(AP) — Authorities say an eastern Nebraska man has died after crashing his motorcycle in Omaha.
Police say the accident occurred around 3:30 a.m. Wednesday at an entrance to Elmwood Park. The westbound motorcycle failed to negotiate a curve and ran off the road, hitting a metal utility pole.
Police say he died later at Nebraska Medical Center.
He was identified as 22-year-old Fredrick Getzschman IV, of Herman. An autopsy is scheduled for later Wednesday.
(AP) — Authorities say a two-vehicle collision in eastern Nebraska has injured the driver of a motorcycle.
Police say 65-year-old James Garrett, of Papillion, was taken via medical helicopter Wednesday morning to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Authorities say an SUV driven by 25-year-old Jacob Molko turned in front of Garrett’s motorcycle as it traveled in Sarpy County. Molko was not injured.
No citations have been issued at this time. The investigation is ongoing.
Federal regulators say a central Nebraska feedlot underpaid dozens of employees and violated a program that hires workers from outside the United States.
The Labor Department announced Wednesday that Adams Land & Cattle Co. will pay more than $127,000 in back wages to nearly 70 employees. It will also pay more than $100,000 in penalties for violations under the H-2A program.
The voluntary H-2A program allows employers to hire and bring foreign workers to the U.S. for temporary or seasonal work when there is a shortage of domestic employees.
The department says the Broken Bow company failed to pay the required wage rate to employees. They’re also accused of rejecting U.S. applicants and paying U.S. employees less than H-2A workers.
The company did not immediately return a message Wednesday.
(AP) — A former doctor accused of killing four people with ties to an Omaha medical school will stand trial on four counts of first-degree murder.
Douglas County Judge Darryl Lowe ruled Wednesday that there is enough evidence for Anthony Garcia’s case to go to trial.
Garcia, of Terra Haute, Ind., is charged with four counts of first-degree murder in the 2008 deaths of the 11-year-old son of Creighton University pathologist William Hunter and the family’s housekeeper, as well as the deaths in May of Creighton pathologist Roger Brumback and his wife.
Brumback and Hunter had fired Garcia from the Creighton pathology program in 2001.
KEARNEY, Neb. (AP) — The University of Nebraska at Kearney has selected a Wisconsin administrator as its new athletic director.
UNK Chancellor Doug Kristensen said Wednesday that Paul Plinske will take over Sept. 1. The post was vacated by Jon McBride, who stepped down for health reasons.
Plinske has been athletic director at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater since 2004. The Division III school has a 20-sport NCAA program that includes 700 students and 50 coaches and staff members.
Among the four UNK finalists was Jean Berger, who has been senior associate athletic director/senior woman administrator at the University of Northern Iowa since 2008.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — If the schedule is an indication, Nebraska’s initiation to the Big Ten is over and the Cornhuskers are set up to make hay.
Coach Bo Pelini starts his sixth season in Lincoln with one of the nation’s most dynamic offenses and a young defense that will benefit from playing its first five games at home.
UCLA is the only real non-conference test. Big Ten favorite Ohio State and three-time defending champion Wisconsin drop off the regular-season schedule and are replaced by Illinois and Purdue.
It probably will be November before anyone knows how good the Huskers are, after they play Northwestern at home and Michigan and Penn State on the road.
The Huskers open the season Aug. 31 at home against Wyoming.
(AP) — The new chief of police in Aurora rose from the ranks.
Paul Graham assumed the post after Tuesday night’s City Council meeting.
He takes over for Chief Godfrey Brokenrope, who died July 27. His motorcycle crashed two days earlier on Interstate 80 near Seward.
Graham has been the acting chief since Brokenrope’s death and has been on the Aurora force since November 1993.
(AP) — A 22-year-old Lincoln man accused of fleeing police has been given four to six years in prison for stealing a truck.
Online court records say Shawn Brooks was sentenced on Tuesday. He’d pleaded guilty to theft after prosecutors dropped a felony charge that he fled in a vehicle to avoid arrest.
Authorities say Brooks stole a pickup on Feb. 10 when the owner left it running near a drive-thru restaurant. Police say Brooks was captured when he ran following the truck’s crash into a utility pole.
(AP) — Imagine the first day of school, when you don’t even know the language on the wall signs that could guide you to your classroom.
That’s what faced scores of new students who began their classes Tuesday in Lincoln.
More than 2,100 English Language Learners attended Lincoln Public Schools last year. The designation is given students from other countries who can’t speak English proficiently. There were 53 different languages among those 2,100-plus students.
At Park Middle School, 101 English Language Learner students from 15 different countries were bused in on Tuesday. The newest students were helped by others who speak the same native language.
(AP) — A 60-year-old Grand Island man has been fined and given probation for structuring deposits to evade currency reporting requirements.
Federal prosecutors say Randy Evans was given five years of probation, was fined $50,000 and is required to forfeit nearly $33,000.
Prosecutors say Evans owns RCE Investments Inc., which did business as Randy Auto Sales in Grand Island. The prosecutors say that between January 2010 and February 2012, Evans made bank deposits of between $1 million and $2.03 million. Cash in the deposits was kept under $10,000, which prosecutors say showed that Evans was purposely evading laws that require banks to report cash transactions of $10,000 and above.
