UPI NewsTrack Quirks in the News

'Satisfaction' brings man out of coma

STOKE, England, Aug. 7 (UPI) -- An English grandfather who had been in a coma for 10 weeks woke up when his wife played his favorite rock anthem -- "I Can't Get No Satisfaction."

Eva Carter told The Daily Telegraph that she was dubious when doctors suggested playing music for her husband as he lay unconscious after an attack of anemia. But she decided to give it a try.

Her husband, Sam, 60, said he would like to thank Mick Jagger and the other Rolling Stones. He said that the first thing he remembers is hearing the guitar riffs from the beginning of the song.

"I can't remember much from being in a coma but I do remember that when that song came on it took me right back to when I was a youngster," he told The Daily Telegraph. "I could remember how excited I was to get it down at the record shop. I suddenly had a burst of energy and knew I had a lot more life left in me and that's when I woke up -- to the sound of the first song I ever bought."

Sam Carter, a retired baker who lives in Stoke, Staffordshire, woke up about two weeks ago in the City General Hospital.

Nuclear town spooked by mysterious bangs

KINCARDINE, Ontario, Aug. 7 (UPI) -- A Canadian town in Ontario adjacent to a nuclear reactor is abuzz with speculation about what caused several thunderous bangs last week.

The blast shook the town of Kincardine, 130 miles northwest of Toronto, around 11 p.m. last Thursday. Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Paul Bradley told the Kincardine News the 911 emergency system was swamped.

"We had calls about windows rattling and houses shaking," Bradley said. "It was almost a surreal experience -- there were so many calls coming in."

Many residents were concerned something had gone wrong at the nearby Bruce Power nuclear power plant but officials there said nothing had happened, the Toronto Star reported.

Others speculated it had been sonic booms from a jet but Bradley told the newspaper air traffic controllers said there had been no supersonic craft in the area at the time. Some residents said there was a meteor shower at that time but Bradley said a 12-mile search found nothing.

"We can't confirm or deny anything. We have no explanation," Bradley told the Star.

Paralyzed suspect 'rolled away'

CINCINNATI, Aug. 7 (UPI) -- Relatives of a paralyzed illegal immigrant charged with armed robbery in Ohio wheeled him away from a nursing home and he remains a fugitive.

Rogelio Santana, 27, was originally held under guard at a Cincinnati-area nursing home, The Cincinnati Enquirer reported. But prosecutors, believing that a man who couldn't move without assistance wasn't an escape risk, asked a judge to release him on bond. Hamilton County budget cuts had made stationing deputies at the nursing home difficult.

Assistant Prosecutor Ryan Nelson told a judge Wednesday that Santana "rolled himself away."

David Washington Jr., Santana's lawyer, said that Tuesday he went to the Greystone Communities nursing home in Dent, Ohio, and discovered his client had been gone for two weeks.

"I have no idea where he is," Washington said. "If you were being held and were facing over 100 years, what would you do?"

Santana was paralyzed in November when he was shot as he allegedly tried to hold up a store in Westwood, Ohio.

Woman, 86, fights attacker half her age

NEW YORK, Aug. 7 (UPI) -- An 86-year-old New York woman said she rumbled with a 44-year-old attacker who tried to steal her bag while she was walking home from church.

Elizabeth Maropoulos said she was walking home Sunday from St. Malachi's Church Church on West 49th Street at Eighth Avenue when a man -- identified by police as Earl Wearing -- attacked her and attempted to take her bag, the New York Post reported Thursday.

"What a bad, bad boy. He's a bastard," Maropoulos said of the suspect. "Once I realized he was coming after me, I went kick, kick!"

"I wasn't scared. Somehow, he knocked me down. He got my bag. He got my money. It was about $100," she said.

However, law enforcement sources told the Post that Wearing did not get far from the scene before a witness pointed him out to police. He was charged with attempted robbery and jailed in lieu of $15,000 bail.