BRIEFS - Scrap-metal artist dies

NEW YORK (AP):

An artist known for turning automotive scrap metal into sculpture has died in New York City. John Chamberlain was 84. The Gagosian Gallery represented Chamberlain and says he died on Wednesday in Manhattan.

Chamberlain's career spanned decades. He started working with junked car metal in the late 1950s, gaining admirers and critics. He also worked with materials as wide-ranging as paper bags, aluminium foil and foam rubber.

Chamberlain's work has been exhibited all over the world. His first retrospective was at the city's Guggenheim Museum in 1971.

DETROIT (AP):

A former Postal Service employee with authority over vehicle maintenance has pleaded guilty to accepting bribes, including cash, truck-repair services and prostitutes from a contractor.

The US Attorney's Office in Detroit said in a release on Thursday that 62-year-old Bruce Plumb of Brownstown Township admitted last Wednesday in the US District Court to taking between US$10,000 and US$30,000 in bribes in 2009 and 2010 from the owner of Metro Diesel. Plumb was in charge of the Postal Service's Vehicle Maintenance Facility in Detroit.

Authorities say Metro Diesel was paid more than US$13 million by the Postal Service to repair and maintain vehicles. Plumb faces up to two years in prison a US$250,000 fine.

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  Toyota looks for comeback

TOKYO (AP):

Toyota is aiming for a comeback, targeting record global sales of 8.48 million vehicles in 2012 and an even bigger number in 2013, after being battered this year by the March disaster in Japan and flooding in Thailand.

Toyota Motor Corp, Japan's top automaker, relinquished its title as the world's biggest in global vehicle sales for the first half of this year, sinking to number three behind US rival General Motors Co and Volkswagen AG of Germany.

Toyota's global vehicle sales for this year totalled 7.9 million vehicles, including group companies, down six per cent from the previous year, it said in a statement on Thursday.

Toyota's targets for 2012 and 2013 do not include group companies such as Daihatsu Motor Co and Hino Motors, and so are not directly comparable with numbers from GM and Volkswagen.

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  Croc Fluffy recovers from crash

CANBERRA, Australia (AP):

A young crocodile named Fluffy is back to her cranky old self after being hit by a bus while duck hunting in a city in northern Australia, a veterinarian said on Thursday.

The 1.3-metre saltwater crocodile underwent emergency surgery and then spent 11 days recovering in the Marlin Coast Veterinary Hospital after the late night accident in a beachside suburb of Cairns, Doug English said.

"It was pretty dopey for a couple of days and then it got fairly cranky, so obviously it was feeling a lot better," English said.

While young crocodiles were often killed by cars on Cairns' roads, Fluffy - so named by vet nurses because she was found with a "fluffy duck" in her jaws - was the first English said he knew of to survive such an accident.

He praised the bravery of sugar cane farmer Andrew Herrington in bringing the injured reptile in. Herrington said he was driving home after midnight on December 10 when he came upon a bus driver trying to coax the injured crocodile off the road with a stick.

The crocodile had caught a duck and was headed across the road with it toward a creek when it was hit.

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  Maserati in bad cheque attempt

EXTON, Pa (AP):

Police are trying to find a man they say tried to use bad cheques to buy a US$60,000 sports car from a south-eastern Pennsylvania dealership.

Investigators tell the Daily Local News that 22-year-old Gabriel Matthews attempted to buy a 2007 Maserati last week using a cheque drawn on a closed bank account.

Authorities say the Upper Gwynedd man went to Car Connections USA on December 13 and picked out the car. He allegedly wrote two cheques for the sale price, but the dealer found out that account was closed when they called the bank.

Matthews faces charges of including criminal attempted theft by deception and access device fraud.

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  40,000 target for Corvette festival

CHAMPAIGN, Ill (AP):

Beginning in 2013, Champaign County will host a Corvette festival that could bring 40,000 people over three days to the region.

The Bloomington Gold Corvette Show will be held on the grounds surrounding the University of Illinois Assembly Hall and in the I Hotel and Conference Centre in Champaign. It will be on June 27-30, 2013, and every year after that through 2017.

As part of the 2013 event, organisers want to take a crack at breaking the Guinness world record for the most number of Corvettes in a single road tour. The tour, which would include over 2,000 Corvettes, is expected to weave through the country roads surrounding Champaign-Urbana and conclude in downtown Champaign, pending city and county approval.