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Headlines for Friday, March 1, 2024

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Emily DeMarchi
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KPR

Missouri Police Charge Man with 2 Counts of First-Degree Murder After Officer, Court Employee Shot

UNDATED (AP) – A Kansas City-area man whose home was sold as he struggled to pay delinquent taxes killed a court employee who tried to serve an eviction notice and a police officer who responded, authorities said Friday in announcing charges.

Larry Acree, of Independence, Missouri, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder, one count of first-degree assault in the wounding of another officer who responded, and three counts of armed criminal action, according to court documents.

The shooting occurred when court employee Drexel Mack tried to serve an eviction notice.

He was shot, and then officers responding to the scene were shot at, one struck fatally and two others injured before Acree was taken into custody.

“Ambush is a strong word but it may be one that’s fitting here,” Jackson County Prosecuting Attorney Jean Peters Baker said at a news conference.

Jackson County Presiding Judge Jalilah Otto said that because Mack was an employee of the court, the case will be moved to another county. The Missouri Supreme Court will decide where it moves to. Mack, who was in his early 40s, had worked for Jackson County for over a decade.

Bond in the case is set at $2 million. Baker said Acree, who sustained minor injuries, remains hospitalized and will be moved to the jail as soon as he is able.

No attorney is listed for Acree in online court records and messages that The Associated Press left with possible relatives of Acree’s were not immediately returned.

On Feb. 23, a “Notice to Vacate” sign was posted at the property, according to the probable cause affidavit. It stemmed from court actions that began one year earlier. Acree “didn't have any right to be there," Baker said.

On Thursday, Mack and another process server arrived at the address to physically evict Acree. Both of the process servers removed a padlock from the gated drive, the statement said.

The two process servers then approached the front of the home, where they knocked and announced their presence. No one answered, so the property maintenance contractor drilled out the lock on the front door, the statement said. They then entered the home and were fired upon. Mack was struck and fell to the floor just inside the front door, court records said.

The other process server ran and sought help, court records said. Independence police then rushed to the home, where three officers entered the home and tried to retrieve Mack. They then came under additional gunfire, court records said.

Allen was struck in the head, and a second officer was struck in the torso, court records said.

Officers then returned fire, and the suspect was taken into custody. The wounded were taken to nearby Centerpoint Medical Hospital, where Mack and Allen were pronounced dead.

The officer struck in the torso underwent surgery and is expected to survive. That officer also sustained additional injuries to the arms and face.

Police Chief Adam Dustman said previously that a third officer also “took gunshot rounds” and had minor injuries. No charges were immediately filed stemming from that officer's injuries.

Baker said more charges were coming but that they just weren't prepared yet. She declined to release details on the type of firearm or firearms used.

The home where the eviction notice was being served had been sold recently and had delinquent taxes dating to at least 2019, records show.

Acree, 69, also had been ordered to pay a roofing company, with $32,155 due as of Aug. 1, according to court records. Records from later that month in the case signaled that a property sale was in the works.

The sale was completed on Aug. 14 for $260,000, with a judgment of $27,733.47 subtracted from the total, records show.

The person who bought the property didn’t immediately respond to a Facebook message from the AP seeking comment.

Independence is a suburb of Kansas City, with about 122,000 residents.

Baker noted that the tragedy followed a recent shooting at the Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory rally in which one woman died and around two dozen others were wounded.

“Our region has been weighted with it seems one tragedy after another after another,” she said. “Almost every one of those is linked to someone using firearms in a way that they’re not supposed to. I do acknowledge that this community is suffering. It’s a lot for one community to bear.”

(–Earlier reporting–)

Court Employee, Police Officer Shot and Killed in Independence, Missouri

INDEPENDENCE, Mo. (AP) — A court employee and a police officer were fatally shot Thursday after the court worker tried to serve an eviction notice at a home in Independence, Missouri. Authorities say a second police officer was critically injured, but is expected to survive. A male suspect, who sustained minor injuries, was taken into custody. It remains unclear what led to the shooting.

Helicopter video from KMBC-TV showed emergency vehicles converged around an isolated house in the middle of a field. The media was cordoned off in an area about 1 mile from the crime scene. The area includes a mixture of woods, farmland and scattered houses. Independence is a suburb of Kansas City, with about 122,000 residents.

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Boeing Confirms It's in Talks to Buy Spirit AeroSystems

DALLAS (AP) — Boeing said Friday that it is in preliminary talks to buy Spirit AeroSystems, which builds fuselages for Boeing 737 Max jetliners, including the one that suffered a door-panel blowout on an Alaska Airlines flight in January.

Boeing used to own Spirit, and it said that bringing the supplier back into the Boeing fold would improve plane quality and safety, which has come under increasing scrutiny by regulators, Congress and airlines.

Buying Spirit back would reverse a longtime Boeing strategy of outsourcing key work on its passenger planes. That approach has been criticized as problems at Spirit have disrupted production and delivery of popular Boeing jetliners including 737s and 787s.

Concerns about quality came to a head after the Jan. 5 blowout of a panel on an Alaska 737 Max 9 at 16,000 feet over Oregon.

Days after the incident, the Federal Aviation Administration announced increased oversight of Boeing and Spirit. This week, the FAA gave Boeing 90 days to submit a plan to improve quality and address safety concerns raised by a panel of experts who spent a year studying the company.

Boeing CEO David Calhoun has long defended the outsourcing strategy, but his tone changed after the blowout. On Jan. 31, as Boeing reported a fourth-quarter loss, Calhoun said that outsourcing probably went too far.

In a statement Friday, the company said, “We believe that the reintegration of Boeing and Spirit AeroSystems’ manufacturing operations would further strengthen aviation safety, improve quality and serve the interests of our customers, employees, and shareholders."

A deal would give Boeing more control over its production chain, but fixing Spirit would present Boeing with new challenges while regulators are pressuring the company to improve its own work. And it could add to Boeing’s debt load, already at $52 billion.

Spirit AeroSystems also confirmed the talks, while cautioning that it could not make any promises about closing a deal or its terms.

Shares of Spirit rose more than 15% after media reports that the two companies were talking about a sale.

Boeing spun off Spirit in 2005. In recent years, quality problems have mounted at Spirit, including fuselage panels that didn't fit together precisely enough and holes that were improperly drilled.

Spirit — which is not related to Spirit Airlines — removed its CEO in October and replaced him with Patrick Shanahan, a former Boeing executive who served as acting defense secretary in the Trump administration.

Things seemed to be going more smoothly until the Alaska Airlines incident. Investigators said a panel used in place of an extra emergency door had been removed at a Boeing factory to let Spirit workers fix damaged rivets, and bolts that help hold the panel in place were missing after the repair job. It is not clear who removed the bolts and failed to put them back.

Two weeks later, during a tour of the Spirit factory in Wichita, Calhoun and Shanahan pledged to work together to improve manufacturing quality. “We will restore confidence," Shanahan vowed.

About 70% of Spirit AeroSystems' revenue last year came from work done for Boeing, according to Spirit's latest annual report. That is up from 60% two years earlier. Most of the company's other revenue comes from making parts for Airbus, Boeing’s European rival.

The talks between Boeing and Spirit were first reported by The Wall Street Journal, which said Spirit hired bankers to consider strategic options and had held preliminary discussions about a sale to Boeing. Spirit also is looking into selling operations in Ireland that make parts for Airbus, the newspaper reported.

Spirit lost $616 million last year and hasn't turned a full-year profit since 2019. Since then, it has lost more than $2.5 billion. Boeing agreed in October to give more financial help to Spirit. Boeing said it would provide $100 million for Spirit to retool its factory and adjust prices to give the supplier another $455 million over two years.

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Kansas Lawmakers Consider Ban on Gender-Affirming Health Care for Trans Children

WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – Transgender young people in Kansas would no longer be able to access gender-affirming health care if proposed legislation becomes law. The Kansas News Service reports, lawmakers heard testimony on the issue Thursday. Two bills would ban prescribing puberty blockers, hormone therapy and some surgeries for Kansans under 18. Major medical groups support gender-affirming care for minors with gender dysphoria. D.C. Hiegert, with the ACLU of Kansas, said banning such care for children would be unconstitutional and put trans children at greater risk of suicide. “We know it will cause serious harm. And I do not mean that in an abstract sense. People will die. Families will suffer,” Higert said. A group of proponents said the bills would protect Kansas children from pursuing a gender transition they may later regret. Jamie Reed, a former gender center worker who helped Missouri enact a similar ban, said “...it is neither liberal nor progressive to medically transition a child. It is not kind. It is not compassionate. It is not evidence-based and it is not safe.”

Lawmakers failed to pass similar legislation last year. They enacted other laws restricting participation in sports and blocking trans people from changing their gender status on state-issued ID cards.

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Windy, Dry Weather Puts Kansas Meteorologists on High Alert for Wildfire Conditions

LIBERAL, Kan. (KNS) – Kansas is on high alert for wildfires as windy, dry conditions persist. The Kansas News Service reports that after two large fires scorched areas of Texas and Nebraska, Kansas State University meteorologists have become increasingly concerned about the risk for Kansas. A wet season last year has actually increased fire risks right now. Christopher Redmond, a meteorologist at K-State says the rain helped crop production, but also created more fuel that can burn in dry times. “It was really important for agriculture to have a wet year like that after so many dry years. But you always know that okay, that was the positive and the negative unfortunately, is the grass load going into fire season,” he explained. Redmond says relief may not come until late April when grasses start to green up.

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Judge Allows Former KCK Detective to Remain on Home Confinement

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCUR) – A federal magistrate on Thursday allowed former Kansas City, Kansas, Detective Roger Golubski to remain on home detention. KCUR reports that prosecutors wanted Golubski placed back in lock-up because he went to a fast food place in January, which is a violation of the conditions of his release pending trial. Magistrate Rachel Schwartz said Golubski’s trip to Culver’s was wrong, but it was a single violation. She did amend Golubski’s pre-trial release conditions to specifically say he can’t make stops like that - he can only leave the house for medical appointments or visits to his lawyer. Golubski faces federal charges of sexual assault and kidnapping, along with helping protect a drug dealer’s sex trafficking operation. No trial date is set.

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Missouri Governor Shortens the DWI Prison Sentence of Former Chiefs Assistant Coach Britt Reid

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Gov. Mike Parson on Friday shortened the prison sentence of former Kansas City Chiefs assistant coach Britt Reid for a drunken driving crash that seriously injured a 5-year-old girl.

Parson's commutation converted the remainder of Reid's three-year prison sentence to house arrest, subject to several conditions. Reid had been sentenced in November 2022 after pleading guilty to driving while intoxicated causing serious bodily injury. He is the son of Chiefs Coach Andy Reid.

Parson is a longtime Chiefs season ticket-holder holder who celebrated with the team at its recent Super Bowl victory parade in Kansas City. A Parson spokesman said the governor considered several factors when making his commutation decision.

“Reid had completed his alcohol abuse treatment program and has served more prison time than most individuals convicted of similar offenses,” Parson spokesman Johnathan Shiflett said.

Reid's house arrest will continue until Oct. 31, 2025, with requirements for weekly meetings with a parole officer and peer support sponsor and attendance at behavioral counseling. He also will be required to work at least 30 hours a week and complete 10 hours a month of community service, among other things.

The Chiefs declined to comment about Parson’s commutation of Reid.

Prosecutors said Reid was intoxicated and driving about 84 mph (135 kph) in a 65 mph zone when his Dodge truck hit the cars on an entrance ramp to Interstate 435 near Arrowhead Stadium on Feb. 4, 2021.

A girl inside one of the cars, Ariel Young, suffered a traumatic brain injury. A total of six people, including Reid, were injured. One of the vehicles he hit had stalled because of a dead battery, and the second was owned by Ariel’s mother, who had arrived to help.

Reid had a blood-alcohol level of 0.113% two hours after the crash, police said. The legal limit is 0.08%.

The Chiefs reached a confidential agreement with Ariel’s family to pay for her ongoing medical treatment and other expenses.

An attorney who represented Ariel's family did not immediately respond to messages Friday.

Reid's sentencing reprieve was one of three commutations and 36 pardons announced Friday by Parson, who also denied 63 clemency requests.

Parson, a former sheriff, has now granted clemency to more than 760 people since 2020 — more than any Missouri governor since the 1940s. Parson has been been working to clear a backlog of nearly 3,700 clemency applications he inherited when taking over as governor in 2018, but he also has considered some new requests.

Many of those granted clemency by Parson were convicted decades ago of drug crimes, theft or burglary and had completed their prison sentences long ago.

But two notable exceptions were Mark and Patricia McCloskey. The St. Louis couple who gained national attention for waving guns at racial injustice protesters were pardoned by Parson on July 30, 2021, just six weeks after Mark McCloskey pleaded guilty to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and Patricia McCloskey pleaded guilty to misdemeanor harassment.

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Wichita School Closure Hearing Draws Dozens to School Board Meeting

WICHITA, Kan. (KNS) – Dozens of Wichita residents urged school board members Thursday night to reject a plan to close six schools. The Kansas News Service reports that the proposal would close two middle schools and four elementary schools at the end of this academic year and send students to schools farther away. At a public hearing, parents, teachers and students said school leaders haven’t explained why the district faces a $42 million budget shortfall — or how closing schools would save money. Darrin Smalls works at Hadley Middle School. He says neighborhood families depend on the school and its staff. “You are dealing with people’s lives here. It’s bigger than money. So you can’t sit behind a desk and look at the numbers and think you know what’s going on in the schools. You don’t,” he told the board members, who will vote on the plan Monday. If the closures are approved, opponents would have 45 days to appeal the decision to the state school board.

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Blood Center Seeks Donations to Shore Up Supply After KC Mass Shooting

TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) – The Community Blood Center of Greater Kansas City is seeking donations to replenish local blood supply after the recent mass shooting at the Chiefs’ Super Bowl parade. The Kansas News Service reports the nonprofit says it provided hundreds of units of blood to hospitals after the shooting that left one dead and more than 20 injured. A blood drive was held Thursday at the Kansas Statehouse, where Governor Laura Kelly and many state lawmakers donated. Guy Niederhauser with the Community Blood Center says more donors are always needed. “Sixty percent of the general population is eligible to donate blood, and only three percent actually do so,” he explained. The Community Blood Center provides 90 percent of the blood used by hospitals in the Kansas City region. Those interested in donating blood can find more information at savealifenow.org.

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More Kansas Districts Embrace Four-Day School Weeks

TOPEKA, Kan. (Kansas Reflector) — More Kansas school districts are moving to a four-day school week. Approximately 29 districts across the state have implemented a four-day week this year. The Kansas Reflector reports that most of the districts moving to the shorter school week are in rural areas. First proposed as a way to save money, the four-day week has also been utilized for teacher recruitment. Typically, students at four-day schools spend more minutes per day in class, but less time overall in class each week.

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National League of Cities Anniversary Tour Kicks off in Lawrence

LAWRENCE, Kan. (KNS) – A national lobbying group is celebrating its 100th anniversary Thursday in Lawrence. The Kansas News Service reports that the National League of Cities was founded at the University of Kansas in 1924. The group focuses on uniting cities and towns on common issues and lobbying the federal government to address them. David Sander is president of the NLC and mayor of Rancho Cordova in California. He says issues like local infrastructure have remained top priorities since the group’s founding, adding that “...these sorts of questions, you know, obviously have spanned a century. I suspect they’ve probably spanned a longer period than that.” The event in Lawrence is the first stop on a national tour of at least 100 cities and towns. It features panelists talking about the group’s history and its current lobbying goals.

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Environmental Group Voices Concerns over USDA Conservation Program

UNDATED (HPM) – An environmental group is accusing a US Department of Agriculture conservation program of adding unproven farming practices to a list of those eligible for compensation. Harvest Public Media reports that the USDA’s EQIP program pays farmers to use practices that promote conservation and curb climate change. But Environmental Working Group ag economist Anne Schechinger says many practices deemed eligible for Inflation Reduction Act funding are unproven. “USDA says that they have literature showing that these practices have climate benefits. But they don’t actually have any quantifiable data showing that these practices reduce greenhouse gas emissions,” she explained. In response, a USDA spokesman says they use a rigorous evaluation process to select their “climate smart” farming practices.

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Kansas Town Celebrates International Pancake Day Race, 75 Years in the Making

LIBERAL, Kan. (KNS) — For 75 years, a race in the southwest Kansas town of Liberal has challenged women to run a quarter mile while holding a frying pan with a pancake in it. The Shrove Tuesday tradition may seem like an oddity, but members of the community say it offers real benefits. For 75 years, women in Liberal have been running the pancake race against women in the city of Olney, England. The women of Olney have been running the race themselves since 1445. (Read more.)

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KC Chiefs Superfan Pleads Guilty to Bank Robberies

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Kansas City Chiefs superfan known as “ChiefsAholic” has pleaded guilty to a string of robberies and attempted robberies of financial institutions in multiple states. Xaviar Michael Babudar pleaded guilty Wednesday in federal court in Kansas City, Missouri, to money laundering, transporting stolen property across state lines and bank robbery. Sentencing is scheduled for July 10. Federal prosecutors say Babudar admitted to a string of robberies or attempted robberies of banks and credit unions dating to 2022. Much of the stolen money was laundered through casinos and online gambling. Babudar's lawyer says his client is humble and repentant.

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The First Stadium Built for a National Women's Soccer League Club Is Ready to Open in Kansas City

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — One by one the women walked onto the field for the first time, shortly before they departed for a warm-weather camp in Florida, and gazed at the stands towering above them on three sides and the scoreboard looming over them on the fourth.

For the first time, they felt as if they were home.

That's because for the first time in the history of the National Women's Soccer League — and just maybe, professional soccer worldwide — the Kansas City Current had a home every bit as good as men's teams just for themselves. Built at a cost of nearly $120 million on the banks of the Missouri River, with the downtown skyline just to the south, CPKC Stadium represents one of the few facilities in the world that has been constructed expressly for the use of female athletes. “I'm very happy for Kansas City," Brazilian star and KC Current forward Debhina would say, “but also for women's soccer.”

The 11,000-seat stadium, almost entirely privately financed, will be christened March 16, when the Current play the Portland Thorns in a game televised by ABC, providing a national showcase for just how far the club and the sport have come.

Start with the game itself, which a century ago in England imposed a ban on women playing pro matches in stadiums used by men. The sport had gone on hiatus during World War I with so many men fighting abroad, and games involving women grew so popular in their stead that 50,000 or more would turn out to watch at places such as Goodison Park.

The sport's governing body, the Football Association, felt threatened by the success and decided the game was “quite unsuitable for females,” and for more than five decades effectively banned women from playing in any FA-affiliated grounds.

The ban eventually was lifted, but it took decades more for the women's game to begin gaining traction around the world. And in the U.S., numerous leagues formed and folded over the years before the NWSL finally found its lasting foothold.

Still, most of the 14 teams in the league rent stadiums, or if they are owned by a Major League Soccer club, play in venues built for the men. The predecessor to the Current, known as FC Kansas City before it folded in 2017, played at various times at a high school football stadium, a college soccer stadium and the training field of MLS club Sporting KC.

When the club reformed as the Current in 2021, it began playing in a minor league ballpark before moving a few blocks over to Children's Mercy Park, one of the jewels of MLS but a stadium that nevertheless belonged wholly to someone else.

But the vision of the Current's ownership group, led by Chris and Angie Long and including investors such as Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and his wife, Brittany, was to build facilities of their own. They began with an $18 million, purpose-built practice facility, then turned their attention to the stadium, where they could control standards, scheduling and, most importantly, revenue. “It raises the bar,” Chris Long said told The Associated Press. “People are going to want to be there. They are going to want to be in Kansas City. And I think that's going to cause a ripple-effect globally, putting forward elite facilities for women athletes.”

With women's sports on the rise, the timing hardly could be better.

The most recent season of the WNBA, whose basketball teams generally rent out facilities, is coming off its highest television viewership in more than two decades. The first season of the Professional Women's Hockey League is underway. And viewership of college sports, highlighted by Iowa basketball star Caitlin Clark's pursuit of scoring history, also has been on the rise.

Nor could the timing be better in Kansas City, where a golden age of sports is underway.

The Royals, who won the World Series in 2015, are planning to build a new downtown stadium by 2028 as part of a $2 billion-plus public-private partnership. The Chiefs are coming off back-to-back Super Bowl titles, will try to become the first team in NFL history to three-peat this coming season, and are aiming for an $800 million renovation of their own at Arrowhead Stadium.

Sporting KC remains a popular draw, as do several minor league teams in the area, while the NCAA wrestling championships and Big 12 basketball tournaments will soon take place at the nearby T-Mobile Center. “From the beginning,” Angie Long explained, “we wanted to be a tier-one sports team in our city. We have asked to be treated like the Chiefs and the Royals and Sporting KC, and our expectation of ourselves is that's what we can mean to our city.”

Angie Long remembers being asked to attend an FC Kansas City game a decade ago, long before her ownership of its successor. "I was like, ‘Where’s the game?' It was at the high school,” she recalled. “The whole premise of that's what women's sports is, we want to break that mold. If you treat women's sports with this level of growth and investments, what can it be?”

Season tickets have been sold out for months, and the demand for single-game seats is strong enough that some fans already are wondering when the stadium will expand. It was designed so that seats can be added in the future.

Yet the construction of CPKC Stadium — naming rights were sold to the Canadian Pacific Kansas City railway — has not been without detractors. Some are concerned about property values and traffic congestion, others a lack of parking; the club recently said spots would cost $50 per match, and many fans took to social media to express their outrage.

The club hopes many take advantage of ride-share options and public transportation to alleviate the parking concerns.

In the meantime, the countdown is on for the opening of one of the few stadiums in the world built for a women's team in any sport, and for showcasing what that could mean for professional teams elsewhere going forward. "It definitely brings energy,” former U.S. national team-turned-Current coach Vlatko Andonovski said. “When we trained in the stadium before going to Florida, the training was energetic and enthusiastic and intense, and we talked about: Can you imagine doing all of this with 11,000 people in the stands? It's exciting, and I hope we can use it to our advantage.”

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After Heart Transplant, Ex-KU Standout and NBA Player Scot Pollard Plans to Campaign for Organ Donations

UNDATED (AP) – Scot Pollard had grown so accustomed to his weak and failing heart that he didn’t realize how close he was to dying.

“Oh, boy. That thing was a wreck,” the former NBA player and “Survivor” contestant told The Associated Press on Friday, a day after he was released from the hospital and two weeks after he received a heart transplant.

“The doctors immediately knew I was much closer to death once they pulled my heart out,” Pollard said. “I don’t think I would have made it another couple of weeks.”

An 11-year NBA veteran who was a member of the 2008 champion Boston Celtics, Pollard inherited a condition from his father, who died at 54, when Scot was 16. Scot Pollard's heart deteriorated quickly after he contracted a virus in 2021; attempts to fix the problem with medication or less radical procedures were unsuccessful, leaving a transplant as the only option.

But finding a heart big enough to pump blood throughout the body of the 6-foot-11, 260-pound former NBA center was a challenge. Pollard was advised to list himself at as many transplant centers as possible (though they needed to be nearby, so he could be available within four hours if a donor heart became available).

Pollard, 49, underwent pre-transplant testing near his home in Carmel, Indiana, and Chicago, but when he arrived at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center last month he was admitted to intensive care and bumped up to the second-highest priority for organ transplants, because of his condition.

Nine days later, his wife, Dawn, posted on X: “ It’s go time!”

“The fact that it came so quick probably saved my life. I don’t know how much longer I would have lasted,” Scot Pollard said. “I was just declining so fast.”

Privacy rules don’t allow Pollard to know the identity of his donor, though doctors told him it was “a big man.” What is allowed: A recipient can write a letter that will be delivered to the donor’s family if they want. (They can also write the recipient, though Pollard had not received such a letter yet.)

Speaking from temporary housing in Nashville, Tennessee, where he needs to stay for the next six to eight weeks so he can have the proper follow-up care, Pollard said he has written a draft of his letter. In it, he thanks the donor – whom he calls a hero – and offers to connect.

“I would like to show them how their big man’s heart is living on and helping people,” he said. “I would love to show them this heart isn’t going to waste.”

Pollard has been warned that many donors’ families don’t want contact with the recipient, because it makes them relive their loved ones’ death. Heart donors, in particular, are often accident victims who were otherwise healthy.

“If it’s a healthy heart, that’s because something else killed them,” Pollard said. “I hope they reach out, because I would like to include them in the rest of my life.”

That life has already improved.

Even after he retired from the NBA, Pollard liked to keep busy – with broadcasting, a few acting roles and as a reality show contestant. But over the last few months, he needed to stop to rest even just walking around the house.

It was only when he woke up after the five-hour surgery that he realized how bad things had gotten.

“I was laying around all the time. That just became my new normal,” he said. “As an athlete, you just sort of put things out of your mind. You push through it. But I couldn’t push that heart. I can already tell I can push this heart.”

After the transplant, which was performed by Dr. Ashish Shah, Pollard was walking around the hospital ward within a day. He is now up to “easy squats,” and working on his balance.

“I’m a mover. I don’t sit around well,” Pollard said.

On Thursday, Pollard danced and shadow-boxed his way down the hospital corridor in a tank top that said “BUT DID YOU DIE?” His care-givers applauded as he yelled “I’m getting out!” and mugged for a camera as he rang the discharge bell.

Pollard said he is going to campaign for organ donation.

“I’m going to annoy people with becoming a donor. That’s going to be a project for the rest of my life,” he said.

He's already helped convince one person to sign up.

“I had never considered being an organ donor, because I wasn't really educated about it and there were some fears when I thought about the process,” Dawn Pollard said. “It became our reality that Scot needed a heart, so I immediately got registered. I am proud to be an organ donor now. It makes me feel good knowing I could be helping someone live.”

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This summary of area news is curated by KPR news staffers. Our headlines are generally published by 10 am weekdays and are updated through 7 pm. This ad-free news summary is made possible by KPR members. Become one today. And follow KPR News on Twitter.