Man fined for cussing at police officers
Singapore, Sep 19: An Indian-origin man was fined SGD7,000 for having hurled vulgarities at a security officer, police officers, and a doctor who was treating him at a hospital.
Mohanarajan Mohan, 30, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to two charges under the Protection from Harassment Act, as reported by The Straits Times.
State Prosecuting Officer A Majeed Yosuff said that on April 14, Mohanarajan was taken to Tan Tock Seng Hospital in an unconscious state.
As he was being examined by a doctor at the hospitals accident and emergency (A&E) department, he woke up.
The prosecutor said Mohanarajan, who was drunk, insisted on being discharged and began verbally abusing the doctor and the staff.
When an auxiliary police officer arrived and tried to calm him down, Mohanarajan shouted vulgarities at him too. (PTI)
Python squeezes woman for 2 hours
Bangkok, Sep 19: A 64-year-old woman was preparing to do her evening dishes at her home outside Bangkok when she felt a sharp pain in her thigh and looked down to see a huge python taking hold of her.
“I was about to scoop some water and when I sat down it bit me immediately,” Arom Arunroj told Thailand’s Thairath newspaper. “When I looked I saw the snake wrapping around me.” The four-to-five-meter-long (13-to-16-foot-long) python coiled itself around her torso, squeezing her down to the floor of her kitchen.
“I grabbed it by the head, but it wouldn’t release me,” she said. “It only tightened.” Pythons are non-venomous constrictors, which kill their prey by gradually squeezing the breath out of it.
Propped up against her kitchen door, she cried for help but it wasn’t until a neighbor happened to be walking by about an hour and a half later and heard her screams that authorities were called. Responding police officer Anusorn Wongmalee told The Associated Press on Thursday that when he arrived the woman was still leaning against her door, looking exhausted and pale, with the snake coiled around her. (AP)
Oktoberfest tightens security
Munich, Sep 19: Security has tightened at Oktoberfest in the wake of last month’s deadly knife attack in Solingen in western Germany, and officials warned revelers to expect longer lines at entry points as metal detectors will be deployed for the first time in the Bavarian beer festival’s 189-year history.
Authorities say there are no specific threats to the world’s largest folk festival, which begins Saturday with the traditional keg-tapping in Munich and runs through October 6.
Some 6 million participants, many wearing traditional lederhosen and dirndl dresses, are expected over the course of the event.
The stepped-up security comes after an August 23 attack in Solingen that left three dead and eight wounded. A 26-year-old Syrian suspect was arrested. He was an asylum-seeker who was supposed to be deported to Bulgaria last year but reportedly disappeared for a time and avoided deportation. The Islamic State militant group has claimed responsibility for the violence, without providing evidence. (AP)
Thai zoo patenting baby hippo
Chonburi, Sep 19: Only a month after Thailand’s adorable baby hippo Moo Deng was unveiled on Facebook, her fame became unstoppable both domestically and internationally.
Zookeeper Atthapon Nundee has been posting cute moments of the animals in his care for about five years. He never imagined Khao Kheow Open Zoo’s newborn pygmy hippo would become an internet megastar within weeks.
Cars started lining up outside the zoo well before it opened Thursday. Visitors traveled from near and far for a chance to see the pudgy, expressive 2-month-old in person at the zoo.
The zoo saw a spike in visitors since Moo Deng’s fame – so much that the zoo now has to limit public access to the baby’s enclosure to 5-minute windows throughout the day during weekends. Narongwit said the zoo has been receiving over 4,000 visitors during a weekday, up from around just 800 people, and more than 10,000 during a weekend, up from around 3,000 people. But the fame has also brought some hostile visitors to Moo Deng, who only wakes up ready to play about two hours a day. Some videos showed visitors splashing water or throwing things at the sleeping Moo Deng to try to wake her up. The hippo pit now has a warning sign against throwing things at Moo Deng – posted prominently at the front in Thai, English and Chinese. (AP)