QUIRKY WORLD ... Royal flush as man drops fake poker chips into loo

USA: A North Carolina man has pleaded guilty to charges that he brought counterfeit chips to an Atlantic City poker tournament in a scheme discovered after he flushed $2.7m (€2.4m) of the chips down a toilet in his hotel room.

Christian Lusardi, 43, of Fayetteville, could face five years in prison at his October 22 sentencing after pleading guilty to trademark counterfeiting and criminal mischief before New Jersey Superior Court Judge Bernard DeLury.

The chips were discovered on January 16, 2014, two days after the Borgata Casino in Atlantic City began hosting its Winter Poker Open, where Lusardi was a participant and where $800,000 of fake chips with a bogus Borgata trademark had been used.