Midwest Flooding Leads to Evacuations; Road, School Closings
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — As the Mississippi River continues to surge, flash flooding along Kansas creeks and streams is forcing people from their homes, closing roads and prompting schools to call off classes. Emergency management officials began evacuating an area about 5 miles west of the Kansas college town of Manhattan around 5 am today (WED). Evacuations also are underway in part of Marion County in the central part of the state. Near the Oklahoma border, flooding closed a stretch of the Kansas Turnpike. And there were numerous water rescues in Augusta, which is about 25 miles east of Wichita. Flash flood watches also are in effect in Missouri, Nebraska, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas, as well as flood warnings along the Mississippi River.
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Welfare Oversight Plan Dropped at End of Legislative Session
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Lawmakers dropped a plan to increase oversight of Kansas's troubled child welfare system in the final hours of their annual session. The Wichita Eagle and The Kansas City Star report that the provision that was eliminated would have created a committee that could have summoned officials to explain problems, drafted legislation and provided frustrated parents with a place to vent. Some advocates saw the panel as their last, best hope to make progress after a year that began with high expectations but ended in disappointment. The measure fell apart after it became caught up in the legislative battle over Medicaid expansion. Kansas's child welfare system has been under stress for years. Problems include child deaths, problems recruiting and retaining staff and dozens of children missing from foster care.
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Kansas Prisons Get More Money; Provisions Worry Officials
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) _ Democratic Governor Laura Kelly and Republican legislators agreed that the Kansas prison system needed funds to boost employees' pay, deal with inmate crowding and address other problems. They also agreed on a figure of almost $36 million. But the Department of Corrections, Kelly and fellow Democrats are unhappy because of strings Republican legislators attached to the new funds. One provision blocks a plan to temporarily close a cell house at a maximum-security prison for men because of staffing problems there. Interim Corrections Secretary Roger Werholtz said another provision could thwart the department's plans to create new space for female inmates. And legislative leaders must sign off on how the prison system spends much of the money. Republicans argue the oversight is needed because of the size of the spending increase.
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Wichita Police: 7 Injured When Car Hits Van
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Wichita police say seven people were injured after a vehicle driven by a teenager crashed into a van carrying disabled people. KSN-TV reports Sgt. Bill Stevens says the seven people in the van were taken to the hospital but their injuries were not considered life-threatening. The crash happened Tuesday afternoon in west Wichita. Police say the teenager's car ran a stop sign and hit the van. Stevens says a preliminary investigation indicates the car driver was under the influence of something. He has been taken into custody.
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Kansas Lawmaker Arrested for DUI, Vehicle Found in Ditch
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas legislator has been arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence after his vehicle was found in a ditch in east Topeka. Police said officers found Democratic state Sen. Vic Miller of Topeka uninjured inside his vehicle late Monday night after receiving a report of a vehicle crashed in the ditch. Officers took Miller to the Shawnee County jail, where he was booked early Tuesday on suspicion of driving under the influence and inattentive driving. The county Department of Corrections said Miller was released after posting a $1,000 bond. Miller declined comment Tuesday afternoon. Miller held several local offices and served in the Kansas House before Democrats picked him in November to fill the Senate seat that Governor Laura Kelly held before her election last year.
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Police: Shooting Suspect Lied About Being a Bail Bondsman
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a man who shot and wounded another man outside a Topeka motel falsely claimed that he was a bail bondsman who was attempting to take a suspect into custody. Topeka police say 36-year-old Durante Dewayne Jones was booked into jail on suspicion of aggravated false impersonation and being in possession of a firearm despite past felony drug and obstruction convictions. Police initially said that the bondsman fired Monday when the suspect attempted to strike him with a large metal object at the Traveler's Inn. Police described the wounded man's injuries as non-life threatening. No one else was hurt. Police spokeswoman Gretchen Koenen says it was later confirmed that Jones was not a bondsman. She said she didn't have information about a motive, noting that the investigation is ongoing.
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Kansas Water Park Where Boy Died Appears Unlikely to Open
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas water park where a 10-year-old boy was decapitated isn't hiring lifeguards, advertising or selling tickets with less than a month left before its typical Memorial Day weekend opening date. Schlitterbahn remains mum on its plans but has largely removed reference from its website about the Kansas City, Kansas, park where Caleb Schwab was killed in 2016 on the 17-story Verruckt slide. Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas, spokesman Mike Taylor says officials are assuming the park won't open this summer. They are hopeful it will come under new ownership and open next year. Speculation about a potential sale was fueled by mortgage lender, EPR Properties, announcing last week that Schlitterbahn is expected to pay off its approximately $190 million loan on the property soon.
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Man Admits to Illegally Getting Drugs from Pharmacist-Wife
SALINA, Kan. (AP) — A Salina man has admitted to illegally getting stolen prescription drugs from his wife before she lost her pharmacist license. The U.S. attorney's office says 29-year-old Dalton Hartley pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court in Wichita to one count of acquiring controlled substances through fraud. Prosecutors said in a news release that he received 450 tablets of the painkiller hydrocodone and 360 tablets of the sedative alprazolam from his wife, Kirsty Hartley. He admitted in his plea that he knew she was altering legitimate prescriptions while she was working at a CVS Pharmacy in Salina in order to divert the medications to him. His wife entered a guilty plea in the case last month. It has been recommended that they be sentenced to 18 months of house arrest.
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Warden: No Idea Why Accused Instructor Was Retained So Long
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A women's prison warden says she doesn't know why the Kansas Department of Corrections retained until December a dental lab instructor who was accused of sexually harassing an inmate two years ago. The Topeka Capital-Journal reported Wednesday that Warden Shannon Meyer recommended firing Tomas Co after an internal investigation in early 2017. Co supervised a program teaching inmates to make dentures. He was charged last month with seven counts of unlawful sexual relations involving female inmates. The Capital-Journal says state and federal auditors recommended Co's firing after the 2017 incident but he continued to work until he was placed on administrative leave in November 2018. Interim corrections department Secretary Roger Werholtz, appointed by Gov. Laura Kelly in January, says current leadership would have dismissed Co based on the 2017 investigation.
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Fleeing Driver in Crash That Killed 2 Booked into Jail
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A fleeing driver suspected in a Wichita crash that killed two people and injured her passenger and two others is out of the hospital and in jail. The Wichita Eagle reports that 24-year-old Mia Collins was booked Tuesday night on suspicion of two counts of first-degree murder. Police say she had been in the hospital since leading officers on a chase Sunday in a stolen BMW. After about 1 mile (1.6 kilometers), the car collided with a car and another SUV at an intersection. The crash killed 70-year-old Maria Wood and 12-year-old Rosemary McElroy and critically injured Wood's daughter, 36-year-old Jenny Wood, a popular Wichita musician known for performing with children. The driver of the SUV that was hit also was hurt. Collins was on probation at the time.
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Man Dies After Crashing ATV into Tree in Southeast Kansas
INDEPENDENCE, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a 29-year-old man has died after crashing an all-terrain vehicle into a tree in southeast Kansas. The Montgomery County Sheriff's Office identified the man Tuesday in a Facebook post as Jacob Morse. The post says deputies went to an Independence hospital Monday after Morse was rushed there in a non-emergency vehicle. He died of his injuries. Witnesses said Morse crashed on the north side of the nearby Montgomery State Fishing Lake. The crash was deemed accidental.
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Man Jailed After 8-Year-Old Girl Escapes Attempted Abduction
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Wichita police say a man trying to kidnap an 8-year-old girl ran away when she started screaming. Police Capt. Brent Allred said the girl was playing outside a Wichita motel Sunday with her 8-year-old cousin when a man identified as 39-year-old Daniel Withrow grabbed her and forced her into a storage shed. He says Withrow ran when the girl screamed. She was not physically hurt. Police say Withrow is a lawn maintenance subcontractor. Allred said the girl didn't know him. The Wichita Eagle reports Kansas prison records show he was convicted of aggravated indecent liberties with a child in a 1999 Reno County case. He also has prior criminal gun possession and drug convictions. Withrow remained in the Sedgwick County Jail Tuesday on suspicion of kidnapping. His bond is $100,000.
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Inmate Dead in Jail Cell was Suspect in Death of Army Veteran
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Sedgwick County authorities say a man charged with killing an elderly Army veteran was found dead in his jail cell on Saturday. The sheriff's office said in a news release that preliminary reports indicate 36-year-old Austin Lee Stewart of Wichita died of self-inflicted asphyxiation from a bed sheet but an official cause of death has not been determined. The Wichita Eagle reports Stewart was found unresponsive in his cell Saturday night and efforts to revive him failed. Stewart was charged with first-degree murder, aggravated robbery and theft in the November 29 beating and asphyxiation death of 88-year-old Floyd Gilbert. Court records say Gilbert died during an attempted robbery. Stewart and another man apparently targeted Gilbert because they thought he kept cash and guns in a safe in his home.
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Police ID Driver Who Died After Council Bluffs Chase
COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa (AP) — Authorities have identified a driver who died following a three-vehicle chase and shooting in Council Bluffs. Police say 18-year-old Ethan Edgar, of Hutchinson, Kansas, was killed. Police say the incident began when a man and several of his friends went looking for the man's stolen car Monday afternoon. When the group spotted the car at a gas station, they used the two cars they were in to box in the stolen car. Police say Edgar, who was driving the stolen car, rammed the other cars in an attempt to flee. That's when a passenger in one of the rammed cars began shooting at Edgar, and a chase ensued before Edgar crashed. Edgar was taken to a hospital in neighboring Omaha, Nebraska, where he died. Police say his injuries included two gunshot wounds. Police questioned but didn't arrest the Omaha shooter or other men. The Pottawattamie County Attorney is expected to present evidence to a grand jury to determine if criminal charges will be filed.
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Massachusetts Couple Gives $20 Million to Kansas State
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — A Massachusetts couple is donating $20 million to Kansas State University's College of Business Administration. The college said in a news release that the gift from Paul and Sandra Edgerley of Brookline, Massachusetts, will fund a new Digital Learning Repository and a new Center for Financial Analysis. It also is expected to help the business college's goals of improving the four-year graduation rate and increasing enrollment by 500 students, including more multicultural students. Other goals include increasing contact between students and businesses, providing more internships, and improving job offers and average starting salaries of its graduates. The Edgeleys' gift brings the business college nearly halfway to its goal of doubling its endowment from $50 million to $100 million by 2021. Paul Edgerley earned an accounting degree from Kansas State in 1978.
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Owners Say Miniature Horse Killed, Dismembered in Missouri
BETHANY, Mo. (AP) — The owners of a miniature horse are demanding justice after the animal was found shot and dismembered in northwest Missouri. The Kansas City Star reports that Tharp's Horse Shoeing in Bethany posted on Facebook that the 30-inch horse, Quigley, was "tortured for no reason." Bethany police say the crime is under investigation. No arrests have been made. Police Chief Brian Groom says officers believe the horse's death is an isolated incident. Quigley's owners say the 4-year-old horse was found in the owner's pasture.