HASTINGS, Neb. (AP) — A truck driver has been killed in a collision with a train in Adams County.
The accident occurred a little before 4 p.m. Friday about four miles east of Hastings. The Nebraska State Patrol says the truck was headed south when the driver didn’t yield at a crossing to the eastbound train.
The semi driver was identified as 68-year-old Alan Lanham, of Ravenna (ruh-VEH’-nuh).
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — There were only two Omaha homicides in the first three months of 2016, the fewest to begin a year in at least a decade.
Last year, when there was a record 50 homicides, 14 of them occurred during the first three months of the year.
A retired Omaha police captain, Mike Butera, oversaw homicide investigations in the 1990s and early 2000s, and he says homicides are cyclical, prone to lulls and to jump in number. Butera says Omaha is “probably going to see an uptick.”
He says that, as the weather warms, outdoor crowds, open-air drug dealing and more drive-by shootings could lead to more killings.
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Authorities allege four men sexually assaulted a 9-year-old girl at a Utah home while her mother was in the garage smoking meth.
Sheriff’s officials say in court documents the assault occurred March 27 at a home in rural Uintah County, which borders Colorado.
Deputies say four men who were staying in the home raped the child, who later reported it to her mother.
The Uintah County Sheriff’s Office says the men have been arrested. It identified them as 36-year-old Larson RonDeau, 20-year-old Josiah RonDeau, 29-year-old Jerry Flatlip and 26-year-old Randall Flatlip.
Charges have been filed against Larson RonDeau. County Attorney G. Mark Thomas says he expects charges to be filed against the other three in the next few days.
None of the men has a listed phone number or appears to have an attorney to comment on his behalf.
Robert Honken has been bound over for trial on two charges of conspiracy to commit murder in Hamilton County.
The man prosecutors say Honken hired to kill his wife, Derrick Shirley of Bradshaw, is scheduled to be in court for a similar hearing on Tuesday.
Nebraska State Patrol Sgt. Ryan Phinney testified last week about the evidence against both men who were arrested last month.
Phinney says Honken tried to hire an undercover officer to kill his wife. And Shirley told investigators that he had been paid earlier this year to kill Honken’s wife but had backed out.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Furniture Mart is open after a small fire inside one of its Omaha warehouses near the store, but the access is restricted to the flooring warehouse where the fire happened.
Firefighters were called to the warehouse around 7 a.m. Sunday after an alarm indicated the sprinkler system had been activated.
Batallion Chief Kathy Bossman says some wooden pallets inside the warehouse had caught fire. Firefighters were able to put the fire out without damage to the building, but some of the contents were damaged.
No one was in the warehouse at the time of the fire.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A multiple vehicle crash has closed part of a southeastern Nebraska highway.
The crash happened around 7:30 a.m. Saturday on Nebraska Highway 77 just south of O Street in Lincoln. At least one person was taken to a hospital.
Lincoln Police on the scene told the newspaper that someone had been pinned in one of the vehicles.
The Nebraska State Patrol also responded to the crash.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Two Omaha attorneys have offered to work with the out-of-state defense team of a former doctor accused of killing four people with ties to an Omaha medical school.
Jeremy Jorgenson and David Reed filed a motion Friday to sponsor Chicago attorneys Alison Motta, her husband Robert Motta Jr. and father-in-law Robert Motta Sr. They represent Anthony Garcia in his first-degree murder case. A judge must decide whether the Mottas will be allowed to continue as Garcia’s attorneys.
Garcia’s trial had been set to begin Monday. It was postponed Thursday when two other Omaha attorneys who had been working with the Mottas withdrew after prosecutors accused Alison Motta of trying to taint the jury pool by telling reporters that DNA evidence exonerates Garcia.
CAIRO, Neb. (AP) — Authorities have identified a man killed in a crash with a semitrailer earlier this week in south-central Nebraska.
80-year-old Arthur Klinkacek, of Ravenna, died in the Thursday morning crash.
The accident happened just after 8:30 a.m. nearly three miles south of Cairo at the intersection of West Airport Road and Nebraska Highway 11.
The Hall County Sheriff’s Office says Klinkacek collided with the semitrailer after failing to stop at a stop sign and died at the scene.
The semi overturned, spilling some of the corn mash it was hauling. The semi’s driver suffered only minor injuries.
CHICAGO (AP) — The first major research of its kind shows that cholesterol-lowering statins can prevent heart attacks and strokes in a globally diverse group of older people who don’t have heart disease.
The results from 21 countries bolster recommendations on who should consider taking the drugs.
The aim was to prevent heart disease using a statin alone, blood pressure drugs or a combination of the two. The patients in the study did not have heart disease and faced lower risks of developing it, and the statin approach worked best.
The research was published online Saturday in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at an American College of Cardiology meeting in Chicago.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — An 11-year-old boy has been arrested after police say he shot a priest with a pellet gun in an Omaha church parking lot.
Officers were dispatched Wednesday night to St. James Catholic Church after the Rev. Thomas Weisbecker reported the boy ran up behind him, shot him in the head three times with a pellet gun and demanded money.
The boy ran away as police arrived. Officers later found him at a nearby house.
The boy’s mother said her son ran into her home as she was in the garage. She escorted officers into her home, where they found the airsoft gun.
The boy was booked at the Douglas County Youth Center on suspicion of attempted robbery and misdemeanor assault.
