RAYMORE, Mo. (AP) — Authorities are investigating whether police were targeted when someone tossed an explosive device at a patrol car along a Missouri highway.

No one was injured Thursday when the device detonated on the pavement behind a westbound police patrol vehicle along Missouri 58 in Raymore, a Kansas City suburb. Investigators say the device was thrown from an eastbound vehicle.

John Ham is a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Ham says the device was “likely homemade” and could’ve caused “severe injury.” He declined to provide further details.

Ham says the concern is the unidentified suspect “targeted law enforcement.”

A $5,000 reward is available for information leading to an arrest and conviction. Ham says dashcam video isn’t available because the patrol vehicle’s lights and sirens weren’t activated.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri lawmaker who temporarily posted a Facebook comment hoping for President Donald Trump’s assassination could face an effort to remove her from office.

Republican Gov. Eric Greitens and Lt. Gov. Mike Parson on Friday both said state senators should oust Democratic Sen. Maria Chapelle-Nadal from office.

Numerous top Democratic and Republican officials in Missouri have called upon Chappelle-Nadal to resign because of the Facebook comment she wrote and later deleted Thursday. But the lawmaker from the St. Louis area has said she won’t step down.

The Missouri Constitution says a lawmaker can be expelled upon a two-thirds vote of the elected members of a chamber.

The Legislature is not currently in session, but it is scheduled to convene in mid-September to consider veto overrides.

EL DORADO, Kan. (AP) — Gov. Sam Brownback has announced pay raises at state prisons in the wake of inmate disturbances that have drawn public attention to staff shortages.

Uniformed officers across the state would receive about a 5 percent raise. Officers at El Dorado Correctional Facility will see raises of about 10 percent. The increase would kick in later this month if the employees’ union agrees.

Brownback says the state can fund the raises in the short term but lawmakers would have to find money next session to continue them.

The move would boost pay from $13.95 to $14.66 per hour statewide, and to $15.74 per hour at El Dorado.

Department of Corrections Secretary Joe Norwood says the higher pay in El Dorado facility is due to the tighter job market in that area.

CLINTON, Mo. (AP) — A man accused of providing the weapon used to kill a western Missouri police officer is facing new charges, and prosecutors also charged his wife.

Henry County Prosecuting Attorney Richard Shields announced Thursday that William Noble, of Clinton, is charged with hindering prosecution, fraudulent purchase of a firearm and four counts of endangering a child. He already was charged with tampering with physical evidence. Prosecutors contend he bought the rifle Ian McCarthy allegedly used to kill Clinton police officer Gary Michael Jr. on Aug. 6.

Brandie Noble was charged with hindering prosecution and four counts of endangering a child.

Prosecutors say McCarthy was in the Nobles’ home for a time while police were searching for him. The couple’s four juvenile children were in the home.

A call to William Noble’s attorney was not answered.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A new monthly report shows drought conditions continue to burden the rural economy in parts of 10 Plains and Western states.

The overall Rural Mainstreet Index for the region rose slightly in August to 42.2 from July’s abysmally low 40.7. The index ranges between 0 and 100, with any number under 50 indicating a shrinking economy.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss, who oversees the survey, says nearly 58 percent of bankers reported in August’s survey that drought conditions were having a negative effect on agriculture products in their area.

Also, bankers expect farmland prices to decline by another 3.5 percent on average over the next year.

Bankers from Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming were surveyed.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A California woman awaits sentencing and a New Hampshire man is prison-bound for their roles in what federal prosecutors say was a $2.25-million scheme to sell anabolic steroids online.

Twenty-nine-year-old Michael G. Peters of Pelham, New Hampshire, was sentenced Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri, to three years in prison. He also was must forfeit $2.25 million the government says was derived from illegal drug trafficking.

Twenty-nine-year-old Brittainy Baker of Venice, California, pleaded guilty to participating in a conspiracy to manufacture and distribute anabolic steroids from December 2011 to February 2016.

Prosecutors say the defendants ran an Internet-based company called Power Trip, which sold anabolic steroids to athletes, minors and other U.S. customers.

Thirty-two-year-old Aaron Schweidler of Smithfield, North Carolina, has been sentenced to four years in prison for his role.

COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Columbia officials say a child playing with a lighter started a fire that killed a 4-year-old boy in May.

Zadrian Harper died in the May 26 fire at his home. Police say the fire, which started in a sofa in a living room, has been ruled accidental.

Police said Wednesday that an adult and three other children were able to escape but Zadrian was found in a bedroom.

He was taken to a hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — World War II veterans exposed to mustard gas by the military will find it easier to receive help under legislation President Donald Trump has signed into law.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that Trump on Wednesday signed the legislation that Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill, of Missouri, pushed through Congress. It requires the Veterans Affairs Department to reconsider disability benefits denied to those who claimed the testing caused health problems.

McCaskill has said the military tested the effects of mustard gas and the blister agent lewisite on about 60,000 veterans by the end of World War II. Her office estimates a couple hundred participants could still be alive, including 90-year-old Missouri resident Arla Harrell, for whom the bill was named.

McCaskill says, “Every once in a while, Congress gets it right.”

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Police and rescue crews say drivers overdosing on heroin and other drugs are driving up the number of car crashes.

Authorities say people with addictions don’t like to wait to get high, so they often shoot up in the car as soon as they get their hands on drugs. Often they’re back on the road before the overdose takes hold and they lose consciousness, creating potential disasters.

Overdose crashes have become so common that some rescue crews immediately administer the opioid antidote naloxone to any unresponsive driver they find at an accident scene.

Kennard Skaggs is a national representative of the International Association of EMTs and Paramedics. He says that the depth of the epidemic is horrifying, and that overdose crashes aren’t abating.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A central Missouri man faces up to five years in federal prison now that he’s admitted his role in a plot to smuggle into the U.S. chemicals used to make synthetic marijuana.

Thirty-year-old Wesley Upchurch of Columbia pleaded guilty Wednesday to a conspiracy count. A sentencing date was not immediately set.

Upchurch is the case’s 18th defendant to plead guilty. Four of them already have been sentenced.

Upchurch admitted that he and other conspirators bought various synthetic cannabinoids in powder form from China over a three-year period to March 2014. The packages often had misleading labeling about their contents to avoid detection by law enforcers.

These chemicals were combined with other ingredients, such as generic potpourri, then packaged and sold at various retail outlets.