World Digest
Alligator horror
UP to 150 people watched for hours as a 12ft alligator ripped apart a smaller gator and ate it in a lake at the University of Florida.
The show ended when trappers were called in to kill the predator. The big alligator, estimated at 600lbs, started eating the small one in Lake Alice.
£4.5m for 23 years
A MAN who spent nearly 23 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit was awarded more than £4.5m yesterday, by far the largest compensation package ever for a wrongful conviction in Canada.
David Milgaard, now 46, was imprisoned in 1970 for the sex-killing of a nursing aide in Saskatoon. He was freed in 1992 and exonerated in 1997 by DNA tests.
Nude dance ban plea
THE US Supreme Court agreed yesterday to decide how far local authorities can go in banning nude dancing in bar rooms, a case that may clarify the line between protected expression and unlawful lewd behaviour.
The court said it will hear Erie, Pennsylvania, officials' effort to reinstate an ordinance that bans appearing in ``a state of nudity'' in public places.
Rebels regrouping
LEADERS of the main rebel group in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have resigned en masse to restructure their organisation, which is deeply divided, officials said.
The RCD Congolese Rally for Democracy controls towns and cities in much of the east of Congo in its campaign to overthrow President Laurent Kabila.
Call to ban GM foods
THE British Medical Association yesterday called for an open-ended ban on the introduction of genetically-modified crops and food.
Sir William Asscher, chairman of the BMA's Board of Science and Education, said more research was needed into the health and environmental impacts of so-called Frankenstein foods.
£1.8m award
A BRITISH hospital trust yesterday agreed to pay £1.8m damages to a 30-year-old woman who suffered massive brain damage after medical staff allegedly failed to treat her promptly for an asthma attack.
Family killers executed
A FATHER, his two sons and two nephews have been executed by firing squad in Yemen for killing three family members. Yemen, an impoverished country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, imposes the death penalty for rape and murder.
Shoplifting `minor crime'
SHOPLIFTING is still regarded as a petty offence by many people with one in four shoppers admitting to having stolen from a store, a British survey revealed.
Sixty per cent of young people under 24 years old rate shoplifting as a ``meaningless offence'' and 40pc of people in all age groups class it as a petty crime compared with other misdemeanours.
Child abuse damages bid
FOURTEEN people who say they were abused at a children's home run by nuns are to begin legal proceedings to claim compensation.
They allege the sisters at St Gabriel's Convent in Knolle Park, Liverpool, knew the abuse was taking place for nearly 20 years. The proceedings follow the conviction of a voluntary worker who was jailed for indecently assaulting 13 boys last year.
Gray whale harpooned
FOR the first time in more than 70 years, Makah Indians seeking to re-establish their whale-hunting tradition harpooned a gray whale off the US Pacific coast yesterday.
The whaling crew in a hand-carved canoe struck the whale and then support crews in motor boats moved in and fired at least two gunshots to to make the kill.
