Four possible link to Hoffman drugs

Three men and one woman arrested in New York on Tuesday have been charged with drugs offences possibly connected to narcotics found at the home of film star Philip Seymour Hoffman following his death of an apparent heroin overdose last weekend. The quartet were arrested during a raid on a building in lower Manhattan after police traced what they believed to have been the source of the heroin suspected of killing the Oscar-winning actor. Separate police sources said the raid was conducted in connection with Hoffman's death and scores of bags of what appeared to be heroin were recovered. The Capote star was found unresponsive on the bathroom floor of his Manhattan apartment by police responding to an emergency 911 call last Sunday. Police found Hoffman, 46, with a syringe in his arm and recovered plastic bags containing a substance believed to be heroin.

Man faces jail for urinating in public

An El Paso man faces up to 18 months in jail after pleading guilty to urinating on the Alamo, the structure seen by many as the symbol of the Texas spirit. Daniel Athens, 23, pleaded guilty in a San Antonio court in the United States on Tuesday to the felony of Criminal Mischief of a Public Monument or Place of Human Burial. The charge carries a punishment of up to two years in prison. Lawyers for Athens are working on a plea bargain with prosecutors, who are seeking an 18-month sentence. Athens was arrested in April 2012 after an Alamo Ranger, one of the police officers who guard the state's No 1 tourist attraction, saw him relieve himself on the 260-year-old limestone facade of the building. As part of a plea deal, Athens will have to pay $4,000 to repair any damage he caused.

Red Light museum opens

A small educational museum opened in the heart of Amsterdam's red light district on Thursday for those interested in how the area works without actually visiting a prostitute. The Red Light Secrets museum is located in a former brothel, one of the narrow buildings typical of Amsterdam. Visitors can view a short film showing the many people who work with the prostitutes: those who clean or repair their rooms, do their laundry, or run over to their windows with coffee or food during shifts. The museum focuses on the area since 2000, when prostitution became legal in the Netherlands. Since then the city has been struggling - it says with some success - to eradicate pimps and human trafficking. Among other attractions at the museum, visitors can also write down their own sexual secrets in a mock-up confessional booth before heading back out onto the street.

Kristin Scott Thomas quits films

British actress Kristin Scott Thomas has quit films to concentrate on theater. The 53-year-old acclaimed actress of such films as The English Patient and Four Weddings and a Funeral, has been juggling a dual career in English and French movies for several decades. Scott Thomas reveals she came to the realization that she wanted to focus on stage work last September. "I just suddenly thought, I cannot cope with another film," she told Britain's Guardian Weekend magazine. "I realized I've done the things I know how to do so many times in different languages, and I just suddenly thought, I can't do it any more. I'm bored by it. So I'm stopping. I shouldn't bite the hand that feeds, but last year I just decided life's too short. I don't want to do it any more."

Chagall 'fake' to be destroyed

A British collector may see an expensive painting burned because a French committee has determined it is not an authentic work by Marc Chagall. Art lover Martin Lang said last week he was frustrated with the decision but he still hopes the painting will be returned to him. The businessman bought the watercolor of a reclining nude woman for 100,000 pounds ($163,000) in 1992, believing it to be an authentic Chagall dating from around 1909 to 1910. Lang's son recently called in experts from the BBC show, Fake or Fortune, to determine if it was real. When it was sent to the Chagall Committee in Paris for a final ruling, the committee - run by the Russian-born artist's grandchildren to protect his legacy - said it was a fake and would be destroyed under French law.

Female inmate executed in Texas

Texas death row inmate Suzanne Basso last week became the 14th woman to be executed in America since the resumption of capital punishment. The 59-year-old woman was found guilty in 1999 of leading a group of thugs to viciously torture and murder Louis "Buddy" Musso, a mentally disabled man she convinced to move with her to Texas with the promise of marriage. Texas, which executes the most death row convicts out of any US state, has stopped giving last meal requests so Basso had the same dinner as all the other inmates: baked chicken, fish, boiled eggs, carrots, green beans, and sliced bread. Basso was injected with the lethal drug pentobarbital. She was officially pronounced dead 11 minutes after the drug was administered. At her trial, Basso was portrayed as the ringleader of a group of people who fatally tortured Musso in 1998 to steal his money. Five others, including Basso's son, also were convicted for Musso's death but prosecutors sought the death penalty only for Basso.

-Agencies

(China Daily 02/09/2014 page4)