OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A 67-year-old man has admitted running a prostitution operation out of his exotic-dance bar in Omaha.

Louis Venditte pleaded guilty on Tuesday to four federal prostitution charges, including one involving the transport of women from Iowa to Nebraska. He is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 10.

Venditte’s wife, Ruby Venditte, and John W. Wagstaffe have pleaded not guilty to prostitution charges, accused of being partners in the operation at the former Goodfellas bar. Law enforcement raided the bar in October 2013 while serving a search warrant. The bar has since closed.

Ruby Venditte and Wagstaffe are scheduled to go on trial next month.

 

BURWELL, Neb. (AP) — A rural one-room schoolhouse in Nebraska is set to close after 45 years.

The District 70 School in Garfield County will close Wednesday. The Burwell Public Schools board decided in January to close the school at the end of this school year.

District 70 was created in 1970 after four other rural schools were consolidated. Over the years, the school shrank to one teacher, a paraeducator and five students in grades four through six.

Two of the students will travel to Burwell to attend school next year, prompting parents to send their siblings as well. This partly contributed to the board decision to close the school.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Authorities say hash oil was being manufactured inside a house in Omaha shortly before a reported explosion that injured two people.

The Omaha Police Department says officers received a radio call Tuesday afternoon about an explosion at the house, located in a neighborhood on the north side of the city.

Police say a preliminary investigation determined hash oil was being manufactured in the home prior to the explosion. The explosion was caused by fire and toxic fumes.

Two people received minor burns and were transported to a nearby hospital. Additional information about their injuries was unavailable.

Police say the investigation is ongoing and charges are pending.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Authorities say a Lincoln woman hit her boyfriend with a pry bar because she was angry about his snoring.

Lincoln police say 45-year-old Elizabeth Ellen Hogrefe hit the 58-year-old man early Monday while the couple stayed at a motel. The man told police he woke up in the motel room to Hogrefe yelling at him and hitting him in the back with a steel pry bar.

The man stumbled out of the room and someone called authorities. A police spokeswoman says he was found later at a nearby convenience store with injuries consistent with being hit with a pry bar.

Hogrefe was placed into custody. She faces a misdemeanor domestic assault charge. Court records do not list an attorney.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Court of Appeals has rejected a man’s claim that his auto insurance company should pay his costs in a wrongful death case because it didn’t push him to have more coverage.

Investigators say Dennis Rath was driving recklessly on Sept. 10, 2010, when he caused a crash that killed 51-year-old Dana Peterson.

A settlement with Peterson’s estate saw Rath’s insurance carrier, State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co., pay his policy limit of $50,000, and Rath personally pay $25,000.

Rath then sued State Farm and an insurance agent to recover the $25,000 and attorneys fees, arguing that they should have pressed him to carry more than $50,000 coverage for bodily injury liability.

But the appeals court on Tuesday said they had no duty to dictate liability coverage to Rath.

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — Sioux Falls police say no criminal charges are expected after a 2-year-old boy fell from a third-floor apartment window.

Police spokesman Sam Clemens says the boy climbed onto a table, crawled out the window and onto a ledge before falling 27 feet to the ground on Saturday.

The boy was taken to a hospital for treatment of injuries that were not considered life-threatening.

Clemens says the boy’s mother was in another area of the apartment, and had left the boy to watch TV with his older siblings, ages 3, 4 and 6. Clemens says there was a screen on the window, but that the incident serves as a reminder for parents to make sure windows are safe for small children.

COLUMBUS, Neb. (AP) — Demolition work is set to begin this week on the old Union Pacific depot in Columbus.

A Union Pacific official says crews will begin removing pieces from the building’s interior Wednesday before the depot ultimately is razed. He said total demolition of the structure likely will take weeks to finish.

Union Pacific asked the city if it wanted to purchase the building estimated to be more than 100 years old before tearing it down.

But a city administrator said saving the depot would be too costly because it couldn’t remain at its current location due to its close proximity to the railroad tracks. The projected price tag to relocate the building was $750,000.

Union Pacific moved into a new depot in Columbus earlier this year.

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. (AP) — Hall County supervisors are set to vote on providing cremation-only services for people who die in the county and are indigent.

The supervisors will vote on the proposal for cremation-only services, which cost less than a basic burial, on Tuesday.

Hall County has been paying funeral homes over $1,000 per indigent funeral since 1986. The county will also consider raising the 29-year-old reimbursement rate from $1,470 to $1,750

The county also plans to abandon a long-standing practice of burying remains and cremated remains.

According to claims data from the Hall County Clerk’s Office, the county has been averaging about 22 indigent funerals costing about $40,000 a year.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska officials have decided to monitor poultry events at county fairs and other venues, but they won’t ban them even though bird flu has been found in the state.

The state Department of Agriculture sent a letter to poultry show organizers after bird flu was confirmed in chickens from two farms in the northeast corner of the state.

Minnesota, North Dakota, Pennsylvania and West Virginia have all banned poultry events because of the bird flu, but several other states, including neighboring Iowa and South Dakota, are allowing events.

Nebraska agriculture officials say they want to be notified about any poultry shows, so they can evaluate the risks. The state is banning any poultry sales east of U.S. Highway 281 and any sales of birds from eastern Nebraska.