LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A recently released affidavit says a man charged in a Lawrence killing laughed about the victim bleeding to death. The affidavit supporting the arrest of 34-year-old Joshua Lee Back says officers followed a blood trail from where officers found 45-year-old Tracy Dean Lautenschlager bleeding in May.

The trail ended at a home, where a witness told police that Lautenschlager, Back and a third man had smoked methamphetamine the night before.

The affidavit says the meth-smoking companion told officers that Back said he had “cut a person’s throat and laughed about the amount of blood squirting from the wound.”

Back, of Oskaloosa, is charged with second-degree murder and jailed on $750,000 bond. His defense attorney didn’t immediately return a phone call from The Associated Press.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas lawmakers are grappling with the state’s possible response to new federal rules aimed at reducing carbon emissions from power plants.

Lawmakers expressed frustration Thursday with the regulations at the first meeting of a committee created earlier this year to review any plan for complying with the rules.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency told states earlier this year that by 2022, they must start reducing carbon emissions linked to climate change. The EPA’s target for Kansas is a 43 percent reduction by 2030.

Kansas is expected to submit its initial plan, along with an extension request, in September 2016.

The Kansas attorney general’s office plans to challenge the federal rules in court after the final rule is published.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska’s new economic development director is out after a little more than eight months on the job.

Gov. Pete Ricketts announced Thursday that Brenda Hicks-Sorensen no longer holds the position. Taylor Gage, a spokesman for Ricketts, says the decision to change leadership was made by the governor.

Ricketts says in a statement that it became clear to him that Nebraska needs to do more to market the state nationally and globally. An interim director will be named shortly, and a new search is underway.

Ricketts appointed Hicks-Sorensen in January after a privately funded national search. She previously served as a vice president of Economic and Community Development for the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation.

BLUE SPRINGS, Mo. (AP) — An Independence woman has died after walking in front of a tractor-trailer in the Kansas City suburb of Blue Springs.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol identified the victim as 25-year-old Caitlyn Morgan. The patrol says the tractor-trailer was headed westbound on Interstate 70 when Morgan stepped in front of it around 2 a.m. Thursday. She was pronounced dead at the scene.

UPDATE (AP) – A student at the Oregon community college where a mass shooting occurred says the gunman shot her teacher and asked others in her classroom about their religion before spraying more bullets.

Eighteen-year-old Kortney Moore of Rogue River tells the Roseburg News-Review newspaper that she was in a writing class at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg on Thursday when a shot came through a window.

The gunman entered her classroom and told people to get on the ground.

Moore says the man started asking people to stand up and state their religion and then opened fire.

The shooting left 13 people dead and at least 20 injured.

Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin says authorities responded and exchanged gunfire with the man. He says the shooter died at the scene, but he didn’t say whether the man killed himself or was shot by police.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A second straight monthly survey of nine Midwest and Plains states suggests a slowdown in the region’s economy.

A report issued Thursday says the overall Mid-American Business Conditions Index dropped to 47.7 last month, compared with 49.6 in August.

Creighton University economist Ernie Goss oversees the survey, and he cited the strong U.S. dollar and global economic weakness among the reasons for the region’s economic slide.

The survey results from supply managers are compiled into a collection of indexes ranging from zero to 100. Survey organizers say any score above 50 suggests economic growth. A score below that suggests decline.

The survey covers Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Kansas City Zoo officials say the facility is acquiring a bull African elephant sometime in October.

The Kansas City Star reports that the addition of the elephant, named Tamani, will make a future breeding program possible. Tamani, who will soon be 10 years old, now resides at the Birmingham Zoo in Alabama with three other males, including his father.

In Kansas City, Tamani will join six female African elephants that are past their reproductive years. But zoo officials hope to acquire younger females in the future.

Zoo director Randy Wisthoff says the addition is “really important for elephant conservation” and “keeps Kansas City in the elephant business.”

Tamani weighs about 6,000 pounds. Zoo officials say his name means “hope” in Swahili.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — Conservation officials are reminding hunters that they can donate deer meat to families in need through a Missouri program.

KYTV reports that the program, called Share the Harvest, is administered by the Missouri Department of Conservation and the Conservation Federation of Missouri.

The program makes it possible for hunters take deer to approved meat processors. Hunters can donate a few pounds of meat or the entire deer. The processor will package the meat, and store it until it’s picked and taken to a charitable agency.

The cost of meat processing is the hunter’s responsibility, but money is available to help offset costs when a whole deer is donated.

In 2014, nearly 4,000 hunters donated more than 212,000 pounds of venison through the program.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — It’s been a tough year for pumpkin growers in Missouri, and buyers can expect to see significantly higher prices this fall.

The wet summer and dry fall combined to make things hard on pumpkin farmers. Fewer pumpkins are being grown, and their size is down.

Ag expert Tim Reinbott says the price of pumpkins is nearly double the price from a year ago.

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — A proposal to use drones to study severe storms has received a boost from a $1.9 million federal grant to refine the aircraft and some of the instruments they carry.

The University of Nebraska  is one of five schools working on the project.

University of Colorado researcher Eric Frew said Wednesday the National Science Foundation grant will allow CU and four other schools to develop guidance systems that maximize the drones’ flight time.

The grant will also help develop some of the instruments the drones would carry.

Test flights would be done over tornado-prone states in the West and Midwest.

The other schools involved are the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Texas Tech, the University of Minnesota and Texas A&M.

Researchers say drones can penetrate parts of storms that other instruments can’t reach, at less cost and with less danger than piloted planes.