Burglar showers, cuts hair, fries chicken

EASTON, Pennsylvania: An eastern Pennsylvania man was charged after he allegedly broke into a home, cut his hair and prepared fried chicken before being discovered. He was charged with breaking into the home in Easton, about 50 miles north of Philadelphia. Court documents show the homeowner returned home Sunday to discover him watching TV and cooking chicken. Authorities said the man threw a rock through a front door window to get inside and appeared to have rummaged through every room in the house. He also took a shower. The man faces burglary, criminal trespass and other charges and was being held on $15,000 bail.

German ‘tyrant’ ad banned in Britain

LONDON: A radio advertisement for a British recruitment website has been banned for implying that Germans are tyrants, a watchdog said Tuesday. The advertisement for Reed showed a man speaking to his boss, who answered furiously in German. A voiceover then said: “Boss a bit of a tyrant? Find your perfect boss on the UK’s biggest job site.” The Advertising Standards Authority (Asa) ordered Reed not to show the advertisement again in its current form after receiving 13 complaints from members of the public. “The humor derived from a stereotype at the expense of German people. We considered that the portrayal suggested that German people were more likely to be unreasonable or aggressive to others,” the Asa said. “The ad reinforced a negative and outdated cultural stereotype of German people as overpowering and tyrannical and therefore the ad had the potential to cause serious offense to some listeners.”

Driver shoots his way out of sinking SUV

ROSEVILLE, California: A driver whose SUV plunged into a Northern California creek after he was startled by his hands-free cell phone device escaped the sinking vehicle by blasting out the window with a handgun. The 28-year-old man, whose name wasn’t immediately available, is an armed security guard at Thunder Valley Casino, north of Sacramento. He sustained minor injuries in Sunday’s accident. A spokesman for the Roseville Fire Department said the man was traveling northbound on Industrial Avenue in Roseville when the cell phone device activated. The driver was startled and veered off the road through the guardrail. The SUV landed in Pleasant Grove Creek. He used his gun to shoot himself out, then flagged down a passerby.

Man cited for ‘rocking out’ on John Denver

FOND DU LAC, Wisconsin: Police responding to a complaint of loud noise have cited a Fond du Lac man for “rocking out” to the music of John Denver. A police who responded to the man’s apartment last week could hear Denver’s music through the door. The officer pounded on the door but the man didn’t answer. Finally the officer found out the man’s name from a neighbor and called to him, bringing the man to the door. When asked why he had the music so loud, the man said he was “rocking out.” The Reporter newspaper in Fond du Lac reported that the 42-year-old was cited for unnecessary loud noise. The ticket could result in a fine of about $210. The late Denver is known for such hits as “Rocky Mountain High” and “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”

Lizards make big money for villagers

JAKARTA: A tiny Indonesian lizard has become big business for impoverished villagers in Indonesia, where growing Asian demand for reptile-based traditional medicines has driven a boom in gecko farming. Geckos — the pale, soft-skinned lizard with a distinctive call — are abundant in Indonesia and are believed by Chinese and Korean traditional medicine devotees to help cure cancer as well as skin and respiratory diseases. The industry began four years ago in Banjarsawah village on the eastern half of Java island when a villager, Abdurrahman, began drying geckos at home and selling them to an exporter. Now, more than 100 hunters scour the forest nightly catching the skittering lizards. But gecko hunting has got environmentalists alarmed. R. Tri Prayudhi, of the conservation group ProFauna said that while the animals were not endangered, they played an important role in the ecological system and should remain in the wild.

— Compiled from agencies