The Odd Truth, June 8, 2005

The Odd Truth is a collection of strange but factual news stories from around the world compiled by CBSNews.com's Joey Arak.

Man Repays Charity 50 Years Later

WORCESTER, Mass. - It took 52 years, but Andy Karlson's conscience is finally clear.

On Tuesday, Karlson, 95, fulfilled a promise to repay the American Red Cross the $7,500 it gave his family to rebuild after a devastating tornado in 1953.

"I owe the Red Cross something. It's really very little," he said at a ceremony at the organization's new Worcester headquarters.

Andy Karlson, a longtime teacher, recalled that he, his wife, daughter and Jeffrey were driving home from Springfield on June 9, 1953, when they saw the storm.

They returned to an "awful sight." Two other sons were seriously injured.

"All we had left was an empty cellar hole," Karlson said.

The injured sons recovered after three months in the hospital, and doctors worked without pay to save them and other storm victims, he said. But the family found their insurance did not cover the damage to their home.

Without the Red Cross grant, Andy Karlson said, the family would have been "out in left field without a portfolio, as they say."

Beware The Underwear Gang

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - Robbers who strike while wearing only underwear, their bodies slathered with oil to make them slippery and harder to catch, have resurfaced in Cambodia.

Two unidentified, underwear-clad burglars robbed homes in the southern province of Takeo on May 30, The Cambodia Daily quoted area police chief Sok Tum as saying.

Police thought they had quashed the "underwear gang" last year, the report said. They apparently wear only underwear in an attempt to make themselves harder to identify.

Residents had started a community watch program to prevent such crimes, Sok Tum said. But "the underwear thieves resurfaced in my region because the villagers stopped," he said.

Crook Tries To Hail Cab

COLUMBIA, S.C. - A taxi cab probably isn't the best getaway car for a bank robbery.

At least that's what one suspect learned Monday after a couple of quick-thinking customers and a veteran cabbie foiled his attempt.

Police said 50-year-old Maurice Eugene Fields Jr. hailed a cab to take him to the nearby South Carolina Community Bank and asked the driver to wait for him.

When he came out with a fistful of money, a couple of customers followed him and told the cabbie not to take him anywhere because he had just robbed the bank, police said.

Driver Michael Airs took his keys and got out of the cab.

The suspect slipped through the back seat and walked away, but one of the customers followed him and kept in touch with someone else at the bank by cell phone.

Officers closed in on Fields, who gave up without resisting.

Cops Thrown In Jail

SUTTONS BAY, Mich. - A training exercise became a bit too realistic for a group of sheriff's deputies, who filed a grievance after their boss ordered them to spend a couple of hours behind bars.

Leelanau County Sheriff Mike Oltersdorf last month required his three dozen law enforcement and corrections officers to spend two hours in the new county jail to prepare for real inmates.

Ten officers filed a grievance May 24 with Pat Spidell, local representative for the Police Officers Association of Michigan.

The grievance complains of false imprisonment, Oltersdorf said. He called the idea ludicrous.

Oltersdorf, who also spent an hour in jail said the incarceration was on par with other mandatory training, such as pepper-spraying officers or shooting them with stun guns before they carry those weapons on duty.

She's Got A Lot Of Buzz

GREENVILLE, N.C. - It happened again to a North Carolina woman.

For the second time in about a year, Judy Byers has had to deal with a huge bee colony living in the walls of her Greenville home.

About 10,000 bees were found inside, about a year after a similar colony was discovered.

Byers called a man who specializes in getting unwanted colonies out of homes by using a customized vacuum and taking them to his personal backyard collection.

Bees spend the summer stocking up on enough honey to last them through their winter hibernation. They often take up refuge in an unprotected piece of wall or roof.

Grandmother Fights Crime, Knows No Fear

MIDDLETOWN, N.Y. - The score is now Granny two, robbers zero. The bad guys don't do very well against Carol Ordway. The last time someone tried to rob her she bit him. This time, she took away the gun. The 59-year-old grandmother works the graveyard shift at an upstate New York convenience store. During a May 9 stick-up, Ordway grabbed the bandit's gun, telling him, "You don't need that." Officers say they arrested suspect Ronald Moran last week. Local officers use Ordway's store as a late-night coffee stop. And they have some advice for their friend: don't fight the crooks. But Ordway says she can't help it, that's just the way she is. She adds she's not afraid of anything.

A Painful Breakup

SUDBURY, Ontario - Allyson Lace will have to serve 30 more days in jail for grabbing her fiance where it hurts. Prosecutors in Sudbury, Ontario, charge Lace and her fiance got into an argument. After kicking, punching and scratching him, prosecutors say she grabbed him by the testicles. According to authorities, the fiance had to whack Lace over the head with his arm cast to make her let go. Police say the woman also kicked the inside of a police cruiser and struck an officer in the eye. She's pleaded guilty to a number of charges, and been jailed since the May 10 incident. The judge sentenced Lace to an additional 30 days behind bars. Before being led out of the courtroom, Lace turned to her victim and mouthed, "It's over, goodbye."