Vicar conducted 360 sham marriages...

Reuters Credit Mike Segar

<--Wedding bell balloons fly from a storefront in Rhinebeck, New York, July 26, 2010.

LONDON (Reuters) Thu Jul 29, 2010- A vicar was found guilty on Thursday of conducting hundreds of sham marriages between African nationals and cash-strapped eastern Europeans to allow illegal immigrants to gain residency in Britain.

Rev Alex Brown, 61, presided over 360 fake ceremonies over four years, including several cases in which participants canceled one wedding only to marry someone else a month or two later, and another in which a person was registered to marry two people on the same day.

Of the hundreds of people Brown married, 90 couples were registered as living in one road in the parish and in some cases several brides and grooms claimed to live in the same house, the Press Association reported.

Brown's co-defendant Vladymyr Buchak, 33, was also found guilty of conspiring to breach immigration laws by paying eastern Europeans up to 3,000 pounds ($4,700) to marry Africans, mainly from Nigeria, to allow them to obtain the documents they needed to live and work in Britain.

The court heard Buchak, a Ukrainian national who had himself been living illegally in Britain since at least 2004, was responsible for "cajoling and persuading" the eastern Europeans into the marriages of convenience, preying on migrant workers in the area who were desperate to earn money.

FORGOT PASSPORTS

Although Buchak was seen as the main organizer of the operation, prosecutor David Walbank said there was no doubt Brown must have been fully aware that the majority of the weddings he was conducting at the church were shams.

Giving evidence during the seven-week trial, Brown insisted he only ever married couples he was sure were getting married for the right reasons and exceptions would only be made if the bride-to-be was imminently expected to give birth.

But he admitted he occasionally forgot to check the passports of foreign nationals wanting to get married to make sure they had indefinite leave to remain in Britain.

He said he became suspicious of one or two couples, but only because of vast differences in age between the bride and groom.

The court heard Brown conducted a total of 383 marriages at his church in East Sussex, southeast England, over the period, a 30-fold increase on the 13 he had conducted over the previous four years.

Brown was arrested on June 30 last year following an investigation by police and the UK Border Agency.

During a search of his vicarage and the church at St Leonards-on-Sea, police found documents he had doctored, including the church's electoral roll plus a second, altered copy, which he had filled out to hide the dramatic increase in weddings over which he was presiding.

The jury at Lewes Crown Court is still deliberating on a third defendant, Nigerian-born Michael Adelasoye, 50, a specialist in immigration law who is accused of helping the African participants by advising them with their applications for residency once they were married.

(Reporting by Kylie MacLellan; Editing by Steve Addison)

Hamas targets women's underwear in modesty drive...

<---Syrian women shop at Souk al-Hamidieh in old downtown Damascus September 29,2008. REUTERS / Khaled al-Hariri

GAZA (Reuters)Wed July 28,2010 The Islamist rulers of the Gaza Strip have ordered lingerie shops to display more modesty.

A week after banning women from smoking water pipes in public places, the Hamas-run police force has told stores selling women's underwear to remove scantily-clad mannequins and any posters of racy undergarments.

"These measures have stemmed from complaints and pressure by ordinary people. They have to do with upholding our traditions," police spokesman Ayman Al-Batniji said Wednesday.

Hamas leaders have repeatedly denied any intention to impose Islamic law on the Gaza Strip, home to 1.5 million Palestinians.

But Hamas police have broken up a hip-hop concert in the territory and tried -- unsuccessfully -- to force women lawyers in court and female school students to wear traditional Muslim clothing, a step that drew a public backlash.

Hamas's modesty moves were widely seen by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as attempts to mollify more conservative Islamic factions that have accused the movement of failing to uphold Islamic Sharia law.

(Writing by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by Samia Nakhoul)

Device combats common cause of vertigo...

Reuters By Dave Levitan

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) Fri July 23, 2010. - A new device lets people treat a common cause of dizziness in the comfort of their own home, Canadian researchers say.

So-called "benign paroxysmal positional vertigo" (BPPV) affects roughly 10 percent of the population over age 60, according to studies done in the late 1980s. It is characterized by intense vertigo (room spinning), which often occurs when looking up, rolling over in bed, or bending under things.

BPPV results from the build-up of crystals in the inner ear. Doctors typically treat BPPV with a physical maneuver to shift the crystals out of a canal in the inner ear where they cause the feeling of dizziness.

The so-called "Epley" maneuver is fairly simple and highly effective -- but difficult for patients to remember how to do on their own. So Dr. Matthew Bromwich and colleagues at Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Canada developed a device to help them.

The device, which attaches to the brim of any common baseball cap, is called the DizzyFIX and costs $150. Bromwich is now the CEO of the company that manufactures it, Clearwater Clinical Limited, but he told Reuters Health that his financial involvement began only after the present study was completed.

The device consists of a plastic tube that attaches to the hat in a way that makes it visible to the person wearing it. The tube contains a thick fluid and a particle. As the patient moves, the particle moves too, giving visual feedback. The user simply guides the particle through the device to relieve their dizziness.

"The tube shape was designed to enable accurate replication of the Epley maneuver," say the researchers. The particle will only move ahead if the patient performs the maneuver correctly.

In their study, published in the Archives of Otolaryngology Head & Neck Surgery, the researchers gave the DizzyFIX to 40 patients suffering from BPPV. After one week of home treatment, 35 patients (88 percent) had no evidence of BPPV.

There were no serious complications.

The researchers did not include a group of patients with BPPV who did not use the device, but the findings compare "very well to physician-guided treatment for BPPV," Bromwich told Reuters Health by e-mail. In a follow-up phone interview, he added that BPPV often recurs, both after home treatment with the new device and after physician-guided treatment.

"Recurrence is about 60 percent," he said. "(The device) cures BPPV about as much as Tylenol cures a headache. The only difference (between the device and physician treatment) is that when you get a recurrence you just reach under the bed, pull out the DizzyFIX, put it on your head, and two and a half minutes later you're cured and you go back to sleep."

The DizzyFIX is approved by the FDA for use with a prescription in the U.S. It's also approved for use in Europe and Canada.

Teenager survives fall from 16th story balcony ...

Reuters

WELLINGTON(Reuters) Mon Jul 26, 2010. A 15-year-old New Zealand boy has survived with minor injuries after falling 16-storeys from the balcony of his family's apartment onto a concrete floor, New Zealand media reported Monday.

The New Zealand Herald said the teen-ager fell about 50 meters off the balcony, dropping through a carpark roof that may have broken his fall before he hit the concrete. Another tenant raised the alarm after seeing the boy fall past his window.

The newspaper said medical experts were amazed that the boy survived as few people managed to live if they plunged from more than five storeys.

The teen-ager was described as in a stable condition in an Auckland hospital with a broken wrist, broken rib, gashed leg and internal injuries, the New Zealand Herald reported.

"God must have been with him. He's got an angel looking after him, that's for sure," housekeeper Kaa Wehi, who was working in the building at the time, told the newspaper.

(Writing by Belinda Goldsmith, Editing by Gyles Beckford)

Germans hold 60 km-long party on motorway....

Reuters

DORTMUND Germany (Reuters) Mon Jul 19, 2010 About three million people turned a busy motorway into one of the biggest open-air festivals in Germany's history on Sunday.

A 60 km (36 mile)-long section of the A40 Autobahn between the western German cities of Dortmund and Duisburg was closed to motorists and turned over to pedestrians, cyclists, skaters and picnickers.

The event called "Still Life" was part of celebrations for the Ruhr region Cultural Capital of Europe 2010. The area, once Germany's industrial heartland, is home to 5.3 million people.

Some 20,000 tables were set up on the motorway for what organizers called "the longest banquet in the world." They said three million people had taken part.

Television pictures from the air showed crowds milling around on a road where cars usually race along at speeds of 160 kph (100 mph) or more.

Hannelore Kraft, state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia state, was among the revelers. She rode a bicycle and said the event should be repeated.

"This is fantastic," Kraft said. "I grew up right next to the A40 and still live close to it. It's great to see it now without cars but with so many people and so much cultural variety."

(Reporting by Petra Wischgoll; writing by Erik Kirschbaum; editing by Andrew Roche)

Popular food additive can cause stomach ache...

Reuters

(Reuters Health) - "Stealth fiber" increasingly added to processed foods, while not a problem for most, can cause gastrointestinal discomfort for some who may not know they're consuming too much of it, Minnesota researchers warn. The fiber is called "inulin."

"Normal fiber foods like wheat bran and legumes are self-limiting, it's hard to over eat them," Joanne Slavin, a registered dietitian in the department of food science and nutrition at the University of Minnesota at St. Paul, told Reuters Health.

Inulin, she explained, may be in chocolate bars, drinks, and snacks around the house, and "before you know it, you may eat more than you can tolerate and have gastrointestinal issues you wouldn't necessarily associate" with those foods.

Inulin is a carbohydrate fiber that occurs naturally in many foods like bananas, wheat, onions and garlic. Found in high concentrations in chicory root, is can be extracted for industrial use. Unlike more familiar carbohydrates, which are broken down in the small intestines and turned into fuel for the body, inulin passes through the small intestines to the colon where it stimulates the growth of "good bacteria" and is fermented by bacteria. In some people it can cause gas, bloating, flatulence, and diarrhea.

Because of its growing popularity as a food additive, Slavin and her colleagues wanted to assess how much inulin it takes to cause gastrointestinal problems.

They designed a study involving 26 healthy men and women aged 18 to 60. After a night of fasting, once a week for five weeks, participants were fed a breakfast of a bagel with cream cheese and orange juice. The orange juice was mixed with a placebo or with 5- or 10-gram doses of two commonly used inulin products -- native inulin and shorter-chain oligofructose.

After their "fiber challenge," participants were called several times over two days and asked about symptoms such as gas/bloating, nausea, flatulence, stomach cramping, diarrhea, constipation and GI rumbling.

Those that got any dose of inulin generally reported "mild symptoms"; the highest scores in every symptom except constipation were reported by those who got 10 grams of oligofructose. The findings are in line with previous research that found the short-chain "sweet" inulin causes faster fermentation in the gut leading to more gas and gastrointestinal symptoms.

Flatulence was the most common symptom reported by all subjects who got fiber although symptoms were "highly variable" among individuals and many subjects did not experience any, the investigators say.

Slavin and colleagues conclude, based on their study, that most healthy people can tolerate up to 10 grams of native inulin and 5 grams of the "sweet" inulin a day.

Food manufacturers, faced with demands to reduce calories, fat, and sodium while increasing fiber and flavor, are increasingly turning to products like inulin. They have discovered they can chemically manipulate the chemical structure of inulin to mimic tastes and textures consumers want in food. "It's like a food manufacturer's nirvana," Slavin said.

Inulin can be found in high fiber breakfast bars, ice creams, and beverages among other processed foods. The label may list inulin, chicory root extract, oligosaccharide, or oligofructose. For example, the Fiber One Chewy Bar with 9 grams of dietary fiber lists chicory root extract as its top ingredient.

Slavin and her colleagues urge continued study of tolerance levels of food additives like inulin because their use is likely to continue to grow and "there is the potential for overuse."

The research was funded by Cargill, Inc. a maker of inulin food additives, which provided the product used in the study.

SOURCE: link.reuters.com/tur56m Journal of the American Dietetic Association, June 2010

Health

Cat burglar takes shine to washing-line underwear | Reuters

Reuters

LONDON Reuters Thu Jul 8, 2010 - A spate of thefts from gardens and washing lines in a southern English town had been puzzling police.

Socks, gloves, ladies underwear -- almost anything left unattended was fair game for the thief, especially the knickers, and the rate of offending was getting worse.

But now the culprit has been unmasked as a kleptomaniac cat with a generous nature.

Eager to please his new owners, Peter and Birgitt Weismantel, 13-year-old Oscar had been bringing home presents to the family home in Portswood, a suburb of the southern coastal town of Southampton.

"He started bringing socks home a few months ago and then gardening gloves which we tracked to our neighbor," his owner Peter Weismantel told the Southern Daily Echo newspaper.

"Then we had a situation in which he brought back young women's underwear," said Peter, 72.

"It began to escalate and I telephoned the police as people must have been missing clothes -- especially with women's underwear being taken."

The couple have been fostering Oscar from Southampton's Cats Protection charity since Christmas.

Since then he had also pinched builder's gloves, a knee-pad, a paint roller, rubber gloves, and 10 pairs of children's underpants.

On average he commits 10 robberies a day.

"He brings them back as presents," Birgitt told the Echo. "We can't give him back now as he makes such an effort with all these gifts. He's got a lovely personality and is a very loving cat.

"I think we fell in love with him before he started taking all these things," she added. "It was just so touching to see him come home every day with something for us."

Now the couple will adopt Oscar full time but they still have yet to devise a way to curb his criminal instincts.

"He's still doing it now," said Peter. "We are thinking of training him as Fagin!"

(Reporting by Deborah Cicurel; Editing by Steve Addison)

BBC Sport - Football - World Cup 2010: Englishman Howard Webb to referee final

BBC Sport - Football - World Cup 2010: Englishman Howard Webb to referee final

Corporate firewalk ends with burnt feet in Italy...

Reuters

A girl walks over burning coal as part of the Dammaduwa festival celebrations in Anawatuna village, some 160 km (99 miles) south of Colombo, Sri Lanka.Credit: Reuters/Nir Elias

ROME (Reuters)- Tue Jul 6, 2010. A "motivation day" organized by one of Italy's biggest real estate agencies ended in tears and scars when nine staff had to be treated in hospital after walking barefoot on a bed of hot coals.

Alessandro Di Priamo, a former athlete now turned motivational trainer for companies, said the nine salespeople from the Tecnocasa agency had suffered light burns and none were seriously hurt.

"Firewalking helps people overcome their fears, seek new challenges and understand that most of what they see as their limits are self-inflicted," Di Priamo told Reuters.

He said the hotel near Rome where the exercise was held used the wrong kind of wood and some artificial coal without him knowing.

"I have done this job for 12 years with thousands of people and never had a problem. I myself walked first on that bed of burning coals and didn't feel anything -- in fact that same evening I went for a 16 km run," he said.

(Reporting by Silvia Aloisi, editing by Paul Casciato)

Alligator takes late-night stroll through town...

Reuters

VIENNA Reuters Wed Jun 30, 2010 12:36pm An Austrian university is on the hunt for girls who recoil at the sight of spiders for research into how fear affects the processes of the brain.

"The researchers are looking for girls aged between 8-13 years who are very fearful of spiders and/or who feel sick at the sight of them," the University of Graz said on its website.

The girls will be shown pictures of the eight-legged crawlers and their brainwaves will be registered. They will also undergo free fear therapy with specialists. The researchers hope the results will help them develop their phobia treatments.

"Spiders provoke revulsion for many people and even set off fearful panic. Girls in particular are frequently affected," the university said.

(Reporting by Sylvia Westall, editing by Paul Casciato)