WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Authorities are planning a memorial service for a police dog that was killed during an exchange of gunfire in which a suspect was killed.
Police say the memorial for the 6-year-old Belgian Malinois, named Rooster, is planned for Friday. Police dog handlers from across the state are coming. The shooting happened earlier this month at a mobile home park on the south side of the city.
Officers responding to a domestic disturbance surrounded a home before 25-year-old Kevin Perry walked out with a gun in his waistband. Rooster was sent after the suspect to stop him from re-entering the home. That’s when gunfire was exchanged, striking both the dog and the man.
Sgt. Nikki Woodrow says authorities believe the suspect shot the dog, but an investigation is being conducted.
HUTCHINSON— A Kansas inmate serving time murder and charged in Reno County with two counts of battery of a corrections officer was granted a new attorney during a hearing last week.
The latest crimes by Richard Powell agains prison officers are alleged to have occurred at the Hutchinson Correctional Facility in September of 2015.
Magistrate Judge Cheryl Allen granted his request and Hutchinson attorney Shannon Crane will take over the case.
Powell is serving time for intentional premeditated murder, criminal possession of a firearm, traffic in contraband, voluntary manslaughter and aggravated assault in Wyandotte County in 1992 and 1998.
DODGE CITY -The American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas is asking Dodge City Community College about the school’s language policy.
According to the organization’s web site, they contacted the DCCC president and requested official documents related to an alleged requirement that the College’s cosmetology students speak only English and refrain from speaking Spanish at school. See the letter here.
The March 14, letter points out that 38.7% of the school’s students were Hispanic during the 2016 academic year and that 53.5% of Ford County residents were Hispanic according to 2015 census data.
The letter further pointed out that an English-only requirement would violate the constitutional rights of the school’s students.
Former Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius says she thinks it will take the state “decades” to recover from the effects of the state’s current financial woes.
During an interview Friday, Sebelius was asked by KCUR host Steve Kraske what she made of the state today.
“Well, it breaks my heart,” Sebelius says, noting that the state’s revenue stream had always been “a carefully balanced dance, with a third coming from property tax, a third coming from sales tax and a third coming from income tax.”
That balance, she says, enabled the state to fund schools, infrastructure, science investments and jobs.
“That’s really been greatly undercut, and I think it will take decades to recover from what has been a very difficult period for Kansas,” Sebelius says.
Sebelius, who was secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services during most of the Obama administration, also talks about the Republican bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. As head of the agency, Sebelius oversaw the law’s rollout and implementation.
“I think if you look at the bill and what the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) tells us the impact of the bill will be, it is a very troubling picture,” Sebelius says. “The bill will save some money for the federal government, that’s clear, but it in no way lives up to what President-elect and then President Trump promised, which is health insurance for everybody, at a lower cost and better coverage.”
Sebelius is particularly troubled by CBO estimates that millions would lose health care immediately if the Republican plan passes.
“Lots of people – the estimate is 24 million people over the next 10 years, 14 million immediately – will lose coverage. Huge costs will be shifted from the federal government to states for Medicaid, which has been a 50-year partnership between the state and the federal government for pregnant women and children, disabled individuals, seniors in nursing homes.”
She also says the proposal won’t deliver what Republican lawmakers have promised voters.
“What has been said – we want patient-centered care, we want people to have choices, we want health insurance for everybody – that is not the proposal that is currently before the United States Congress,” Sebelius says.
Sebelius says the congressional debate over health care has been driven more by political considerations than a focus on the people who stand to be most affected by it.
“I find it very, very troubling that there are many members of Congress who talk about this as if it is some sort of a chess match: ‘We need to add a little bit here, we’ve got to win this battle,’” Sebelius says. “This is life and death for about 20 million people who now have financial stability and now have health coverage and protection for them and their families.”
Sebelius now devotes her time to an outfit she formed called Sebelius Resources LLC. She says it’s a vehicle through which she’s working on health and wellness issues in the private sector.
Dan Margolies is KCUR’s health editor. You can reach him on Twitter @DanMargolies.
SHELBY COUNTY, MO – Six people from Southwest Kansas were injured in an accident just before 7 a.m. on Saturday in Shelby County, Missouri.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 2005 Chevy Van driven by Jose M. Gomez-Miranda, 39, Garden City, was eastbound on U.S. 36 just east of Hunnewell.
The van traveled off the right side of the road, hit a field entrance and a road sign.
Gomez-Miranda, Hayde B. Lores-Cortez, 38, and four children all of Garden City, were transported to Hannibal Regional Hospital.
A 7-year-old passenger in the vehicle was not wearing a seat belt, according to the KHP.
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — An Oklahoma food company is recalling more than 466 tons (422 metric tons) of breaded chicken because of possible metal in the food.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture said Friday that OK Food, Inc. is recalling 933,272 pounds of the food shipped nationwide that was produced between Dec. 19, 2016, and March 7, 2017, and includes the number “P-7092” inside the USDA inspection mark.
The USDA said in a news release that contamination came from metal conveyor belts and was discovered Tuesday. An agency spokesman did not immediately return a phone call for further comment.
The agency says there have been no confirmed reports of injury, but consumers should either throw the product away or return it to the place of purchase.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Lottery players soon might be able to buy tickets from vending machines.
The House voted this week in support of the move.
Lottery spokeswoman Sally Lunsford says the measure would increase lottery revenue and cut labor costs for retailers, where ticket buyers could bypass clerks and use the self-service machines. She says 37 other states, including Missouri, Colorado and Oklahoma, use the machines. The Kansas lottery has sought the bill for three years.
Lunsford says vending machines have increased lottery sales by up to 50 percent in other states. Kansas is counting on $12 million in growth over two years. The money would be used for mental health services.
Lottery revenue hit a record last year at $78 million.
Investigators on the scene of Sunday’s murder investigation in Topeka-photo courtesy WIBW TV
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas judge will hear a prosecutor’s bid to have a combined preliminary hearing for four people accused in the Topeka killings of three people.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that Shawnee County District Judge Nancy Parrish will hold a hearing Wednesday on District Attorney Mike Kagay’s request.
The four defendants, ages 19 to 34, are charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of the victims, ages 19 to 38. Police found the bodies after being dispatched to a home to check the well-being of the occupants.
Kagay says in court filings that while the charges against the defendants are connected and warrant just a combined preliminary hearing and not one for each of them, he’s not seeking to try the four defendants in a single trial.
SEDGWICK COUNTY- A Kansas man died in an accident just after 2:30a.m. Saturday in Sedgwick County.
The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2016 Mitsubishi passenger vehicle driven by Damien Ware, 34, Wichita, was south bound on Interstate 235 near MacArthur Road.
The vehicle left the road, entered the median, struck the guardrail, crossed over Interstate 235 to the right shoulder, struck another guardrail and came to rest in the middle of a curve.
The driver of a southbound semi negotiating the curve saw the Mitsubishi but was unable to stop before hitting it.
Ware was pronounced dead at the scene.
The driver of the semi Franklin Jones, 53, Wichita, af was not injured.
Both drivers were properly restrained at the time of the accident, according to the KHP.
The accident closed the interchange in south Wichita for several hours Saturday.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Police in Wichita, Kansas, are investigating after an 18-year-old and two children were wounded when a handgun one of them perhaps was playing with fired.
Police Sgt. Nikki Woodrow says the three victims, including a 12-year-old boy and an 11-year-old boy, sustained injuries not considered life-threatening during the shooting about 9 p.m. Friday.
The victims’ medical statuses were not immediately known Saturday.
Police say a 42-year-old man was driving the van when the teenager shot himself in the hand. The 12-year-old was wounded in the leg and the 11-year-old in the hand.
