PATNA, India (Reuters) – Villagers at a wedding in eastern India decided the groom had arrived too drunk to get married, and so the bride married the groom’s more sober brother instead, police said on Monday.

“The groom was drunk and had reportedly misbehaved with guests when the bride’s family and local villagers chased him away,” Madho Singh, a senior police officer told Reuters after Sunday’s marriage in a village in Bihar state’s Arwal district.

The younger brother readily agreed to take the groom’s place beside the teenage bride at her family’s invitation, witnesses said.

“The groom apologised for his behaviour, but has been crying that word will spread and he will never get a bride again,” Singh said by phone.

SEATTLE – There were a few surprises for the University of Washington’s Class of 1957 when they opened a time capsule sealed 50 years ago.

Among audiotapes and copies of the yearbook and school newspaper were 1980s-era porn, a condom and some dirty underwear.

Alumni opened the capsule earlier this week in preparation for a public unveiling Saturday during a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the university’s communications program. The capsule had been placed in an interior wall of the then-new Communications Building in 1957.

The capsule is being replaced by another created by a student-faculty team.

“The good news is that all the things that were in there are still there,” said Jerry Baldasty, chairman of the Department of Communication. “The interesting news is that some other things were added.”

There aren’t any suspects in the case. But it was located outside the offices of The Daily — the campus newspaper — and it’s assumed someone from the paper was responsible for the revisionism, said communication alumni and development manager Victoria Sprang.

The new capsule will be filled with digital media with a focus on “communication from a global perspective,” said Coma Te, a senior among six students who created the new capsule.

ANKENY, Iowa – Several classrooms at Des Moines Area Community College were evacuated after college officials became nervous about a suspicious package.

College officials called police and postal inspectors after the box was delivered Thursday. What they found inside wasn’t a bomb — it was a box containing 500 condoms.

The package was sent to a teacher of a human sexuality class, and was sent by a person who had been a previous speaker at the class, said Rob Denson, the college’s president.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand – A grandmother was alarmed to find a condom in a happy meal gift pack bought for her 7-year-old granddaughter at a McDonald’s restaurant in New Zealand, local media reported Thursday.

The condom was discovered Tuesday night in a bag that came with Maia Whitaker’s meal, which her grandparents bought at a McDonald’s outlet in the city of Wellington.

Grandpa Rowan Hutch told The Dominion Post newspaper it was lucky his wife was first to look inside the small sports bag that came with the meal.

She was aghast when she found the green condom and its packet inside the bag, he said.

“I was pretty horrified really. The fact my granddaughter was going to look in the bag and find this thing. It would be difficult to explain, she’s only seven,” said Hutch.

The outlet quickly swapped the happy meal for a hamburger and pencil case. McDonald’s is investigating the find.

Spokeswoman Joanna Redfern-Hardisty said because of its popularity, the previous happy meal gift had sold out at the outlet and prepackaged sports bags were substituted as children’s gifts.

One was left unsealed for display purposes and “somehow” had ended up with the customer, she said, without explaining why the condom was present.

LONDON (AFP) – A male stripper in Scotland has been charged with impersonating a policeman after real officers mistook him for one of their own, he said Thursday.

Stuart Kennedy, 24, was dressed in his fake uniform outside a bar in Aberdeen, north-east Scotland, when he was spotted by two female plain-clothes officers from Grampian Police.

The genetics student at Aberdeen University — whose stage name is “Eros” — told them he was a stripper and the officers then watched him perform at the city’s Paramount venue before taking him in for questioning.

His outfit and props were confiscated and he was later charged with impersonating an officer and carrying an offensive weapon, he told the Scottish Press Association news agency.

He has yet to discover whether the case will come to court — and said he faces problems with show bookings as his uniform has still not been returned.

“I immediately told the officers I was a stripper but they didn’t seem to believe me. They watched the show then they asked me back to the station. Now I have to wait to find out if this is going any further,” he said.

“I just don’t think this is in the public interest at all. The legislation isn’t designed with this in mind. It’s not supposed to stop entertainers.

“It’s a good thing they don’t film (the British television police drama) ‘The Bill’ up in Aberdeen or there would be trouble.”

Grampian Police confirmed that a 24-year-old man was charged in connection with wearing a police uniform and equipment in a public place on March 17 and that a report had been sent to prosecutors.

“As this is now a live inquiry we cannot make any further comment on this incident,” a spokesman said.

OKLAHOMA CITY – Miss America can add crime fighter to her resume. Lauren Nelson recently went undercover with police in New York for a sting targeting sexual predators. Officers with Suffolk County’s computer crimes unit created an online profile of a girl that included photographs of Nelson as a teenager.

“I got to chat online with the predators and made phone calls, too,” Nelson said by phone from Atlantic City, N.J. “The Suffolk County Police Department was there the whole time.”

The operation was filmed for a segment of “America’s Most Wanted” that will air Saturday on Fox. Police spokesman Tim Motz said the operation was ongoing and declined to comment Tuesday evening.

At least four men were arrested and face charges, said Avery Mann, a spokesman for the show. Another six men agreed to meet Nelson, of Lawton, Okla., he said.

Nelson, 20, posed as a young teen online and went into chat rooms, where she said men would begin sending her instant messages asking her how old she was and where she lived.

“I would say I’m a female from Long Island. Sometimes they would say, ‘You’re too young, sorry,’ which is exactly what needs to happen, but some would continue chatting.

“It would only take a matter of time before it got pretty explicit.”

Nelson then arranged to meet the men at a home in Long Island, where police and camera crews were waiting.

“The story was that they knew I was young, and I told them I was cutting school to meet with them,” Nelson said. “I stood outside on the porch, and I would say, ‘Hi’ to them and wave them inside.”

Once she entered the home with the suspect, Nelson said, she left the room, and police and “America’s Most Wanted” host John Walsh confronted the suspect.

“That part was very scary, but the police were all over the place,” Nelson said. “I was nervous, of course, but it was a very controlled environment, very safe.”

Art McMaster, president and CEO of the Miss America Organization, said he initially was hesitant about Nelson participating in the sting, but agreed after speaking with Nelson’s father and the producers of “America’s Most Wanted.”

“We came to the agreement that as long as she was safe and wanted to do this, we’d be behind her,” McMaster said.

Nelson, whose platform issue is Internet safety for children, said she was eager to participate.

“As many as we caught on that day, there are a lot more out there,” she said. “It’s nice to know that they were chatting with police officers and me rather than a young girl.”

ROME (Reuters) – A 40-year-old office clerk made a splash at Rome’s Trevi fountain when she went for a swim, naked, in the Renaissance masterpiece in front of a crowd of tourists.

“The water is everyone’s. I was hot,” Roberta, who did not give her last name, said, as snapshots of her appeared in all Italy’s major newspapers on Monday.

The Trevi featured in the 1960 classic film “La Dolce Vita” in which screen diva Anita Ekberg went for a dip in the fountain wearing a skimpy black dress.

But swimming in the fountain is prohibited and Roberta, from Milan, now risks a hefty fine for public indecency.

In 1995, German supermodel Claudia Schiffer also waded into the fountain for an advertising campaign for designer Valentino.

MIAMI (Reuters) – An explosion set fire to a Miami house being used to grow marijuana hydroponically on Wednesday and the force of the blast sent the occupant flying into the yard, police said.

The man, identified by police as Edel Mesa, 40, was badly burned on the chest, arms and legs and was in critical condition at a trauma hospital, investigators said.

“The house was pretty much destroyed,” said Miami-Dade Police Detective Carlos Maura.

Firefighters extinguished the flames and called police, who seized more than 40 marijuana plants from the home, police said.

Arson investigators were trying to determine the cause of the explosion, but police said the man may have been using propane gas near the high-intensity lamps used to grow the plants indoors.

Police said Mesa was not immediately charged with a crime because of his injuries.

WELLINGTON (AFP) – A suspicious package which sparked a bomb scare and evacuation of a New Zealand mail centre was later identified as a harmless sex aid, a report said Thursday.

An airport x-ray machine alerted staff about suspicious wiring in the parcel from China on Tuesday and it was placed in an explosives safe overnight.

Emergency services were only notified the next morning when they decided to evacuate the mail centre near Auckland airport.

The parcel was later identified as a sex aid, the New Zealand Herald reported.

The incident has prompted a Customs investigation into why emergency services were not immediately contacted, leaving a potential bomb in a safe overnight.

BEIJING (Reuters) – Worried your husband-to-be is already married?

In China you will soon be able to check on a nationwide registry of marriage details, designed to stamp out bigamy, the official Xinhua agency reported late on Tuesday.

The system, recording the date, place and names of every marriage, should be up and running by 2010, Xinhua quoted the Civil Affairs Ministry as saying.

Simplified marriage procedures have led to a rise in bigamy in recent years, Xinhua said.

China is in the middle of a crackdown on official corruption, with those who take extra wives and mistresses being targeted.

SAINT PETERSBURG, Russia (AFP) – In a hurry to get hitched? How about boarding the “wedding train” being offered by a Saint Petersburg rail company to start your married life?

The rail project is to be unveiled by the Oktyabrskaya railway company at a ceremony in Russia’s romantic former capital Saint Petersburg on Wednesday.

“Newly weds will have the chance to marry, celebrate their wedding, and go on honeymoon on their own wedding train,” the company said in a press release.

Holding the ceremony in the specially designed chapel provided on board could mean a slightly jolting start to married life.

But the company insisted in a press release that there would be plenty of space for guests and none of the metallic squeals and painful bumps that sometimes accompany Russian train journeys.

With a reception carriage, an entertainments carriage and two restaurant cars there will be room for 100 guests, the company said.

A video facility will be in place for relaying congratulations from absent friends.

And if the newly-weds tire of the company they have brought with them, they can at least retreat to their own “Grand De Luxe” compartment, tastefully decorated with flowers and balloons, to continue their roll through Russia’s vast expanses.

LORAIN, Ohio – A former principal who kissed the feet of three male students to settle a bet on a volleyball game has been convicted of a misdemeanor sex charge.

Robert Holloway resigned from St. Anthony of Padua School in this town west of Cleveland after the 14-year-old students and their parents reported the foot-kissing to police in February 2006.

Holloway told authorities he paid each student $15 and kissed their bare feet 50 times each in the school’s library and gym to pay off the bet on a student-teacher volleyball game.

“They didn’t think he would literally do it,” police Sgt. Mark Carpentiere said.

Holloway pleaded no contest Tuesday to sexual imposition and unauthorized use of public property, also a misdemeanor, and was found guilty. He faces up to 15 months behind bars when sentenced in June.

“It’s not behind me yet,” Holloway said as he left court.

Carpentiere said 400 photos depicting adult foot fetish behavior were found on two school computers seized from Holloway’s office. The photos depicted the scenarios that he had engaged in with the boys, Carpentiere said.

“This appears to be a legitimate sexual fetish that adults are into, which is fine,” he said. “The problem here is he was engaging in this activity with juveniles.”

Prosecutor Jim Walther said he was pleased Holloway entered a plea and that the victims were spared any further embarrassment.

SYDNEY (AFP) – Asia’s lovers rate sex far less highly than those elsewhere around the globe, spend less time having intercourse and are less likely to reach orgasm, according to a survey released Tuesday.

The international survey of more than 26,000 people in 26 countries found Asians ranked themselves among the least satisfied with their sex lives.

The Global Sexual Wellbeing Survey was conducted by condom-maker Durex and released at this week’s World Congress on Sexual Health in Sydney.

The survey found most people around the globe had sex 106 times a year, with the Japanese the most infrequent on 48 and the Greeks putting in an Olympian effort on 164.

It might explain why respondents from Japan were the least satisfied with their sex lives, with only 10 percent ranking it as exciting, well behind the global average of 49 percent, led by Nigerians on 78 percent.

Hong Kong (32 percent), Australia (40), Singapore (41), Thailand (42) and New Zealand (43) were also among the bottom 10 nations in the exciting sex life stakes.

India’s lovers were the world’s quickest, taking 13.2 minutes per session compared to the global average of 18.3 minutes, with the ranking again topped by Nigeria, on a leisurely 24 minutes.

Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand and Australia were also well below the world average for time spent on intercourse.

However, China’s lovers were the seventh most lengthy in the world on 20 minutes, a heartbeat behind Malaysia’s on 19.9.

Only 24 percent of respondents from Hong Kong and China reported always experiencing an orgasm during sex, the lowest in the survey, followed by Japan on 27 percent and Singapore on 36.

On average, 59 percent of respondents strongly agreed that sex was important to them, with the lowest rankings coming from Thailand on 38 percent, Japan (39) and Hong Kong (48 percent).

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexico is unlikely to allow U.S. artist Spencer Tunick stage a nude photo shoot at its famous Teotihuacan pyramids, citing possible damage to the ancient site.

Tunick has asked Mexican archaeological authorities for permission to photograph masses of naked people at Teotihuacan, Mexico’s oldest major ruins, on May 6.

“The application has been filed and the National Anthropology and History Institute is evaluating it, but it looks like they won’t let him. It’s not the last word but they have told me it will be rejected,” Alejandro Sarabia, who runs the Teotihuacan site, told Reuters on Monday.

Tunick has caused controversy by staging nude photo shoots in cities from Dusseldorf to Caracas. Organizers say the Mexico City event might top his record of 7,000 naked people photographed in Barcelona in 2003.

Teotihuacan, which housed some 200,000 inhabitants at the height of its power around 500 AD, is a series of pyramids and buildings set around a central boulevard and would provide Tunick one of his most monumental backgrounds.

Only 35 miles (56 km) northeast of Mexico City, participants could be bussed to Teotihuacan quickly from the capital.

The Aztecs, who flourished many centuries after Teotihuacan’s mysterious collapse, gave the city its current name, meaning “the place where gods are made.”

Mexico is highly protective of its archaeological sites and in October rescinded an offer to let Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO – news) project into space a “time capsule” from Teotihuacan’s Pyramid of the Sun, fearing damage.

A spokesperson for Tunick’s photography project would not comment on the likely rejection but promised the event would go on, either at Teotihuacan or in Mexico City itself.

CAPE CORAL, Fla. – A woman arrested for shoplifting has blamed the crime on irritable bowel syndrome, authorities said. Helen Gallo, 61, of Clearwater, was arrested Sunday after allegedly shoplifting from a Cape Coral grocery store, The Daily Breeze of Cape Coral reported.

Gallo reportedly told authorities that she could not wait in line because she has irritable bowel syndrome, according to the newspaper.

Gallo was charged with petit larceny and released Sunday from the Lee County jail on $500 bond.

Gallo did not answer a telephone call placed to her home by The Associated Press. It was not known if she had an attorney.

LONDON (AFP) – A controversial British artist on Friday hoisted a flag in the heart of London picturing swimming sperm and a message that reads, “One Secret is to Save Everything.”

Tracey Emin’s flag, at 6.5 metres by 4.2 metres (21 feet by 14 feet), will fly above the Jubilee Gardens in the British capital until July 31, with the parliament building and the London Eye as backdrops.

It is the second flag in a series by several artists commissioned by the Hayward Gallery.

Gallery director Ralph Rogoff said the phrase on the flag was in line with the paradox and ambiguity the artist has become known for.

Emin, a BritArt icon, gained particular attention for earlier work that included a tent with the names of men she had slept with and her unmade and dirty bed.

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysian religious authorities, alarmed by a snowballing trend of crossdressing among young people, have threatened to set up a rehabilitation centre to counsel offenders if the situation gets out of hand.

Cross-dressing is frowned upon in mainly Muslim Malaysia, where devout believers consider the practice contrary to strict Islamic injunctions on the proper dress for men and women.

The New Straits Times newspaper said religious officials in a northeastern state would keep vigil on the favourite hangouts of transvestites and cross-dressers after young people drew inspiration from male celebrities with feminine characteristics.

“Those involved would be given a court order, similar to the Drug Preventive Measures Act, to attend rehabilitation programmes,” the paper quoted Rosol Wahid, an official of the Malaysian state of Terengganu, as saying.

Rosol said 12 cases of transvestites and cross-dressers had been recorded since January. “We found out that those sentenced to jail were back to their old habit when released. We are looking to counselling as a way to curb the problem.”

Rosol could not be contacted for comment.

The same state had in February unveiled a controversial plan to recruit “Islamic” spies to snoop on unmarried lovers and report them to the religious authorities.

But Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi later shot down the idea, saying there was no need for such activities.

MANTORVILLE, Minn. – A Byron man, who distributed sexually vulgar stickers featuring his ex-girlfriend’s name, phone number and address, has been sentenced to four months in jail after pleading guilty to a felony harassment charge.

Thomas Carl Tiedeman, 62, who appeared in Dodge County District Court on March 21, was also ordered to serve five years on probation, perform 32 hours of community service and pay a $100 fine.

The stickers included a photo of a woman, along with the phrase “call me now for the best,” according to the criminal complaint.

The Kasson Police Department received reports in September that someone was placing the stickers on vehicles and buildings in Kasson.

On Sept. 28, Kasson police searched Tiedeman’s home and found the photo used on the stickers. Tiedeman admitted to police that he had printed about 20 stickers and placed them on vehicles.

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Female civil servants in India are furious with new government guidelines that force them to list intimate details, including their menstrual history, in appraisal forms, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

The All-India Services Performance Appraisal Rules 2007 — which apply to senior government workers — ask female employees to record their last menstrual period, as well as when they last took maternity leave, the Hindustan Times said.

“The questions are too intrusive and have no bearing on our work,” Seema Vyas, a senior bureaucrat in Maharashtra state, was quoted as saying.

India’s Ministry of Personnel, which drew up the new appraisal guidelines, says it has not received any complaints and the addition of such questions was based on advice from health officials.

“I assume this will help evaluate the officer’s fitness,” Satyanand Mishra, the ministry’s most senior bureaucrat, told the newspaper.

But women officers said it was “insensitive” and “irrelevant”, adding they planned to protest.

“Health problems or aberrations are generally mentioned to assess the officer’s physical fitness,” said Chandra Iyengar, a senior civil servant.

“But information on menstrual cycles is irrelevant.”

BEIJING (AFP) – Chinese footballers accused of making obscene gestures to the crowd have been told to control their middle fingers by league officials, state media reported Tuesday.

Officials were examining two incidents involving crowd violence this month in which the conduct of players was questioned.

On April 1, fans of Henan Jiangye smashed windows of the visiting Shandong team bus after the home team were held to a 1-1 draw, according to the report.

A week later Tianjin’s Czech coach Josef Jarabinsky was reportedly forced to flee from rampaging home fans after his team beat Zhejiang 3-1.

“We don’t have concrete evidence to prove they gave the finger to fans but I can well believe it,” Lang Xiaonong, secretary of China’s Super League, was quoted as saying in the Beijing Morning Post.

“The cultural level of some of our Chinese footballers is regrettably low.”

“All we can do is to encourage them to improve their manners and behave calmly whatever fans may do.”

Crowd trouble is a common problem in China’s Super league. Last month hooligans surrounded and damaged a car carrying China’s national head coach Zhu Guanghu after a league match in Xiamen, southeastern China. That match also involved Tianjin, who beat home team Xiamen 2-1.

“It is obvious that our fans can behave in a pretty unreasonable way, resulting in some unfortunate incidents,” said Lang.

UNION CITY, N.J. – School district officials are trying to identify who watched $250 worth of pay-per-view pornographic movies using a school cable television box, officials said.

Someone after business hours used one of the five cable boxes in the Board of Education building to order the films, priced between $4.95 and $9.95.

The cable provider, Cablevision, has refunded the school district the money, and is helping to investigate the purchases.

School officials have since gotten rid of three of the cable boxes. A board official said the building had cable in case there was an emergency.

ROME (Reuters) – Often seen as mommy’s boys, Italian men are now letting their mothers choose their future wives live on television.

Italy’s state TV aired the first episode of a new reality show this week in which the mothers of five single men have to pick out prospective brides from a selection of candidates.

Critics said “Perfect Bride” was both insulting to women and showed Italian TV — already packed with other reality formats such as Big Brother and Celebrity Island — falling to new depths of banality.

In the first episode, the jury of mothers — called only by their first names such as “Mamma Rosa” and “Mamma Ambra” — quizzed 18 hopefuls about their suitability as wives.

From next week the mothers will have to live in a Big Brother-style house with their potential daughters-in-law, seeing first hand how they deal with household chores. Viewers will be encouraged to vote off the candidates they dislike.

Mamma Teresa said she was looking for “a simple, intelligent, classy girl” for her son Claudio. “I would like someone who’s not too ostentatious and who knows how to take care of the family,” she said on the program’s Web site.

Claudio, viewers learn, is “a really capable person, very affectionate with his family,” but suffers from one defect common to many Italian bachelors: “He has too many girlfriends! I want to find him his ultimate woman.”

In a country where it is normal for unmarried men to live with their parents into their 30s and “mamma mia!” (my mommy) is a common exclamation, the Italian mother figure is revered by society but often feared by girlfriends and wives.

TV critics said the program exploited the stereotype of the overbearing mamma.

“It’s the most grandiose, caricatural, corrosive demolition of the image of the Italian mamma,” said Italy’s leading daily Corriere della Sera.

The show’s debut comes as RAI is debating the future of reality shows which the state broadcaster’s chairman, Claudio Petruccioli, said were “unrealistic and coercive, leading inevitably to unreasonable if not degrading behavior.”

Petruccioli failed in his bid to scrap the formats which have become a staple both for RAI and Mediaset, the broadcaster owned by former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.

La Repubblica daily said Prefect Bride had an out-dated vision of women’s role in society. “State TV is going too far in its failure to limit the rubbish, the rudeness, the lying, the lack of manners and the wiping out of social changes which happened 50 years ago,” it said.

NEW YORK (AFP) – Talk about burying the past. A New York divorcee has come up with a solution for failed marriages — a miniature coffin to lay those unwanted wedding rings to rest.

“Give a dead marriage its proper, final resting place,” the company offering the miniature caskets says on its website.

“The Wedding Ring Coffin is the perfect gift for yourself or a loved one for bringing closure after a divorce. It’s time to bury the past and move on to a new tomorrow,” it says.

The 15 by five centimeter (six by two inch) solid wood coffin has a black velvet ring insert, a choice of six brass plaques inscribed with messages including “I do NOT!” and “Six feet isn’t deep enough,” and costs 30 dollars.

“It’s a way to acknowledge the death of a marriage and to physically and symbolically close the lid on that chapter of your life,” Jill Testa, who came up with the idea, told the New York Post.

“Most people just stick their rings in the bottom of their jewelry box, in a corner of a sock or underwear drawer,” added Testa, who surprisingly describes her own divorce after 20 years of marriage as amicable.

Her company, Wedding Ring Coffin, even offers cards inviting people to join in your marriage wake, featuring the slogan: “You’re invited to my divorce party. Join me as I close the lid on my marriage.”

BARABOO, Wis. – A peeping Tom seen peering into a second-floor window at Matt Edgerton’s apartment fled before Edgerton could catch him, but he left a key piece of evidence behind — his ladder.

“The ladder is absolutely in our custody,” said police Lt. Rob Sinden, who is heading the investigation.

Edgerton, 24, said he and a date were at home March 24 when he noticed a shadow move across his bedroom window and went to investigate.

When he pulled back the curtain, he was face-to-face with a middle-aged man peering in.

“My nose was actually touching the window and it was like, boom! His face was right there,” Edgerton said. “It was like a horror movie.”

The man seemed just as surprised and scrambled down the ladder.

“I tried opening my window to push the ladder over but I couldn’t get it open,” he said.

LOS ANGELES – An Air Force veteran has filed a federal claim after an operation at a Veterans Administration hospital in which a healthy testicle was removed instead of a potentially cancerous one.

Benjamin Houghton, 47, was to have had his left testicle removed June 14 at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center because there was a chance it could harbor cancer cells. It also was atrophied and painful.

But doctors mistakenly removed the right testicle, according to medical records and the claim, which seeks $200,000 for future care and unspecified damages. He still hasn’t had the other testicle removed.

“At first I thought it was a joke,” Houghton told the Los Angeles Times. “Then I was shocked. I told them, ‘What do I do now?’”

Houghton, his wife, Monica, and their attorney, Dr. Susan Friery, said they hoped to get the VA’s attention by going public with the situation.

Dr. Dean Norman, chief of staff for the Greater Los Angeles VA system, has formally apologized to Houghton and his wife.

“We are making every attempt that we can to care for Mr. Houghton, but it’s in litigation, and that’s all we can tell you,” he said. The hospital changed practices as a result of the case, he added.

PASADENA, Md. – A seven-months-pregnant woman has been accused of soliciting money for sex in an advertisement on a popular Web site — with her husband acting as her pimp. Diana Cornwell, 34, and her husband, Jesse, 32, each face prostitution charges, Anne Arundel County police said.

“She advertised that she was pregnant and married,” and she did so with her husband’s knowledge, said Cpl. Sara Schriver, a police spokeswoman. “I have not heard of this before.”

According to police, Cornwell posted an ad on craigslist.org, an Internet classified ad service, in which she offered sex for $300. An undercover officer made an appointment, and Jesse Cornwell greeted the officer at the door of their Pasadena home. Jesse Cornwell knew the officer was there for sex with his wife, police said.

It was unclear how long the ad had been posted on the site. Diana Cornwell had not been arrested before.

Diana Cornwell was charged with prostitution, scheduling an act of prostitution and operating a house of prostitution. Her husband was charged with the latter two offenses.

SYLVANIA, Ala. – A woman who went for a horseback ride through town at midnight and allegedly used the horse to ram a police car was charged with driving under the influence and drug offenses, police said Tuesday.

“Cars were passing by having to avoid it, and almost hitting the horse,” said Police Chief Brad Gregg.

He said DUI charges can apply even when the vehicle has four legs instead of wheels.

Police in the northeast Alabama town received a call around midnight Saturday about someone riding a horse on a city street, Gregg said.

Officer John Seals found Melissa Byrum York, 40, of Henagar on horseback on a nearby road and attempted to stop her. Seals asked the woman repeatedly to get off the horse, but she kept trying to kick the animal to make it run, the chief said.

“She wouldn’t stop. She kept riding the horse and going on,” Gregg said.

After ramming the police car with the horse and riding away, the woman tried to jump off but caught her foot in a stirrup, Gregg said. The officer took the woman into custody and discovered that she had crystal methamphetamine, a small amount of marijuana, pills and a small pipe, the chief said.

York was charged with DUI for allegedly riding the horse under the influence of a controlled substance. She was also charged with drug possession, possession of drug paraphernalia, resisting arrest, assault, attempting to elude police and cruelty to animals.

Gregg said the horse, which belonged to York, “wasn’t in the best of health, but it’s still alive.”

York was released from the DeKalb County Jail on $4,000 bond and was being transferred to the jail in Jackson County, where authorities had a warrant for her arrest on unrelated charges, Gregg said.

Jackson County officials said Tuesday that York had yet to be booked, and there were no records indicating whether she had a lawyer.

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – Amsterdam’s sex workers came to work early on Saturday to offer a free look at the city’s famed red-light district.

Hundreds of wide-eyed visitors queued in the sunshine to enter the dimly-lit sex clubs and peep shows that draw thousands to the city and to snoop around prostitutes’ neon-lit boudoirs.

“I think the open day is a great idea,” said Love, an erotic dancer at Amsterdam’s Banana Bar, who was on hand to answer questions and pose for photographs in fluorescent negligee.

“It is especially interesting for women. If they learn what we do here they will realize it is not a big deal if their husbands or boyfriends want to come here.”

Organisers staged the open day to counter bad publicity surrounding the 800-year-old district after harrowing reports of forced prostitution, human trafficking and organized crime.

More than 30 brothels are fighting closure after officials revoked their licenses last year over suspected links to money laundering and drug dealing.

But tourism authorities say the district — a warren of narrow alleys and canals lined with sex shops, brothels and neon signs – - is as big an attraction as Amsterdam’s art museums and coffee shops, where marijuana is freely smoked and sold.

Every night visitors throng the streets, agog at scantily clad women sitting behind huge red-lit windows, and who sell their services for as little as 50 euros ($66.58).

“I am here because my wife was interested in coming along,” said 63-year-old Evert Rijnders from Haarlem.

His wife Jos added: “This has been a chance to look behind the scenes, and some things have definitely surprised me.”

Organizer Jacco Wanders displayed a typical prostitute’s bedroom, usually concealed behind red velvet curtains and fitted with an emergency alarm bell in case a client turns violent.

He laughed as visitors posed in the tall street-facing window or bounced around on the mattress.

“This day is to help break down taboos around prostitution and to create more understanding and respect,” he said.

The “open day” concludes with the unveiling of a statue to an unknown sex worker, intended to honor those employed in the industry world-wide, including those without the same protection found in the Netherlands, where prostitution is legal.

Amsterdam’s window-prostitutes are self-employed tax payers, hiring their own windows at around 110 euros per night.

“People who work in the sex industry don’t get enough respect,” said Mariska Majoor, a former prostitute who now runs the red-light district’s information center.

“There are millions of them and many are in trouble. Some are abused by clients or pimps and it is important for them to know that they deserve respect.”

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A life-size sculpture of a naked Jesus made out of chocolate has angered a Roman Catholic organisation and forced a Manhattan art gallery to reconsider exhibiting it during Easter week.

The sculpture “My Sweet Lord” by Cosimo Cavallaro was to be exhibited for two hours each day next week in a street-level window of the Roger Smith Lab Gallery in Midtown Manhattan. It was set to open on Monday, days before Good Friday when Christians mark the crucifixion of Jesus.

“We’re considering our options,” Matthew Semler, the gallery’s artistic director, said on Friday. “We’re still assessing the situation.”

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights called for a boycott of the accompanying Roger Smith Hotel, writing to 500 religious and secular organisations.

“This is an assault on Christians during Holy Week,” said Kiera McCaffrey, director of communications for the league, which describes itself the largest U.S. Catholic civil rights group.

“They would never dare do something similar with a chocolate statue of the prophet Mohammad naked with his genitals exposed during Ramadan,” she said.

Semler said the hotel had no knowledge of what the gallery planned to show and was being unfairly targeted. Moreover, he said the work was not irreverent.

“It’s intended as a meditation on the Holy Week,” Semler said of the sculpture, which depicts Jesus as if on the cross.

A photo of the piece on the artist’s Web site (http://www.cosimocavallaro.com/) shows the work suspended in air.

The Catholic League has no intention of bringing legal action but seeks to punish the hotel with a boycott because “they’re the ones bringing this into the mainstream, in the heart of Manhattan, for any child holding his mother’s hand to see,” McCaffrey said.

She was further irked by an unconfirmed report that Cavallaro invited the public to come take a bite out of the sculpture.

Semler said that was only a joke by the artist.

New York is familiar with peculiar clashes between art and religion. In 1999, then, mayor Rudolph Giuliani threatened to withdraw a grant from the Brooklyn Museum of Art for showing a painting depicting the Virgin Mary as a black woman splattered with elephant dung adorned with cut-outs from pornographic magazines.