Table talk
Cops flush out rooftop peeping Tom
Police arrested a maintenance man last week suspected of installing a hidden camera in the women's toilets of a Bellevue restaurant in Washington State, USA. Police were called to Coco's restaurant after a woman noticed suspicious holes in the ceiling. Officers knocked a hole in the ceiling tiles to reveal a camera control head and video wire which, when followed, led on to the roof. There they found a video recorder inside a large metal box containing the air conditioning unit. The VCR had been spliced into the air conditioner's wiring to receive power. As the on-call maintenance worker, 40-year-old Joseph Warner was asked to repair the hole left by the police. He agreed to come to the restaurant but never arrived and was arrested the next day.
Anyone for knobbly knees and a tight-fitting shirt?
Sifting through replies to invites to Hospitality Action's Tennis Day, which was held this week, David Coubrough of Portfolio Group and Michael Hirst of Insignia Hotels discovered that people in the hospitality industry get very self-conscious about their possible appearance in sportswear. Excuses for non-attendance ranged from "It is years since my spindly legs have been seen in public" to "I had hoped to play but the spare tyres no longer allow my shirt to fit". Other copping-out reasons included hastily arranged board meetings, suddenly planned holidays, maternity leave, daughter's graduation and even constituency matters.
This one goes particularly well with fish
More than 300,000 litres of white wine ended up in a tributary of the Loire in western France after vandals opened a winery's storage vats, police said this week. Employees at the Remy Pannier-Ackermann firm found the gates to several maturing vats open when they arrived at work. By the time they had sealed the vats, 310,000 litres of wine had poured into the River Thouet. Nearby water purification stations were alerted, but checks showed that the water had been only "very slightly affected". A water company spokesman said: "The level of alcohol in the water was detectable, but only in a science laboratory. It was around 0.001% in some areas for about an hour. Not enough to get anyone even slightly tipsy."
The con artist formerly known as a prince
Even as Orlando police led Anthony Enrique Gignac in handcuffs to a patrol car outside the Sheraton Studio City hotel last week, he continued to impersonate a Saudi Arabian prince. "Call the embassy!" he shouted to a group of reporters. Gignac had been staying at the hotel when an American Express investigator tipped police off. Gignac, 31, had already run up bills of nearly $30,000 (£20,550) on a platinum credit card in the name of Khaled al Saud, the grandson of the founder of modern Saudi Arabia and one of the wealthiest men in the world. Court records show he has been convicted of similar charges from Honolulu to Miami since he was a teenager. A probation report said he was so convincing that it was unlikely he would give it up for a mundane lifestyle.
