Storytelling box foils kindergarten thief

BERLIN (AP) — German police say they have solved a burglary case at a kindergarten after a storytelling gadget the suspect had swiped revealed his location. Police said Tuesday that the 44-year-old suspect had stolen various items during a break-in at a kindergarten in the western town of Halver in April. Among them were a laptop, picture books, cups and glasses, some fish sticks, pasta and a smart speaker for playing children’s stories. When the man tried to download new stories onto the device a month later it sent his home location to the manufacturers, who informed police. Police said the device has since been returned in working condition to the kindergarten, where it was eagerly received by the children.

Spain’s new volcano attracts visitors

LA LAGUNA, Spain (AP) — Traffic jams pack the winding narrow roads of La Palma at dusk as curious residents and visitors flock to snap photos as the Spanish island’s new volcano furiously ejects material into the air and glowing lava swallows villas, crops and warehouses on its downhill path to the sea. With the constant rumbling of the eruption as the soundtrack, punctuated by the thundering sound of the magma as it breaks into the surface, the scene is almost hypnotic. Yet emergency workers, banana farmers and grape growers in La Palma are less thrilled by one of nature’s most astounding events unfolding so close to home. “This is no joke,” said Pedro José Alegría, 70, a farmer who had returned to La Laguna, a neighborhood bordering one of the evacuated areas, to feed his donkey.

UK police charge Russian in poisoning

LONDON (AP) — British police said Tuesday they are charging a third Russian suspect, a member of the country’s military intelligence service, in the 2018 nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy in England. Prosecutors believe there is sufficient evidence to charge Denis Sergeev, who went by the alias “Sergey Fedotov,” with conspiracy to murder, attempted murder, possessing and using a chemical weapon, and causing grievous bodily harm, according to London’s Metropolitan Police force. Former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were targeted in a nerve agent attack in March 2018 in the English city of Salisbury. British authorities say the poisoning had almost certainly been approved “at a senior level of the Russian state.” Moscow has vehemently denied the allegations.