CASS COUNTY — One person died in an accident just before 10:30a.m. Saturday in Cass County.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 2005 Ford Focus driven by Colton W. Parker, 21, Independence, was southbound on Missouri 2 at Highway K. The driver failed to stop at the stop sign.

A westbound 1996 Chevy Tahoe driven by Daniel R. Foster, 60, Garden City, MO., struck the drivers side door of the Ford.  The collision pushed the Ford into a ditch where it hit a guy-wire, a telephone box and a fence.

Parker was pronounced dead at the scene.  Logan Parker, a passenger in the Ford, was transported to Children’s Mery.  Foster was transported to Cass Regional Hospital.

Colton Parker was not wearing a seat belt, according to the MSHP.

SMITH COUNTY – The Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI) is investigating the attempted murder of a woman in Smith County, as well as an officer involved shooting which occurred as police attempted to apprehend the 15-year-old suspect.

According to a KBI media release,  just after 10:20 a.m. Saturday, the Smith County Sheriff’s received a 911 call, and responded to 10021 O Road in Smith Center. Upon arriving, they located a 66-year-old white female victim who reported being restrained, beaten, and strangled. She was taken to a local hospital, and is expected to recover.

The suspect, a 15-year-old black male, fled the area on horseback. When he was located by Kansas Highway Patrol troopers at 100 Road and L Road, in Smith County, he was armed with a firearm. KHP and Smith County Sheriff’s deputies spent a few hours attempting to apprehend the suspect. Then just before 2:20 p.m. the suspect fired at troopers. Two troopers returned fire, striking the subject.

They rendered medical aid and EMS responded. EMS transported him to a local hospital. He was then flown to a Kearney, Nebraska hospital where he underwent surgery. His condition is currently unknown. The identity of the subject will be withheld because he is a juvenile.

No law enforcement officers were injured during the incident.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – A Springfield, Mo., man who worked as a private tutor was sentenced in federal court today for sexually assaulting a former 10-year-old student, according to the United State’s Attorney.

John Paul Sparapani, 30, of Springfield, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Bough to 30 years in federal prison without parole, which is the maximum statutory penalty for this offense. The court also sentenced Sparapani to a lifetime of supervised release following incarceration.

On Feb. 21, 2018, Sparapani pleaded guilty to using a minor to produce child pornography. He admitted that he took pornographic photos of a student he was tutoring in a private room at a public library.

This investigation began when an officer with the Southwest Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force identified Sparapani’s computer as sharing child pornography on a peer-to-peer file-sharing network on May 25, 2015.  Officers executed a search warrant at Sparapani’s residence on Dec. 21, 2015, and seized two laptop computers, three hard drives and a cell phone, which contained multiple images and videos of child pornography.

On August 25, 2017, a 12-year-old minor female disclosed that Sparapani had sexually assaulted her when she was 10 and 11 years old and had taken photographs of the assault with his cell phone.  The child victim disclosed that the sexual abuse occurred while she was being tutored by Sparapani in a private room at a public library.

COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — University of Missouri students were stunned when a towering dairy cow appeared on campus to make a cameo in a graduation photo shoot.

Senior animal sciences major Massimo Montalbano brought the 3-year-old cow, named Amelia, to campus on Thursday to join his commencement photo shoot.

Montalbano worked with cattle throughout his undergraduate studies with the university’s Foremost Dairy Research Center.

Montalbano initially presented the idea to Jim Spain, the vice provost for undergraduate studies. Spain referred Montalbano to the university’s operations department, which ultimately approved the request.

Spain says it’s not the first time a student has asked him to bring a cow to campus. But it was still a rare sight to unsuspecting bystanders.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A $6.9 million gift from a late geologist and his wife will be used to help University of Kansas researchers better understand early human life in the Americas.

Joseph and Maude Ruth Cramer established the Odyssey Archaeological Research Fund at the university in 2002 with a $1 million gift. The additional $6.9 million was recently received after their deaths.

The KU Endowment said in a news release that the gift will benefit research by the Kansas Geological Survey and the university’s archaeology program.

Cramer grew up in Wichita and graduated from the University of New Mexico. His was a petroleum geologist, but he had a lifetime interest in archaeology and a passion for searching for the earliest people in the Americas.

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OZARKS, Mo. (AP) — Members of a southwest Missouri family have been caught after a lengthy investigation into the illegal killing of hundreds of deer, in what state conservation agents called one of the largest poaching cases in state history.

David Berry Sr. of Springfield and two of his adult sons, David Berry Jr. of Brookline and Kyle Berry of Everton, were arrested in August after an 8½- month investigation by state, federal and international agencies that also involved cases in Kansas, Nebraska and Canada.

The Missouri Department of Conservation said in a news release Thursday that information gained from the investigation led to 14 Missouri residents facing more than 230 charges in 11 counties.

“The deer were trophy bucks taken illegally, mostly at night, for their heads, leaving the bodies of the deer to waste,” said Lawrence County Prosecuting Attorney Don Trotter. He said investigators believe some of the heads were stuffed and mounted for sale.

David Berry Jr. was sentenced Thursday to 120 days in jail in Barton County for a felony firearms probation violation. On Dec. 6, he was given a one-year jail sentence in Lawrence County after pleading guilty to taking wildlife illegally in that county.

In 2016, David Berry Sr. and another son, Eric Berry of Everton, were convicted of taking gamefish by hand in Dade County. While awaiting his court appearance in that case, Eric Berry and another person were caught in 2017 spotlighting deer in Lawrence County. David Berry Sr. is awaiting a probation revocation hearing for the poaching violations in Lawrence County.

David Berry Sr. and David Berry Jr. have had their hunting, fishing and trapping privileges revoked for life. Eric Berry and Kyle Berry had hunting and fishing privileges revoked for 18 years and eight years, respectively. Jerimiah Cline of Republic, who took wildlife illegally and assisted the Berrys, had hunting privileges revoked for five years, the conservation department said.

The investigation into the Berrys began in late 2015 when the conservation agency received an anonymous tip about deer poaching in Lawrence County through Operation Game Thief, a toll-free enforcement hotline.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Auditor Nicole Galloway has agreed to help the secretary of state’s office investigate whether Attorney General Josh Hawley illegally used public resources to help his political campaign.

Galloway, a Democrat, said Friday in a letter to Secretary of State Jay Ashcroft, a Republican, that her office would review the allegations against Hawley “with heightened scrutiny.”

Ashcroft sent a letter to Galloway on Monday asking to enlist her office’s subpoena power in his investigation.

Hawley, a Republican, will leave office in January to take a seat in the U.S. Senate.

Ashcroft’s request was prompted by a complaint filed by The American Democracy Legal Fund, a liberal group, after The Kansas City Star reported political consultants influenced the attorney general’s office during Hawley’s tenure.

Hawley has denied any wrongdoing.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Election officials in Kansas counties don’t believe voter fraud is a problem in the state, according to a survey of local election officials released Friday that counters Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s unsupported claims that voter fraud is widespread.

The finding came in a wide-ranging survey conducted by the American Civil Liberties Union that examined whether county election policies reduced voter turnout and hurt democracy in Kansas. The survey was at least partially completed by election officials in 85 of the state’s 105 counties.

Of the 77 counties whose officials addressed the survey’s question about voter fraud, 66 who responded it was “not a problem at all.” None deemed voter fraud a “significant problem.”

Sherman County Clerk Ashley Mannis, the sole official who said voter fraud was “somewhat of a problem,” noted that Kobach’s office prosecuted two people in her county for duplicate voting. She conceded it was not a widespread problem, adding: “It’s not like we had tons of cases, but it’s not like we had tons of voters, either.”

Kobach’s office, which oversees Kansas elections, did not immediately respond to an email from The Associated Press seeking comment on the report. Kobach, who unsuccessfully ran for governor in November, has repeatedly claimed without evidence that voter fraud is a problem in Kansas.

The ACLU survey also found that voter turnout was higher in counties offering more days of early voting, and that in general, the higher the average number of voters assigned to a polling place, the lower the voter turnout.

Overall, Kansas doesn’t fare well when it comes to voter participation. In the 2016 election, voter turnout was 59.2 percent in Kansas, putting the state in 34th place among U.S. states. The 2018 midterm election turnout was slightly more than 50 percent, which still left Kansas in the bottom half of voter turnout nationwide, according to the United States Election Project at the University of Florida.

The ACLU suggested that Kansas election officials could expand early in-person voting, including later and weekend hours; increase the number of polling places to reduce wait times; and advocate for expanding outreach efforts to young voters and minorities.

In its report, the ACLU also examined what it called the “wildly divergent policies and practices” used by local election officials. In Kansas, such officials are the decision makers when it comes to polling sites, in-person voting days and other details that can affect voter turnout.

For example, state guidelines for determining the validity of provisional ballots are vague, so local election officials use their own discretion about which ballots are counted. That became an issue in the state’s close Republican primary for governor, in which Kobach cinched the GOP nomination by just 343 votes. Kobach lost in the general election to Democrat Laura Kelly.

Sedgwick County, the state’s second most populous county, counted provisional ballots even though voters incorrectly filled out forms to switch from no-party affiliation to a party affiliation so they could vote in that party’s primary. But election officials in Johnson County, the state’s most populous, decided not to count provisional ballots with the same issue. Johnson County was much stricter than the other counties with its “signature match” policy.

The ACLU noted that “the job of county elections officials is much more than just counting votes — it is to foster a culture where democracy thrives.”