UPI NewsTrack Quirks in the News

Woman sues over letter stamped 'Deceased'

DULUTH, Minn., Dec. 1 (UPI) -- A Minnesota woman is suing the federal government after a letter to her son serving in Iraq came back mistakenly stamped "deceased."

Joan Najbar of Duluth said in her lawsuit against the federal government and the U.S. Postal Service, filed Nov. 5 in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis, the letter returned to her Oct. 13, 2006, was stamped with the word "Deceased" in red ink, the Duluth News Tribune reported Tuesday.

Najbar said the letter caused her severe emotional distress because she did not know if her son, who was serving in the Army in Iraq, had been killed. She said she discovered through the Red Cross that he was still alive, but she required medical treatment and suffered a loss of income as a result of the distress.

The government has yet to file a response to the suit, but representatives of the Army and U.S. Postal Service said they do not use red "Deceased" stamps in any situations.

The lawsuit alleges negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress against the government and postal service.

Lawsuit: Woman pressured into buying car

CLIVE, Iowa, Dec. 1 (UPI) -- A 77-year-old Iowa woman said in her lawsuit against a car dealership she was pressured into buying a new car when she only wanted an oil change.

Audrey McKnight of Carlisle said she took her 2006 Hyundai Sonata to an auto dealership in Clive for an oil change Oct. 21 and a saleswoman pressured her into looking at cars despite her protests that she could not afford a trade-in, the Des Moines (Iowa) Register reported Tuesday.

"I told them I cannot do a bigger payment," McKnight said. "I just kept telling that. They didn't care."

McKnight said her repeated protests that she had to leave were ignored and sales staff aggressively showed her cars for eight hours until she agreed to "try out" a 2008 Hyundai Azera with the promise that she could return it the next day if she was not satisfied. However, she said the dealership told her the next day that the sale was final and she could not trade back for her 2006 Sonata.

Max Holmes, owner of the dealership, said his business "tries to be straightforward and honest" and he is working to find a resolution to the lawsuit.

"The important thing to me is that, since the day after she purchased her car, we've been working with her to try to accomplish her objectives," Holmes said. "We still will, and that's really our first and only objective here -- to end up with a satisfied customer."

Mystery ostrich egg placed as joke

CHARLESTON, W.Va., Dec. 1 (UPI) -- A West Virginia man has come forward to reveal an ostrich egg discovered in the woods in Charleston was placed in a tree as a joke.

Herbert Herold, 40, said a friend gave him a pair of ostrich eggs and he took one that was cracked and placed it in the fork of a tree in the woods on his way home Nov. 20, the Charleston (W.Va.) Daily Mail reported Tuesday.

Herold said his brother told him the egg was gone from the tree a few days later and he assumed it had been taken by an animal until he read a story in Thursday's Daily Mail about Sherman Farley, who discovered the 4.5-pound egg on the ground while deer hunting.

Herold came forward and revealed his joke in response to the questions that arose from Farley's discovery.

"I put it there for my brother, or whoever, to find while hunting," Herold said. "I was just being ornery. I'm always doing stuff like that."

Food sculpture's origins a mystery

LOOMIS, Calif., Dec. 1 (UPI) -- A California family says sheriff's deputies picked up the 4-foot-tall fiberglass food sculpture that mysteriously appeared in their yard.

Trisha Pickerel of Loomis said Placer County deputies hauled away the fiberglass sculpture of a hamburger, hot dog and slice of pizza Monday morning, one day after it appeared in the middle of her family's lawn in the early morning, KXTV, Sacramento, Calif., reported Tuesday.

"It was pretty fun. The neighborhood kids kept coming over and playing on it," Pickerel said of the sculpture's brief time in her yard.

Pickerel said her family believes the sculpture was probably stolen from a local restaurant or bar, but the Placer County Sheriff's Department said no giant food statues have been reported stolen in recent days.

"The sheriff's department said if nobody claims it in 90 days, we can have it," Pickerel said.