WhiteBoard News for Thursday, March 27, 2003

Columbus, Ohio (AP):

A bank robbery suspect learned a painful lesson: Never shove stolen money containing an explosive dye pack down your pants. 

Shortly after the National City Bank downtown was robbed Thursday, police spotted John Gladney, 40, about a block away, walking strangely, in obvious pain. 

Officers stopped Gladney and discovered he had been injured when the dye pack exploded near his groin, said Sgt. Brent Mull, police spokesman. 

Gladney was charged with aggravated robbery. 
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Mojave Desert, Arizona Daily Record):

A Welshman spent five years creating the world's biggest rubber band ball - only to drop it out of an airplane above the Mojave Desert to see whether or not it would bounce.

Tony Evans, 54, from Swansea, dropped the one-ton record-breaking ball from a 1,6km up over Arizona.

The ball took 20 seconds to hit the ground, and it created a 1.2-metre wide crater and a 6.5 metre cloud of dust.

It didn't bounce.

The ball collapsed on impact and the remains were left firmly rooted to the bottom of the crater.

A television show paid to film the ball being dropped, and a skydiving cameraman captured its final descent on camera. 

Evans's ball earned a place in the Guinness Book of Records. 

"It was my pride and joy," he told Britains' Daily Record. "People were always asking me what would happened if the ball was dropped from a great height. Would it bounce or explode? No one knew.

"I'd have loved to see it bounce up into the sky. But it was an incredible sight.
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Zhengzhou, China (Ananova):

A Chinese man is suing a shop that sold him a belt that twice came loose during an important business meeting.

Li, of Zhengzhou, Henan Province, was meeting a woman executive from Canada about a contract to run an immigration agency.

But he failed to win the $125,287 contract after his belt twice came loose, reports China Daily, quoting Henan Shangbao.

Li said he had already reached a verbal agreement to become the local representative of an immigration agency.

He had bought the $78 belt from a local shopping centre before a final interview for the contract.

But the belt suddenly came loose when he shook hands with the woman in her hotel lobby, forcing the woman to look away in embarrassment.

Li apologized and fixed the belt in the bathroom. But then the same thing happened again in the middle of their conversation. He is suing the shop for $23,500 compensation.
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Izegem, Belgium (Ananova):

A Belgian man asked his boss for an hour off work so he could rob a bank.

Frederic Mestdach, 30, told his boss he needed to do some shopping in Izegem, reports Het Laatste Nieuws.

But instead he borrowed a colleague's bike and rode to the Axa band and robbed it at knifepoint.

After the robbery, Mestdach cycled back to work and was back behind his desk within the hour.

But he had been identified and one hour later police came to arrest him. They found the money in his office.

A judge in Kortrijk jailed Mestdach for four years.
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Chow
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