JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A bill to limit police use of deadly force has advanced in the Missouri Senate, an effort aimed at addressing concerns raised after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson.

The Missouri Senate gave initial approval to the bill Tuesday on a voice vote.

Current law justifies deadly force when an officer believes a suspect has committed or attempted a felony, is escaping with a deadly weapon or poses a serious threat of danger to others.

The bill would change part of that law to allow deadly force only if police reasonably believe the suspect has committed or tried to commit a violent felony.

The measure needs a second full Senate vote before it can move to the House.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon has signed legislation that will grant amnesty to some delinquent taxpayers.

The bill signed by Nixon on Monday will waive interest, fees and other penalties for those who pay back taxes this fall.

The period to pay back taxes without penalties runs from Sept. 1 through Nov. 30. Missourians under civil or criminal investigation for tax-related reasons are not eligible.

Those who take advantage of the amnesty period must follow state tax laws for eight years.

Legislative researchers estimate the measure will bring in more than $60 million for the state next fiscal year. Most of that will be set aside to pay for adult dental coverage for Medicaid recipients, as well as provider rate reimbursements.

LARNED, Kan. (AP) — Kansas is among a number of states facing scrutiny over its program that commits sex offenders to involuntary treatment, which critics claim indefinitely warehouses them due to public safety concerns.

Program supporters argue it is necessary to keep dangerous offenders off the street, but some lawmakers have expressed concern as its costs and population balloon. A state audit report is due out Tuesday, comparing Kansas’ programs to those in 19 other states and the District of Columbia.

Republican Gov. Sam Brownback has recommended increasing its funding from $13.9 million in 2014 to $20.4 million by 2017 to accommodate its growing population.

The Department for Aging and Disability Services says the number of offenders confined under the program has grown to 258 since 1994 and only three have been released.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is telling legislators that defending a new anti-abortion law in court could cost the state up to $450,000.

The new law takes effect in July and bans a procedure used in second trimester abortions that critics describe as dismembering a fetus. Kansas is the first state to enact such a ban.

Abortion providers have said they’re considering lawsuits. Anti-abortion leaders are confident the statute will withstand a challenge.

Schmidt told legislators last week that his office could need $50,000 by the end of June, between $100,000 and $200,000 for the fiscal year beginning July 1 and up to $200,000 for the following fiscal year.

Schmidt’s office already has paid outside attorneys $1.2 million to defend anti-abortion laws since 2011, without losing a case.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Former county treasurer Nicole Galloway has been sworn in as Missouri’s new auditor.

Galloway vowed to protect personal data during the Monday ceremony, which made her appointment by fellow Democrat Gov. Jay Nixon official.

Galloway will replace Republican Auditor Tom Schweich, who fatally shot himself Feb. 26. She will serve the remainder of Schweich’s four-year term, which began in January. Longtime Nixon chief of staff John Watson had served as auditor while the governor searched for a permanent replacement.

Nixon first appointed Galloway as Boone County treasurer in 2011 following the death of Treasurer Jan Fugit. She was reelected the next year.

WARRENSBURG, Mo. (AP) — A suburban Kansas City man is dead after crashing his skateboard over the weekend just weeks before he was to graduate from college.

Twenty-six-year-old Dylan Austin of Independence was riding his skateboard at 2:17 a.m. Saturday down a hill leading into a park when he lost control and hit his head on a concrete curb.

Police Chief Bruce Howey says the University of Central Missouri student was going down a huge hill in the darkness and picking up speed when he crashed.

Austin was pronounced dead at the scene. He would have graduated in two weeks from the university with a master’s degree.

Howey says there is no reason to suspect foul play was involved.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A white supremacist accused of killing three people near two Kansas Jewish centers says he’s ready to plead guilty to all charges to avoid a lengthy trial.

Frazier Glenn Miller told The Associated Press in a phone call from jail on Monday that he doesn’t have long to live and wants to have his day in court.

The 74-year-old from Aurora, Missouri, is charged with capital murder in the April 2014 shooting deaths of 69-year-old William Lewis Corporon and his 14-year-old grandson, Reat Griffin Underwood, at the Jewish Community Center of Greater Kansas City in Overland Park, Kansas. He also is accused of killing 53-year-old Terri LaManno at a nearby Jewish retirement home.

Miller told the AP he executed the attacks but wasn’t aware none of the victims were Jewish.

BRAGG CITY, Mo. (AP) — The mystery of the balloon that crash-landed into a southeast Missouri field has been solved — it was a Google Loon.

The Kennett Daily Dunklin Democrat reports that the balloon hovering at 70,000 feet lost its signal Thursday afternoon and ended up in a field near Bragg City, Missouri.

A program director for Google told Pemiscot County Deputy Anthony Dale that Google started the Loon project in New Zealand two years ago in an attempt to fill in gaps in Internet coverage. The balloon over Missouri had been in the air for 14 months.

Google says the balloon tends to develop steering issues after being in the air for so long, so the programmer sends a code so the device will descend, deploying a parachute.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — An Oklahoma woman is challenging her convictions in the 2002 shootings of her ex-husband and his fiancee as they slept in their Topeka home.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that Dana Chandler, of Duncan, Oklahoma alleges that a Shawnee County District Court judge erred in imposing two “Hard 50” sentences. Chandler, now 55, received the sentences in 2012 for the killings of 47-year-old Mike Sisco and 53-year-old Karen Harkness. The sentences mean Chandler would have to serve 100 years before appearing in front of a parole board.

Chandler is asking the Kansas Supreme Court to vacate her convictions, grant her a new trial, or send the convictions back to Shawnee County District Court so she can be resentenced. The earliest the case could be argued would be in the fall.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — All three investor groups interested in developing a southeast Kansas casino have met the minimum financial and management requirements.

The Capital-Journal reports that the Kansas Lottery Commission affirmed Friday that each group met the standards necessary to be forwarded to a seven-member Lottery Gaming Facility Review Board. The board is responsible for selecting the best strategy for what would be the fourth state-owned casino, with a decision expected as early as July.

Under a Kansas law adopted in 2007, four gaming zones were created for casinos, with only one casino allowed in each region. The state owns the casinos but they are managed by private companies responsible for developing the properties.

Casinos now operate in Dodge City, Mulvane and Kansas City, Kansas.