(AP) — When Sarpy County emergency dispatchers picked up a recent call, all they heard were the sounds of breathing and scratching.

Dispatchers were worried — until they learned the noises were coming from a dog that dialed 911.

Sarpy County 911 Assistant Director Marilyn Gable said it’s the first time a dog has called the emergency center.

The dog’s owner, Melissa Acosta, says she thought her 2-pound Japanese Chin, Sophie, was trying to curl up next to her on the couch, then realized Sophie was scratching at Acosta’s smartphone with her paw.

Then Acosta heard a voice from the phone asking for an “address of the emergency.”

Acosta says the whole thing is “a little embarrassing.” Sophie, of course, had no comment.

Investigators with the Nebraska State Patrol Troop C-Grand Island are asking the public for help in locating two suspects and a pickup truck believed to be connected with the assault of a Davenport man.

Just after 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, March 25, investigators with the Nebraska State Patrol responded to a request for assistance from the Nuckolls County Sheriff’s Office reference an assault which occurred in a home under construction north of Oak, in Nuckolls County.

The victim, identified as Steven Reinke, 62, of Davenport, told investigators he was working alone in the residence one mile north of Oak, when two males entered the home around 12:30 p.m., and assaulted him with a wooden baseball bat.  He walked to a neighboring residence after the attack, and let himself in when no one answered the door. He was discovered around 4:00 p.m., on the kitchen floor by the residents when they returned home.

Reinke, who suffered a skull fracture, a broken arm and a broken leg, was transported by ambulance to the Hebron hospital, before being flown by medical helicopter to BryanLGH-West in Lincoln.

Investigators are looking for two suspects, both identified as white males.  One suspect is said to be approximately 55-years of age, 5’8’’ tall, 165 lbs. with a sandy blonde or light gray beard and mustache, and short sandy blonde or light gray hair. He was wearing a green camouflage shirt, desert camouflage pants, boots and a brown military style hat. The second suspect is described as a white male, in his 40’s, approximately 5’8’’ tall, 190 lbs. with a stocky build. He was wearing a black ski mask, dark glasses, a red shirt under a black zip-up sweatshirt, black sweat pants and black or gray hiking boots.

The suspects were believed to have left the home in a southerly direction, driving an older boxy 1996 style green Dodge Dakota pickup, with a matching green topper and a possible red pinstripe on both the pickup and the topper.

Anyone with information that could aid in the investigation of this crime is asked to call the Nebraska State Patrol Troop C Headquarters in Grand Island at (308) 385-6000.

(AP) — A 20-year-old University of Nebraska at Omaha student has been arrested after three rifles, magazines and bullets were found in his dorm room.

The resident adviser at Scott Village reported to campus police around 2 a.m. Saturday that Ned McNally had the weapons.

Police say McNally told officers the guns and ammunition were his. He faces a felony charge for unlawfully possessing firearms on school property. Online court records don’t list the name of his attorney.

The university said Monday that having firearms on campus also would violate several university policies.

(AP) — Online brokerage TD Ameritrade is offering a day of free seminars about investing Tuesday to help people plan for retirement.

The Omaha, Neb., based company is offering seven free webcasts throughout the day about the economy, the stock market and investment options.

TD Ameritrade’s Robert Miller says investors need to understand how rising health care costs and longer life spans might affect their retirement expenses.

TD Ameritrade says the education event will start at 9 a.m. Central on Tuesday and continue until 7 p.m.

More details about the event are available online at www.tdameritrade.com/educationday.

(AP) — Nebraska lawmakers have advanced a bill to ban new forms of popular synthetic drugs, including K2 and bath salts.

The bill won first-round approval on Tuesday with a 33-0 vote. The bill by Sen. Ken Schilz of Ogallala was introduced this year as part of Attorney General Jon Bruning’s annual legislative package.

Nebraska’s current ban on K2 was enacted in 2011 and updated last year, but overseas chemists have kept adjusting the drug’s formula to skirt the ban. K2 mimics the effects of marijuana.

Lancaster County authorities say the drug was responsible for the October death of 18-year-old Billy Tucker after a weekend party in Lincoln. Tucker died while sleeping at a friend’s house in nearby Waverly.

 

(AP) — The bishop of the Lincoln Catholic Diocese has issued a letter reminding the diocese’s nearly 98,000 members that the church stance has not changed over the millennia: The use of contraceptives is forbidden.

Bishop James Conley said he chose to issue the letter during Lent because of its theme of love and sacrifice being the language of love.

Conley told the newspaper that “we really live in a wounded world when it comes to the family.”

In his letter issued Tuesday, Conley says marriage was created “to be unifying and procreative” and that the church “has always taught that rejecting the gift of children erodes the love between husband and wife.”

(AP) — Grand Island leaders haven’t given up on retaining the state veterans home instead of seeing the state build a replacement in Kearney.

Grand Island Mayor Jay Vavricek said Grand Island leaders are fleshing out their counterproposal to the plan approved by Gov. Dave Heineman. The state plan already has been sent to federal officials in Washington, where it awaits funding.

Grand Island officials say the counterproposal would cost an estimated $80 million to update and expand the local facility, compared with the $121 million needed to build new in Kearney.

An early version of the counterproposal was directly sent to the Veterans Affairs Department in Washington, but VA officials have since said the decision about where to build rests with state officials.

(AP) — Two Nebraska sisters have been supporting each other as they dieted and exercised their way to a combined weight loss of 270 pounds.

Forty-nine-year-old Kathy Ladehoff, of Columbus, is overjoyed by her loss of 160 pounds over the past year. She said that she’s finally living, “not just existing.”

Ladehoff’s 44-year-old sister, Wendy Konz, of Genoa, weighed 335 pounds at one point. She’s lost 110 pounds and has dropped from a size 26 down to size 16.

To drop the weight, they exercised, changed their diets and eating habits and took a weight loss supplement.

Their mutual goal is to reach 150 pounds.