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Florida, United States: A Florida man was arrested after he allegedly broke into a room inside his own house to steal a hookah from his roommate, the Lee County Sheriff’s office said. The man identified as Tyler Wesley, 19, was arrested Saturday evening in Fort Myers city of the US after his roommate, Monica, dialled 911 to report him. Security camera footage from inside her room shows the teen trying to cover the camera with a cloth before dropping it and running away. The incident is only the latest in a series of conflicts to which deputies have responded at...

Fourteen people — one of whom died and two of whom were critically hurt — were shot early Saturday at a Las Vegas hookah parlor, cops said. Two patrons at Manny’s Glow Ultra Lounge & Restaurant traded bullets after an argument at around 3:15 a.m. this morning, according to police. Police responded to multiple 911 calls about the incident, according to police.

Fewer American high school students smoked cigarettes in 2012 compared to 2011, according to a study released Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But, at the same time, more high school students were smoking cigars, pipes, electronic cigarettes and hookahs. Overall, 23.3 percent of high school students (grades 9-12) said they had used a tobacco product at least once in the 30 days before they were surveyed in 2012, said the study published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. That was down from the 24.3 percent who said they had used a tobacco product at least...

<p>Osama bin Laden 'had stoned fantasies about marrying Whitney Houston and murdering Bobby Brown'</p> <p>Like all beautiful, successful women Whitney Houston had more than her share of male admirers. But few stars could have provoked such unwanted attention as that which the singer received from one of history's most depraved and despicable men, terror chief Osama bin Laden. Extraordinary as it might seem, bin Laden is said to have lusted after Houston, dreamed of marrying her and at one point even plotted to murder her husband Bobby Brown.</p>

(NewsCore) - The Hamas-run government in Gaza on Sunday said it had banned women from smoking water pipes in public, as fear of the police drove many cafe owners to extinguish the popular pastime for both genders. "The police have decided to ban women from smoking water pipes in open, public places because it is against our customs, traditions and social norms," interior ministry spokesman Ihab al-Ghussein told AFP. The smoking of water pipes loaded with sweetened tobacco, also known as nargileh or shisha, is popular in cafes across the Arab world and was one of the few remaining leisure...

When government power grows, businesses have no choice but to hire lobbyists. Some entrepreneurs near Detroit are learning this the hard way: Michigan’s smoking ban has taken effect. The law bans establishments that offer hookah smoking from selling any food or beverages — a move that owners say would effectively drive out hookah cafés. What galls the owners — most of them Arab American — is that the state has given exemptions for cigar bars and Detroit casinos to allow smoking along with eating and drinking. To them, the issue is tinged with religious and ethnic bias. “It’s a double...

DEARBORN, Mich. -- The main thoroughfares of this Detroit suburb, like those of many Michigan cities, aren't as busy as they used to be. Thousands of jobs shed locally by the Ford Motor Co. have forced smaller businesses to shutter and left fewer customers for those that remain. --snip-- This scene is now clouded by a new state law that bans a popular feature of the local eateries - the hookah, or Arabic water pipe filled with flavored tobacco.

It was alleged he spent $80,000 over a 10-year period on hookers. But the morality of public servants and the hypocrisy of high office, the fact that he wanted “unsafe” sex - this wasn’t what people were talking about. Most of the focus was on “Kristen”, the prostitute he met at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington DC and booked for $1,000 an hour. She was described as, “American, petite, very pretty, brunette, 5 feet 5 inches, and 105 pounds”. My female friends in New York were outraged. “105 pounds? No way.” This was the biggest grievance. Not that she was...

The young prosecutor rubbed his hands with glee. For months on end, the high-profile defense lawyer had been a thorn in his side. He’d violated every rule in the book, hurled scandalous accusations, tried the case in the press despite countless admonitions from the court. But finally, the charlatan had stepped in it. Preoccupied with theatrics, he’d overlooked the basic lawyer work and blown a filing deadline. By law, it meant his client could not appeal the detention order that had already kept him in jail for a year-and-a-half. Many months more in the slammer loomed before what promised to...

This is the latest canard making the rounds — I heard a radio talk-show guy say it this morning, and one of the endless stream of former federal prosecutors suggested it on MSNBC last night (I had switched channels following Jeffrey Toobin's botched explanation of the money-laundering offense known as "structuring" — the cash transaction amount that triggers the reporting requirement is $10K, not, as Toobin stated, $5K.) Currency transaction reporting requirements were enacted in the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970, and money laundering was made a crime in overhaul of the federal narcotics laws that took place in 1986....

I have been bugged out with the flu, and as a result I've seen a lot of the commentary — including, of course, "expert" commentary, which has been something less than expert. The general approach of the federal law to prostitution mimics its approach to gambling. They are activities that tend to generate big profits for organized crime syndicates, which profits not only enrich the racketeers but underwrite their various other rackets, including loan-sharking, narcotics trafficking, murder-for-hire, etc. In Governor Spitzer's case, moreover, it's worth remembering the Nevada senator character in Godfather II who is blackmailed into doing the Corleones'...

Water-pipe bars are proliferating, and health experts fear the consequences.. Want to put away the cigarettes and talk with some interesting people? Go to a hookah bar, says Aaron Alu as he takes a leisurely puff from a glass water pipe at the Mirage Coffeehouse and Hookah Lounge in Long Beach, Calif. Apple-scented smoke drifts in the air as the police officer looks around genially. "I get to talk to people here that I otherwise wouldn't ever get to know." One patron looks up from her laptop and nods in agreement. "I'm sure it's not great for you," Alu adds,...

Vancouver's hookah-parlour owners are celebrating after winning an exemption Thursday from a proposed new bylaw that will ban smoking on most sidewalks in commercial districts, in bus shelters and even in taxis passing through Vancouver. In giving the bylaw unanimous approval-in-principle, Vancouver city council members bowed to arguments that hookah lounges provide an important cultural space for the city's Muslims and granted them a temporary exemption. The bylaw, which provides for fines of $100 to $2,000, won't come into effect until the legal department has drafted Thursday's amendments. No firm date for its implementation has been set. Hamid Mohammadian, operator...

A smoking new trend from the Middle-East is filtering its way into eastern Iowa. University of Iowa student Robin Loewe is tired of doing the same old things. Loewe says, "There's not that much to do besides going to the bar or sit in your room and watch a movie or something." That is why she decided to try out one of the newest trends among 18 to 24 year-olds, smoking hookah. Also known as a water pipe or hubble-bubble, a hookah is a device used for smoking tobacco through a water filter. Robin Hickenbottom, the manager of the Red...

Dutch Politicans Seek Marijuana Rules Amsterdam, Netherlands -- A broad coalition of political parties unveiled a pilot program Friday to regulate marijuana farming on the model of tobacco, which opponents say would be tantamount to legalizing growing the drug. Under the test program, to be conducted in the southern city of Maastricht, existing health and safety standards will apply to growers, but they would no longer be the target of police raids or prosecution. Coffee shops permitted to sell marijuana would be required to provide consumers with information about the health hazards of smoking - similar to tobacco companies -...

The word on the street had been that hookahs were an underground phenomenon, but there they were, coals lit and hoses ready, atop patio tables at Nochee in downtown Minneapolis. Hip-hop music played. As seats filled, boxes of flavored tobacco were emptied, and organizers said there was no time to talk: "We have to host a party," said Sasha Patel, 26. The hookah (pronounced WHOOK-ah or WHO-ka) is in the midst of a revival among college students and -- in Patel's words -- among 21- to 35-year-olds "with money to spend." A Dinkytown head shop stocks the smoking devices in...

AT THE Hookup Lounge near the University of Texas (UT), 20-somethings loll about, some encased in plumes of smoke. But they are not snogging, yet. In true academic spirit, they are learning the ways of another culture—and passing around a hookah pipe. “I normally smoke cigarettes, but it's kind of nice not having to get up and go outside,” says Jon Faviell, who is trying to get into graduate school at UT. He is sharing a mint pipe with a friend. Alas for Austinites, there are now fewer hookah places to puff. At the beginning of this month, a city-wide...

<p>BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) The job of occupying Iraq means hardship and long hours and sometimes a game of Risk over a hookah and a few beers.</p> <p>In a city where few people drink, Baghdad's sealed-off green zone counts at least seven bars, including a Thursday night disco, a sports bar, a British pub, a rooftop bar run by General Electric, and a bare-bones trailer-tavern operated by the contractor Bechtel.</p>

The first experience most students probably had with a hookah was watching the caterpillar swarthily blow smoke vowels from one in Disney's Alice in Wonderland. Former student Deryk Schlessinger will try to make that experience a bit more personal by opening Hillsdale's first hookah bar. The bar is scheduled to open soon after Spring Break in downtown Hillsdale near the old Democratic Party offices. "We're trying to bring the Middle Eastern culture to Hillsdale," Schlessinger said, from an easy chair beside a 5-foot gold-plated hookah in his Park Place apartment. "Even though that sounds like a big task, we think...

<p>The city isn't enforcing the smoking ban against Middle Eastern hookah bars - even though they don't qualify for an exemption under the new law, The Post has learned.</p> <p>The city has only a handful of hookah bars, a Middle Eastern version of cigar bars where patrons smoke fruit-flavored tobacco called shisha. Many of them have been ticketed for allowing illegal puffing since the city's tough anti-smoking laws went into effect March 30.</p>