Authorities: Man Who Made Threats at Rural Kansas Home Shot and Killed by Deputy
RANSOM, Kan. (AP) — An armed man was shot and killed by a sheriff's deputy Tuesday in central Kansas. Deputies coaxed the man out of a house in Ransom where he had been making threats and then, authorities say, he fired a weapon. The Kansas Bureau of Investigation says it's reviewing the fatal police shooting of 46-year-old Jesse Nicholls.
The KBI says Ness County deputies responded to 911 calls about an armed man making threats inside a house. A deputy spoke with Nicholls on the phone and then convinced him to come out of the house. Outside, Nicholls followed instructions to put his pistol down, the bureau said. But then he picked it up again and fired at the ground. A Ness County deputy immediately fired at Nicholls, striking him repeatedly. He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. The bureau has not released the name of the deputy, and the Ness County Sheriff's Office has not commented on the case. No deputies were hurt.
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Multiple People Indicted in Kansas City for Trafficking Meth
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (KPR) – A federal grand jury in Kansas City has returned an indictment charging multiple people for their alleged involvement in a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine in Kansas and elsewhere between 2020 and this year. Most of those charged are from the Kansas City metro. Two other defendants are from Seneca and Dodge City. Prosecutors say all were involved with the possession and distribution of methamphetamine. One of the defendants is also charged with money laundering.
According to court documents, 43-year-old Jose Roman, 32-year-old Marcos Valencia Jr, 37-year-old Ezequil Castro and Juan Gonzalez - all from Kansas City, Kansas - are charged. In addition, 28-year-old Manuel Alvarez, of Seneca, and 32-year-old Manuel Faudoa, of Dodge City and 21-year-old Gerardo Sierra-Martinez, of Kansas City, Missouri, are also charged.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Jackson County, Missouri Drug Task Force, the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department, the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Nebraska Highway Patrol, and the Midwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) Program are investigating the case.
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Fund Established for Family of Fallen Kansas Officer
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KNS) — Law enforcement officers from around the region took part in a Tuesday procession to take the body of fallen Fairway police officer Jonah Oswald to a funeral home in Shawnee. Funeral arrangements are pending. The 29-year-old officer was a 4-year veteran of the Fairway Police Department. He was shot and critically wounded in a confrontation with auto theft suspects inside a convenience store in Mission Sunday morning. He died at the University of Kansas Medical Center on Monday. Oswald is survived by his wife and two young children. The City of Fairway has established a fund for donations to Oswald's family. Donations are now being accepted through the Public Safety Credit Union. Fairway officials say Oswald’s family will receive 100% of donations made in his honor.
(– Earlier reporting–)
Kansas Officer Dies from Injuries After Being Shot While Responding to Car Theft
MISSION, Kan. (FOX NEWS / KCTV) — A Kansas police officer who was shot over the weekend while responding to a suspected car theft has died from his injuries. The Fairway Police Department announced Monday that 29-year-old officer Jonah Oswald died after he was critically wounded in a shooting Sunday morning. Fox News reports that Oswald leaves behind a wife and two young children. He was a four-year veteran of the police department.
"I am heartbroken at the tragic loss of Officer Jonah Oswald, who made the ultimate sacrifice while carrying out his oath to serve and protect," Fairway Chief of Police J.P. Thurlo said in a statement. "Officer Oswald was an integral part of our team and made significant contributions to our department and to the Fairway community. We will remember him as a warm-hearted individual whose hard work and passion touched the lives of many."
KCTV reports that Lenexa police responded to reports of a stolen car at a QuikTrip convenient store located at 95th Street and Interstate 35 in Lenexa around 7:30 am Sunday. When officers arrived, the suspect driving the stolen vehicle allegedly struck a police car and drove off heading north on I-35. The driver arrived at another QuikTrip location on Lamar Avenue and the two people in the vehicle ran inside. Multiple law enforcement agencies responded to the incident, including the Fairway Police Department, Kansas Highway Patrol and the Mission Police Department.
A shooting took place between the suspects and law enforcement, which is when Oswald was struck by gunfire. He was transported to a hospital in critical condition and was pronounced dead on Monday.
One of the suspects, 40-year-old Shannon Wayne Marshall, was shot and killed. The other suspect, 32-year-old Andrea Rene Cothran, was arrested and charged with aggravated assault. The case remains under investigation.
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Kansas Abortion Providers Seek Injunction to Stop New Law
OLATHE, Kan. (KNS/KCUR) — A district court judge in Johnson County hopes to decide “in short order” whether to temporarily block a Kansas abortion law. Critics say the law makes it harder to access and provide an abortion. Abortion providers are after a temporary injunction of the law, which they say adds burdensome regulations and requires health care workers to spread false information. Though the judge has not yet made a decision, he did question the state’s arguments. Planned Parenthood Great Plains CEO Emily Wales took the inquiries as a sign he understands the burden on providers. “This is not about the Supreme Court. It's not about regulations or laws that are far removed from people's lives," she said. "This is about people who are seeking care today in KCK, in Overland Park, in Wichita.” Both parties have agreed the new provisions won’t be enforced until the state court decides on the matter.
(–Additional reporting–)
In Kansas and Utah, State Courts Flex Power over New Laws Regulating Abortion
OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — State courts have become hot spots in the national abortion debate, with Utah's top court and a Kansas judge considering Tuesday whether their state constitutions require them to block or invalidate laws regulating the procedure more than a year after Roe v. Wade was overturned. The U.S. Supreme Court's June 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson transformed what was long a debate over the U.S. Constitution, immediately limiting the pathways abortion advocates could take in challenging restrictions from one state to the next. "State courts are incredibly important in this moment when patients are having difficulty accessing abortion because many states have banned it entirely so patients are traveling hundreds or even thousands of miles," Alice Wang, a Center for Reproductive Rights attorney, told reporters after arguing providers' case in a courtroom in the Kansas City area.
In Kansas, the legal battle is over how providers dispense abortion medications, what they must tell patients and a required 24-hour wait for an abortion after information required by the state is provided to the patient. Questions about those restrictions hinge on the state constitution — and on the Kansas Supreme Court's 2019 decision declaring bodily autonomy a "fundamental" right that protects abortion access. Kansas doesn't ban most abortions until the 22nd week of pregnancy.
Judge K. Christopher Jayaram was skeptical of parts of those requirements, including provisions in place for years, but did not rule from the bench. He repeatedly questioned an attorney for the anti-abortion Alliance Defending Freedom who was arguing for the state.
The new Kansas law, which took effect July 1, requires providers to tell patients a medication abortion can be stopped once it is started with a regimen that major medical groups call unproven and potentially dangerous. While the state is free to regulate an area of medical "uncertainty," Jayaram told the alliance's attorney, Denise Harle, that the medical literature he's read suggests there's no good, valid study supporting the regimen. "I'm concerned about that," he said.
The state and the providers mutually agreed that the new law wouldn't be enforced at least until Jayaram decides whether to block the law and the other requirements while a trial of the providers' lawsuit against it goes forward.
Harle said those requirements don't limit bodily autonomy but bolster it by giving patients more information.
"It's not a right to unregulated abortion," she said in court.
In Utah, the state's attorneys want the state Supreme Court to overrule a lower court's decision to put a 2020 state law banning most abortions on hold. They argued the "original public meaning" of the state constitution drafted in the Mormon Pioneer era in 1895 didn't guarantee a right to abortion. "There is no constitutional text, history or common law tradition that can support it, and yet the state's law has been under way for one year and 28 days, allowing thousands of abortions to proceed," said Taylor Meehan, Utah's outside counsel, echoing an argument Kansas made before the 2019 decision of its highest court.
The Kansas and Utah cases reflect how the impact of the overturning of Roe remains unsettled 13 months later. Republican-controlled legislatures, including in Utah and Kansas, have since pushed to tighten laws surrounding abortion, prompting fierce court battles from the doctors and clinics providing them. Kansas voters scrambled the national debate last year by decisively rejecting a proposed change in the state constitution sought by GOP lawmakers to say it doesn't grant a right to abortion. Anti-abortion groups warned that without the change — and its rebuke of the Kansas Supreme Court — the state's existing restrictions could fall.
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K-State President Reduces Workload to Battle Cancer
MANHATTAN, Kan. (KNS) — The president of Kansas State University, Richard Linton, is partially stepping aside after being diagnosed with throat and tongue cancer. Linton was named president of K-State last February, but he’ll now need daily cancer treatments in Kansas City. He will stay as involved with the university as he can, but while he gets treatment, Senior Vice President and Chief of Staff Marshall Stewart will step up and help run the college. Linton is not permanently stepping down and says his cancer is treatable.
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Lawrence Votes to Ban Single-Use Plastic Bags
LAWRENCE, Kan. (LJW) — Lawrence city leaders have approved an ordinance that imposes a ban on single-use disposable plastic bags. The Lawrence Journal World reports that after years of public debate, the ordinance passed by a 3-2 vote at Tuesday's meeting. Besides banning the kinds of plastic bags commonly used by grocery stores, the ordinance also established a system of fines for stores that violate the ban. The ordinance will take effect March 1, 2024.
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Study: Kansas Rural Hospitals in Trouble
UNDATED (KPR/KCUR) — Rural hospitals are in trouble, and according to a new study, Kansas stands to lose more of them than any other state. Many rural hospitals are not making enough money to cover their bills. They often struggle to attract doctors and nurses willing to work in small towns. So, many are cutting services. Dozens have closed, and hundreds more are in serious trouble. The Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform reviewed hospital financials and found that some 300 rural hospitals nationwide are at what the study calls “immediate risk of closing." That includes 29 hospitals in Kansas, the most in any state. Missouri has 8 hospitals in the same predicament. Kansas Governor Laura Kelly has said repeatedly that expanding Medicaid would help rural hospitals balance their books and keep them from closing.
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Kansas Plans to Eliminate Specialized Services Waitlist
TOPEKA, Kan. (KNS) — It could cost Kansas between $29 million and $40 million to eliminate a waitlist for specialized services for disabled residents. The program, known as an IDD waiver, is designed to give intellectually disabled kids case management services and financial support. But families sit on the waitlist for about 10 years before they get help. So, the state is looking to create a new waiver. It will take people off the waitlist and put them in line for the new community support system. The hope is that two waiver systems offering different levels of support will get people services faster. Republican Representative Will Carpenter hopes it could cut the waitlist time in half. "A lot of states are doing this same thing. It's not like we're reinventing the wheel here," he said. It could take two years to get the new waiver approved by the federal government.
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University of Kansas Selects Contractor for $335 Million Stadium Upgrade
LAWRENCE, Kan. (KPR) — The University of Kansas has selected Turner Construction Company for the $335 million upgrade to KU's century-old football stadium. The modernization effort will include construction of a new hotel, a meeting hall and related amenities. Plans call for outfitting the 47,000-seat David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium with modern amenities, redesigned seating and club seats and suites. The stadium will also be renovated with expanded concession areas and restrooms, increased accessibility and an improved concourse.
According to the website Engineering News-Record, the project also includes construction of a convention space and related development, plus streetscape and infrastructure improvements. KU plans to fund the work in part with a $50-million Kansas Department of Commerce grant, $35 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds approved last year by state lawmakers and $150 million in donations.
Turner has already provided construction management services for 25 projects at KU, including 16 for Kansas Athletics. The work, scheduled for completion in September 2026, is expected to create 2,600 construction jobs.
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15-Year-Old Kansas Boy Killed After Pickup Crashes into Bridge Rail
COUNCIL GROVE, Kan. (KAKE) — A 15-year-old Kansas boy died over the weekend after the pickup truck he was driving crashed into a bridge rail. KAKE TV reports that Kolter Litke, of Council Grove, was taken to a local hospital where he was later pronounced dead. The Morris County Sheriff's Office was notified just before 11 am Sunday about a crash south of Wilsey. A deputy arrived to find a wrecked Chevy truck. The deputy began performing CPR on the driver but to no avail. The investigation indicates the pickup went off the roadway and hit a concrete bridge rail. It's unclear what caused the vehicle to leave the road.
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Conservation Group Sues Kansas to Enforce Quivira Water Rights
TOPEKA, Kan. (TCJ) — A lawsuit filed last month in Shawnee County District Court seeks to force the state to enforce the water rights for the Quivira National Wildlife Refuge. According to the Topeka Capital-Journal, Audubon of Kansas filed a motion seeking to enforce the refuge's water right at the expense of farmers and other landowners in the Rattlesnake Creek Basin in south-central Kansas.
Negotiations between the refuge and landowners have been ongoing for several years, but the conservation group says a lack of progress led to the filing. The latest lawsuit comes on the heels of an earlier suit filed in U.S. District Court. A federal appeals court dismissed that lawsuit earlier this year.
Many areas of the state have been hit by a drought, and the water table in the Quivira area has declined slightly. Audubon says that drought buts thousands of birds at risk, including numerous endangered species, that migrate through the area each year. The Quivira National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1955 and is listed as a Wetland of Global Importance.
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Deadline Looms for Veterans to Apply for Retroactive Health Care Benefits
WICHITA, Kan. (KNS/KMUW) — Veterans have until today (WED) to apply for backdated health and disability benefits offered by a new law. The PACT Act expands health care and benefits for veterans who were exposed to burn pits and other toxic substances used in war. The substances can cause cancer and respiratory illnesses. President Joe Biden signed the act into law last year. Veterans can still apply after August 9th, but they won’t be eligible for benefits backdated by up to one year. David Jackson, with the Wichita Veteran's Affairs office, says veterans should apply quickly. "I’ve seen retroactive payments of tens of thousands or even a hundred thousand dollars for people having conditions. That’s life changing for a veteran," he said. The act means veterans no longer have to prove that exposure to toxic substances during their service caused certain health conditions. Visit va.gov to learn more.
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New App Seeks to Help Declining Bee Populations
UNDATED (KNS) — Scientists hope to speed up research on pollinators with artificial intelligence and the public’s help. The new Bee Machine app identifies bees that people photograph in the wild with their smartphones. This could help scientists track increasingly hard-to-find species, like the American Bumblebee, and identify tricky species that look similar to each other.
Kansas State University entomologist Brian Spiesman created Bee Machine and says the app is still learning to identify many lesser-known bees. “Probably a lot of the general public doesn't even realize they’re bees, because they're so small," says Spiesman. "They're very important no only for agriculture, but for our natural ecosystem." Native bees pollinate many plants that European honeybees cannot.
Many insect species are declining globally and scientists are scrambling to piece together a better picture of what’s happening.
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This summary of area news is curated by KPR news staffers, including J. Schafer, Laura Lorson, Tom Parkinson and Kaye McIntyre. Our headlines are generally posted by 10 am weekdays and updated throughout the day. These ad-free headlines are made possible by KPR members. Become one today. You can also follow KPR News on Twitter.