Mystery of Little Prince Author's Fate Solved

From murder mysteries to murky maladies

(NEWSER) - A lot of big news happened in 2011 ... and some of it only half-happened. The Atlantic Wire took a look at the most frustrating unanswered questions of the year, and keeps its fingers crossed that 2012 will bring new details. Highlights from its list of the year's 10 most nagging mysteries:

• What's the deal with the Long Island serial killer/killers? In the course of searching for Shannan Gilbert, police ultimately found 10 bodies. Gilbert's body, recently found, was No. 11—except she died accidentally . And authorities can't even agree whether one or two killers are responsible for the deaths. Are police anywhere near catching this guy(s)?

Police mystified by cleanly cut limb

(NEWSER) - A family visiting St. Petersburg, Florida, got a nasty surprise yesterday, when they stumbled upon a severed human leg that had washed ashore on a small beach tucked behind a waterfront neighborhood. The leg was pale, white, and shaven, bent at the knee and cut with eerie cleanness at the thigh and foot. “We don’t know the cause and manner of death,” the city’s top detective tells the Tampa Bay Times . “But obviously someone went to great lengths to dismember the body.” More»

Germany probing 1944 massacre in occupied France

(NEWSER) - German police have raided the homes of six former SS soldiers suspected of having taken part in the worst massacre of civilians in Nazi-occupied France. A German war crimes prosecutor says the John Demjanjuk trial inspired him to reopen the investigation into the massacre of 642 men, women, and children in the village of Oradour-sur-Glane four days after the D-Day landings in 1944, Der Spiegel reports. More»

For two months, the strange sound has been heard from midnight to 4am

(NEWSER) - They’ve shut off the electricity. There are no factories or busy intersections. And still the English village of Woodland remains at a loss regarding the mysterious “hum” that has plagued the small town from midnight to 4am each night for nearly two months. Residents describe this hum as a vibration similar to the whir of a car engine, reports the Telegraph ; one says it's so strong at times that it shakes bed frames. "It's not tinnitus, that's a high pitched sound and this is very low,” one resident explains. “If I put my fingers in my ears it stops, so I know it's not in my head.” More»

How old is Catherine Zeta-Jones for real?

(NEWSER) - E! is blowing out 20 candles on its birthday cake this year, and it has one wish: To learn the answers to the top 20 nagging celebrity mysteries.

1. How old is Catherine Zeta-Jones really? (And Beyoncé, for that matter.)
2. Murder mystery No. 1: Did OJ kill Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman?