In an attempt to avoid paying his pending loans, an ex-convict prefers to be behind the bars. Salvatore Gramagna was arrested for slapping a police officer who asked him not to smoke in an area of Milan's Linate airport.

Each year Americans celebrate the country's freedom and independence with barbecues, picnics and family gatherings on July 4, but a diner in a West Virginia town does it everyday. As the clock ticks towards noon waitress Judy Hawkins is joined by several customers for a sing-along with a local radio station's broadcast of "The Star-Spangled Banner. ""We just think it's good to honor ("The Star-Spangled Banner"). The public enjoys it. They stop eating and join in," Hawkins, who said she started singing the national anthem several months ago, told the Associated Press.

After spending their lives enduring brutal treatment, the last of Bulgaria's dancing bears are headed to a mountain sanctuary where they can rest their paws. The bears are the last in a line of centuries of bears in the Balkans that have been trained to dance by walking across burning embers on their bare paws hopping from one foot onto the other to escape the fire while their trainer beat a drum until they connected the drum to the pain. The bears were caught while they were cubs and trained. Many Gypsy, or Roma, families earned their livelihoods with bear dancing for generations.

A Marshalltown woman may have never thought that her alleged first attempt to steal toilet paper could rob her of her freedom. Suzanne Marie Butts has been accused of stealing at least three toilet paper rolls from the Marshall County Courthouse and if convicted could face three years in prison. According to courthouse workers, the disappearance of toilet papers had been in process from a long time and that Butt was caught red-handed last week after an employee saw her whisking away with three rolls of two-ply hidden in her shirt.

For James Taylor, a man accused of robbing a bank in central Florida, beer was more important than his freedom. Taylor, who robbed the Bank of America branch in east Orange County, Florida simply changed clothes in a van and went to a nearby pizzeria for a cold beer. The Orlando Sentinel said Tuesday Taylor was recognized by an unidentified bank customer as the man who robbed her. He then apparently change clothes inside the van and relaxed.