LONDON (AP) – Freddie Garrity, the lead singer of the 1960s pop band Freddie and the Dreamers, has died. He was 69.

Garrity, whose band hit the top of the U.S. charts with the 1965 hit “I’m Telling You Now,” died in a hospital in Wales on Friday, according to a statement from his agent, Howard Elson Promotions. The singer had suffered from emphysema for several years.

Garrity, originally from Manchester, in northwest England, formed Freddie and the Dreamers in 1959, and they were signed to Columbia Records.

Some success in Britain prompted work in the U.S. and eventually American television appearances, and his exuberant on-stage performance led to a minor dance craze inspired by the hit song, “Do the Freddie.” Chubby Checker also recorded a cover version of the song.

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The ‘Naked Guy’ dies in prison

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) – Andrew Martinez, the former college student known as the “Naked Guy,” who gained notoriety in the early 1990s for attending class in the buff, died in jail, authorities said. He was 33.

Martinez whose stripped-down strolls at the University of California, Berkeley, got him expelled and prompted the city to adopt a strict anti-nudity ordinance, was found unconscious Thursday in a Santa Clara County jail, said jail spokesman Mark Cursi.

Officials are investigating the death as an apparent suicide.

He had been in custody since Jan. 10 on charges of battery and assault with a deadly weapon, authorities said.

In 1992, Martinez organized a “Nude-In” protest at the university. He said he was trying to make a point about free expression.

The message caught on, and nude spottings spiked on campus. Martinez, who landed on national talk shows, was expelled the next year after the university banned nudity.

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