Zimbabwe swimmer shares gift

People

Swimmer shares

Zimbabwe’s state newspaper says star Olympic swimmer Kirsty Coventry is giving some of a $100,000 gift from President Robert Mugabe to local charities. Mugabe gave the nation’s Olympians a total of $148,000 last month, even as international aid agencies warned more than half the country’s population faces hunger. Coventry won one gold and three silver medals at the Beijing games.

Law & disorder

Mom longed to cheer

Wendy Brown, 33, has been accused of stealing her daughter’s identity to attend Ashwaubenon High School near Green Bay, Wis., and join the cheerleading squad. Brown is charged with felony identity theft after enrolling in the school as her daughter. The criminal complaint says Brown admitted telling school officials she was 15 because she wanted to get her high-school diploma and join the squad. She reportedly attended practices, received a cheerleader’s locker and went to a pool party at the coach’s house. Her daughter lives in Nevada with Brown’s mother.

“Tater” briefly jailed

Ron White, 51, of the “Blue Collar Comedy Tour,” was late to a sold-out performance Wednesday in Florida, but he had a good excuse: The Vero Beach Police Department arrested the him Wednesday on charges of possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia. White, whose comedy album is titled “You Can’t Fix Stupid,” was released after about two hours on $1,000 bail and went straight to the show. One of White’s most famous routines includes a joke about being booked into a Texas jail under the alias “Tater Salad.”

Ouch

Ebert: I was whacked

Film critic Roger Ebert on Thursday confirmed that a fellow critic yelled at him and whacked him on the knee with a program during a movie screening at the Toronto Film Festival last weekend but said the incident was “blown out of proportion.” In a column posted on the Chicago Sun-Times Web site, Ebert said, “It is of little interest.” Ebert, who has battled cancer in recent years and was left unable to speak, did not name the other critic, but he said an account published in the New York Daily News that named the other man as New York Post critic Lou Lumenick was “truthful.” Saturday’s incident began, Ebert said, when he could not see subtitles for the film “Slumlord Millionaire” because the man in front of him was leaning into the aisle. “In my medical condition I cannot speak, I tapped him lightly on the shoulder, and gestured him to move over a little. He said, ‘Don’t touch me!’ and remained in position. I tapped him lightly again. … He leaned further into the aisle, as if making a point of it. I tapped him a third time … and he jumped up and whacked me on the knee with whatever it was,” Ebert said.

People

New baby on the way

Former “Daily Show” correspondent Rob Corddry will be a dad again. The comedian and his wife, Sandra, are expecting a child in November, People reports. They have a daughter, Sloane, 2.

Never mind

Pastor rejects donation

James Ryan, the pastor of The Lighthouse Mission, which helps feed 3,000 Long Island, N.Y., residents a week, has turned down a share of a $3 million lottery jackpot because accepting the money could send the wrong message to gambling addicts. An anonymous donor gave the winning ticket last month to the True North Community Church, which said it would share the money with other charities, including the mission.

Today in History

1948: Republican Margaret Chase Smith of Maine was elected to the U.S. Senate, becoming the first woman to serve in both houses of Congress.

1971: A four-day inmates’ rebellion at the Attica Correctional Facility in New York ended as police and guards stormed the prison; the ordeal and final assault claimed 43 lives.

Today’s Birthdays

Radio-TV personality Tavis Smiley, 44. Actor-writer-director-producer Tyler Perry, 39. Singer Fiona Apple, 31. Actor Ben Savage, 28.

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