Watercooler Stories

Sausage tycoon fined for foie gras

CHICAGO, March 30 (UPI) -- The owner of a Chicago "sausage superstore and encased meat emporium" was fined $250 Thursday for defying the city's ban on selling foie gras.

Foie gras, the livers of geese and ducks that have been force fed, is a staple of fancy French cooking. But it has come under fire from animal rights activists who say force feeding is cruel.

At a penalty hearing, a magistrate imposed the minimum fine on Doug Sohn, proprietor of Hot Doug's, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Sohn was not present at the hearing. Since the city council adopted the ban, he has continued to advertise foie gras on his Web site and on a sign outside the door.

The council passed the ordinance over Mayor Richard Daley's veto.

'Not proven' verdict under attack

EDINBURGH, Scotland, March 30 (UPI) -- The unique Scottish legal verdict, "not proven," which has been under fire for 300 years, faces a new challenge from a legislator.

Scotland is the only place in the world where criminal trial juries have an alternative to guilty or not guilty verdicts. Michael McMahon, a member of the Scottish Parliament, says it should be dropped, The Scotsman reports.

"At the moment we have a system of guilty and a wee bit guilty and it doesn't work," McMahon said. "You can't be a little bit guilty. The case is either proved or not proved."

The verdict was instituted during the Scottish Reformation more than 300 years ago and has been criticized for almost that long.

A jury in 1857 ruled "not proven" when Madeleine Smith, a young woman from Glasgow's upper crust, was charge with poisoning her lover with arsenic. Sir Walter Scott, the 19th century novelist and poet, called it "that bastard verdict."

In recent years, about 20 percent of criminal cases have ended with a "not proven" verdict. McMahon said he was inspired by the release of Francis Auld, after a jury decided the case against him for the 1992 killing of a drama student from Hamilton was "not proven."

Czech club fined on Gypsy discrimination

PRAGUE, Czech Republic, March 30 (UPI) -- A Czech Republic court has ordered a nightclub owner to pay $238 and apologize to each of three Gypsies denied service at his club in 2001.

The Gypsies, or Romanies as they are also called, filed suit claiming they were denied entry by the staff to the club, while non-Gypsy friends were not.

A regional court in Ostrava, in North Moravia in the eastern Czech Republic, originally ordered club manager Jiri Ozdinec to pay each plaintiff $2,380 and apologize in writing, Prague Radio reported Thursday.

But Ozdinec appealed and the High Court in Olomouc lowered the amount of compensation, CTK, the Czech news agency, reported.

Parents don't sleep like babies

LONDON, March 30 (UPI) -- One-third of new parents lose the equivalent of two months of sleep during their baby's first year, a survey by a British company found.

One in five parents surveyed said they lose more than three hours a night, almost three full nights a week, according to the survey of 500 mothers from Tomy, the nursery products company, The Telegraph reported.

Half of new parents reported arguing with each other over who gets less sleep, while a fifth of respondents said they brag -- often falsely -- about how well their baby sleeps, The Telegraph reported.

Forty-two percent of mothers reported that they responded to their babies' night-time cries within 30 seconds, while 68 percent of mothers said it takes their partners five minutes to respond.

The sleepless nights don't necessarily end with baby's first birthday.

Thirty-eight percent of babies were not sleeping through the night by age 1, the survey said.

"Being up with a screaming baby, several times in the night can be a very lonely experience, especially if you're not getting support," Joanne Gray of Tomy said in The Telegraph. "Our message is simple -- you're not alone."