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Headlines for Wednesday, September 29, 2021

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CORRECTED: KDHE Reports 2,481 New COVID-19 Cases, 27 New Virus-Related Deaths Since Monday

TOPEKA, Kan. (KPR) - The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) has recorded 2,481 new COVID-19 cases in the state and 27 new, virus-related deaths since Monday.  Officials say Kansas has now recorded 408,934 COVID-19 cases and 6,051 deaths since the pandemic began.  Another update is expected Friday.

KPR's Coronavirus Resources Page.

(A previous version of this story incorrectly stated there had been zero new, virus-related deaths in Kansas since Monday.  KDHE reviewed its data and has since corrected the reporting error.)

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Missouri Hospital Issues Panic Buttons for Staff in wake of COVID-Related Attacks

UNDATED, (AP) - Nurses and hundreds of other staff members will soon begin wearing panic buttons at a Missouri hospital where assaults on workers tripled after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Cox Medical Center Branson is using grant money to add buttons to identification badges worn by up to 400 employees who work in the emergency room and inpatient hospital rooms. Pushing the button will immediately alert hospital security, launching a tracking system that will send help to the endangered worker. The hospital hopes to have the system operational by the end of the year. Missouri isn't alone. A February report cited hundreds of COVID-related attacks worldwide.

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Hospitals Brace for Staff Shortages as Vaccine Mandates Arrive

UNDATED (AP/KPR) - Hospitals and nursing homes around the country are bracing for worsening staff shortages as state deadlines arrive for health care workers to get vaccinated against COVID-19. With such rules taking effect this week in states New York, California and Rhode Island, the fear is that some employees will quit or let themselves be fired or suspended rather than take the vaccine. In New York State, some hospitals have already begun suspending or otherwise removing holdouts.  Some healthcare workers who don't want to take the vaccine argue that the personal protective equipment they wear will ensure patient safety, just like it did when there was no vaccine and they were hailed as healthcare heroes.

(-Related-)

Kansas GOP Lawmakers Push Back on Pandemic Restrictions, Mandates

TOPEKA, Kan. (KPR/KNS) - Republican legislative leaders have formed a committee to recommend ways that Kansas can resist federal COVID-19 mandates. This week's move came over objections from Democrats.  Republican Senate Vice President Rick Wilborn says policies like Democratic President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate go too far. "It’s just completely out of control," he said.  "We need to put a checkmark on the federal government and let ‘em know where we stand.”  The recently announced vaccine mandate covers federal workers and private companies with more than 100 employees.  Senate Democratic leader Dinah Sykes says the committee will further politicize efforts to stop the spread of the virus, which has already claimed the lives of more than 6,000 Kansans.

(AP version...)

Kansas GOP Lawmakers Question State's Pandemic Response

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) - Top Republican Kansas lawmakers are forming a committee to examine the impact of COVID-19 mandates and what they call government overreach. This is partly in response to Democratic President Joe Biden's federal vaccine requirements.  Republican Senate President Ty Masterson and Republican House Speaker Ron Ryckman will appoint the 11-member panel, which will meet for up to five days and take public testimony. One senior Democrat said the move could further politicize the pandemic.  Democratic Governor Laura Kelly and all Kansas House members are up for reelection in 2022.  

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Judge Denies Missouri Attorney General's Push to Expand Mask Lawsuit

COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — A judge in Boone County, Missouri, has denied Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt's efforts to expand his lawsuit against mask mandates in public schools. Schmitt sued the Columbia Public Schools after it required students and staff to wear masks while indoors. He had sought to expand the action to every school district in the state that has a mask requirement. He also asked for a preliminary injunction against the mask requirements. Circuit Judge J. Hasbrouck Jacobs denied those motions but he also rejected the Columbia district's request to dismiss the lawsuit. Schmitt's office said after the ruling that he plans to continue litigation against mask requirements.

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Dangerous Sex Offender Who Escaped from Kansas Mental Hospital Arrested in Utah

SALT LAKE CITY (KUTV) — Police have confirmed to a Salt Lake City TV station that an inmate who escaped from a Kansas mental institution has been arrested.  KUTV reports that 42-year-old John Freeman Colt has been booked into the Sevier County Jail.  No other information was released. Colt, described by authorities as a dangerous sex offender, escaped from Larned State Hospital in central Kansas on June 30th by obtaining a replica of a staff ID badge and dress clothes.  Colt was sentenced in 2001 to five years in state prison for aggravated sexual battery, attempted rape, aggravated burglary and four counts of aggravated battery against law enforcement.  Officials said Kansas courts later deemed him a Sexually Violent Predator at high risk to commit a future sex offense and too dangerous to be released.  Colt was indefinitely civilly committed and sent to the Larned State Hospital’s Sexual Predator Treatment Program in 2007, where officials said he was living until his escape.  Officials in Larned said the morning of his escape, Colt shaved off his long hair and beard and was able to convince a new staff worker that he was in fact a new doctor and needed help finding his way out. Posing as a doctor, Colt was able to make his way past five secured doors and ultimately outside the gates.

(AP version...)

Sex Offender Who Escaped from Kansas Mental Institution Arrested in Utah

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Federal officials say a convicted sex offender who escaped from a state hospital in Kansas in June has been captured in Utah. The U.S. Marshal's office announced Tuesday that 42-year-old John Freeman Colt was arrested in Wayne County, Utah, after a citizen reported seeing him camping on federal land. In June, Colt escaped Larned State Hospital in central Kansas by creating a staff identification badge and pretending to be a doctor. Prosecutors say he walked through five secure doors on his way out of the hospital. The U.S. Marshal's Service said Colt apparently had help and had been able to buy a motorcycle while on the run.

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Paola Man Sentenced in Fatal Crash that Killed Baker University Employee

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A 27-year-old Paola man was sentenced to more than three years in prison after a fatal crash killed a Baker University employee. The Douglas County District  Attorney's office said Tuesday that Tayler Livingston was sentenced to 41 months in prison for involuntary manslaughter. Authorities said Livingston's car was trying to pass another vehicle on Kansas 33 about 6 miles east of Baldwin City in February 2020. The Kansas Highway Patrol says Livingston's vehicle hit a car driven by 25-year-old Deeva Sharma, of Leawood. Sharma died in the crash. The district attorney's office say Livingston was intoxicated at the time of the crash. Sharma was an admissions counselor at Baker University. ( Read more in the Lawrence Journal-World.)

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Missouri Man Pleads Guilty in Trying to Set Up Murder of Crime Victim

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A 57-year-old Sedalia man admitted in federal court that he tried to arrange the murder of a victim in a statutory sodomy case. Jon Mark Wilson pleaded guilty Tuesday to using a cell phone and crossing state lines in commission of a murder for hire. He admitted that he paid an undercover agent $2,000 to murder the victim in a statutory sodomy case. Prosecutors said Wilson asked another person in January 2019 to arrange the murder. That person contacted law enforcement and arranged a meeting with the undercover officer in Kansas City, Kansas. Wilson was arrested after he gave the officer $2,000 and agreed to pay $5,000 more after the murder.

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Wichita Policeman Sentenced in Arrest Avoidance Case

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) - A former Wichita police officer has been sentenced to a year of probation after he admitted helping a woman avoid arrest.  A probable cause statement says that on May 3, 2019, Matthew Power told a woman who was wanted on a warrant that officers were coming to arrest her. The woman was taken into custody about two weeks later.  KAKE-TV reports the woman told detectives that Powell had helped her avoid arrest for months.  Powell would serve a year in jail if he violates probation.  He also cannot be certified again to work as law enforcement officer.

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Former Kansas Utility Worker to Change Plea in Water Scam

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) - A former Kansas utility worker accused of remotely tampering with a public water system's cleaning procedures has notified a federal court that he plans to change his plea.  Wyatt Travnichek was indicted in March with remotely accessing the Post Rock Rural Water District's systems in March 2019, about two months after he quit his job with the utility.  He initially pleaded not guilty to the charge.  He's accused of shutting down the facility's cleaning and disinfecting procedures.  A notation entered in the docket Monday shows his change-of-plea hearing is set for October 20th before U.S. District Judge Toby Crouse in Topeka.

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5 Missouri Boarding School Employees Charged with Abuse

STOCKTON, Mo. (AP) — A southwest Missouri prosecutor is charging five employees of a private Christian boarding school with abusing students. Cedar County Prosecuting Attorney Ty Gaither announced Tuesday that the five Agape Boarding School employees will be charged with a total of 13 third-degree felony assault counts. The Missouri Attorney General's Office had recommended prosecuting 22 staffers of the school near Stockton with 65 counts on behalf of 36 victims. Attorney General Eric Schmitt asked Governor Mike Parson to take his office off the case last week, saying Gaither didn't plan to seek justice for all the students who say they were abused.

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Conservative Koch Network Disavows Bans on Critical Race Theory in Schools

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A prominent backer of Republican causes and candidates is notably absent from efforts by conservative political groups to ban in schools what they call critical race theory. Leaders in the network built by the billionaire Koch family say they oppose government bans on the discussion of any concepts. Koch's philanthropic decision-makers say government stifling of debate runs counter to principles of democracy and the network's own efforts to improve the nation's social climate. However, their record of support for policymaking organizations and candidates working to advance such bans has sparked new cries of hypocrisy from critics. The headquarters for Koch Industries is based in Wichita.

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Settlement Saves Kansas School Districts Money on Gas Bills

TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) - A settlement will save almost 200 Kansas school districts millions of dollars they owe for natural gas bills from February's record-setting cold snap.  During the winter storm, the price of natural gas went from about $2 per unit to  more than $600.  The Kansas News Service reports that means many districts had bills for one month totaling what they would normally pay in an entire year.  Austin Harris works for the Kansas Association of School Boards, which negotiates gas prices for most school districts.  He says the settlement will cut many of the bills in half, ultimately saving more than $4 million.  In the settlement, the districts agreed to pay the smaller amount in a single lump sum instead of payments spread out over the coming years.

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Western Wildfires Affecting Air Quality in the Midwest

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (NPR's Midwest Newsroom) - Wildfires in California have been on the rise. Now, a new investigation shows how those blazes are affecting air quality, here in the Midwest.  Hundreds of miles of desert, mountain ranges and prairies keep Midwesterners safe from the immediate harm of wildfires on the West Coast.  But an investigation by the NPR California Newsroom and Stanford University shows these fires are increasingly producing smoke that makes its way into air in the Midwest.  Western Kansas and western Nebraska are two areas in the region with the highest increase in smoke days, or days when there’s wildfire smoke in the air. Particles from smoke can impact heart and lung health.  Increases in smoke days are more modest in the eastern parts of the two states, including Kansas City. But Kansas Citians were warned in August to limit outdoor activity as smoke from Canadian wildfires swept through the area. Experts say that drier conditions from climate change means more fires and eventually more smoke in the Midwest.  

The Midwest Newsroom is a collaboration between NPR and member stations in Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and Iowa.

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Sexual Assault Cases Spur Protests on Campuses in Kansas and Across the U.S.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) - Reports of sexual assaults have fueled protests on at least eight U.S. college campuses just weeks into the new school year. Victims' advocates say more young people are vulnerable this year as they settle into campus life after learning remotely because of the pandemic. They also say students seem more engaged in speaking out against campus sexual assault and adept at drumming up support for the cause social media. Sexual assault allegations have led students to demonstrate over the past month at colleges in Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Alabama, Michigan, Massachusetts and Missouri. Advocates say COVID-19 restrictions last year kept some sophomores from fully settling into college life, making them more vulnerable to assaults.

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Pilot Program for Prison Mail in Ellsworth Raises Civil Rights Concerns

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) - Kansas has launched a pilot program for mail handling at the Ellsworth Correctional Facility that aims to stem rising drug use by inmates at facilities. It involves scanning incoming mail and passing along only copies to inmates. The originals are destroyed. Corrections officials contend there have been increased cases of the synthetic drug K2 being soaked into sheets of paper and sent into prisons via the mail. Kansas plans to expand the process throughout its prison system, if it proves successful at Ellsworth. Criminal justice reform activists and legal advocates worry about privacy concerns. They argue the power of holding a hand-drawn card from your child shouldn't be underestimated.

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Blood Donations Urgently Needed; American Red Cross Reports Worst Blood Shortage Since 2015

LAWRENCE, Kan. (KPR) - The American Red Cross is experiencing an emergency blood shortage, the worst in six years. A sharp drop in blood donor turnout has contributed to the lowest post-summer blood inventory level since 2015.  In some areas, the blood inventory is less than a day's supply. Officials say they must collect 10,000 additional blood products each week over the next month for the blood supply to recover and meet hospital and patient needs. Donors of all blood types are needed, but especially those with type O blood.  The blood shortage is now so severe that the Red Cross is giving away prizes to those who donate. Those who give blood soon could get a limited-edition, football-inspired Red Cross T-shirt, free haircut coupons from Sport Clips and a coupon for a free Zaxby’s® chicken Sandwich or other freebies.  More information is available at RedCrossBlood.org. ( Read more.)

To Make an appointment to give blood or platelets, use the Red Cross Blood Donor App, visit RedCrossBlood.org or call (800) RED CROSS (800-733-2767). 

Find a list of area blood drives.

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These area headlines are curated by KPR news staffers, including J. Schafer, Laura Lorson, Kaye McIntyre and Tom Parkinson. Our headlines are generally posted by 10 am weekdays. This news summary is made possible by KPR listener-members. Become one today!