World: Nice Girl Goes to Jail

A shocked France learned last June that the most secret secret of the Ministry of Education, the questions asked in the critical baccalaureate examination, had been leaked to test-takers.

Public opinion naturally blamed the Marseille underworld, but the culprit was actually Daniele Maurel, 21, an about-to-be-fired secretary in the ministry who only wanted to help her brother and her boy friend’s friend’s brother. Once she gave away the answers to her friends, they spread all over the south of France, causing the biggest education scandal in many decades.

Last week Danièle Maurel was sentenced to ten months in prison, and assorted accomplices got lesser terms. Her father saw her misdemeanor as the result of too much heart. “My daughter has the mentality of a St. Bernard,” he said.