News from across the USA
ALABAMA Birmingham: James Woolley, 50, a family practice and criminal defense attorney, was charged with attempted murder, kidnapping and robbery, AL.com reported.
ALASKA Juneau: The state Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case alleging the wrongful firing of an Alaska Airlines employee, the Empire reported. The case was dismissed by the lower courts.
ARIZONA Phoenix: John Feit, 83, a former priest, was arrested in connection with the slaying of Texas beauty queen Irene Garza in 1960, The Arizona Republic reported.
ARKANSAS Hot Springs: A Malvern man praised a woman he admitted to raping and threatening to kill, then asked a jury to sentence him to the maximum prison term, the Sentinel-Record reported. Larry Lavelle Jones, 37, was given the maximum sentence of life plus 60 years.
CALIFORNIA Half Moon Bay: The Titans of Mavericks contest is on for Friday off the coast of Princeton Harbor, the San Fran
cisco Chronicle reported. Excellent conditions are predicted for the 24 invited surfers.
COLORADO Denver: State officials say they’ll keep working on the state’s plan to comply with the Obama administration’s clean-power regulations despite a U.S. Supreme Court order delaying enforcement of the rules. The
Denver Post reported Wednesday the state Department of Public Health and Environment said Colorado needs to be ready in case the court eventually upholds all or part of the rules.
CONNECTICUT New Haven: The Archdiocese of Hartford has agreed to pay $500,000 to settle sex abuse allegations against a Connecticut priest, the Connecti
cut Post reports. The Rev. Stephen Bzdyra was accused of beating and sexually abusing an altar boy between 1985 and 1990.
DELAWARE Dover: Gov. Markell signed a resolution formally apologizing for slavery and Jim Crow era laws, The News Journal reported. The long-awaited symbolic gesture aimed at reconciliation took place at the Delaware Public Archives.
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA: Jullette Saussy, the Fire Department’s medical director, announced her resignation, saying her proposals have been blocked and “people are dying needlessly because we are moving too slow,” The Washington Post reported.
FLORIDA Melbourne: Barre Taylor, a five-year veteran with the Brevard County Sheriff ’s Office, was fired from his position, arrested and charged with one count of felony sexual misconduct after investigators said he engaged in inappropriate relations with an inmate, Florida Today reported.
GEORGIA Atlanta: Evangelist Franklin Graham decried samesex marriage and the push for transgender rights at a prayer rally attended by thousands outside the state Capitol, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
HAWAII Hilo: The Lyon Arboretum’s Seed Conservation Laboratory is asking for online donations to help deal with a fungus that has spread to 34,000 acres of ohia trees, the Hawaii
Tribune-Herald reported. The tree is important to Hawaii’s water supply, endangered native birds and cultural traditions like hula. Donations: gofundme.com/ohialove.
IDAHO Boise: An Ada County employee and a state employee have been accused of theft and forgery. The Idaho Statesman reported that the two women have been accused of stealing from the estates of three people who died without a will or heirs.
ILLINOIS Chicago: Opponents of Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plan to raise the legal age to buy cigarettes to 21 and hike tobacco taxes blocked a vote after the mayor tried to jump-start the measure by pledging to crack down on illegal smoke sales, the
Tribune reported.
INDIANA Indianapolis: Heating, ventilating and air-conditioning manufacturer Carrier is shuttering its manufacturing facility and moving its operation to Mexico, The Indianapolis Star reported, eliminating about 1,400 jobs during the next three years.
IOWA Des Moines: Iowa adults diagnosed with a terminal illness could make a written request for self-administered medication they could use to end their lives under a bill that provoked an emotional debate before an Iowa Senate subcommittee, The Register reported.
KANSAS Topeka: A proposal to remove gifted children from the special education realm in Kansas was abandoned after push back from gifted education advocates, The Wichita Eagle reported.
KENTUCKY Frankfort: A state Senate committee voted for a bill that is intended to shield county clerks from having to put their names on the marriage licenses of same-sex couples, The Courier-Journal reported.
LOUISIANA New Orleans: Police confiscated 30 guns on or near Mardi Gras parade routes, The Times-Picayune reported.
MAINE Augusta: A man was sentenced to less than a month in prison after he admitted to possessing sexually explicit materials of minors under 16, the Kennebec Journal reported.
MARYLAND Annapolis: The bodies of two duck hunters have been recovered from the Severn River, Maryland Natural Resources Police said. WUSA-TV reported that Earling Stephen Lamp and Matthew Davis, both 23, drowned last month when their boat capsized.
MASSACHUSETTS Wellfleet: With the number of sharks prowling the waters off Cape Cod expected to increase, a local group met here to discuss water safety. The Cape Cod Times reported that Leslie Reynolds, chief ranger for the Cape Cod National Seashore, said the aim is to change human behavior and keep people closer to shore.
MICHIGAN Iron Mountain: A male cougar found dead along a road about 4 miles north of here had been caught in a snare, WLUC-TV reported. Under state regulations, snares may be used to catch foxes and coyotes Jan. 1 to March 1 on private land, but cougars are an endangered species.
MINNESOTA Caledonia: Roger Lee Olsen, 50, who was wrongfully convicted of child sex abuse will be compensated $475,000 under a new state law, the Tribune Star reported. Olsen spent two years in the Stillwater Correctional Facility. He was released from prison in 2008 when investigators found evidence that his accuser lied about the incident.
MISSISSIPPI Houlka: Delta Furniture Manufacturing will locate in the 80,000-square-foot facility formerly occupied by Astrolounger, the Mississippi Business Journal reported. The Chickasaw County project represents a corporate investment of $432,000 and will create 100 jobs.
MISSOURI Springfield: A school nurse was charged with having sex with a 15-year-old student, The Springfield News-Leader reported.
MONTANA Billings: Officials identified a bicyclist who was struck and killed by a pickup truck here as a veteran who was living in a transitional living facility. The Billings Gazette reported that James Clark, 39, died of injuries suffered when he was struck by the truck.
NEBRASKA Lincoln: Thirteen people were arrested as a part of a sex trafficking sting conducted by a national coalition of law enforcement agencies between Jan. 17 and Feb. 7, the Lincoln Journal Star reported. The sting included 23 law enforcement agencies across 14 states and arrested a total of 552 would-be sex buyers and 30 sex traffickers.
NEVADA Reno: The Washoe County School Board is searching for a replacement for Barbara McLaury, its west county representative who recently resigned due to health problems, the Reno Gazette-Journal reported. McLaury’s resignation forces the board to appoint a replacement representing District G until McLaury’s term ends in December.
NEW HAMPSHIRE Conway: A man was presumed dead after he fell through ice at Pequawket Pond here, WMUR-TV reported.
NEW JERSEY Camden: Gregory Pardlo, who won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for poetry, will join the faculty of Rutgers University-Camden in September as a member of the school’s masters of fine arts program in creative writing, the Courier-Post reported.
NEW MEXICO Santa Fe: Mayor Javier Gonzales called Santa Fe “a city on the rise” during his second State of the City address, the Albuquerque Journal reported.
NEW YORK Buchanan: A radiation specialist from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will investigate what led to the radioactive contamination of a monitoring well at Indian Point nuclear power plant, The Journal News reported.
NORTH CAROLINA Fayetteville: Tom Roberts, president of Aqua North Carolina, told officials he would address problems with the company’s pipes and service to about 13,000 customers in western Cumberland County, The Fayetteville Observer reported.
NORTH DAKOTA Fort Totten: The Spirit Lake Tribe is getting a $900,000 grant to help improve housing and provide economic opportunities.
OHIO Barberton: Vandals cut down 10 black walnut trees earlier this week that the founder of this Akron suburb planted in 1910, the Akron Beacon Journal reported. The person responsible knew the 50-foot-tall trees’ value because only those black walnut trees were targeted, Barberton Historical Society officials said.
OKLAHOMA Tulsa: The Tulsa County Park Board has approved an $18 million plan to upgrade the 192-acre Chandler Park between Tulsa and Sand Springs, the Tulsa World reported.
OREGON Grants Pass: Authorities say a couple here were rescued after spending two nights in their pickup in a snowy ditch in the mountains. The Mail Tribune reported that a woman and 80-year-old man left their home Saturday to go for a drive in a four-wheel drive pickup truck.
PENNSYLVANIA Philadelphia: The city is moving ahead with a $16.5 million, year-long renovation of Love Park, and its namesake Robert Indiana statue.
RHODE ISLAND Providence: Police plan to stop enforcing an anti-panhandling ordinance that opponents say has led to the harassment of homeless people, the Providence Journal reported. It comes after the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island sent a letter to Mayor Jorge Elorza in January calling for the change.
SOUTH CAROLINA Berkeley County: Police say a woman charged with killing her mother told investigators that ghosts told her to do so. Paula Anderson, 45, is charged in the death of Frances Anderson, 68, who was found strangled in her Hanahloan home, WLTX-TV reported.
SOUTH DAKOTA Parker: Turner County gave conditional approval to an egg-laying facility that aims to bring 500,000 chickens to a site near here, the Argus Leader reported.
TENNESSEE Dickson: Freed-Hardeman University and Nashville State Community College are offering joint enrollment that will provide an easier path for community college students to complete a bachelor’s degree, according to a news release from the schools.
TEXAS Austin: Texas was ranked the top exporting state in the country for the 14th consecutive year by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. Texas exported more than $251 billion in goods in 2015, more than 16% of all U.S. exports, the Austin Business Journal reported.
UTAH Ogden: A report shows that Zion National Park is about $70 million behind on maintenance work, while continuing to see a record number of visitors, The Standard-Examiner reported.
VERMONT Montpelier: VSECU, a credit union for Vermonters, has announced a partnership with Vermont-based equity crowdfunding company Milk Money L3C, Burlington Free Press reported.
VIRGINIA Chesterfield: Bon-Chon Chicken — the fast casual Korean fried chicken chain — is about to open a location at the Towne Crossings Shopping Center, the Richmond Post-Dispatch reported.
WASHINGTON Seattle: President Obama’s proposed budget includes $1.2 billion toward a proposed light rail line in Washington’s Puget Sound area. The
Seattle Times reported that the federal government might also contribute $75 million to a streetcar line and $43 million toward a bus line.
WEST VIRGINIA Charleston: Corporate officials convicted of pollution crimes such as those connected to the Freedom Industries chemical spill in January 2014 are seldom punished with prison terms. Over the past five years, data from the sentencing commission show that defendants in environmental crime cases were sentenced to probation, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.
WISCONSIN Green Bay: The Brown County Drug Task Force on Tuesday reported a big increase in seizures of methamphetamine in 2015, Green Bay Press-Gazette reported. Drug agents seized 1,269 grams of methamphetamine in 2015, compared with 237 grams in 2014 and just 41 grams in 2013.
WYOMING Casper: State regulators denied an application to dispose of wastewater underground for a proposed oil and gas project in Natrona and Fremont counties, the Casper Star-Tribune reported. The Wyoming Oil and Gas Conservation Commission on reversed its earlier approval that would have allowed up to 10 million barrels of wastewater.