Man Purse of the Week 

Curses, Foiled Again
Less than an hour after a bank robbery in Orlando, Fla., police located suspect Johnathan L. Graves, 37, when an officer in police headquarters looked out his window and spotted the man hiding from a patrol car. The officer alerted other officers, who nabbed Graves as he tried to flee. (Orlando Sentinel)

• While arguing with the mother of their 4-year-old son at her apartment in St. Clair Shores, Mich., Antonio Owens, 27, “grabbed a kitchen knife and said he is going to cut the gas line and burn down the place,” police Detective James Wagner reported. “He tried to get the stove away from the wall to get to the gas line” before both parties realized the stove was electric. (Oakland County’s Daily Tribune)

What, Me Worry?
Many reusable grocery bags contain high levels of lead, according to the Center for Consumer Freedom. Of the 44 retailers whose bags the consumer group tested, 16 contained lead in amounts higher than the limit many states set for heavy metals in packaging. The bags are made from “non-woven polypropylene,” which comes from China. Noting that lawmakers nationwide are proposing to ban or tax paper and plastic bags, CCF Senior Research Analyst J. Justin Wilson said consumers “should have the option of using lead-free plastic and paper bags when they’re bringing home their groceries.” (United Press International)

• Plastic trays used at shopping mall food courts contain as many germs as a gas station toilet seat, according to a Canadian Broadcasting Corp. investigation. Bob Hancock, a microbiologist at the University of British Columbia, where swab samples from trays were analyzed, said that two of the trays were contaminated with “a fairly large number” of acinetobacter bacteria, which cause gastrointestinal illness and are highly resistant to antibiotics. The CBC said various officials at the three Vancouver shopping malls sampled pointed out the trays aren’t intended to come into direct contact with food. (United Press International)

Man Purse of the Week
Corrections officials said that during a “clothed pat-down search” of Antoine Banks, 25, after his arrest on drug charges in Louisville, Ky., they found a small bag of suspected crack cocaine tied to the waistband of his underpants. They proceeded with a strip search and found “another small baggie” containing crack rocks in the foreskin of his penis. (Louisville’s WLKY-TV)

Piscine Follies
Police who charged three teenage boys with residential burglary in Arlington Heights, Ill., also charged one of them with cruelty to animals after he admitted poisoning and killing three goldfish. “According to the police report,” police Sgt. Mike Hernandez said, the 16-year-old boy “looked at the fish tank and said, ‘We can’t leave any witnesses.’” (suburban Chicago’s Daily Herald)

• Chinese animal rights groups objected to a television appearance by magician Fu Yandong, who performs a trick where six goldfish swim in formation. The protestors insisted the trick might involve the use of magnets and thus could injure the fish. The magician denied harming the fish, pointing out, “If I used magnets, the fish would stick together.” (BBC News)

• Fish swimming around big cities could be subjected to doses of anti-depressants, according to Canadian researchers, who discovered that significant quantities of Prozac are finding their way into the water around Montreal and into the brains of fish. Noting that a quarter of Montreal’s human population consumes some type of anti-psychotic or anti-depressant drug, lead researcher Sebastian Sauve said his team observed that the pharmaceuticals reduced brain activity in brook trout exposed to Montreal’s wastewater over a three-month period. Sauve warned that fish in other big cities could show similar effects. (The Canadian Press)

Slightest Provocation
Police arrested Consuela McCrobey, 19, and Laela Cross, 20, in Chattanooga, Tenn., after a dispute that began, McCrobey said, with Cross “spitting ice cream on my car.” McCrobey responded by throwing eggs at Cross’s porch, according to the police report, which stated that Cross retaliated a few hours later when McCrobey drove past her home by firing her semi-automatic pistol at McCrobey’s car “once and then at least five more times.” All six shots missed. “She wears glasses, she can’t see,” McCrobey said. “But I don’t know what kind of anger she had for her to start shooting over some eggs.” (Chattanooga Times Free Press)

Compiled from the press reports by Roland Sweet. Authentication on demand.