BUNGLING COPS: Berlin police officers arrested each other as robbers made off with the cash after holding up an off licence.
Two crooks threatened a female employee with a machete at the cash-and-carry selling beer in the city’s Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf district.When the woman opened the till and handed over £5 000, the shop’s silent alarm went off.Plain-clothes policemen arrived at the store minutes later but ended up being arrested when uniformed officers stormed in seconds afterwards. The crooks escaped and police have issued an apology over the mix-up.Manager of the off-licence Heinz Huber said: “We all thought the uniformed police had caught the crooks and when the plain-clothes cops tried to tell them who they were, the uniformed police told them to keep quiet. “It was only when one of the uniformed officers recognised one of the plain-clothes cops that they realised what had happened.“They knew they had made fools of themselves and the real thieves were long gone.” —— Ananova.
MARITAL-SEVERANCE: A New York surgeon who donated a kidney to his wife has gone to court to get it back after they split up.Dr Richard Batista (49) gave up the organ eight years ago when his wife Dawnell fell ill, reports the Daily Telegraph.But he claims she repaid his kindness by having an affair before filing for divorce, and is demanding compensation for risking his life.“There’s no deeper pain you can ever express than to be betrayed by the person you devoted your life to,” he told reporters.His lawyer Dominic Barbara said he wanted US$1,5 million in compensation for the kidney as part of a matrimonial break-up which has dragged on for three years.“In theory we are asking for the return of the kidney. Of course, he wouldn’t really ask for that, but the value of it. This has never been done before in the State of New York,” said Barbara.Batista volunteered to donate his kidney after he was found to be a suitable match. “She was my wife. My first priority was to save her life and future of our children and hopefully with that in mind keep the marriage alive. To this day I would still do it again,” he said.His wife survived but their relationship did not and the doctor claimed his wife had an affair before filing for divorce in 2005. Mrs Batista’s lawyer has made no comment.     Legal experts said the case was unlikely to succeed because donating an organ is considered a gift and cannot be bought or sold. —— Ananova.
ROBBER-CLIENT: An armed robber was arrested after he held up a bank — and returned minutes later to pay off his overdraft.The man ran into the Kredi Bank in the Serbian ski resort Nova Varos wearing a balaclava and brandishing a shotgun and demanded tellers hand over all the cash they had.He got the equivalent of £30 000 in cash and then ran out of the bank.Staff were still recovering from the shock of the robbery when Grlic, this time without his balaclava, walked back in to settle his overdraft.Sharp-eyed staff recognised the distinctive trainers he’d been wearing and called police.A police spokesman said: “The man had been wearing bright red trainers and everyone remembered them distinctly when they saw him run out of the bank.“They could not believe their eyes when they saw a man wearing the same shoes come back in and kept him in the bank talking about his overdraft while our officers arrived.”The man (33) has now been charged with armed robbery. —— Ananova.
