(AP) — A 14-year-old girl is in an Omaha hospital after sustained serious fireworks injuries while celebrating July Fourth at Ernst Lake near Columbus.
An ambulance was called to the lake Thursday night after the girl suffered injuries to her upper left side.
The girl was taken to Columbus Community Hospital and later flown to Children’s Hospital and Medical Center in Omaha.
Hospital officials have declined to release her condition.
(AP) — The eastern Nebraska city of Papillion has agreed to pay $70,000 in a settlement with a woman injured when a speeding police car slammed into her vehicle in 2008.
Alicia Johnston was a 28-year-old nurse at the time of the crash. She sued in 2009, seeking to recoup $21,000 in medical bills, plus additional damages for lost wages, destroyed car, and pain and suffering. Her lawyer originally submitted a settlement claim for $385,000.
Her lawsuit said an on-duty police officer was traveling faster than 60 mph in a 35 mph speed zone and did not have the cruiser’s emergency lights or siren activated when he crashed into the side of her car.
(AP) — NTSB Chairman Deborah Hersman says federal investigators based in Los Angeles are traveling to San Francisco.
At a briefing in Washington, Hersman said she and other NTSB personnel in the nation’s capital were expected to arrive in San Francisco on Saturday evening.
She said they have not yet “determined what the focus of this investigation is.”
Investigators from South Korea were being invited to participate in the probe.
She said the team’s first job will be to collect information and document the accident scene.
The Asiana Airlines flight from Seoul, South Korea, crashed while landing at San Francisco International Airport on Saturday, critically injuring at least 10 people and forcing passengers to jump down the emergency inflatable slides to safety.
Miraculously, most of the 291 passengers were uninjured in the crash.
(AP) — Police say a woman found slumped over in a running car is the city’s latest homicide victim.
Police say officers responded early Saturday morning to a report of a vehicle sitting idle and running in a street. When officers arrived they found 46-year-old Annette Plater, of Omaha, slumped over inside. She was declared dead at the scene.
Shell casings found nearby indicate that Plater died of an apparent shooting.
Police said they have no additional information about the death and asked anyone with information about Plater’s death to contact Crime Stoppers at 402-444-STOP.
(AP) — Police say one of two men shot Friday in Omaha has died.
Police say in a news release that 19-year-old Timothy J. Howell, of Omaha, died Friday at Creighton University Medical Center. An autopsy was to be conducted Saturday.
Howell was one of two men found shot early Friday morning.
Police say another man who was a witness to the first shooting walked into the hospital shortly before 3 a.m. Spencer Mason, 22, was treated for non-life threatening injuries.
Omaha police say they’re still investigating. Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers, and may be eligible for a $1,000 reward.
(AP) — Officials say two people have been injured in a grain elevator explosion in Nuckolls County.
Emergency Manager Tim Stutzman says the explosion happened Friday afternoon in the unincorporated community of Sedan, about five miles southeast of Edgar. Firefighters were still working to put out hotspots Friday night.
The elevator is owned by Aurora Co-Op. CEO George Hohwieler says an employee and a farmer were injured.
They were first taken to Fillmore County Hospital in Geneva before being flown to a Lincoln hospital. Stutzman says he does not know what their conditions are.
The cause of the blast hasn’t been determined. Stutzman says the state fire marshal is investigating.
(AP) — Ten days after a fatal crash involving an inmate-driven prison van, the director of the state’s prisons department has ended the program that allowed inmates to drive state-owned vans to ferry other inmates to and from work-release sites.
Nebraska Department of Correctional Services Director Robert Houston announced the demise of the program Friday at a news conference in Lincoln.
The program had already been suspended last Friday, three days after investigators say a prison van driven by 35-year-old inmate Jeremy Dobbe hit a minivan, killing its driver, 47-year-old Joyce Meeks.
Houston said Friday that inmates who are assigned to work detail jobs will be transported by department staff from now on.
(AP) — An Iowa man suspected of sexually assaulting an 8-year-old girl has been arrested in eastern Nebraska after a brief standoff with police.
Bellevue police say they received a call around 9:30 a.m. Friday reporting that 25-year-old Diego Campos, of West Des Moines, had sexually assaulted the girl at a Bellevue house. Police say Campos fled the home with a knife, and the search for him began.
Officials found him just before 2 p.m. hiding in a drainage culvert near a wooded area. Campos initially refused to come out, but surrendered less than an hour later. He was taken to a hospital for cuts and later arrested.
(AP) — Omaha police have identified two men who were victims of early-morning shootings, including one with life-threatening injuries.
Police say 19-year-old Timothy J. Howell of Omaha was in critical condition after the shooting, shortly before midnight on Friday. He was taken to Creighton University Medical Center.
Police say another man who was a witness to the first shooting walked into the hospital shortly before 3 a.m. Spencer Mason, 22, was being treated for non-life threatening injuries.
Omaha police say they’re still investigating. Anyone with information is urged to contact Crime Stoppers, and may be eligible for a $1,000 reward.
(AP) — A 4-year-old passenger on an ATV has died in a crash with a pickup in northeast Nebraska.
The Nebraska State Patrol says Dylan Jacob Becker of Hartington was riding on the vehicle Thursday night when it collided with an eastbound pickup on a county road near the village of Winnetoon.
The driver of the ATV, 19-year-old Natalie Becker of Creighton, was flown by helicopter to a hospital in Sioux City, Iowa. The pickup driver, 16-year-old Austyn Larsen of Orchard, was not hospitalized.
It’s not known whether the ATV riders were wearing helmet.
