POLICE CONFISCATE DRUGS: Officers from the Latvian Drug Enforcement Bureau confiscated drugs, weapons and cash on a sweep Aug. 11. DEB detained a total of 14 persons from four apartments in central Riga, Krists Leiskalns, police spokesman, said. The police found in the apartments 100-200 grams of heroine, $20,000 and 200 lats ($327) in cash, two guns possessed illegally, and one pneumatic pistol.
CAUGHT BY THE PAST: A woman hunted by the Latvian police since 1994 is being extradited from Germany. In 1994 with several persons she robbed a flat and stole various items worth a total of 4,000 lats ($6,546). The prosecutor's office said that after committing the crime, the woman and her accomplices were detained. She later fled to Germany.
BUSTED AT AIRPORT: The regional court in Vilnius issued a warrant for arrest on Aug. 12 of a Turkish citizen. The citizen is wanted by police for smuggling drugs several times in different countries. Ali Ay arrived in Vilnius from Stockholm with a Swedish passport. He was detained on suspicion of terrorism, drug smuggling and money laundering on a large scale. The Lithuanian court warranted Ay's arrest on the grounds that an international search for him had been announced, and that Turkey had applied for his extradition. Ali Ay was present at the court hearing and asked not to be detained. He said that he was detained for a crime he had committed in Sweden and that he had already served a term for it in Sweden.
SOCCER FANS CLASH OFF FIELD: A scuffle broke out in Vilnius on Aug. 10 among Lithuanian and Polish soccer fans. The police said that Lithuanian fans attacked about 40 Polish fans, hospitalizing two. The Polish soccer fans refused to launch a complaint with the police in spite of clear evidence of having been attacked.
A BOOT SAVED THE DAY: The Lithuanian Airlines quality manager, Vilmantas Mazonas, left for Israel on Aug. 11 to investigate an incident involving an LA aircraft at the Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv, LA director-general Kestutis Auryla said. Israeli airport worker Abrosh Michaelov claims he had diverted a potential disaster from an LA jet by swiftly placing his boot under the airliner's wheels to stop it in its tracks. The LA director-general said that the Israeli national company El Al ground services should take all the blame for failing to provide special stoppers to be placed under the wheels of the aircraft.
CAUGHT ON BRIDGE: A Russian tax inspector attempted to bring illegal cigarettes into Estonia on Aug. 11, using a simplified border crossing pass at the Narva checkpoint. The tax inspector crossed the footbridge over the Narva river into Estonia at about 4 p.m. when she was stopped by border guards who found 40 packages of Arktika cigarettes hidden under her clothes, a representative of the border guard board said.
JUDGES WANT MORE: Estonian judges are applying for a 20 percent salary raise as of next year, so the state court chairmen's salary would become equal to the president's and the prime minister's. According to a bill worked out at the Justice Ministry, State Court chairman Uno Lohmus would be paid 22,500 kroons ($1,300) and ordinary judges 18,000 kroons monthly, the daily Eesti Paevaleht reported. The bill also includes the right for judges to receive state support in the acquisition of a house or an apartment.
MILLIONAIRE TO VISIT SEA TOMB: Estonia agreed Aug. 10 to send a border guard officer to observe the dive to the ferry Estonia wreck by the American Gregg Bemis. Finland and Sweden have decided to send patrol boats to watch the dive to the wreck, and Estonia consented to send a border guard officer on a Swedish vessel, the government's spokesman said. Bemis, a U.S. millionaire, said he is planning to dive to the wreck of the passenger ferry Estonia in August and establish the real causes of its sinking. He has not said exactly when he is planning to go down to the wreck.
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