A woman who claimed to be a psychic persuaded a 12-year-old girl to steal jewelry from her family and throw it into a cauldron to lift a curse and appease evil spirits, authorities said Friday.

Jackeline Lopez, 42, of Palmdale was arrested last month for investigation of extortion. She has since posted bond and is scheduled to appear in court on Oct. 18.

Nestle Purina PetCare is releasing what it says is the first television commercial designed to appeal to dogs.

The company told the St. Joseph News-Press that animal behavior experts at the Nestle Purina Product Technology Center in St. Joseph, Missouri, helped it develop the commercial aimed at selling Beneful dog food.

Public transport bus drivers in Macedonia's capital have been asked to replace turbo folk melodies popular throughout the Balkans with classical tunes and easy listening music, officials said Friday.

After numerous passenger complaints, managers of Skopje's public transport company JSP decided to equip new Chinese-made double-decker buses with about 400 song-playlists prepared by Macedonia's prominent DJs.

The Dutch national railway has an unusual solution for passengers who need the bathroom on a train line designed without them: plastic bags.

The rail operator underlined that the bags, introduced Friday, are for use in emergencies only, when a train has stopped and passengers can't be evacuated.

No one in the northern Arkansas town of Yellville will say if they expect wild turkeys to fall from planes for this year's Turkey Trot festival. But the Federal Aviation Administration says it is watching.

Organizers of the festival long ago disavowed the tradition of letting wild turkeys fall from low-flying airplanes as spectators watched them glide to the ground.

The first thing that people notice about Brahim Takioullah is not his feet -- which he hopes will make him famous -- but his enormous height. He stands more than eight foot (246 cm) tall.

As he strolls through downtown Paris people gasp, stare, take his picture and ask: "Are you the tallest man in the world?" He's not, not quite, but he does have the biggest pair of feet on the planet -- and that's official.

Controversial Lithuanian mayor Arturas Zuokas on Friday said his nation should buy an island from debt-ravaged Greece and convert it into a holiday resort for tourists from the Baltic state.

Zuokas, who is mayor of the capital Vilnius, urged Lithuanian businesses to come up with some seven million euros ($9.3 million), saying it would be enough to acquire the rights to an island.

Record-breaking autumn temperatures attracted hundreds of rare moths to Britain in what experts have called the best migration of the insects in years.

A wide variety of species, usually found in the Mediterranean, flocked to Britain to bask in temperatures of almost 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) and southerly winds.

Dutch National Railways said Friday it planned to introduce so-called "pee-bags" as an emergency alternative to non-existing toilets on its short-hop trains.

"Yes, we are planning to introduce the bags on our short-hop Sprinter trains," NS spokeswoman Nienke Kooistra told Agence France Presse, but stressed "it's to be used in extreme emergencies only, for instance when a train is stranded."

A protest of Utah's uptight laws that featured people running through the streets of Salt Lake City in their underwear has set a new world record.

Guinness World Records says the Utah Undie Run broke the previous record for largest gathering of people wearing only underpants or knickers by 1,720 people.