On this day in conspiracies

Time magazine publishes a short article, "Foo-Fighter," reporting that balls of fire had been trailing American night fighters for over a month and that the crews had named the phenomenon themselves. The story brings the sightings to a wider public.

Housewife Betty Bersinger, walking with her daughter on South Norton Avenue in Leimert Park, finds a nude body severed at the waist in a vacant lot and initially mistakes it for a discarded mannequin.

After learning that the FBI has obtained a recording made by Chen Chi-li implicating Taiwanese officers, Taiwan arrests Wang Hsi-ling and his two subordinates and publicly acknowledges that its Military Intelligence Bureau was involved in the killing. It is a rare admission by a state of a role in an assassination abroad.

According to Taiwan's Central News Agency, local calls are still being made from Indonesia using the missing engineer's mobile phone a week after the boat is found. After examining the call records, Taiwanese police come to regard a mutiny as probable.

A bench of five judges refuses the posthumous appeal, upholding Megrahi's conviction; the family is later refused permission to take the case to the UK Supreme Court.