Police catch underwear thief

Mon Jul 20, 4:13 pm ET BERLIN (Reuters) –

German police uncovered over 1,000 pairs of underpants and more than 100 pairs of swimming trunks after catching a thief nabbing another three pairs for his collection.

The 46-year-old man was caught Sunday pinching three pairs of pants from a sports hall in the western town of Gelnhausen. Police then came across the enormous collection of underwear while searching his flat.

"They were all evidently in use, but had been washed and neatly stacked away," a police spokesman said Monday.

Police are now investigating where all the underwear came from. The suspect claims to have acquired then from car-boot sales and over the Internet.

(Reporting by Caroline Copley, editing by Paul Casciato)

Chuck note- Secretary Clinton wanted to do one on one negotiations with the thief prior to release of the underwear. She called the police interdiction as brutal and vowed that the United States would never engage in such unilateral actions. She immediately called upon allies at the UN to study the future of cotton production and ways that the United States can bolster cotton and silk markets abroad in light of the confiscation.