BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Narcan is not just for police and first responders anymore.

New York and a handful of other states are helping to make the life-saving heroin antidote available to regular folks, hoping to increase the odds it will be there when needed in an emergency.

State health officials say New York has trained 10,000 laypeople in the last six months alone, sending them home with a rescue kit containing Narcan and a nasal atomizer used to spray it in an overdose victim’s nose. The training was helped by a law change last year that allowed prescribers to issue general, rather than patient-specific, prescriptions.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says California, Illinois, New Mexico and Washington have similarly changed regulations.

 

NICKERSON, Neb. (AP) — A Nickerson farm dedicated to caring for discarded animals will open to the public this weekend.

Admission to The Poor Farm on Sunday is free, but it will accept animal care donations.

The Poor Farm is a nonprofit, no-kill animal sanctuary just north of Fremont. It provides long-term care for disfigured and disabled animals.

Ducks, donkeys and dogs have found a refuge at the farm. So have peacocks, goats, Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs, horses, sheep and other animals and birds.

One of the farm’s permanent residents is a zebu — a southeastern Asian bovine — named Mona who came to the farm 15 years ago. Wary of humans, Mona spends her days at the farm playing with baby goats.

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. (AP) — Hall County Sheriff Jerry Watson is looking to the Nebraska Legislature to ease the expense of serving civil process papers that cost taxpayers in his county at least $10 for every hand delivery.

Watson said the Legislature sets the amount charged to serve papers, and the amount is not keeping up with actual costs.

Watson says that for every paper served in 2012 cost the county $34.55, but the county is only allowed to collect $24. 36. In all, he says, serving papers cost taxpayers nearly $100,000 in 2012.

Watson says the cost has likely only grown.

It’s been years since the Legislature has increased the amount that can be charged to serve papers. Watson believes the amount should be reviewed each year.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A woman who faked an anti-gay hate crime has been sentenced to 90 days in jail for violating probation, but she can apply to serve the time on house arrest.

36-year-old Charlie Rogers was sentenced Friday in Lancaster County Court.

She had faced up to a year after acknowledging in March that she violated her probation by not reporting to jail on Jan. 15 to finish her original 90-day jail sentence.

Rogers, a former University of Nebraska-Lincoln basketball player, was convicted of lying to police about being attacked by masked men and having anti-gay slurs carved into her skin.

Prosecutors say Rogers faked the attack because she thought it would inspire change in the treatment of gay people.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Omaha city park workers and volunteers plan to wrap ash trees throughout the city to help raise awareness of the emerald ash borer threat.

The Omaha Parks Foundation and City of Omaha Forestry Division will work with volunteers on the effort.

Following a news conference Saturday in Seymour Smith Park, volunteers will spread out through the park, Abbot Drive, Memorial and Elmwood Parks, Regency Parkway and Ramble Ridge Park, where they will wrap nearly 1,000 ash trees on city rights of way and parkland over a week.

Emerald ash borers are native to Asia and were first detected in Michigan in 2002. Authorities have said the insect has killed more than 50 million ash trees since in the United States and have been found in at least 20 states.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A judge says a 42-year-old Lincoln man who twice was ruled mentally incompetent to stand trial in his wife’s slaying is now competent.

Kent Burklund is charged with second-degree murder in the death of 41-year-old Bettina Burklund. She was found dead in the couple’s home in April 2014.

Retired Judge Jeffre Cheuvront (shehv-ROHNT’) made the ruling Wednesday, based on an April 30 report by a doctor at the state psychiatric hospital in Lincoln. A trial date has not been scheduled.

Another judge ruled in August last year and again in February this year that Kent Burklund was incompetent for trial. But that judge also said a doctor at the state hospital reported there was a substantial likelihood that Burklund’s competency could be restored.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Douglas County prosecutors say an autopsy shows a boy thrown into the Elkhorn River on the eve of his fifth birthday drowned.

The autopsy says Josue Ramirez-Marinero, whose tiny body was pulled from the river Monday, showed no signs of injury or trauma.

Police say Josue’s 25-year-old half brother, Roberto Martinez-Marinero, threw the boy into the river on May 5 because the boy had witnessed his mother’s killing at the hands of Martinez-Marinero. Police reports say he would have turned 5 on May 6.

Police say Martinez-Merinero also told investigators he had killed his mother, Jesus Ismenia Marinero, on May 5. Her body was found in a southeastern Omaha ditch.

Martinez-Marinero is charged with two counts of first-degree murder. His girlfriend, 24-year-old Gabriela Guevara, is charged with being an accessory.

HASTINGS, Neb. (AP) — Three people have been taken to a Hastings hospital as a precaution following a natural gas leak at a discount department store.

A forklift hit a heater inside a Walmart at Hastings on Friday, causing the leak.

Hastings Fire Chief Kent Gilbert says employees worked to keep customers safe. He says the building was evacuated, then ventilated.

Gilbert says the three taken to a hospital were treated because they had smelled the gas. Natural gas is colorless and odorless, but an odor is added to it as a safety measure to help people detect leaks.