■UNITED STATES
Playwright dies aged 92
Horton Foote, whose plays and scripts about the longing and struggles of small-town life won him two Academy Awards, an Emmy and a Pulitzer Prize, has died at the age of 92. Foote, whose best-known works included the Oscar-winning scripts for To Kill a Mockingbird and Tender Mercies, died on Wednesday in Hartford, Connecticut, after a brief illness, his daughter, actress Hallie Foote, told the New York Times. Foote was nominated for an Oscar for the 1985 film The Trip to Bountiful, a version of one of his plays that won an Oscar for Geraldine Page as a woman trying to reconnect with her small-town Texas roots. Other popular movies he wrote included Steve McQueen’s Baby, the Rain Must Fall, based on the Foote play The Travelling Lady, and The Chase, which starred Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda and Robert Redford.
■MEXICO
Ancient sea turtle unveiled
Paleontologists on Thursday unveiled the oldest fossil remains of a sea turtle that lived 72 million years ago in northern Mexico, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) said. “It is the oldest sea turtle of its kind and it belongs to the chelonia family. The oldest specimen of this species up to now was 65 million years old and was found in New Jersey, United States,” the INAH said in a statement. The fossils of seven sea turtles were found at different sites in Coahuila, the state that Mexican scientists call “the paradise of paleontology.”
■UNITED STATES
Soldier denies Iraq theft
An Army captain accused of stealing nearly US$700,000 from the US government while serving in Iraq pleaded not guilty on Thursday to charges including theft of government property and money laundering. Captain Michael Dung Nguyen, 28, is accused of stealing more than US$690,000 entrusted to him as the battalion civil affairs officer in Muqdadiyah, Iraq, between April 2007 and Feb. 24. A federal grand jury indictment alleges Nguyen used some of the money to buy two new vehicles, along with computers, electronics and furniture.
■MEXICO
Fat man ready to roll
The world’s heaviest man still can’t walk, but he will soon be able to roll. Manuel Uribe said on Thursday he is having a 1989 Chevrolet Astrovan outfitted to support his record-breaking weight, giving him mobility after more than six years of being confined to his bed. Uribe earned the Guinness World Record as the world’s heaviest man in 2006, when he tipped the scales at 560kg. He claims to have since shed more than 220kg after making a public call for help. The minivan is being converted into an open-air, flatbed pickup of sorts. Manuel says he will put a bed on the back of the van to drive around town, with his new wife at the wheel. When at home, he will hang out in a remodeled garage that will include a forklift to help raise his regular bed up to the level of his car bed, allowing him to switch locations from time to time.
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