(AP) — Firefighters in eastern Nebraska have found the body of a man inside a burning home.

The fire was discovered before 7:30 a.m. Saturday in a ranch home in Waterloo, just west of Omaha.

Waterloo Volunteer Fire Department Chief Travis Harlow says black smoke was billowing from the home when firefighters arrived. The man, who was alone in the house, was found dead in the living room.

Harlow says the man has not yet been identified. Investigators are working to determine what caused the fire, which burned a hole through the floor of the house but was quickly contained.

Harlow says an autopsy would be done to determine the cause of the man’s death.

(AP) — Police are investigating after shots were fired Friday near a northeast Omaha city park.

An officer parked in the area saw a person fire shots into the air around 10 a.m. Friday near Miller Park.

The officer chased after and arrested the 19-year-old suspect, whom police say has a felony conviction on his record.

The teen was taken jailed on suspicion of unlawfully discharging a gun, possession of an unregistered firearm and obstructing an officer.

(AP) — Omaha police say two officers involved in a recent shooting at a bar have been cleared to return to duty.

Police say Officers Brian Korth and Scott Richter were off-duty and working as security at the Tquila Bar when the shooting occurred Sunday morning.

The shooting happened after officers and the bar’s staff noticed someone prowling the parking lot checking car doors while another man followed in a white truck.

The man roaming the lot was quickly arrested, but police say the man in the truck drove at the officers as he fled, leading to officers to fire on the truck.

Police identified the man in the truck as Juan Sarmiento-Reyes, who turned himself in to police later.

(AP) — Two people will share a $25,000 Crime Stoppers reward for providing tips to police in the slaying of a 5-year-old Omaha girl.

The two will remain anonymous. The Omaha Crime Stoppers program will arrange for them to use code numbers in picking the cash at a bank.

Four men have been arrested and charged in the slaying of Payton Benson on Jan. 15. Police say the girl was eating breakfast in her home when she was struck by a stray bullet fired from a block away.

(AP) — The Nebraska Supreme Court has, for the second straight week, addressed the issue of teenagers sentenced to life without parole.

Trevelle Taylor was 17 in 2009 when he shot and killed Justin Gaines in a gang-related dispute. In 2010, Taylor was convicted as an adult of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. While the words “life without parole” don’t appear in his sentence, the judge set no discharge date for Taylor “until the Pardons Board of the State of Nebraska commutes the sentence or offers a specific term of years.”

His attorney argued that amounts to life without parole. On Friday, the Nebraska Supreme Court agreed and ordered a new sentencing.

The U.S. Supreme Court says teenagers cannot be locked up for life without the chance of parole.

(AP) — The owner of an unusual wolf hybrid dog breed faces a deadline to move his dog outside Lincoln city limits.

A judge has denied a motion to delay an order by the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department to Alex Kaftan. He was told in a Jan. 17 letter to move his Czechoslovakian vlcak (VUHL’-chak) out of town within 30 days.

The city says the dog, Mars, is a hybrid cross between a German shepherd and a Carpathian wolf. Wolf-dog hybrids are barred from the city.

Kaftan says the vlcak is not a hybrid but rather a special breed. The Czechoslovakian Vlcak Club of America says German shepherds were experimentally crossed in 1955 with Carpathian wolves. Kaftan’s attorney says neither of Mars’ parents was a wolf.

(AP) — A federal judge has ordered the people behind an alleged Ponzi scheme that cost investors about $4.7 million to pay roughly $10 million in penalties.

U.S. District Judge Laurie Smith Camp imposed the penalties against Elite Management Holdings, MJM Enterprises and two individuals who ran them: Michael Kratville and Jonathan Arrington.

The penalties are part of a 2011 lawsuit filed by the federal Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The commission says investors lost $3 million in participants’ funds and more than $1.5 million in investments was misappropriate. The companies involved closed in 2007.

Kratville and Arrington are both facing federal criminal charges related to the case.

 

(AP) — The second suspect in the 2012 shooting death of a Lincoln man has pleaded guilty after making a deal with prosecutors.

On Wednesday 24-year-old Miguel Castillo was convicted of aiding and abetting the use of a firearm to commit a felony and of being an accessory to second-degree murder. Prosecutors reduced a murder charge in exchange for Castillo’s plea.

Castillo and 21-year-old Adrian Casares are accused of killing Tyler Schoenrock in December 2012. Schoenrock’s body was found on a rural road outside of Lincoln. Casares pleaded no contest to lesser charges last week.

Each man says the other shot Schoenrock. Both men are scheduled to be sentenced in April.

(AP) — A judge has fined an 88-year-old woman $100 for backing over and killing a former state senator while driving in a Lincoln parking lot.

The fine was the maximum punishment on the traffic infraction. Imogene Bruce, of Lincoln, had pleaded no contest on Wednesday to careless driving. Authorities say former Sen. Jennie Robak died Jan. 3 after the accident in a grocery store parking lot. Police say Bruce accidentally accelerated when trying to stop as Robak walked behind her car.

Bruce said before her court hearing that she was sorry for what happened. Bruce’s lawyer says Bruce has given up her driver’s license.

Robak represented the Columbus area in the Legislature from 1989 until 2003.

(AP) — An attorney for a Peru State College student says he’ll ask a federal judge to reconsider her dismissal of the student’s lawsuit challenging Nebraska’s denial of driver’s licenses to people who were brought into the country illegally as children.

U.S. District Judge Laurie Smith Camp ruled Wednesday in favor of the state, saying Nebraska had not violated Mayra Saldana’s equal-protection rights. Saldana was granted deferred-action status under an Obama administration program.

Saldana, who came to the U.S. from Mexico at age 2, applied for a Nebraska driver’s license three times in January 2013, and was denied.

Her attorney, Aaron Siebert-Llera with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, says he needed more time to show that Nebraska officials have given licenses to some immigrants with deferred-action status.