Potential Case of Coronavirus Under Investigation in Douglas County
LAWRENCE, Kan. (KPR) — The Kansas Department of Health and Environment says a Douglas County resident is under investigation for potential exposure to the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV). Specimens have been sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for testing. Results are expected Friday. Officials say the patient is not severely ill but is being kept in isolation at the hospital in Lawrence as a precaution. The patient recently spent time in Wuhan, China, where an outbreak of 2019-nCoV has been underway. The patient returned with symptoms similar to those associated with coronavirus. Currently, there are at least five confirmed cases of the virus in the U.S. but that number is predicted to climb. Two new suspected cases of coronavirus are now under investigation in Oklahoma. ( Read more here.)
Health officials say anyone who recently traveled to Wuhan, China and developed a fever with respiratory symptoms should stay home and call a healthcare provider or the KDHE Epidemiology Hotline: (877) 427-7317
Read the Lawrence Journal-World's reporting on this story.
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Man Fatally Shot in Pizza Hut in Kansas City, Kansas
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a man has been fatally shot at a Pizza Hut in Kansas City, Kansas. Police identified the victim Wednesday in a news release as 25-year-old Laron Briggs. He was shot inside the restaurant Tuesday night. Police provided no information about a suspect or motive in the news release.
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Body Found in Burning Car in Wichita
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Authorities are investigating after a body was found in a burning car in Wichita. KFDI-FM reports that the discovery was made around 5 am today (WED) as firefighters were putting out the blaze. The name of the victim hasn't been released, and it wasn't immediately clear what caused the fire.
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Kansas City Man Charged with Beating Aunt to Death with Baseball Bat
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A 33-year-old Kansas City man is charged with beating his aunt to death with a baseball bat. Prosecutors say Darryl Banks was charged Tuesday with second-degree murder and armed criminal action. Officers found his aunt Phillis Banks dead in a chair Sunday night at a Kansas City home. She suffered severe head trauma. Charging documents say officers also found an aluminum bat and knife with apparent blood on them near her body. The Kansas City Star reports a relative told police Darryl Banks and his aunt were the only ones home before she was found dead. Banks is being held on $350,000 bond.
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KU Student Arrested, Suspected of Child Sex Crimes
LAWRENCE, Kan. (LJW) — The Lawrence Journal World reports that an 18-year-old University of Kansas student has been arrested on suspicion of 10 counts of sexual exploitation of a child. Citing Douglas County Jail records, the newspaper reports that the man was arrested this (WED) morning at the Douglas County Judicial and Law Enforcement Center. ( More details in the Lawrence Journal-World.)
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Child Porn Charges Filed Against Kansas Man in Threat Case
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas man accused of threatening on social media to kill President Donald Trump faces additional charges after investigators found child pornography on his cellular phone and elsewhere. Federal prosecutors say 24-year-old Aaron McDowell, of Salina, was charged in a criminal complaint Tuesday with two counts related to the child pornography. That is in addition to the earlier charge filed last week of making a threat against the president. Prosecutors said McDowell wrote on Facebook that he was going to kill the president.
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Winter Storm Leaves Blanket of Snow Across Parts of Kansas, Oklahoma
DODGE CITY, Kan. (AP) — A winter storm has coated roads and closed schools in some parts of Kansas and Oklahoma. The National Weather Service issued a winter storm warning Tuesday for several counties along the western border between the two states, where it predicted up to 7 inches of snowfall. The National Weather Service warned of a "hazardous commute" in a tweet. In Kansas, transportation officials reported Tuesday that many roads in the western part of the state were partially or completely covered. In Oklahoma, transportation officials said blowing snow caused "severe driving conditions" in three Panhandle counties. Far less snow fell overnight in eastern Kansas Tuesday night and this (WED) morning, with many areas reporting an inch or less accumulation.
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Abortion Rights Forces See Tennessee as Warning for Kansas
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Abortion rights advocates are trying to defeat a proposed anti-abortion amendment to the Kansas Constitution by arguing that it will lead to a ban on most abortions like a measure being pursued in Tennessee. The Kansas proposal is aimed at overturning a state Supreme Court decision last year protecting abortion rights and is modeled on a change that Tennessee voters approved in their state's constitution in 2014. The Kansas proposal was up for debate Wednesday in the state Senate. The debate came less a week after Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee announced plans to seek a ban on most abortions.
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Police Arrest Man Accused of Ramming Vehicle into Home
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Authorities have arrested a man who is suspected of ramming into a Wichita home with three children and three adults inside during a domestic disturbance. Thirty-six-year-old Samuel Higgins, of Wichita, is jailed on suspicion of multiple charges, including aggravated assault, battery of a law enforcement officer, criminal damage to property and driving while under the influence. Police said in a news release that he also tried to run over a couple of relatives, rammed into another vehicle and attempted to injure a police officer before he was arrested Tuesday night.
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737 Max Costs Double, Boeing Posts First Loss in 2 Decades
UNDATED (AP) — Boeing is posting its first annual loss in more than two decades and said the costs related to the grounding of its best-selling plane have doubled to more than $18 billion. Production of the 737 Max was suspended after two crashes that killed 346 people. Boeing said Wednesday that it lost $1 billion in the fourth quarter, and revenue is down 37% from a year ago. The company lost $636 million last year, its first full-year loss since 1997. New CEO David Calhoun is criticizing the company's former leadership for not disclosing embarrassing internal communications sooner.
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Driver Charged with Killing 14-Year-Old in Olathe Said He Thought He was Braking
OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — Charging documents say a 71-year-old driver who is charged in the death of a 14-year-old girl told police he thought he was stepping on the brakes when he struck her as she walked home from her suburban Kansas City school. The documents released Tuesday in the case against Sudhir Gandhi, of Lenexa, said that he also told police that when the car continued to accelerate, he decided to steer it away from other vehicles stopped on the road and drive onto a sidewalk. Gandhi is charged with reckless second-degree murder in the death of Alexandra Rumple.
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Native Kansan Becomes First Woman to Coach in Super Bowl
MIAMI (KNS / KPR) — Super Bowl LIV pits the Kansas City Chiefs against the San Francisco 49ers. No matter what happens during Sunday's big game in Miami, one native Kansan will make some sporting history of her own. Katie Sowers will become the first woman to coach in the Super Bowl. Even though Sowers is an assistant coach for the 49ers, she grew up in Hesston, Kansas, and has an image of the Kansas City skyline tattooed on her arm. The 33-year-old woman is one of just three women coaches in the NFL. ( See Greg Echlin's story for more.)
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Kansas Woman Accused of Abandoning Caged, Starving Dog in Dumpster
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Wichita woman faces a misdemeanor count of cruelty to animals after a caged and starving dog was discovered next to a trash dumpster earlier this month. Twenty-six-year-old Raykesha Hardyway made a first appearance in court Tuesday in a case that accuses her of abandoning a pit bull named Kodak without making provisions for its care. Court records do not list a defense attorney for Hardyway. The Wichita Eagle reports that the Wichita Animal Action League is caring for the dog and expects he will be ready for adoption in the spring or early summer.
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Woman Killed when SUV and KHP Vehicle Collide in Western Kansas
DODGE CITY, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a western Kansas police officer was not using lights and sirens when he crashed his patrol vehicle into a car while responding to an emergency call and killed the driver. The Wichita Eagle reports Cpl. Shane Harris was responding to a break-in call Saturday morning when 26-year-old Vanessa Guzman drove into the path of the patrol vehicle in Dodge City. The resulting collision rolled her car over a guardrail. She was ejected as the car rolled and died of her injuries. Harris was treated for a minor injury.
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North Carolina Man Admits Pocketing $685,000 by Defrauding Kansas Employer
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A North Carolina man admitted Tuesday to defrauding his employer in Kansas by placing orders for more than $685,000 for electrical and wire cable, then selling them to another company and pocketing the money. The U.S. attorney's office in Kansas says 48-year-old Coe Downing of Charlotte, North Carolina, pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud. Downing agreed as part of his plea deal to pay restitution of $25,000 to Wachter and $660,323 to the company's insurer. Sentencing is set for April 21.
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Former Missouri Teacher Sentenced to 20 Years for Bathroom Recordings
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A former Missouri teacher was sentenced Tuesday to 20 years in prison for secretly recording videos of three teenagers in his bathroom. Federal prosecutors said the court also ordered 40-year-old William Derek Williams, of Cameron, to serve 10 years of supervised release following his incarceration. He pleaded guilty in August to one count of producing child pornography. Williams was a high school language arts teacher and high school multimedia teacher. The former teacher admitted filming three victims over a five-year period from January 2013 to September 2018 while they were in the basement bathroom of his home.
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Woman Gets 7 Years After KHP Discovers 21 Pounds of Meth in Her Vehicle
RUSSELL, Kan. (AP) — A woman who was stopped in Kansas with 21 pounds of methamphetamine has been sentenced to more than seven years in prison. The U.S. attorney's office says 30-year-old Maria Alonso-Espinoza, who is from Mexico, was sentenced Monday after pleading guilty to one count of possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine. Her brother was driving her car last February when the Kansas Highway Patrol stopped them near Russell. Troopers found the meth hidden in the driver's side rear quarter panel. Prosecutors say Alonso-Espinoza was taking the methamphetamine from Colorado to Wichita for distribution.
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Drop in Missouri Kids on Medicaid Faces Continued Scrutiny
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri officials say parents who no longer qualify for government health care but do not then sign up their children separately are partly to blame for the drop in children's Medicaid coverage. Roughly 100,000 children lost coverage through the program between January 2018 and December 2019. Rep. David Wood says families dropped off the program after renewed efforts to check eligibility in 2018. He says some didn't reapply for their children to be covered separately, even if their kids likely would have qualified. Democrats have been complaining about the drop in coverage for months.
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Kansas, Wisconsin Consider Banning Bias Based on Hairstyles
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Black female legislators in two predominantly white Midwestern states are trying to convince their Republican colleagues to join a national push to outlaw discrimination based on hairstyles such as braids and dreadlocks. Supporters of bills in Kansas and Wisconsin said Tuesday that employers and teachers often wrongly see white people's hair as the standard for what's clean and professional. Committees in both states have proposals to revise anti-discrimination laws to ban bias in housing, employment and public accommodations based on hairstyles "historically associated with race" such as braids, locs and twists. But supporters are facing questions about how such laws could be applied.
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U.S. Postal Employee in Kansas Charged with Embezzlement
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas woman has been charged with embezzling from the U.S. Postal Service while she was an employee. The U.S. attorney's office announced the charge against 37-year-old Kimberly Kirchner, of Atlanta, Kansas, on Tuesday in a news release. The crime is alleged to have occurred this year and last year in Cowley County. If convicted, she faces up to 10 years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000.
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Yikes! Residents of Rose Hill Discover Boa Constrictor in Living Room Couch
ROSE HILL, Kan. (AP) — Firefighters are looking for anyone who might be missing a boa constrictor after some Kansas residents found the 6-foot snake in their living room couch. Police officers responding to a 911 call Monday from a resident in Rose Hill, a town about 20 miles southeast of Wichita, requested assistance from Butler County firefighters. The Wichita Eagle reports that deputy Fire Chief Melvin Linot, the department's "snake charmer" wrangled the nonvenomous snake from the couch with the help of another firefighter. The fire department says in a Facebook post that the residents have lived in the duplex for four years and never owned a snake.
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Analysis: Kansas State University Enrollment Trends Downward
MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) — The number of Kansas residents enrolled at Kansas State University hit a 31-year low last fall, continuing a five-year downturn that may worsen despite efforts to reverse it. The Manhattan Mercury reported that its analysis of enrollment and population data shows similar drops in enrollment for non-resident and resident students since a 2014 peak of 24,766 total students at the university's Manhattan, Olathe and Salina campuses. The newspaper reported that the downturn has had a more profound effect in student numbers at Kansas State where Kansas students made up about 80% of the student body.
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Democrat: North Dakota's New Elections Chief 'Ineffective'
BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — North Dakota's secretary of state says he has no problem with the state's new elections director, despite complaints that he undermined election security work, created a toxic work environment and broke the law in previous roles elsewhere. Brian Newby started working for North Dakota's secretary of state's office in mid-December. Newby was the top election official in Johnson County, Kansas, before leaving to become executive director of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission from 2015 to 2019. Politico last year reported about management troubles at the federal agency under Newby's tenure. Newby this week told The Bismarck Tribune that he's proud of what he accomplished there and blamed the “political environment” for the allegations leveled against him.
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KPR's daily headlines are generally posted by 10 am weekdays and updated throughout the day. KPR's weekend summary is usually published by 1 pm Saturdays and Sundays.
