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Starsky And Hutch Busted In France For Driving Under Influence

Yes, they are both French. Yes, those are their real names. No, they weren't driving a Ford Gran Torino.

Starsky And Hutch Busted In France For Driving Under Influence
Bertrand Hauger

Starsky and Hutch on the wrong side of the law? It happened in France this weekend, and worse still: they were busted driving a Renault minivan...

The scene Saturday night at a police checkpoint in the small French town of Beautiran was vaguely reminiscent of the high-octane car chases of the iconic 1970s American TV detective series. Just swap the busy streets of Bay City, California, for the quiet, vineyard-flanked roads of southwestern France — and the trademark bright red, white-striped Ford Gran Torino for a family-friendly Renault Scénic. And yet as French as it all may seem, the names matched up ...

Shortly after 10 p.m., upon seeing a police roadblock, a car with two men onboard refused to pull over and instead started accelerating, reported the regional Sud Ouest daily newspaper. After managing to shake the fuzz, the car showed up an hour later … on the same road, same checkpoint — only to be stopped this time by the gendarmes who managed to deploy their tire-deflating stop-stick bar.

In the car, two 30-something local brothers with the first names, Starsky and Hutch, on their respective identity documents. An odd choice of names for the the parents in the land of Pierre and Jacques, which Sud Ouest traces back to when the U.S. series gained cult status in France in dubbed reruns through the 1980s and 1990s as Starsky et Hutch.

Police brought the brothers into the station on suspicion of driving under the influence and refusing to comply with police. Though there were no details on the color of either brother's hair, authorities confirmed that, yes, Starsky was behind the wheel.

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FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War

That Man In Mariupol: Is Putin Using A Body Double To Avoid Public Appearances?

Putin really is meeting with Xi in Moscow — we know that. But there are credible experts saying that the person who showed up in Mariupol the day before was someone else — the latest report that the Russian president uses a doppelganger for meetings and appearances.

screen grab of Putin in a dark down jacket

During the visit to Mariupol, the Presidential office only released screen grabs of a video

Russian President Press Office/TASS via ZUMA
Anna Akage

Have no doubt, the Vladimir Putin we’re seeing alongside Xi Jinping this week is the real Vladimir Putin. But it’s a question that is being asked after a range of credible experts have accused the Russian president of sending a body double for a high-profile visit this past weekend in the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

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Reports and conspiracy theories have circulated in the past about the Russian leader using a stand-in because of health or security issues. But the reaction to the Kremlin leader's trip to Mariupol is the first time that multiple credible sources — including those who’ve spent time with him in the past — have cast doubt on the identity of the man who showed up in the southeastern Ukrainian city that Russia took over last spring after a months-long siege.

Russian opposition politician Gennady Gudkov is among those who confidently claim that a Putin look-alike, or rather one of his look-alikes, was in the Ukrainian city.

"Now that there is a war going on, I don't rule out the possibility that someone strongly resembling or disguised as Putin is playing his role," Gudkov said.

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