Watercooler Stories

Man urinated on cough drops

SANFORD, Fla., April 26 (UPI) -- Police in Florida said they were working to identify a man videotaped urinating on more than 100 packages of cough drops at a Walgreens store.

Sanford police said the man entered the French Avenue location about 10:30 p.m. Thursday and urinated on 110 unopened packages of cough drops, the Orlando Sentinel reported Monday.

Investigators said the man then attempted to fill a prescription but he lacked the proper paperwork. He left the store and employees later discovered the urine and saw the incident on surveillance video.

New York library: Porn is free speech

NEW YORK, April 26 (UPI) -- New York library officials say patrons viewing Internet "adult content that is legal" on computers at city libraries is protected by the First Amendment.

Library officials said the First Amendment right to free speech allows library visitors using the Internet at the more than 200 library branches in the city to view whatever they want online, including hardcore pornography, the New York Post reported Monday.

"Customers can watch whatever they want on the computer," Brooklyn Public Library spokeswoman Malika Granville said.

Some religious leaders are speaking out against the policy.

"What they're doing is publicly funding an appetite for the most debased fare available," said Catholic League President Bill Donohue. "It's not like a Playboy centerfold anymore -- it's far worse."

Library patron Daisy Nazario, 60, said she opposes the policy after she discovered an elderly man sitting next to her at a library branch was viewing Internet pornography.

Nazario said the privacy shields at the side of the computers protected her from seeing the images "but I could still hear the voices."

New York Public Library spokeswoman Angela Montefinise said limits will not be placed on Internet viewing.

"In deference to the First Amendment protecting freedom of speech, the New York Public Library cannot prevent adult patrons from accessing adult content that is legal," she said.

Woman fined $300 for ex-lax cookie prank

WAUSAU, Wis., April 26 (UPI) -- A Wisconsin woman accused of giving laxative-laced cookies to her college professor was ordered to pay a $300 fine.

Becky Riiser, 38, of Wausau, pleaded no contest Thursday to three misdemeanor disorderly conduct charges and was fined after prosecutors agreed to reduce the original felony charge of placing a foreign object in food, the Wausau Daily Herald reported Monday.

Riiser admitted to investigators she had placed cookies laced with ex-lax outside the office door of University of Wisconsin Marathon County biology Professor Aruni Pehl-DeSilva in December 2009. The professor became ill after eating one of the cookies, prosecutors said.

"It was supposed to be a stupid, practical joke," Riiser wrote in a January 2010 apology letter to Pehl-DeSilva. "It was something I didn't think through."

Marathon County Circuit Judge Greg Huber called Riiser's actions "demeaning."

"The cruelty of [the act] is uncalled for," Huber said to Riiser. "For someone of your maturity, [this] was totally unexpected."

Girl, 8, brings mom's pot to school

PENSACOLA, Fla., April 26 (UPI) -- Authorities in Florida said an 8-year-old girl who brought marijuana to school identified it to her teacher as the substance her mother "puts in blunts."

The Escambia County Sheriff's Office said the 8-year-old student at Lincoln Park Elementary School in Pensacola gave a small amount of marijuana to her teacher Tuesday afternoon, the Pensacola News Journal reported Monday.

"This is some of my mom's weed. It's what my mother puts in blunts," the girl was quoted as telling the teacher.

Deputy Chris Welborn, a sheriff's spokesman, said the incident is being investigated by deputies and the Department of Children and Families.

"Right now, I can't speculate as to what charges might be brought against the mother," Welborn said.