In the news

■ Raul Soto, 41, a former employee of a tire shop in Fair Lawn, N.J., dropped his wallet when he stole the shop’s cash register, police said, and was later arrested along with an accomplice in a nearby parking lot where officers found the pair, who had returned to look for the wallet.

■ Melania Trump, who had said she wanted to wear something “modern, sleek, light, unique and unexpected” as she accompanied President Donald Trump to inaugural balls on Jan. 20, donated her vanilla silk, offthe-shoulder gown to the First Ladies Collection at the Smithsonian Institution.

■ Bret Hedden, 34, of Scranton, Pa., faces strangulation, assault and harassment charges on accusations that the choked a woman during an argument that began because she no longer wanted him to use her iPad and changed its security password, police said.

■ Peter Mutharika, president of Malawi, appealed for calm, saying his government “will offer protection from these alleged bloodsuckers,” after police arrested about 140 people over mob attacks in which nine people suspected of being vampires were killed.

■ Charity Grigsby of Killeen, Texas, called the school when her daughter texted her saying a substitute teacher had duct-taped her mouth and the mouths of nine other fifth-graders, prompting the school district to fire the teacher and call police.

■ Sheridan Perkins, owner of Valley Aquatics, an animal-rescue group in Wasilla, Alaska, said he’s thinking of relocating a 4-foot-long alligator named Allie to Florida after its owner realized it had outgrown its bathtub home.