OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — State Sen. Heath Mello will run for Omaha mayor next spring and challenge incumbent Jean Stothert.

Mello announced his campaign Sunday. The Democratic lawmaker says he’ll offer a new vision for Omaha to address its infrastructure problems and try to retain talented young residents.

Term limits will force Mello to leave the Legislature at the end of this year. He has represented south Omaha and led the Legislature’s appropriations committee.

Mello is a Democrat will face the Republican Stothert in next spring’s election although the mayor’s race is officially nonpartisan.

Stothert is completing her first term as mayor after being elected in 2013. Before that she served on the Omaha city council and Millard school board.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A Lincoln man has been sentenced to 50 to 60 years in prison for sexually assaulting and beating a woman in August 2014.

52-year-old J.C. Thomas was sentenced Friday in Lancaster County District Court as a habitual offender.

District Judge Susan Strong called Thomas “every woman’s worst nightmare” in handing down the sentence, noting he was on parole when he committed the crime.

Prosecutors say Thomas lured four women to his car and beat or raped them. In a deal with prosecutors, he pleaded guilty to just one count of first-degree sexual assault.

Thomas has two prior felony convictions — one in Tennessee and another in Arkansas — and prosecutors say he has spent most of his life in prison.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — The works of cats, camels, chickens and more are now on sale at the Lincoln Children’s Zoo’s semi-annual Animal Art event.

The one-of-a-kind critter creations on canvas feature the works of dozens of animals.

In all, 116 works are to be sold.

The zoo’s Ryan Gross says paintings at last winter’s event sold so quickly and demand was so high that the zoo decided to make Animal Art a biannual event — late summer and late fall.

All of the money raised will go toward caring for zoo animals over the winter.

Prices for the paintings range from $30 to $400 and come in various sizes. Each painting comes with a photo of the artist at work and a certificate of authenticity.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Authorities say a 58-year-old jail inmate has died at an Omaha hospital.

The woman became unresponsive around 4:15 p.m. Wednesday in one of the Douglas County Jail housing units. Lt. Dan Scherer says staffers began CPR and called 911 for help. Scherer says the woman died at 11:10 p.m. at Creighton University Medical Center.

Scherer identified the woman as Sheryl Bentley, who was serving a 30-day sentence for drunken driving. Her sentence began on Aug. 11. She lived in Omaha.

Bentley’s death is being investigated. State law requires such investigations whenever someone dies in custody or while being taken into custody.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A Colorado man has been sent to prison for setting fire to a hotel room in the Nebraska capital of Lincoln.

Online court records show 34-year-old Joshua Berney, of Thornton, Colorado, was sentenced Wednesday to four to eight years. He’d pleaded no contest to felony arson after prosecutors dropped a charge of criminal mischief.

Authorities say he reported the blaze from his room at the Holiday Inn Express just before 4 a.m. on April 6 last year. Fire sprinklers helped contain the flames to just his room on the second floor, but smoke escaped into hallways.

Thirty-five hotel guests were evacuated during the fire. Berney was taken to a hospital to be checked for smoke inhalation.

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — Developers of a $3.8 billion, four-state oil pipeline have agreed to halt construction near an American Indian reservation in southern North Dakota until a federal court hearing next week in Washington, D.C.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe is suing federal regulators for approving permits for the Dakota Access Pipeline that will move oil from North Dakota to Illinois. Tribal officials filed the lawsuit last month against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The tribe argues the pipeline would affect drinking water for residents on the reservation and disturb sacred sites outside of it.

The tribe’s request for a temporary injunction hearing is slated for Wednesday.

Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners said Thursday it will temporarily stop work near the reservation but that work continues in other parts of the state.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A 17-year-old boy has pleaded not guilty to murder and other charges in the shooting death of one Lincoln man and the wounding of another.

Court records say the pleas were made Wednesday in Lancaster County District Court. The Associated Press generally doesn’t name juveniles accused of crimes. His trial is scheduled to begin the week of Nov. 7.

Investigators say he fatally shot 32-year-old Christopher Coleman and left 21-year-old Jerry Griffis Jr. paralyzed from his wounds on April 18. The boy also is facing unrelated robbery charges.

Three other people have been charged in connection with the robbery and shootings.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Lincoln authorities say a 20-year-old man was hospitalized in critical condition after a tree branch fell on his head.

The accident occurred around 4 p.m. Wednesday in central Lincoln. Neighbors told authorities that the branch fell as the victim and another man were cutting down a yard tree.

Authorities have not released their names or other details.

BEATRICE, Neb. (AP) — Gage County has hired a legal firm to examine insurance coverage in a recent ruling involving six people who were wrongly convicted of the 1985 rape and homicide of a Beatrice woman.

Gage County Board of Supervisors Chairman Myron Dorn said Joel Bacon and Joel Nelson, of Keating O’Gara law firm in Lincoln, have been hired to determine if the county is covered in the case.

The Nebraska Intergovernmental Risk Management Association became the county’s carrier nearly 20 years ago. Association officials have previously said coverage typically doesn’t extend for something that took place before it joined the insurance pool.

Gage County has appealed the verdict awarding more than $28 million to the six people who were wrongly convicted.

Dorn says the contract with the firm will cost about $7,600.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Omaha Police Department says internal investigations have found that two officers violated policies and procedures.

The department announcement Wednesday said it wouldn’t disclose the nature of any discipline pending or received by Officers Thomas Deignan and Bryan Kulhanek. The officers have declined to comment.

The department said last month that Kulhanek had posted potentially inappropriate content on his Facebook page. He’d said the Black Lives Matter movement is racist and is against white officers.

Officials say Deignan threw a teenager to the ground as he attempted to book her into the Douglas County Youth Center on May 15. The 16-year-old suffered a fractured eye socket. The State Patrol says it found no evidence of criminal conduct, and prosecutors have agreed.