LEXINGTON, Neb. (AP) — A woman in rural Dawson County has been accused of stealing from the church she served as treasurer.
Court records show 34-year-old Candice Hasbrouck, of Cozad, is charged with theft. A public phone listing for her couldn’t be found. Her attorney didn’t immediately return a call Wednesday from The Associated Press.
Authorities say she’s been treasurer at St. John’s Lutheran near Cozad since 2009. An audit of the church books shows that more than $46,000 is missing.
Hasbrouck’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for Dec. 2.
COLUMBUS, Neb. (AP) — A council member has apologized for her vote to erect a cell tower in a Columbus park, but the tower is still expected to go up.
Several people who live near Glur Park criticized the City Council at its Monday meeting for its August approval of Verizon’s request to erect an 80-foot tower designed to resemble an evergreen tree. Many of the residents complained that they weren’t notified about the proposal and so couldn’t register their opposition with city officials.
Councilwoman Beth Augustine-Schulte apologized for her vote for the tower, saying she wouldn’t want it across the street from her house either.
City Attorney Neal Valorz told the crowd that reneging on the Verizon contract would open the city to a lawsuit.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Teachers at an Omaha middle school dealing with unruly student behavior have received an extra day of training that focused on student discipline.
Nathan Hale Magnet Middle School teachers say some students are disruptive and exhibit aggressive behavior, including assaults on staff and other students. Educators participated in a training course Tuesday designed to give them better techniques to deescalate behavioral problems and engage students.
A consulting firm is assisting with the training.
Omaha Public Schools officials have held parent meetings about the problems and pledged to provide more staff and training.
Additional security guards and student deans have been added and the school is hiring a social worker.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A 21-year-old man has been given 10 to 15 years in prison for his role in an attempted robbery that led to a fatal shooting in Lincoln.
Online court records say Joseph Bratt had pleaded no contest to attempted robbery in exchange for prosecutors dropping a weapons charge. Bratt was sentenced Tuesday.
Authorities say Bratt, Brandon Benson and Joshua Lock were charged after the November 2015 robbery attempt of people trying to buy marijuana. Authorities say Benson later went back to the house where the robbery attempt failed and fired several handgun rounds, killing 19-year-old Richard Randall Jr., of Plattsmouth, and wounding 18-year-old Angok Wal, of Bellevue.
Benson is scheduled to be sentenced next week. Lock is set to be sentenced on Dec. 16.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The City Council has voted unanimously to rename a two-block street section in north Omaha for a local civil rights leader.
The proposal approved Tuesday renames Lake Street from North 22nd to North 24th Street for Bertha Calloway. She helped found the Great Plains Black History Museum in 1976 and served as director and curator. City officials say Calloway also participated in protests to integrate diners and the city’s Peony Park.
Councilman Ben Gray says the application for the name change was “something that has been a long time coming.”
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Omaha City Council has changed its collective mind and voted to apply the city’s 2.5 percent restaurant tax to food trucks.
The council voted 5-2 Tuesday to expand the tax to food trucks, which were specifically exempted when the city began charging the tax in 2010.
Operators of regular restaurants have complained that the exemption was unfair, but a majority of council members has resisted expansion of the tax. In September four council members — Pete Festersen, Chris Jerram, Rich Pahls and Aimee Melton — voted to kill an expansion proposal.
But on Tuesday Melton and Jerram switched their votes to yes and joined the other council members in favor of expansion.
Omaha Food Trucks Association leader Kelly Keegan says the association has no problem with the expansion.
The following is a statement from the North Platte Police Department regarding the case of Gracie Toelle, an area teen who was missing since March and was recently found safe in California.
On November 18th, 2016 the North Platte Police Department received a call from a youth shelter in San Francisco, CA in regards to Gracie Toelle being at the facility. NPPD contacted San Francisco PD and they verified the information. It was determined that Gracie was uninjured and arrived at the facility voluntarily. Her dog that she left with was determined to have died at some point during her disappearance.
Gracie’s guardian was contacted and it has been confirmed a family member has taken custody of Gracie in California. Gracie faces no criminal charges in Lincoln County. Gracie has chosen at this point not to speak with authorities about what has occurred during the months that she has been missing.
Unless further information becomes available we have suspended our investigation as no criminal activity has been identified. This case was originally classified as a runaway juvenile and that status remains unchanged.
We are pleased that Gracie has been located and reunited with her family. Many hours have been spent on this investigation by the NPPD. Numerous local and out of state agencies assisted us in the follow up of leads that were received. One of the leads coincidentally located a different a missing juvenile. Social media companies played a large role in the investigation and were very helpful in assisting with the investigation. We would like to thank the following agencies for their assistance in no particular order:
National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office
Nebraska State Patrol
Columbus Police Dept.
Frontier County Sheriff’s Office
Centerville, IA Police Dept.
Evans, NY Police Dept.
Cheyenne, WY Police Dept.
Center for Search and Investigations (CFSI)
Pine County, MN Sheriff’s Office
Sterling, CO Police Dept.
Crenshaw County, AL Sheriff’s Office
Soldotma, AK Police Dept.
Kenai, AK Police Dept.
San Francisco, CA Police Dept.
State of California Child Protective Services
FBI Nebraska and New York
Bastrop, TX Police Dept.
North Platte Guardians of the Children
Kik, INC Social Media
Skype, INC Social Media
Facebook, INC Social Media
T-Mobile Communications
Time Warner Cable
Windstream Communications
We also would like to thank the public and local news media for getting the information spread across the nation.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Operators of a Kansas water park where a state lawmaker’s 10-year-old son was killed on a waterslide last summer say that ride will be demolished.
Schlitterbahn Waterparks and Resorts and the family that runs it said in a statement Tuesday that the 168-foot “Verruckt” at the Schlitterbahn park in Kansas City, Kansas, will eventually be torn down.
The ride has been closed since authorities say Caleb Thomas Schwab was killed Aug. 7 while on the Verruckt, which is German for “insane.” Two other riders in Caleb’s raft, both women, were injured.
Attorneys for Caleb and the women are investigating the accident. No charges or lawsuits have been filed as of Tuesday. Messages left by The Associated Press for the attorneys were not immediately returned.
CAMBRIDGE, Neb. (AP) — A weekend fire forced two main street businesses to relocate to temporary quarters in the southwest Nebraska town of Cambridge.
The former grocery store building that held First Central Bank of Cambridge and Cambridge Telephone sustained significant damage Sunday morning.
Cambridge fire chief Delaine Soucie says the bank building is a total loss. Nearly 100 firefighters from Cambridge and surrounding towns were needed to extinguish the blaze.
Soucie says the fire was difficult to fight because the building had been remodeled to divide the space, and the two businesses shared a basement.
Bank CEO Don Moore says he’s confident the bank’s vault is OK, and electronic information is backed up once a day.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A 53-year-old Lincoln man has been sentenced to up to 50 years in prison for sexually assaulting a girl hundreds of times over nearly a decade.
Jack Borkowski was sentenced Monday to 40 to 50 years in prison. Even with so-called good time credit, Borkowski will be at least 80 before he’s eligible for parole.
Prosecutors say he began inappropriately touching the girl when she was 6 and soon began raping her before she reached puberty. The abuse continued until the girl was in her teens.
Police say Borkowski admitted during a police interview to committing more than 200 sexual assaults on the girl.
LEXINGTON, Neb. (AP) — A woman in rural Dawson County has been accused of stealing from the church she served as treasurer.
