LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A Lincoln doctor has been accused of using patients and employees to obtain prescription drugs for his own use.

Federal court records say Dr. Jeffrey Fraser has been indicted on a weapons charge and a charge of obtaining controlled substances by fraud. He’s due in U.S. District Court for a hearing on July 11.

A phone listed for him rang busy during several calls Friday. The court records don’t list the name of an attorney who could comment for him.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Supreme Court has upheld a Lincoln man’s first-degree murder and other convictions and his life sentence for the 2016 shooting death of another man.

Anthony Wells was convicted in January 2017 for the shooting death of 25-year-old Joshua Hartwig. Police found Hartwig dead outside an apartment building north of downtown Lincoln. Investigators say Wells fired 13 rounds into a crowd outside the building following an argument with a woman, hitting Hartwig in the neck.

In his appeal, Wells argued the trial court made several errors, including a faulty jury instruction, and that his lawyer was so ineffective that it cost him a fair trial.

On Friday, the high court dismissed those arguments in affirming Wells’ convictions and sentences.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Lincoln’s fire and rescue department is looking into equipping its emergency crews with body armor.

Fire Chief Micheal Despain told the Lincoln Journal Star that the department is researching ballistic protection to potentially acquire vests and helmets to protect firefighters in an active shooter response. Lincoln Fire and Rescue has already purchased bulletproof medical bags and trained with local law enforcement agencies to prepare for active shooter situations.

“You never thought ambulance teams or medic teams would even need to wear body armor,” said Shawn Mayfield of Point Blank Enterprises at a recent vest demonstration in Lincoln. “But I guess that’s the way things are going.”

More fire departments around the county are buying bulletproof vests, according to manufacturers.

Despain doesn’t know of any recent stabbings or shootings involving the city’s emergency crews but he said there have been some close calls. Several paramedics have been assaulted, he said.

“We’re seeing more and more weapons out there,” he said.

Ballistic vests are covered under warranty for a certain number of years. The city will assume all liability after that if one fails to work or someone is injured or killed, Despain said.

The department estimates the vests would cost more than $200,000 total for the 250 firefighters.

The vests aren’t a top priority since the department is working to replace aging fire engines, Despain said. New fire engines are estimated to cost upward of $450,000 each.

“We need 11 fire engines yesterday,” he said. “We won’t be able to go to the (active shooter) incident if we don’t get that solved over time.”

AUBURN, Neb. (AP) — A 36-year-old man charged with first-degree murder in the case of a missing Peru State College coed has pleaded not guilty.

Joshua Keadle entered the written plea Thursday in Nemaha County District Court. He’s charged in the disappearance and presumed death of 19-year-old Peru State College student Tyler “Ty” Thomas.

Keadle’s arraignment had been set for July 2, but his written plea waives that appearance. A trial date has not yet been set.

Thomas disappeared Dec. 3, 2010, after leaving a party near the Peru State campus. Authorities say Keadle, a fellow student, told them he and Thomas had sex in his vehicle that night, and that Thomas threatened to report he had raped her.

The state issued a death certificate for Thomas in 2013, even though her body has never been found.

Keadle is already serving prison sentence for the 2008 rape of a 15-year-old girl.

DOON, Iowa (AP) — An estimated 230,000 gallons (870,619 liters) of crude oil spilled into floodwaters in the northwestern corner of Iowa following a train derailment, a railroad official said Saturday.

BNSF spokesman Andy Williams said 14 of 32 oil tanker cars just south of Doon in Lyon County leaked oil into surrounding floodwaters from the swollen Little Rock River. Williams had earlier said 33 oil cars had derailed.

Nearly half the spill — an estimated 100,000 gallons (378,530 liters) — had been contained with booms near the derailment site and an additional boom placed approximately 5 miles (8.05 kilometers) downstream, Williams said. Skimmers and vacuum trucks were being used to remove the oil. Crews will then use equipment to separate the oil from the water.

“In addition to focusing on the environmental recovery, ongoing monitoring is occurring for any potential conditions that could impact workers and the community and so far have found no levels of concern,” Williams said.

Officials still hadn’t determined the cause of Friday morning’s derailment, but a disaster proclamation issued by Gov. Kim Reynolds for Lyon and three other counties placed the blame on rain-fueled flooding. Reynolds visited the derailment site Saturday afternoon as part of a tour of areas hit by recent flooding.

Some officials have speculated that floodwaters eroded soil beneath the train track. The nearby Little Rock River rose rapidly after heavy rain Wednesday and Thursday.

A major part of the cleanup work includes building a temporary road parallel to the tracks to allow in cranes that can remove the derailed and partially-submerged oil cars. Williams said officials hoped to reach the cars Saturday.

The train was carrying tar sands oil from Alberta, Canada, to Stroud, Oklahoma, for ConocoPhillips. ConocoPhillips spokesman Daren Beaudo said each tanker can hold more than 25,000 gallons (20,817 imperial gallons) of oil.

Beaudo said Saturday that the derailed oil cars were a model known as DOT117Rs, indicating they were newer or had been retrofitted to be safer and help prevent leaks in the event of an accident.

The derailment also caused concern downstream, including as far south as Omaha, Nebraska, about 150 miles (240 kilometers) from the derailment site. The spill reached the Rock River, which joins the Big Sioux River before merging into the Missouri River at Sioux City.

Omaha’s public water utility — Metropolitan Utilities District — said it was monitoring pumps it uses to pull drinking water from the Missouri River.

Rock Valley, Iowa, just southwest of the derailment, shut off its water wells within hours of the accident. It plans to drain and clean its wells and use a rural water system until testing shows its water is safe.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says sandbars along part of the Missouri River are again closed to protect the nests of endangered bird species.

The Corps says endangered interior least terns and threatened piping plovers nest on sandbars between Ft. Peck Dam in Montana and Ponca State Park in Nebraska.

The birds use the sandbars to lay their eggs and hatch chicks.

The number of sandbars on the Missouri River is limited this year because the water level is higher than normal.

The nesting season runs from mid-May through August.

LA VISTA, Neb. (AP) — A new music venue with an indoor space and an outdoor amphitheater will be built in eastern Nebraska.

The La Vista City Council unanimously approved a preliminary statement of intent to build the venue, the Omaha World-Herald reported

The venue will be built by local promoter 1% Productions, Kansas-based Mammoth Live and Omaha developer City Ventures. Mammoth Live and 1% Productions will operate the venue.

“There are more shows out there,” said Marc Leibowitz of 1% Productions. “There’s more business to be had, and we need a place to do it that works.”

Brenda Gunn, city administrator for La Vista, said the cost hasn’t been determined for the project but that about $3.2 million could be needed.

Leibowitz said the goal isn’t to take down other venues.

“It’s about the venue we want to build. It’s about bringing something new,” Leibowitz said. “We really just want it to be a top-notch experience.”

The venue is expected to hold 1,800 people indoors and 4,000 people outdoors. Both areas will have the capacity to scale up, depending on the configuration of seating and other elements.

Mammoth Live and 1% Productions said artists have skipped the market because they don’t have the right place to play.

“We’re missing tours. When we don’t miss them, we’re putting them in oddball situations where the production doesn’t work, or it’s an odd fit, or the artist can’t make money, or we can’t break even,” said Josh Hunt of Mammoth.

Construction is expected to begin this year, with a goal of opening by 2020.

“It’s gonna be really exciting for the market,” Leibowitz said,

HARRISON, Neb. (AP) — A woman has been given one to three years in prison for her role in a pasture rental scam in the northern Nebraska Panhandle.

Sioux County District Court records say 52-year-old Kelley Heller, of Crawford, was sentenced June 12.

Heller and her daughter, Calinda Barthel Vantine, were arrested in February 2017. Prosecutors say the scheme was orchestrated by Vantine and resulted in more than $44,000 in losses to the five victims. The two didn’t own the pasture they’d rented to the five people from Nov. 1, 2015 through Feb. 15, 2017.

The 28-year-old Vantine was sentenced to prison last October. She also is known as Calinda Barthel.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — A Lincoln man has been found guilty in a second trial in the brutal beating and robbery a University of Nebraska-Lincoln student.

Late Wednesday night, a Lancaster County jury found 25-year-old James Price guilty of aiding and abetting robbery and first-degree assault. He faces up to 100 years in prison when he’s sentenced in August. Price’s first trial in 2016 ended in a hung jury.

A Texas man, 25-year-old Stelson Curry, is already serving 25 to 40 years for the attack on Patrick Pantoja.

Police say Pantoja and a fellow student were walking near the State Capitol to the UNL campus one October night in 2014 when they were attacked.

Pantoja spent a month in a coma and several more months in a hospital from the beating.

 

GRETNA, Neb. (AP) — Authorities say a dispute led a man to shoot another man in a Gretna apartment complex parking lot, then fatally shot himself.

The Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office says the shooting happened around 8 a.m. Thursday, when 50-year-old Michael Bartenhagen, of Gretna, was shot two to three times while he was in his vehicle. Investigators say Bartenhagen drove himself to a nearby fire station and was then taken to an Omaha hospital in serious condition. He’s expected to recover.

Deputies say they found the suspect, 52-year-old Scott Rieflin, of Gretna, in his apartment suffering from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Investigators say the two men knew each other and that Rieflin was upset about a relationship between Bartenhagen and a woman.