he would be able to meet women as the building was being evacuated. He was arrested for arson and booked in to...

ADAM CAROLLA: Ann Coulter, who was suppose to be on the show about an hour and a half ago, is now on the phone, as well. Ann? ANN COULTER: Hello. CAROLLA: Hi Ann. You’re late, babydoll. COULTER: Uh, somebody gave me the wrong number. CAROLLA: Mmm… how did you get the right number? Just dialed randomly — eventually got to our show? (Laughter in background) COULTER: Um, no. My publicist e-mailed it to me, I guess, after checking with you. CAROLLA: Ahh, I see. COULTER: But I am really tight on time right now because I already had a —...

BERLIN (Reuters) - A 52-year-old man from the German town of Darmstadt tried in vain to get a refund for 400 euros ($475) worth of what he said was "bad marijuana" from his dealer before turning to the police for help, according to authorities. The police then charged the man with violating drugs possession laws and confiscated the 200 grams of marijuana he brought with him to the police station, according to a report in Bild am Sonntag newspaper Sunday. "It is un-usable," the man told police in the hope they would help him get his money back. Amounts of...

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German inventor said he has developed a method to produce crude oil products from waste that he believes can be an answer to the soaring costs of fuel, but denied a German newspaper story implying he also used dead cats. Christian Koch, an inventor and patent holder of the "KDV 500" that he said produces high quality fuel, said he can transform waste products such as paper, rubbish and plastic materials into fuel. But Koch, 55, said there was no truth to stories published in Bild newspaper Tuesday and Wednesday that suggested he used dead cats...

DELTONA, Fla. -- A convenience store worker has admitted urinating into a soda bottle, causing a customer who drank from it to become violently ill, his bosses say. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Publix officials confirmed to Local 6 News that an employee urinated in a Mountain Dew bottle and put it on the store shelves at the Publix-owned Pix convenience store located off Howland in Deland, Fla. Publix Super Markets spokesman Dwaine Stevens said the accused employee was suspended after the company learned of the incident this week. An internal investigation is being completed. Lab tests done by Publix on the contaminated Mountain...

BERLIN (Reuters) - An apparently friendly motorist in Germany stopped to tow a broken-down car, stranded the owners as he sped away, crashed their car into a gas station and then drove off, police said Thursday. "After attaching it, the man sped off so fast that the two hadn't even got into the car -- and were left gesticulating wildly," said police in Aachen. The man then drove toward the gas station, swerving his own car at the last minute. "But the trailing vehicle went straight on and smashed into the air pump," police said. "The station attendant was roused...

Boca Raton resident Carol Flannigan, a music teacher at a Boynton Beach public school, not only slept with an 11-year-old former student, but also had a sexual relationship with the boy’s father at the same time, according to a deposition filed this week in Palm Beach County Circuit Court. The boy’s father says in the deposition that he had the same sort of sexual relationship with Flannigan, 50, that former President Bill Clinton had with Monica Lewinsky. But the document refers only to oral sex and points out a red dress that may or may not contain a DNA sample....

Nagel - A mouse was blamed for a two-car accident in southern Germany - after having crawled up a motorist's trousers. As the rodent squirmed up his inside thigh, the driver slammed on the brakes, causing a rear-end collision with a car driven by a female motorist. When the woman got out to give him a piece of her mind, the man opened his trousers and hauled out the wriggling mouse, according to a police spokesperson.

Mon Nov 29, 8:43 AM ET  Oddly Enough - Reuters BERLIN (Reuters) - A German singer who plays Snow White has lost her job at Dresden's Christmas fair after posing for nude photos in a bathtub, Bild newspaper said on Monday. Fair organizers fired Samira, 22, after photos appeared in Bild and other publications showing her lying naked in a bathtub filled with soap suds and rose petals. Samira, whose surname was not given, has played Snow White for five years. Dresden's mayor and others who miss her performance are asking that she be reinstated.

Man ducked from flying shrimp; family sues Benihana saying it caused his death Family of man who ducked a piece of shrimp tossed by a chef is suing the chain claiming the occurrence eventually lead to the man’s death BY JENNIFER SINCO KELLEHER STAFF WRITER Posted November 24 2004 A sizzling piece of shrimp tossed at a man during dinner at a Long Island Japanese restaurant in 2001 led to his death, his family has claimed in a lawsuit against the Benihana chain. Jerry Colaitis injured his neck while ducking from the shrimp, which a chef flipped his way during...

BERLIN (Reuters) - Germans find smelly co-workers to be the most annoying aspect of their jobs, according to a survey by the German business magazine Junge Karriere. The survey found 38 percent of German office workers were "most bothered" by the smells of their colleagues, 15 percent said they were annoyed by co-workers socialising too much, and 14 percent by untidy desks. The poll of 354 participants found 26 percent were content with their jobs and have nothing at all to complain about.

Someone stole a Krispy Kreme truck from an Orlando supermarket Thursday morning. It happened at the Albertson's store on West Colonial Drive, WESH NewsChannel 2 reported. The driver left the truck running, and when he came back, his truck was gone along with $2,000 worth of doughnuts. So far, deputies haven't recovered the truck or doughnuts.

Attorney: 'It's A Classic Case Of Religious Discrimination' ORLANDO, Fla. -- A Central Florida woman was fired from her job after eating "unclean" meat and violating a reported company policy that pork and pork products are not permissible on company premises, according to Local 6 News. Lina Morales was hired as an administrative assistant at Rising Star -- a Central Florida telecommunications company with strong Muslim ties, Local 6 News reported. However, 10 months after being hired by Rising Star, religious differences led to her termination. Morales, who is Catholic, was warned about eating pizza with meat the Muslim faith...

ORLANDO, Fla. -- The antics in the trial of a Walt Disney World worker accused of groping a 13-year-old girl's breast while posing for photos dressed as Tigger would be downright goofy if the charges weren't so serious. Jurors will get the chance to try on a Tigger costume in the jury room. Walt Disney World officials suggested Tigger's costume be altered before being introduced as evidence. The defense attorney moonlights as Goofy and Tigger at the theme park resort. "This whole trial has a bunch of things unique about it," Matt Benefiel, court administrator for the Ninth Judicial Circuit...