September 16, 1985

A Stranger's London

Burglary shame of rebel

Strike rebel leader Ken Foulstone has been jailed for 12 months for a burglary eight years ago.

Foulstone, 45, of Tuxford, Notts, robbed an elderly couple of £1,600 worth of goods including their Christmas dinner, Lincoln Crown court heard.

He was "shopped" by his son Cohen who said: "I don't feel any remorse - he was never a proper father.

"When I saw him on TV during the miners' strike talking about law and order I felt he was a hypocrite."

New dad Chris in family way

New dad Chris Allsop breathed a sigh of relief after his daughter Sarah was born. For the previous nine months he'd been plagued by a phantom pregnancy. He had morning sickness, stomach cramps and mysterious rashes. "It was hell," said Chris, 23, at his home near Rotherham, South Yorkshire. "I now know what women go through."

Doctors were baffled. One diagnosed an allergy, another food poisoning. But when Chris visited his parents, who live nearby, he found that the mystery condition was hereditary.

"Said Chris: "My dad told me the same thing happened to him each time mum was expecting." Chris was at wife Trish's side when Sarah was born. And all the symptoms immediately vanished.

Rasta 'liberated museum books'

A Rastafarian who 'liberated' priceless Ethiopian books from the British Museum and other libraries claimed that he was returning them to their owners. He took books and journals from the British Museum Library, the School of Oriental and African Studies, the Foreign Office Library and the Bible Society, Southwark Crown Court was told

When he was arrested McClean told police that Ethiopian writings had been plundered by General Napier during a military expedition to that part of Africa during the reign of Queen Victoria, said Mr Stephen Waller, prosecuting.

"It appears his motive was to liberate them." He said: 'It is our mission in life to recover what is rightfully ours. I don't call it stealing'," added counsel.

Mr Waller said: "It is impossible to put a value on the books but a second- hand insurance value is in excess of £8,000.

Police recovered more than 750 of the books, finding most of them at the headquarters of Rasta International, in Kennington, London. Others were found at McClean's home in Fernlea Road, Balham, London.

McClean denies 15 charges of theft between January 1982 and May 1984. Four other rastafarians denied handling stolen goods.

Grandad leaves his bride at night

Every night grandad Rayley Keam kisses his young bride - then goes off to sleep at his ex-wife's home.

Rayley, a 76-year-old former Methodist lay preacher, and his new wife Pat, 30, never spend a night together. Neither of them sees anything odd in this.

But Rayley's ex-wife Audrey, 69, said at her home in Bodmin, Cornwall: "He's a silly old fool. I don't think he's ever slept with her. In any case, he wouldn't be any use to her - I can tell her that."

Rayley and Pat were married in May after his 48-year marriage ended in divorce. He spends all day with her at her mother's cottage in St Leonard's, Bodmin, just 100 yards from his old home. But at 10.30 every evening he kisses her goodnight and walks off to his old home. Audrey said: "We'll set up home on our own together eventually, but these things take time."

Pat said of their own sex life: "We don't actually get much opportunity. But that's our business."

£50,000 win? That's peanuts!

A woman who was told she had won £50,000 on the football pools replied: "Is that all? That won't even buy a new house. I was expecting £300,000. I have a large family and the money won't go far."

Then she told the Vernons representative: "It's hardly worth phoning up to tell me. Just put it in the post.

The woman, from Finchley, North London, who asked for no publicity, won £49,470.15p. But another couple from Ruislip, Middlesex, were delighted after winning £33,000 with Vernons. They plan a holiday in South Africa to see their daughter.

Shark case shocker

The lawyers of the Greek Captain who threw African stowaways overboard has defended his action with the claim that the stowaways could not have been killed by man-eaters "because sharks don't eat blacks."

Captain Emanuel Garoufalias told an Athens court: "The Japanese freeze stowaways throw their bodies overboard."

And another skipper Nikolas Vezirtzis claimed: "Norwegian captains burn them to death in the ship's galley."

But the judge interrupted angrily: "Even if foreigners do such things to stowaways it doesn't mean Greeks can as well."

The alleged victims were thrown into the Indian Ocean, off the African coast, last year. No survivors were found. Continuing his defence last week, the Captain also admitted striking one of the Africans in "the ribs which I'd I heard was a vulnerable part of an African”