--Amanda Howard, a former teacher's aide in Little Rock, Arkansas, told her 5th grade students she wouldn't interfere if they were to beat 11-year-old Eugene Pitts into submission for disrupting her class. Sentenced to 90 days in jail and convicted of assault, Howard was seen laughing as up to 10 students took turns beating Pitts. Pitts required treatment for injuries to his nose and ribs.

--The state house in Montpelier, Vermont, just passed a bill allowing game wardens to shoot dogs caught in the act of taunting moose repeatedly.

--French scientists have discovered killer sponges. Belonging to the same family as a group of sponges which typically lives in the deep ocean, the French killer sponge kills by taunting its prey of shrimp with a sticky thread which extends from its body. The more the creature struggles, the more it is entangled, until it finally dies.

--Sensing something odd about the titillating movements of a 42 year old women's chest as she shimmied through Swedish customs, officials conducted a search and found 65 baby grass snakes in the woman's brassiere and six lizards scampering about her blouse. The woman planned to start a reptile farm, but was arrested on smuggling charges.

--Representatives at the Illinois state capitol building in Springfield just announced that by firing six propane cannons mounted on the building, pigeon and starling droppings to the building have been reduced by a third.

--The Federal Highway Commission told Alaska that having two mechanical gorillas-equipped with flourescent vests, hard hats and gloves-act as construction flag holders doesn't meet federal safety standards. A spokesman for the state said the $3100 beasts were more effective than traffic lights and cheaper than actual construction workers.