A St. Joseph man is charged with having sex with a young girl over the course of two years. Investigators say the girl gave birth to a child last year at the age of 15, but they say the sexual relationship continued for several months after that.

Jonden K. Williams, 27, of St. Joseph, is charged with statutory rape.

Williams is due in court for his first appearance October 28.

In court documents, investigators say they received the initial complaint in April of 2015. The victim gave birth to a baby in November of last year, according to a court affidavit. The victim told investigators the sexual contact with the defendant began at his house when she was 13 years old, and continued until September of this year.

Court documents say that based on the victim’s written statement and some text-messaging evidence, the defendant fathered the child with the victim.

A judge set bail at $10,000. Williams remains in custody in the Buchanan County Jail.

Volunteers are being sought for the Salvation Army’s 2016 Red Kettle Campaign in St. Joseph.

The campaign kicks off Nov. 18 and continues through Dec. 24 every day except for Thanksgiving and Sundays.

This year, volunteers are needed to ring bells at more than 8 locations in the community, including K-Mart, Hy-Vee, Hobby Lobby, Apple Markets, East Hills Mall and Sam’s Club.

“Salvation Army bell ringers are a cherished symbol of Christmas, the season of giving,” said Major Abe Tamayo. “Volunteers are critical to the overall success of our Red Kettle Campaign. We encourage individuals, families and groups to sign up for a shift – it’s a fun, easy way to help those less fortunate in our community.”

The money collected during the 2016 Red Kettle Campaign will support Salvation Army programs in St. Joseph, MO for the entire year. These programs include emergency shelter, food pantry, youth and senior programs and disaster response.

To volunteer to be a Salvation Army bell ringer call LeeAnn at 816-232-5824 Ext. 200

Mosaic Life Care announced Thursday it recently received a five-star rating from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Overall Hospital Quality Star Rating.

Mosaic said the star ratings were assigned to 3,693 hospitals across the United States. Only 112 hospitals were awarded a five-star overall hospital quality rating on CMS’ Hospital Compare website. Mosaic Life Care is the only five-star hospital in Missouri.

“This is about everyone’s hard work,” said Dr. Mark Laney, CEO of Mosaic Life Care. “You have to have everyone doing their best work to accomplish something like this.”

According to CMS, the overall star rating is based off hospital-reported data on 64 quality measures from seven categories: mortality, safety of care, readmissions, patient experience, effectiveness of care, timeliness of care, and efficient use of medical imaging.

A complete list of measures included in this star rating can be found on the Overall Hospital Quality Star Rating Methodology Report available on QualityNet: www.qualitynet.org

A 55-year-old St. Joseph man has been charged with 1st degree child molestation for an incident with a six-year-old child.

Gary Robinson is behind bars, unable to post $25,000 cash bail. He’s scheduled to appear in court on Friday.

According to court documents, Robinson is accused of making sexual contact with the youngster while at his home. A detective says with the St. Joseph Police Department says Robinson was on top of the six year old at the time of the occurrence.

The court affidavit asserts that Robinson has a lengthy criminal history, with past convictions of burglary, stealing, unlawful use of a weapon, and flight/escape.

A Liberty, Missouri woman was seriously hurt in a three-vehicle crash Tuesday near Lathrop in Clinton County. The Missouri State Highway Patrol says a Honda Civic was southbound on U.S. Highway 69 at Missouri-116 just before one p.m. Tuesday. According to the crash report, the Honda failed to yield and pulled into the path of a pickup truck, hitting the truck on the driver’s side. The pickup then plowed head-on into a semi.

The patrol says Diana Hopwood, 62, of Liberty, was a passenger in the Honda, and suffered serious injuries in the crash. She was flown to Liberty Hospital for treatment.

The driver, identified as Jimmy Reece, 65, of Kansas City, Missouri, suffered what were described as moderate injuries, and was flown to the Truman Medical Center in Kansas City for treatment.

The driver of the pickup was identified as 59-year-old Ivan Swindler of Braymer. He was taken by ambulance to Liberty Hospital for treatment of moderate injuries.