OMAHA, Neb. (AP) – A federal appeals court has struck down a state law that keeps picketers several hundred feet away from a funeral or memorial service. A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday reversed a U.S. District Court ruling against members of Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan. The appeals court relied on its 2008 ruling in a Missouri case that said peaceful protests near funerals are protected by the First Amendment’s right to free speech. The opinion came on the appeal of a lawsuit filed by Shirley Phelps-Roper, a member of the Westboro Baptist Church that regularly protests at the funerals of fallen soldiers. Phelps-Roper had asked for a preliminary injunction to stop enforcement of the law, saying it’s constitutional.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) – The University of Nebraska has announced it has signed an agreement with China to create the American Culture Center in Xi’an, China. The center will initiate and host programs to expose students and faculty at Xi’an Jiaotong University to all things American. That includes history, government, art, law, medicine and culture. The center will be one of 10 in China to receive seed funding from the U.S. government.

 

 

ALLIANCE, Neb. (AP) – Nebraska’s Carhenge, an automobile replica of England’s Stonehenge, the prehistoric circle of stones, is up for sale. The asking price is $300,000. Eagle Radio station KCOW says Wednesday that the Friends of Carhenge board of directors voted to place the 24-year-old tourist attraction, which consists of a circle of 38 cars, on the market. The organization’s president, Marcia Buck, says the quirky tourist attraction lacked volunteers and limited capital. Carhenge was built in 1987 by the Jim Reinders family on land that Reinders’ family once farmed just north of Alliance in western Nebraska. Reinders donated Carhenge and 10 acres of land around it to the Friends organization a few years later.

 

KIMBALL, Neb. (AP) – A city councilman in the western Nebraska town of Kimball who’s charged with sexually assaulting a mentally disabled teenage boy says he won’t resign from the council. City Administrator Harold Farrar tells Eagle Radio station KQSK that Councilman Scott Haun says he has “no intention” of resigning. Farrar says the council, which met on Tuesday, will not request any action. Farrar says it’s Haun’s decision whether to continue on the council. Prosecutors charged Haun last week with first-degree sexual assault on a child more than 12 years of age but less than 16. An affidavit in Scotts Bluff County District Court says the alleged abuse took place Sept. 3 at the boy’s home. Haun was released from jail on $15,000 bond.

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. (AP) – Grand Island police are investigating the discovery of what are believed to be human skeletal remains. Police Chief Steve Lamken says that the remains were discovered Wednesday afternoon by a construction worker at a site in the city. Investigators are processing the scene, and yellow police tape was visible on some trees at the scene.

MINDEN, Neb. (AP) – Federal labor officials want to impose nearly $170,000 in fines on a Nebraska fiberglass company for violations of safety and health standards. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration says Wednesday that America’s Fiberglass Animals was cited for eight repeat and seven serious violations found during an inspection at its plant in Minden. OSHA says the inspection was a follow-up after the company moved operations from Hastings. OSHA says the company was cited last year for exposing employees to serious chemical hazards and for other dangerous condition and failed to correct them. Company spokesman Patrick Keough told The Associated Press on Wednesday that he was on the road and hasn’t seen the violations, but he anticipates he’ll turned the matter over to his attorney.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) – The Humane Society of the United States and the Nebraska Farmers Union have announced a partnership on farm-animal issues that is drawing criticism from some farm groups. The partnership, called the Nebraska Agriculture Council of the Humane Society of the United States, is intended as a way to find middle ground – and hopefully persuade the Humane Society from going to the ballot with a measure restricting cruelty to farm animals. In other states, the Humane Society has backed public votes to outlaw gestation crates for pregnant sows, cages for laying hens and other standard agricultural practices. The partnership comes weeks after the Nebraska Cattlemen, Nebraska Farm Bureau Federation and other agricultural groups unveiled efforts to lobby against such restrictions.

HARRISON, Neb. (AP) – Sioux County prosecutors have submitted the necessary filing to seek the death penalty against a western Nebraska man accused of killing his 8-year-old stepdaughter. Salvador Lopez, of Mitchell, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Kerra Wilson. Her body was found Sept. 22 on remote ranchland several miles north of their home. Online court records show prosecutors on Monday filed a notice of aggravated circumstances in the case. While the state is required by law to state its intentions to seek the death penalty from the beginning of a case, it could later determine not to seek the death penalty. Lopez said he dropped her off at school but she didn’t appear in any surveillance footage in the school or playground.