Small Bits of News You Didn’t Know You Needed

Toddler craving fries found at Wal-Mart

A San Francisco Bay area toddler has been reunited with his mother after apparently stepping out for a bite to eat.

The 2-year-old from Pleasanton was found in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart wearing only a white T-shirt and diaper around 3 a.m. Thursday.

Pleasanton police Sgt. Maria Munayer says he told investigators he wanted McDonald's french fries. There is a McDonald's inside the Wal-Mart.

The boy appears to have awoken in the middle of the night, opened the front door of his apartment and headed out, crossing four lanes of a usually busy thoroughfare. Police say the knob on the front door is set low and automatically unlocks the deadbolt.

His mother called 911 when she awoke around 6 a.m. to report her child missing.

Police say there is no basis for any criminal charges against his mother.

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April Fool's prank costs Ill. teen $150 in tickets

A 16-year-old Bloomington, Illinois girl has been given $150 in tickets after the worried victims of her April Fool's Day prank called police.

Authorities say the girl texted her friend and cousin Friday morning and said she'd been robbed and shot in the foot.

The pair called police, who rushed to a home where they found the 16-year-old safe. She hadn't been robbed or shot.

The girl received a $100 ticket for disorderly conduct and a $50 ticket for truancy because she wasn't in school Friday.

Police say she could have been criminally charged with filing a false police report.

Bloomington police spokesperson Dave White says the friend and cousin did the right thing by calling police. They haven't been cited or charged.

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Man finds it difficult to sell ferry

A man who bought a used 300-foot Staten Island Ferry to convert it into a waterborne dorm for New York college students is drowning in a bad case of buyer's remorse.

Former marina owner Jacques Guillet bought the orange ferry for $162,000 at a closed-bid auction three years ago.

But he's failed to find an affordable parking spot along the area's waterfront for the 3,500-passenger boat, named the Gov. Herbert H. Lehman. The city wanted to charge him $1,000 a day.

Now he's paying $6,000 a month to dock it in Staten Island. Any buyer would need to deal with complicated logistics, including the boat's size.

There were no bids when he advertised it on eBay.

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Police arrest man who escaped by fax

Spanish police say they have arrested a man who twice escaped from custody by having his wife send fake faxes ordering his release.

Fifty-seven-year-old Jose Carlos Serna was taken into custody at his home in San Lorenzo del Escorial, a suburb north of Madrid, on Friday, while hiding in a hollowed-out sofa, police said.

In December, he was in a cell at Arganda del Rey courthouse awaiting trial when officers got a fax purportedly from a regional court. It was followed by a phone call purportedly from a court official, corroborating the release order.

Authorities tried to verify the order, but their calls went unanswered. When a second call was received confirming Serna's release, he was freed to a waiting taxi.

Police said Serna used the same trick to escape from Valdemoro jail in October.

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