KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A third man has been sentenced to life in prison for shooting and wounding a Wyandotte County Sheriff’s deputy in 2015.

Wyandotte County prosecutors say 21-year-old Charles Bowser was sentenced Friday to life plus 37 years for attempted capital murder and other charges.

Deputy Scott Wood, who was off-duty, was shot several times at a 7-Eleven in Kansas City, Kansas, during an attempted robbery. He spent two weeks in the hospital before being released.

In February 2016, Dyron King and Cecil Meggerson were found guilty of attempted capital murder in Wood’s shooting.

MONTGOMERY COUNTY —  Two people died in an accident just before 4p.m. Sunday in Montgomery County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 1999 Chevy Silverado driven by Derek Scott Messner, 44, Coffeyville, was east bound on U.S. 166 three miles west of Coffeyvile.  The Silverado went left of center and struck a 2009 Dodge Ram pickup driven by Garry Gene Bush Jr., 57, Caney, head-on.

Messner and Bush were pronounced dead at the scene. A passenger in the Dodge Jana Gay Bush, 55,  Caney, was transported to Mercy Hospital in Joplin, Mo.

The occupants of the Dodge were properly restrained at the time of the accident, according to the KHP. Details on Messner’s seat belt usage are not available.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) – Missouri is getting close to $280,000 in federal funding for housing for homeless veterans.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development unveiled $43 million in grants for local housing agencies across the country Friday.

A portion of that money will go to housing authorities in the St. Louis area, Springfield, Joplin and parts of southeast Missouri.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill in a Friday statement said homelessness disproportionately affects veterans. She touted the funding.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A woman whose two daughters died in separate violent crimes told one of the killers that she hopes he burns in hell.

On Friday, Cherri West, of Kansas City, Kansas, spoke in court before Enemencio Lansdown was sentenced to 20 years and seven months in the April 2017 fatal shooting of West’s 34-year-old daughter, Casey Eaton.

Eaton was killed about a block from where her sister, Pamela Butler, was kidnapped in 1999. Pamela was later found dead in Missouri. The man who killed her, Keith Nelson, was sentenced to death.

West told Landsdown before his sentencing that she hoped Eaton haunted his dreams and that “you rot and burn in hell.”

Lansdown did not speak in court before he was sentenced.

RULO, Neb. (AP) — A Native American tribe has regained ownership of river bluffs, hardwood forest and tall grass prairie along the Missouri River through an agreement with the Nature Conservancy of Nebraska.

The conservancy recently transferred 160 acres of Richardson County bluff land to the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska. The tribe and the conservancy agreed to a conservation easement, which prevents development incompatible with the land’s ecological value.

The site is a rare habitat where mature hardwood forest coexists with tall grass prairie, said Mace Hack, the conservancy’s state director. The overlapping ecosystems magnify the variety of plants and animals living on the land, he said.

The conservancy bought the land in 1994 in order to expand its Rulo Bluffs Preserve and protect the hardwood forest and prairie habitats.

“This return of a part of our reservation, in a natural condition much as our ancestors would recognize it and which we will continue to restore, is helping us to heal the land and as a tribe,” said Alan Kelley, tribal vice chairman.

The land is also sacred ground to the tribe, said Lance Foster, the tribe’s historic preservation officer.

“To be somewhere where it’s quiet, that’s one of the things I enjoy about being here … and the fact that our ancestors are here,” he said. “The spirits of our ancestors are here. In our private moments we hear them sometimes. We communicate with them.”

The land return is part of a larger attempt by the tribe to purchase back more reservation lands with its casino revenue. About 30 percent of the reservation is currently owned by tribal members.

“It’s a slow process,” Kelley said.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The co-owner of a Kansas waterpark where a 10-year-old boy was decapitated on a raft ride is being investigated in Texas over a confrontation with people in his home.

New Braunfels, Texas, police say a woman reported Thursday that Jeff Henry had threatened her. Henry has not been charged.

Henry co-owns Schlitterbahn Water Parks and Resorts and is charged with murder in the 2016 death of Caleb Schwab, who died on a waterslide when his raft went airborne and hit an overhead loop. Henry made his first court appearance in Kansas and flew back to Texas on Thursday.

Defense attorney Ron Barroso said when Henry arrived at his home he discovered people staying there had burglarized and ransacked it. He says Henry confronted them, which prompted the woman’s call to police.

Barroso says Henry plans to file charges.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Latest on the Kansas Legislature’s debate on increasing school funding to meet a court mandate (all times local):

12:26 a.m. Sunday

Kansas legislators have given their final approval to an increase in spending on the state’s public schools amid intense pressure to respond to a court mandate.

The Senate approved a bill early Sunday to phase in a $534 million increase in education funding over five years. The vote was 21-19.

The House approved the bill on a 63-56 vote. The measure goes to Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer, who has already endorsed it publicly.

The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in October that the state’s current education funding of more than $4 billion a year isn’t sufficient. Many Democrats said the plan will not satisfy the court.

Senate GOP leaders backed a plan to phase in a $274 million increase. They said the bigger plan will eventually force a tax increase.

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10:40 p.m.

The Kansas Senate is debating a proposal to increase spending on public schools in hopes of meeting a state Supreme Court mandate.

Senators were moving toward a final vote late Saturday or early Sunday on a bill that would phase in a $534 million education funding increase over five years.

But majority Republicans were split over the measure and some of them were harshly criticizing the bill.

The measure is similar to a plan the House passed earlier in the week, and it approved the new plan Saturday on a 63-56 vote. Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer endorsed it as well.

The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in October that the state’s current funding of more than $4 billion a year is insufficient.

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8:12 p.m.

The Kansas Legislature’s work on a plan for increasing school funding has stalled with tempers rising among Republicans.

The state Senate had not acted by Saturday evening on a bill that would phase in a $534 million increase in education funding over five years. The House passed it earlier Saturday on a 63-56 vote.

The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in October that the state’s current funding of more than $4 billion a year is insufficient.

Senators were having a lengthy debate over another bill rewriting income tax laws to head off the possibility that changes in federal tax laws last year might cause some Kansas residents to pay more state taxes.

They suspended the debate to pass a resolution allowing lawmakers to meet past Saturday. But the move angered some Republicans.

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6:50 p.m.

Dozens of teachers have converged on the Kansas Statehouse to lobby for passage of a plan to increase spending on public schools.

The Kansas National Education Association organized lobbying Saturday evening in favor of a bill that would phase in a $534 million increase in education funding over five years. It is the state’s largest teachers’ union.

The House passed the bill Saturday on a 63-56 vote, but the Senate had yet to debate it. Supporters feared senators might not take it up.

Senate GOP leaders were critical of the plan.

The Kansas Supreme Court ruled in October that the state’s current funding of more than $4 billion a year is insufficient.

KNEA lobbyist Mark Desetti said the plan is probably the best that legislators can pass.

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1:35 p.m.

The Kansas House has approved an education funding proposal that’s designed to break an impasse among Republican lawmakers over boosting spending on public schools.

The vote Saturday was 63-56. The bill would phase in a $534 million increase in education funding over five years and is similar to a plan approved by the House earlier this week.

The bill goes next to the Senate for an up-or-down vote that could send it to Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer. He has endorsed the proposal.

The Senate previously approved a plan to phase in a $274 million funding increase over five years.

Lawmakers are considering an education funding increase in response to a state Supreme Court ruling in October that the state’s current funding of more than $4 billion a year is insufficient.

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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Big differences among Republican lawmakers over how much to increase spending on Kansas’ public schools forced them to return Saturday to the Statehouse under increasing pressure to pass a plan that could satisfy a court mandate on education funding.

Some legislators and GOP Gov. Jeff Colyer have worried that a frustrated state Supreme Court would take the unprecedented step of preventing the state from distributing dollars through a flawed education funding system — effectively closing schools statewide.

House and Senate negotiators had several rounds of talks Friday afternoon and evening to resolve the differences between their rival education funding plans. But the talks broke off abruptly Friday night when it became clear that the negotiators weren’t getting closer to agreeing on the core issue of how much to spend.

The House plan would phase in a roughly $520 million increase in education funding over five years. The Senate’s figure is $274 million.

“Folks are talking, and we’re not getting much closer,” House Speaker Ron Ryckman Jr., a Kansas City-area Republican, said Friday night. “We’re not making progress, at least not at this point.”

The Supreme Court gave Attorney General Derek Schmidt until April 30 to report on how the GOP-controlled Legislature responded to an education funding ruling last fall. Schmidt sent a letter Friday to legislative leaders in both parties, expressing “profound concern” that no school funding bill has passed.

The court declared in October that the state’s current funding of more than $4 billion a year is insufficient for lawmakers to fulfill their duty under the Kansas Constitution to finance a suitable education for every child.

Colyer and lawmakers want to avoid a tax increase, and Senate GOP leaders have excoriated the House’s plan as likely to force one within two years. Democrats do not think the House plan or the Senate plan would satisfy the court.

The Legislature had been scheduled to start its annual 2½-week spring break Saturday, then return to the Statehouse on April 26 — only four days before the court’s deadline for Schmidt. For now, legislative leaders expect to heed calls from Colyer and Schmidt to delay their break until a school funding bill has passed.

They do face a potential hurdle: Saturday was the 90th calendar day since lawmakers convened their annual session, and the state constitution requires two-thirds majorities of both houses to pass a resolution to stay in session longer. In the past, it’s not been a problem.

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SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) – Springfield police say a 27-year-old man died after his car crashed into a bookstore.

Police say Matthew Combs died and a passenger in his car, 25-year-old Katherine Levere, was critically injured in the crash early Saturday at the Book Rack.

Police say Combs was speeding when the car left the road and hit the building.

The Book Rack was seriously damaged in the crash.

An investigation into the wreck is continuing.