oddly enough

oddly enough

Police: ‘Brighton Tree Ninja’ caught chopping down tree

BOSTON

Boston police say they have arrested a 65-year-old man they believe is the infamous “Brighton Tree Ninja.”

For several years a vandal has been damaging newly planted trees and shrubbery in the city’s Brighton neighborhood. Authorities have been unable to apprehend the perpetrator.

The Boston Globe reports that police set up surveillance near the Brighton Elks Club. Officers caught Joseph Rizza entering an empty lot and attempting to chop down a tree with a hammer.

Detectives took Rizza into custody. He is being charged with five counts of willful and malicious destruction of property and one count of possession of a dangerous weapon.

Police are continuing to investigate Rizza in connection with several years of reports of similar incidents.

A message left with Rizza’s attorney was not immediately returned.

Woman blames coffee-drinking parrot for car crash, police say

UNIONTOWN, Pa.

State police say a woman blames her coffee-drinking pet parrot for distracting her moments before she crashed her car into a guardrail in Pennsylvania.

Troopers from Uniontown say the 35-year-old woman was driving on a South Union Township road just before 5 p.m. Tuesday when she noticed the bird pecking at the lid of her coffee cup. The woman says she struck the guardrail when she glanced down to see what the bird was doing.

The woman told police that the bird likes to drink coffee — and they also found bird seed in a cup holder next to the coffee and a few feathers nearby.

Police say the woman broke her arm and had facial cuts because her air bag deployed.

The bird was safely removed from the vehicle.

Israeli ultra-Orthodox site cuts Kim Kardashian from photo

JERUSALEM

An Israeli ultra-Orthodox Jewish news website has cut Kim Kardashian — one of the world’s most photographed women — from a photo taken of her in Jerusalem this week.

The original photo of Kardashian, her husband, Kanye West, and Jerusalem’s Mayor Nir Barkat was altered to put Kardashian behind a restaurant receipt. Kardashian was blurred in another.

Nissim Ben Haim, an editor at the Kikar HaShabbat website, said Wednesday they removed Kardashian because she is a “pornographic symbol” who contradicts ultra-Orthodox values. In an article chiding Barkat for dining with them at a nonkosher restaurant, Kardashian was referred to as “West’s wife.”

Within the insular Ultra-Orthodox community, pictures of women often aren’t shown out of modesty. In January, an ultra-Orthodox newspaper removed German Chancellor Angela Merkel from a photo.

Associated Press