Free Republic

A Canadian scientist has been arrested for smuggling 22 vials stolen from Canada's National Microbiology Lab, used in Ebola and HIV research, into the United States, Canadian and US officials said Wednesday. Konan Michel Yao, 42, "was taken into custody" while crossing from Manitoba into North Dakota A Public Health Agency of Canada spokeswoman [said] Yao "was working on vaccines for the Ebola virus and HIV, among other things." The Ivory Coast-born scientist is said to have studied at Laval University in Quebec and briefly worked at the University of Manitoba's plant sciences department.

(This classic Dave Barry column was originally published Feb. 24, 2002.) My advice to aspiring humor columnists is: Never make fun of North Dakota. Because the North Dakotans will invite you, nicely but relentlessly, to visit, and eventually you'll have to accept. When you get there, they'll be incredibly nice to you, treating you with such warmth and hospitality that before long you feel almost like family. Then they will try to asphyxiate you with sewer gas. I found this out when I went to Grand Forks, N.D., in January. I had made fun of Grand Forks and its sister...

Latino immigrants admit paying thousands of dollars for unlawful entry Federal authorities say two suspected smugglers and nearly a dozen illegal aliens have been taken into custody following an attempt to enter the U.S. through North Dakota. The Grand Forks Herald reports Carlos Rivera-Erazo was arrested at the Greyhound bus station in Grand Forks with three aliens, while another, Oscar Bonilla-Montero, was nabbed while attempting to pick up eight aliens near the border at Walhalla, N.D. U.S. Attorney Nick Chase says a tip from Canadian authorities led to the arrest of Bonilla-Montero, a native Costa Rican who became a legal...