LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — One of three Kansas men charged in a triple homicide in Lawrence is free after pleading to a misdemeanor.
Dominque McMillon from an earlier arrest in Shawnee Co.
Defense attorney J.C. Gilroy said 20-year-old Dominque McMillon pleaded no contest Tuesday to misdemeanor battery. He was freed from jail because he was sentenced to less time than he’s already served in the case. A felony charge of aggravated assault was dropped as part of the plea deal.
McMillon started a fistfight that escalated into gunfire in downtown Lawrence in October 2017, killing three and injuring two.
Douglas County District Attorney said in a news release that resolving Gilroy’s case allows the state to concentrate on the two remaining and more serious cases.
The two other suspects are jailed on $1 million bond each while awaiting trial.
The Jefferson City News-Tribune reports that Gov. Mike Parson announced Tuesday that he was naming Col. Eric Olson as the patrol’s next superintendent, subject to the Missouri Senate’s confirmation. He’s been acting superintendent since Sept. 1, when the previous patrol head — Sandra Karsten — was named director of the state’s Public Safety Department.
Olson grew up in Chillicothe and began serving with the patrol in 1990 after earning a bachelor’s degree in psychology from William Jewell College in Liberty. He has served as director of the Division of Drug & Crime Control and as commander of the Criminal Investigation Bureau at the patrol’s general headquarters in Jefferson City.
ATCHISON COUNTY, Mo. — Six people were injured in an accident just before 9p.m. Tuesday in Atchison County.
The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 2007 Nissan Minivan driven by Alisha R. Sachs, 33, Tarkio, was southbound on Interstate 29 three miles east of Watson. The van skidded out of control when the vehicle’s front passenger tire deflated. The van slid off the road into a water-filled ditch and overturned.
Atchison-Holt ambulance transported Sachs and passengers Mark S. Sachs, 31, Lincoln, NE., Aubrey L. Sachs, 9; Mark S. Sachs, 4; Raelynn J. Sachs, 8; and Riley F. Sachs, 10, all of Tarkio to the Fairfax Hospital.
Mark S. Sachs, 31, was not wearing a seat belt, according to the MSHP.
MONTGOMERY COUNTY – A Kansas sheriff is under investigation in connection with a DUI arrest.
Sheriff Dierks -photo courtesy Montgomery Co.
According to a media release from the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, on March 1, Montgomery County Sheriff Robert W. Dierks, 55, was served a summons to appear in Montgomery County District Court following an investigation by KBI agents.
Dierks is scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday, March 6, on one count of Interference with a Law Enforcement Officer; Obstruction, or in the alternative, Attempted Obstruction; and one count of Intimidation of a Witness; Attempt to Prevent or Dissuade. According to the summons, the alleged crimes occurred on Jan. 27, 2018, in Montgomery County related to a DUI arrest.
The Fourteenth Judicial District entered an order appointing Todd Hiatt, an attorney from Shawnee County, to serve as special assistant county attorney for the case.
COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Two men who ran a brothel in Columbia have been sentenced to federal prison.
Manthe -photo Boone Co.
Barry Manthe was sentenced Monday to 18 months in prison and Ronald Clark was sentenced to 30 months. Both men pleaded guilty to using the internet to promote a prostitution business.
Another man, Kenneth Jones, was sentenced in December to 15 years in federal prison for the sex trafficking of a minor.
The FBI learned in June 2016 that Jones was forcing a 17-year-old runaway from Wisconsin into prostitution. She was found at a Columbia residence that Manthe and Clark operated as a brothel. The girl told investigators that Manthe placed ads in on the website Backpage, Clark collected a fee from the prostitutes and Jones got the rest of the money.
ATCHISON, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a 3-year-old boy has been flown to a hospital with an abdominal wound after an apparent accidental shooting in a northeast Kansas home.
Authorities responded Tuesday after the boy’s mother reported that her son picked up a loose gun, which went off as he was handling it.
Atchison Police Chief Mike Wilson said further details on how the boy came to find the gun and who it belongs to can’t be discussed at this time pending an investigation. Wilson says the cause of the discharge appears to be accidental.
The boy initially was taken to Atchison Hospital and flown from there to Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri man has been sentenced for sex crimes involving a 13-year-old Alabama girl who was brought to Missouri by the man’s mother and grandmother.
Twenty-two-year-old Michael James Collins was sentenced Monday to 15 years in prison without parole.
Investigators say Collins met the girl on a dating website in July 2017. At the time, Collins was a registered sex offender on probation for a previous conviction for sexual misconduct involving a child.
He admitted in November that he paid his grandmother $400 to bring the girl from Alabama to Missouri. His mother was with his grandmother when they picked up the girl.
Collins says he had sex with the girl in a van while the women were taking him to and from work and the Community Supervision Center in Fulton.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A new study says expanding Medicaid in Kansas would have a net cost of $47.4 million in the first year.
Image courtesy KHI.org
The nonprofit Kansas Health Institute estimated in the study released Tuesday that an additional 130,000 low-income adults and children would sign up if the program was expanded. That accounts for adults who already are eligible but may not know it, as well as those who already have insurance but would switch if state assistance were available.
The number is lower than previous estimates that 150,000 would sign up for the coverage. KHI policy executive and lead author Kari Bruffett says that’s because economic improvements have left fewer people uninsured.
Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly has made expansion a top priority, although Republican leaders are opposed.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Missouri Senate has approved legislation aimed at sharply limiting the large legal awards coming out of the St. Louis court system in cases where multiple plaintiffs combine similar lawsuits.
Sen. Ed Emery, R-Lamar
Republicans have tried for years to outlaw awards like one in February in which 22 women were awarded $4.7 billion after claiming that Johnson & Johnson baby powder caused their ovarian cancer. Many of the plaintiffs were not from Missouri.
The attempt to change the law was helped this year when the Missouri Supreme Court halted the practice after the Johnson & Johnson verdict was reached, said Sen. Ed Emery, R-Lamar, who led the GOP effort.
Under the proposed change, an incident must have occurred in the same county or the parties in the lawsuit must live in the same county, The St. Louis-Post Dispatch reported. The Senate approved the bill Monday on a 24-7 vote. It now goes to the House.
Sen. Scott Sifton, D-Affton, acknowledged that the current practice needs to be addressed but said the proposal approved Monday could have the unintended consequence of clogging the court system if each individual must file a separate lawsuit.
Sifton, an attorney who is considering running for governor next year, held an overnight filibuster on the proposal last month to find time for a compromise. His fellow Democrats argued during the filibuster that the proposed change would make the claims process inconvenient and more expensive.
“I think plaintiff joinder is something that allows us to resolve important disputes more efficiently,” Sifton said. “In that regard, I am still concerned you are going to see more lawsuits than you otherwise would.”
The new proposal exempted lawsuits that were filed before the state Supreme Court’s decision and that are scheduled to go to trial before Aug. 28.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Stephanie Mott, a well-known advocate for LGBTQ rights in Kansas, has died.
Pastor Sarah Oglesby-Dunegan of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Topeka says Mott was hospitalized Sunday after apparently suffering a heart attack. She died Monday at the age of 61.
Mott was a mental health clinician at Valeo in Topeka. She led the Kansas Democratic Party’s LGBT caucus, and managed the Topeka chapter of Equality Kansas.
We are all devastated by the loss of Stephanie Mott. We cannot find adequate words to express our grief at her passing, but we will find solace in the knowledge that her life and her work will make Kansas a better place for future generations. #ksleg#lgbtqpic.twitter.com/f16InIHkMp
Kansas Democratic Party chairwoman Vicki Hiatt and executive director Ethan Corson said in a statement that Mott was courageous in the face of cowardice while advocating for vulnerable people.
Equality Kansas said in a statement that the group will find solace in the knowledge that Mott’s work will make Kansas a better place for future generations.
