(AP) — The 18-year-old sister of a man accused of killing four people in and around Omaha in August has been charged with being an accessory in one of the killings.

Lori Sayles waived her preliminary hearing on that and an unrelated charge on Friday.

Prosecutors say Sayles got rid of the murder weapon used to kill 22-year-old Curtis Bradford on Aug. 19. Police say 27-year-old Nikko Jenkins shot Bradford. Jenkins is also charged with three other counts of first-degree murder for the Aug. 11 shooting deaths of 29-year-old Jorge Cajiga-Ruiz and 26-year-old Juan Uribe-Pena and the Aug. 21 shooting death of 33-year-old Andrea Kruger.

Sayles also faces a separate robbery charge from an Aug. 12 incident.

(AP) — A jury has awarded an Omaha woman $6.5 million after she was injured in a 2007 crash in which she argued her car’s air bag didn’t fully deploy.

The Douglas County jury made the award Friday to 70-year-old Katherine Sprague.

She suffered severe injuries in the crash and still has difficulty walking.

Sprague’s attorneys argued her injuries were more severe because the air bag in her Lexus ES330 didn’t fully inflate.

Toyota attorneys argued how Sprague sat and the way her seat belt was draped over her body contributed to her injuries.

The $6.5 million award was for past and future medical bills, care Sprague may need and for pain and suffering.

Toyota attorneys couldn’t be reached for comment, but the company will likely appeal.

(AP) — While the lawsuits against state and county officials by two men falsely accused of murder have been settled, a former Douglas County crime scene investigator still faces claims.

Lawsuits by Matthew Livers and Nicholas Sampson are pending against former CSI Director David Kofoed, who served time in prison for witness tampering in the case.

Kofoed was investigating the 2006 deaths of Wayne and Sharmon Stock when he said he found a speck of a victim’s blood in a car linked to Livers and Sampson.

Prosecutors said Kofoed faked a positive test to bolster a case against the two men, who were later exonerated.

An attorney for Sampson, Maren Chaloupka, says Kofoed does not have an attorney and has not participated in court actions.

Kofoed could not be reached for comment.

(AP) — A Lincoln event might be just the ticket for people who worry about being prepared for the march of the walking dead.

Matt Mogk will share tips on surviving a zombie apocalypse in his presentation, “Zombies, Run!” The presentation is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 30 in the Nebraska Union Auditorium on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln campus.

The event is free for UNL students with a valid NCard and costs all others $5.

Mogk is the founder and head of the Zombie Research Society, which is composed of more than 60,000 zombie academics and enthusiasts on six continents. He is the author of “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Zombies.”

(AP) — The topic will be government surveillance when two University of Nebraska-Lincoln doctoral candidates face off against the British National Debate Team.

Renowned for their wit, humor and eloquence, members of the British team tour the United States each year.

The Lincoln debate will begin at 3 p.m. on Wednesday in the auditorium of the Nebraska Union. The UNL students are Jonathan Carter and Jessy Ohl. They are doctoral candidates in the Department of Communication Studies.

The event is free and open to the public.

 

(AP) — Omaha police have identified the two men involved in a fiery crash that killed one and critically injured the other man.

Police Sgt. Doug Klein says the crash happened around 2:45 a.m. Sunday at the 24th Street exit on I-80.

An eastbound 2000 Buick Century tried to exit the Interstate at 24th Street, but the car sped across 24th Street and struck a traffic barrier.

The car came to rest on its side and caught fire. The first officer to arrive extinguished the fire.

The passenger, 26-year-old Joshua Pacheco, died at the scene, and the driver, 22-year-old Matthew Fleshman, was hospitalized in critical condition. Both men are from Omaha.

Investigators say speed and alcohol likely contributed to the crash.

(AP) — A Lincoln man who led law enforcement on a two-day manhunt and forced the lockdown of three Lincoln schools has been found guilty of being a felon with a gun.

Police captured 30-year-old Chadrick Fitzgerald on March 21, a day after Lincoln police were called about a possible shooting involving his ex-girlfriend.

Officials locked down nearby Northeast High School and Pershing Elementary, and later North Star High School, as the search for Fitzgerald spread.

He was found the next day hiding in an apartment complex storage closet.

If Fitzgerald is found by the judge to be a habitual offender, he will face at least 10 years in prison when he’s sentenced Nov. 21.

(AP) — Nebraska’s largest public school district is applying for a $7.6 million Sherwood Foundation grant to better prepare science teachers and improve curriculum.

Omaha Public Schools would use the five-year, K-12 grant to hire science coaches, send teachers back to school for graduate-level science coursework, buy supplies for student experiments and develop new curriculum.

The application comes amid a national push to prepare students for STEM careers — those in science, technology, engineering and math.

The Omaha district is in the process of submitting its application for the grant, which was developed solely with OPS in mind. No other districts are competing for the funding.

(AP) — Authorities in western Pennsylvania say a man fathered four children with a relative whom he repeatedly raped and assaulted over more than 20 years.

State police arrested the 55-year-old Butler County man on Saturday. He is charged with dozens of counts of rape, indecent assault and incest.

The offenses allegedly occurred from 1992 until August of this year in various locations in Butler County and neighboring Allegheny County, where Pittsburgh is located.

The Associated Press is not naming the suspect to avoid identifying his relative. The AP generally does not identify victims of sexual assault.

The man, who is from Chicora, was being held at the county prison on $500,000 bail. It was not clear whether he had an attorney.

Police could not immediately provide more details on the case.

(AP) — A Grand Island woman convicted of having sex with her stepson and then violating her probation by living with him has again been given probation.

The 28-year-old woman was re-sentenced Thursday by Hall County District Judge William Wright to five years’ probation.

That’s the same sentence she got in May after pleading no contest to sexual assaulting her 15-year-old stepson. As part of the probation, she was ordered to have no contact with her stepson or with any child under age 18 without her probation officer’s approval.

But two weeks later, court documents say, sheriff’s deputies found her living in a home with her stepson and two other young children.

The Associated Press is not naming the woman to protect her stepson’s identity.