News from around the country
Medical marijuana facility to open in old Saginaw flea market
The old Saginaw flea market on Sheridan Avenue will not be empty for much longer.
Saginaw County Sheriff William Federspiel confirmed the 70,000 square foot building will be turned into a medical marijuana facility.
It is the first of its kind in Spaulding Township.
Many have speculated about what the business might be thanks to a newly installed fence around the property. But those questions have been answered.
Federspiel said the new site will operate as a provisioning and processing center and could be open by next spring.
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Flea Market Raid Nets Over 6,000 Counterfeit Items: Police
LAWRENCE, MA — Three New York men were arrested during a raid of a Lawrence flea market Saturday, an operation that yielded more than 6,000 counterfeit fashion and accessory items, police said.
Jinwu Wang, 41, Sheng-Fu Weng, 39, and Sheng-Chao Weng, 37, were charged with charged with possession with intent to distribute more than 1,000 items bearing a counterfeit mark. They were released on bail and will be arraigned in Lawrence District Court.
State, local, and federal authorities executed the search warrants at 85 Manchester St. If the items had been authentic, police said the retail value would have surpassed $1.5 million.
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Man unknowingly buys 4,000-year-old pottery at flea market, uses it as toothbrush holder
You never know what you'll find at a flea market … like a 4,000-year-old piece of pottery. That's what a guy in England discovered, though he didn't realize what he had until later, after he'd repurposed the jar as a toothbrush holder.
The pottery vessel, adorned with the painting of an antelope, caught the eye of Karl Martin while he was browsing a yard sale five years ago. He picked the jar up, along with another pot, for about $5 (4 pounds).
"I liked it straight away," Martin said in a statement from Hansons Auctioneers, where he now works and where the pottery was auctioned — selling for about $100 (80 pounds) in November.
The jar dates to the Indus Valley Harappan civilization, which thrived in the northwestern regions of South Asia during the Bronze Age, according to James Brenchley, head of antiquities at Hansons Auctioneers. The Indus, along with ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, is one of the three cradles of civilizations in the Old World, he added.
That backstory was unbeknownst to Martin, a collector, at the time of his purchase. So who could blame him for plopping the jar in the bathroom, right? "I used it in the bathroom to store my toothpaste and toothbrush — it even ended up getting a few toothpaste marks on it," he said.
Years later, while helping Brenchley unload a van at the auction house, Martin noticed some of the pottery going up for auction looked similar to his toothbrush holder. "The painting style looked the same, and it had similar crudely painted animal figures," he said in the statement.
Brenchley examined the pot and confirmed that it was a genuine artifact from Afghanistan dating to 1900 B.C.
"That means it's around 4,000 years old — made 2,000 years before Christ was born," Martin said. "It's amazing, really. How it ended up at a South Derbyshire car-boot sale, I'll never know."