/ 7 September 2004

Suicide threat lands unemployed man a job

An unemployed Czech man has been given a job by the mayor of the north-eastern town of Stramberk after threatening to commit suicide in a cellphone text message, daily Pravo reported on Tuesday.

Mojmir Havrlant (40), sent a message to mayor Jan Socha, threatening to throw himself off a 30m tower because he could not find a job.

Socha took pity on Havrlant, who had been unemployed for more than a year, and found him a job in the council’s technical services department.

”I immediately alerted the police and invited the man to contact me again,” Socha told the newspaper.

”It was an exceptional case. I don’t give in to blackmail,” he added. — Sapa-AFP