police on the scene of Sunday’s shooting investigation -photo courtesy WIBW-TV
SHAWNEE COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities continue to investigate a shooting at a home that is a private business which provides residential services to those with special needs.
Just after 3p.m. Sunday, police responded to report of a shooting in the 4100 Block of SW 28th in Topeka, according to a media release.
When officers arrived at the residence they found five individuals in the home with gunshot wounds. Four were pronounced dead at the scene.
One person was transported to a local hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
Police say the individual responsible identified as Joshua Gueary, 25, Topkea is among the deceased.
Police say Gueary shot and killed Larry Gueary, 29, Jesus Galvez, 64, and Soren Galvez, 20, all of Topeka. Jushua Gueary died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to police.
Police continue to investigate at the residence and a vehicle that may have a connection to the crime.
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SHAWNEE COUNTY – Law enforcement authorities are investigating a shooting at a home that is a private business which provides residential services to those with special needs.
Just after 3p.m. Sunday, police responded to report of a shooting in the 4100 Block of SW 28th in Topeka, according to an online media briefing.
When officers arrived at the residence they found five men with gunshot wounds. Four were pronounced dead at the scene.
One person was transported to a local hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
Police believe the individual responsible is among the deceased.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas legislators are returning from their annual spring break to fix the state budget and are waiting to hear whether tax collections met expectations in April.
The Senate was reconvening Monday morning and the House planned to gavel in Monday afternoon.
The state Department of Revenue is releasing a report Monday on tax collections in April. It comes less than two weeks after state officials revised revenue projections to make them a little more optimistic.
Kansas faces projected budget shortfalls totaling $889 million through June 2019. The state’s budget woes developed after GOP lawmakers slashed personal income taxes in 2012 and 2013 at Republican Gov. Sam Brownback’s urging.
Legislators have been focused on rolling back those past income tax cuts despite Brownback’s resistance. He vetoed a tax bill in February.
TOPEKA -Spring storms moving across Kansas this weekend brought a variety of weather issues.
The Kansas Division of Emergency Management activated the State Emergency Operations Center in Topeka on Sunday afternoon to a partial level in response to the severe winter storm system affecting the western region of the state and flooding in southeast Kansas.
The Kansas Department of Transportation reopened Interstate 70 at 5 a.m. Other roads in many areas of western Kansas remained closed.
The National Weather Service reported 17 inches of snow in Thomas County including the city of Colby; Stanton County 16 inches; Scott City and portions of Greeley County 15 inches; Rawlins County, Morton and Grant County 14 inches of snow.
Workers restored power to the city network in Garden City late Sunday afternoon. Localized outages still exist in Finney and other areas of southwest Kansas.
Officials opened Horace Good Middle School in Garden City as an emergency shelter for those in Finney County were still without power or are stranded and unable to get home.
In addition to the snow, officials in three counties in eastern Kansas had flooding.
A blizzard is forcing road closures across Western KS as a different scene unfolds in SE KS. Photo from Adam R. Smith in Frontenac #kswxpic.twitter.com/lc2Ca7Wra5
TOPEKA -Spring storms moving across Kansas this weekend brought a variety of weather issues.
The Kansas Division of Emergency Management activated the State Emergency Operations Center in Topeka on Sunday afternoon to a partial level in response to the severe winter storm system affecting the western region of the state and flooding in southeast Kansas.
At 6 p.m. Saturday, Governor Brownback declared a state of emergency in 13 western Kansas Counties and four more in southeast Kansas.
Early Sunday, the Kansas Department of Transportation closed Interstate 70 in Trego County and then at Hays.
That followed with multiple roads and highways in western Kansas closed due to heavy snowfall and blizzard-like conditions that made them impassible.
A large area of southwest Kansas experienced a major power outage due to the winter weather according to police in Garden City.
Finney County Emergency Management was set to open shelters. The city of Colby declared a snow emergency, according to Thomas County Emergency Management. Officials reported up to 17 inches of snow.
In addition to the snow, heavy rains caused flooding and flash floods in southeast Kansas.
KANSAS CITY – A Kansas City man was charged in federal court Friday with illegally possessing a firearm following the armed robbery of a Jimmy John’s restaurant in Kansas City on Thursday, according to Tom Larson, Acting United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri.
Terry K. Rayford, 54, of Kansas City, was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm in a criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Kansas City.
Caught on camera: robbery at Jimmy Johns, 39th & Broadway, last night. VERY clear video. Can you help ID suspect? https://t.co/AlbgmPFe0n
Friday’s criminal complaint alleges that Rayford was in possession of a Witness-P .45-caliber semi-automatic handgun and a Jimenez 9mm semi-automatic handgun on Thursday, April 27, 2017.
According to an affidavit filed in support of the complaint, the firearms were found in Rayford’s vehicle after he was stopped by Independence, Mo., police officers at approximately 7:30 p.m. Officers received information about a person matching the description of the suspect in an armed robbery at a Jimmy John’s restaurant the day before. A retired major with the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department had seen video of the robbery broadcast on the news and saw Rayford – who appeared to be the robbery suspect – driving in the area of 40 Highway and Crysler in Independence.
Independence police officers responded to the area and stopped Rayford’s vehicle. When they ordered him to get out of his vehicle, officers found the Witness-P .45-caliber semi-automatic handgun lying on the driver’s side floorboard. Rayford was arrested and his vehicle towed. During an inventory of the vehicle, the Jimenez 9mm semi-automatic handgun was found in the back pouch of the front passenger seat.
Rayford told investigators he had stolen both of the handguns from his source of supply for crack cocaine, to whom he owed money.
Under federal law, it is illegal for anyone who has been convicted of a felony to be in possession of any firearm or ammunition. Rayford has numerous felony convictions for first degree armed robbery and he was on parole at the time of the alleged offense.
Larson cautioned that the charge contained in this complaint is simply an accusation, and not evidence of guilt.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A private Catholic university in Kansas is planning to offer a support group for its LGBTQ students, using a model implemented at Notre Dame.
Newman University in Wichita says the group was formed in response to a growing interest to recognize diversity on campus. The group, called “Kaleidoscope,” met this semester but will officially launch next school year.
The Wichita Eagle reports Newman students tried unsuccessfully to form a LGBTQ group in the past. The growing interest prompted formation of committee, which worked over the summer and fall last year.
The club must not contradict Catholic teaching that LGBTQ students should be chaste because sex is condoned only in marriage between a man and woman.
The group will hold supportive meetings and plan events that recognize LGBTQ students.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas judges are backing off an effort to shield jurors’ names in a compromise with transparency advocates who hope to avoid court secrecy.
The Kansas District Judges Association will still seek to keep jurors’ addresses secret under its compromise with the Kansas Press Association. Lawmakers had approved the original bill, but the measure can still be changed before getting final legislative approval.
Transparency advocates had warned that the original effort was part of what they see as a growing trend across the U.S. toward anonymous juries. States where courts don’t have to release jurors’ names include California, Indiana and Oklahoma.
Kansas judges said they want to protect jurors from harassment and stop a “chilling effect” potential jurors’ feel when they have to disclose their information for the public record.
Crime scene in the 800 block of N. Chautauqua -photo courtesy KWCH
SEDGWICK COUNTY- Law enforcement authorities in Sedgwick County are investigating a fatal stabbing and have made two arrests.
Police booked an 18-year-old woman for murder and robbery and a 28-year-old man for murder, robbery, forgery, and resist, according to a social media report from police.
Investigators are not currently looking for anyone else in connection with this homicide. No additional details were released early Sunday.
Just before 4p.m. Friday, officers were dispatched to a home in the 800 block of N. Chautauqua in Wichita. They found the home owner Otto Meyer, an 86-year-old male from Wichita dead from multiple stab wounds, according to a social media report.
At the time, police needed help in locating the victim’s stolen 1989 Chevy, two toned, maroon top and silver on bottom extended cab long bed pickup with Kansas tag 320JWN.
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SEDGWICK COUNTY- Law enforcement authorities in Sedgwick County are investigating a fatal stabbing and need help to locate a vehicle.
Just before 4p.m. Friday, officers were dispatched to a home in the 800 block of N. Chautauqua in Wichita. They found the home owner Otto Meyer, an 86-year-old man from Wichita dead from multiple stab wounds, according to a social media report.
Police need help in locating the victim’s stolen 1989 Chevy, two toned, maroon top and silver on bottom extended cab long bed pickup with Kansas tag 320JWN.
Gov. Sam Brownback has vetoed two bills this session: one to increase taxes and the other to expand Medicaid. Legislators return Monday to Topeka for the wrap-up session, when they must craft a tax plan.-file photo KPR
Gov. Sam Brownback kicked off the Kansas legislative session by drawing lines in the sand on taxes, spending and Medicaid expansion, and he has defended those positions with his veto pen.
The question when lawmakers return Monday to Topeka is whether those vetoes will hold up.
In January Brownback stood before Kansas lawmakers packed into the House chamber for the State of the State address. He took a preemptive strike against Medicaid expansion, saying the Obama-era health care law was in trouble.
“It would be foolish to endorse Obamacare expansion of Medicaid now, akin to airlifting onto the Titanic,” he said. “Kansas was right. We should stay the course.”
On taxes, Brownback defended his income tax exemption for businesses, saying it had grown jobs. His budget plan would keep it.
“The days of ‘tax first, cut never’ have come to an end,” the governor said.
Fast forward a month, and lawmakers were stepping across the line Brownback had drawn in the sand. They voted to roll back many of the 2012 tax cuts.
Brownback fired back during a Kansas Chamber of Commerce dinner.
“I won’t sign it. I will veto this bill. This is bad policy,” Brownback said to a cheering crowd of business officials.
A veto override attempt fell three votes short in the Senate.
‘Tired Of Giving’
Republican Sen. Barbara Bollier said lawmakers may come back with another plan to raise revenues, this time with more supporters.
“For me it looks more that we’re going to have to go to an override, which means some people are going to have to change their position,” she said.
Bollier, a moderate Republican from Mission Hills, admits that in recent years it has been moderates who have given in to the will of conservatives like the governor. Will they again?
“The answer is hell no. We’re not giving. We’re tired of giving,” Bollier said. “We’ve given and given and given; we’ve had cuts and cuts and cuts and cuts. We have to be the ones to stand up and save the state.”
The top Democrat in the Senate, Anthony Hensley of Topeka, is making a pitch to get lawmakers on board for veto overrides. On taxes, he said anything the governor will agree to won’t be enough to fix the projected budget shortfall, which amounts to almost $900 million over the next two fiscal years.
“I don’t think we want him to be relevant to this process. Up until now, he really hasn’t brought much to the table in the way of tax reform,” Hensley said.
But not everyone is pushing back against Brownback’s use of his veto pen.
“That’s a normal part of the process. He’s elected statewide and he has that right,” said Republican Senate President Susan Wagle of Wichita.
Wagle has been negotiating with the governor on a new tax plan. Republican Rep. Dan Hawkins of Wichita would like those talks to be productive. If legislators must go for a veto override, he said, maybe that means they haven’t found the best solution.
“If we continually are looking at nothing more than veto overrides, what are we doing?” Hawkins asked. “We’re really not trying to put something together that will work for the state. We’re trying to put something together that will work for that faction that has the control.”
Downplaying Tension
Last year’s election put more legislative control in the hands of Democrats and moderate Republicans. Brandi Fisher, of the Mainstream Coalition, told a group of voters in Leawood recently that they should be calling the shots.
“The one holdup that we’re having is this governor’s veto. What that tells us is that we need a new governor,” Fisher said.
Among those at the Leawood meeting was physician Bill Jennings, who said he was disappointed by the governor’s veto of Medicaid expansion. To Jennings, it’s an issue of health and economics.
“If patients don’t have coverage for their care, they will get care in emergencies and those who have insurance are going to pay for that,” he said.
The governor has downplayed the tension surrounding his vetoes. He said the back-and-forth so far is normal on a tough issue like taxes.
“We’ll keep doing it. That’s part of the process,” Brownback said. “The last few years, any time you talk about taxes, the normal process is you end up with 100 runs before you find one that they’re comfortable enough with to vote for.”
Brownback said recently that he might accept a repeal of the business tax exemption under certain conditions, showing he may be willing to be flexible as lawmakers work to approve a budget and end the session.
Stephen Koranda is Statehouse reporter for Kansas Public Radio, a partner with kcur.org in the Kansas News Service.
LEAVENWORTH, Kan. (AP) — A Leavenworth woman has pleaded not guilty to in the death of her mother.
Victoria Smith entered the plea Friday and will go to trial July 17. She is charged with first-degree murder in the July 2016 death of her 85-year-old mother, Anna Higgins.
The Leavenworth Times reports Higgins died at Smith’s home. A probable cause statement alleges Smith told police she hit her mother with a hammer.
Police said they went to Smith’s home after receiving several 911 calls.
Smith remains in custody at the Leavenworth County Jail.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Three western Kansas men accused of plotting to attack Somali immigrants in Garden City are asking for a delay in their federal trial.
Attorneys for Curtis Wayne Allen, Patrick Eugene Stein and Gavin Wayne Wright jointly filed the motion Friday. Federal prosecutors joined in the request.
The Hutchinson News reports (https://bit.ly/2pshW8F ) U.S. District Judge Eric Melgren did not immediately act on the motion. The trial is currently scheduled to begin June 13.
The three men, all members of a small regional militia group, are accused of conspiring to detonate truck bombs at an apartment complex where about 120 Somali immigrants live in Garden City.
The motion notes the case is complex, one of the defendants was recently appointed a new attorney and the large amount of evidence to be reviewed.
