JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) – Missouri’s unemployment has dropped slightly.
Department of Economic Development data released Tuesday show the unemployment rate dropped slightly from 3.9 percent in August to 3.8 percent in September. Unemployment has held fairly steady in recent months.
Data show the state also lost 10,500 jobs between August and September. Local government faced the biggest hit.
The change in nonfarm employment came as the seasonally adjusted civilian labor force grew by more than 13,000 people in the same time period. The labor force counts people with jobs and those who are on unemployment but looking for work.
PENSACOLA, Fla. (AP) – A Missouri woman has been sentenced in Florida to 20 years in prison for part of a string of crimes in multiple states.
Florida Panhandle prosecutors say in a news release that 32-year-old Brittany Nicole Harper was sentenced Tuesday after pleading no contest to robbery, home invasion and other charges.
Authorities say Harper was involved in crimes that span four states. They ended Feb. 5, 2016, when Harper’s boyfriend, Blake Fitzgerald, was killed during a shootout with police in Milton, Florida.
Authorities say the couple stole a Cadillac during a test drive in Missouri, later carjacked victims at gunpoint in Alabama and Georgia and also were involved in a home invasion.
Instead of going directly to a Florida prison, Harper will be transferred to face charges in the other states.
TONGANOXIE, Kan. (AP) – The Latest on three missing foster children in Kansas being found (all times local):
Police have released a man who was considered a person of interest after three sisters who disappeared in August from their Kansas foster home were found safe.
Authorities did not release details about where the 12-, 14- and 15-year old girls were found but police said they were safe.
Rigoberto Reyes Rangel, 48, was taken into custody in Kansas City, Missouri. Police had said the girls might be in danger if they were with him. Kansas City police released him Tuesday morning after Tonganoxie officials said they didn’t have enough evidence to charge him.
KCTV5 reports police said the man was trying to help the girls after they lied to him and said they were being abused at their foster home. Police say there is no evidence the man abused or hurt the girls.
Police have said the girls ran away from their foster home Aug. 26.
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TONGANOXIE, Kan. — Authorities have arrested a man and found three sisters whose disappearance in August from their Kansas foster home touched off a larger debate about runaway foster children.
Tonganoxie police chief Jeffery Brandau says police in Kansas City, Missouri, arrested 48-year-old Rigoberto Reyes Rangel early Tuesday, hours after identifying him as a “person of interest” and saying the 12-, 14- and 15-year-old girls would be “in danger” if they were with him. Brandau says Rangel is being detained on a 24-hour investigative hold.
Rangel has previous convictions for drugs, DUI and various other driving violations, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections.
The case led to broader concerns among lawmakers who learned last week during a Statehouse meeting that more than 70 foster children are missing in Kansas. The number of missing represents about 1 percent of the state’s foster care population, which is in line with the national average.
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) – The former city clerk in Walnut Grove was sentenced to a year and a day in federal prison for embezzling city funds.
Forty-five-year-old Cari Gillmore, of Springfield, was sentenced Tuesday for credit card fraud. After she is released from prison, she will serve three years of supervised probation. She also was ordered to pay nearly $67,000 in restitution.
Prosecutors say Gillmore admitted that she used city credit cards to pay for personal expenses. The crimes occurred from January 2014 to June 2016.
Kansas Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, standing at middle, and his House counterpart Jim Ward are asking Senate President Susan Wagle to form an interim committee on school funding. FILE PHOTO / KANSAS NEWS SERVICE
ByCELIA LLOPIS-JEPSEN
The top Democrats in the Kansas Legislature are calling on Senate President Susan Wagle not to wait until January to start work on fulfilling a Kansas Supreme Court order to fix funding for public schools.
Senate Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, of Topeka, and his counterpart in the House, Jim Ward of Wichita, wrote a letter to Wagle, who heads the Legislative Coordinating Council, seeking an interim bipartisan panel of House and Senate members.
“We were admonished by at least three of the Supreme Court justices that we’re dragging our feet,” Hensley said, adding that an expedited schedule would suit the importance of the task and signal to the court that lawmakers aren’t leaving the matter to the last minute.
Wagle said Friday she is reviewing the request to determine whether it would be “efficient and productive.”
“Given the dim view the Kansas Supreme Court has taken with regard to the school finance work previously performed by legislative staff,” she wrote to Ward and Hensley, “we must carefully reflect on whether any meaningful work product can come from such a quickly convened interim committee that the Court would deem credible.”
Ward dismissed that characterization, saying a well-composed panel could help ensure lawmakers can “get to work on day one” upon returning to Topeka in January.
“It’s not just having an interim discussion — it’s making sure you have a broad base of the Legislature represented on that committee,” Ward said.
The committee he and Hensley want would meet for four days and receive briefings on the state Supreme Court’s Oct. 2 88-page ruling, in which the justices found the state’s school finance formula unconstitutional. It also would seek testimony from educators and others about how to respond, and draw up recommendations for the House and Senate to consider in January.
Crafting a fix
Asked whether Gov. Sam Brownback and Lt. Gov. Jeff Colyer are supportive of an interim committee, Brownback spokeswoman Rachel Whitten said such a panel is a matter for the Legislature to decide.
“The governor has said repeatedly that the court should not substitute its decision-making for decisions made in good faith by the elected representatives of the people of Kansas,” Whitten added.
Democrats aren’t alone in wanting to jump-start the process of tackling school finance.
State Rep. Melissa Rooker, a Fairway Republican, says Kansas lawmakers don’t have “the luxury of waiting three months to start engaging” in a discussion on school funding. CREDIT KANSAS LEGISLATURE
“We need to come back in January with a plan or a number of options,” said Rep. Melissa Rooker, a Fairway Republican. “I don’t see us having the luxury of waiting three months to start engaging.”
To that end, Rooker said she had spoken with legislative leaders and Colyer, conveying her interest in participating in any interim efforts.
“That said, I’m certainly not waiting to hear what gets decided,” she said. “I’m doing what I have always done, which is to sit down and work out the to-do list and getting going with my own efforts.”
The court set an April 30 deadline for the state to file a brief explaining what action it has taken to remedy school finance since Oct. 2. That means lawmakers will need to craft a fix before then, with enough time left for the Attorney General’s Office to compose the brief.
Oral arguments are scheduled for May 22.
Lawmakers need to address four specifics of money distribution and spending rules that the court found unfair to poorer school districts.
“I don’t see that as a complicated process,” Rooker said, “to come up with the alternatives that we need to resolve those concerns.”
How much money is needed?
But the thorniest question will be overall spending levels. The justices concluded that funding for public schools falls short of the state’s constitutional obligation to provide education, but they didn’t specify how much is needed. Lawmakers agreed this spring to phase in a nearly $300 million increase over two years. After that, they agreed to adjust annual funding levels in line with inflation.
Hensley suggested Kansas could have dodged one of the court’s concerns about fairness — that lawmakers handed an extra $2 million to the Blue Valley and De Soto school districts without clear reasoning — by increasing aid to other districts as well.
For example, adding around $100 per student statewide to Kansas’ base funding formula, he said, would have achieved the same increase for Blue Valley while ensuring other districts are treated similarly.
The Legislative Budget Committee — a joint panel that monitors budget matters outside of session —received briefings from legislative staff last week on the Gannon ruling and current education appropriations.
Steven Johnson, an Assaria Republican on that committee who also is chairman of the House tax committee, said Kansans should “very definitely” let their lawmakers know how they want the Legislature to respond to the court.
The options, depending on how much money is needed, he said, are to find the money within the state’s available revenue, raise taxes or defy the court.
Considering the difficulty with which the Legislature passed a tax hike this year, Johnson expressed doubt that lawmakers have much interest in treading that path again.
“And it depends, will the governor at that time also suggest a tax increase is not necessary?” he asked. “If so, a veto-proof majority I don’t see as possible.”
Senate leaders issued a statement the day of the court ruling saying tax hikes aren’t an option and that the justices’ decision “puts the rest of state government and programs in jeopardy.”
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A murder charge has been filed in the case of a missing Peru State College student who disappeared nearly seven years ago.
The Nebraska Attorney General’s office says that 36-year-old Joshua Keadle has been charged with first-degree murder, accused of killing 19-year-old Tyler “Ty” Thomas.
Thomas disappeared in the early morning hours of Dec. 3, 2010, after leaving a party near the southeast Nebraska campus. Authorities say Keadle, a fellow student, told them he and Thomas had sex in his vehicle that night, and Keadle later told investigators Thomas threatened to report he had raped her.
The state issued a death certificate for Thomas in 2013, even though her body has not been found. The attorney general’s office declined to comment on whether Thomas’ remains or any new evidence had been found.
Keadle is currently serving 15 to 20 years for the 2008 rape of a 15-year-old girl.
NEOSHO, Mo. (AP) – A southwest Missouri man who was shot multiple times by police has pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the 2015 incident.
The Joplin Globe reports that 51-year-old Jeffrey Hill pleaded guilty Monday to felony assault and driving while intoxicated. His plea agreement calls for three years in prison.
Court records show an officer shot Hill in the course of a domestic disturbance call in Joplin in 2015. Police say Hill was shot after refusing orders to stop driving toward the officer. Hill was on parole at the time of the shooting and has since been sent back to prison.
In light of the plea agreement, Hill said he would dismiss his lawsuit against the city and Joplin police over the shooting. The agreement also dismissed other charges, including armed criminal action.
KANSAS CITY ‑Law enforcement authorities are investigating a murder and believe a suspect may be in south-central Kansas including the Wichita area, according to a media release.
On April 30, Isabell Addison, 18, was driving in the area of Blue Parkway and Cleveland in Kansas City when her car was shot while stopped at the intersection. She died at the scene. Anton Hunter has been charged in her murder but is not in custody.
Jackson County courts have issued an arrest warrant for Hunter for Murder in the second degree, Armed Criminal Action, Unlawful Use of A Weapon (UUW), and leaving the scene of a shooting, regarding Addison’s death.
Anyone with information on the whereabouts of the suspect should call Crime Stoppers at 267-2111.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – The Latest on Missouri appeals court ruling that vacated a $72 million award in an Alabama’s woman’s lawsuit that claimed talcum powder and other Johnson & Johnson products contributed to her cancer. (all times local):
1 p.m.
A spokeswoman for Johnson & Johnson says the company is pleased with a Missouri appeals court ruling that threw out a $72 million award for an Alabama woman who claimed the company’s talcum powder contributed to her ovarian cancer.
The appeals court ruled Tuesday that Missouri was not the proper jurisdiction for the lawsuit. The court cited a U.S. Supreme Court ruling this summer that found there must be a strong connection between the plaintiff and a state where a lawsuit is filed. Only two of the 65 plaintiffs in Fox’s case live in Missouri.
Three other juries have ruled against Johnson & Johnson in similar lawsuits in Missouri.
Spokeswoman Carol Goodrich said in a statement Tuesday that the company has consistently argued that Missouri has no jurisdiction in cases involving non-residents and “we expect the existing verdicts that we are appealing to be reversed.”
12 p.m.
A Missouri appeals court has thrown out a $72 million award to a woman who claimed talcum powder made by Johnson & Johnson contributed to her ovarian cancer.
The Missouri Eastern District court ruled Tuesday that Missouri was not the proper jurisdiction for a lawsuit filed by 62-year-old Jacqueline Fox, of Birmingham, Alabama, who died in 2015 of ovarian cancer.
That 2006 award was the first award in several cases that claimed talcum powder contributed to cancer. About 65 people joined Fox’s lawsuit but only two were from Missouri.
Federal Prison Medical Center in Springfield-photo Fed. Bureau of Prisons
SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) – A federal inmate with end-stage renal disease has been spared the death penalty for his fourth murder conviction and the second committed while imprisoned.
The Springfield News-Leader reports that federal jurors couldn’t reach a unanimous decision Monday in the case against 61-year-old Ulysses Jones Jr. Defense attorney Shane Cantin says that means the slowing dying man will receive another life term when he’s sentenced.
The same jurors had convicted Jones earlier this month of using a makeshift knife to kill fellow inmate Timothy Baker as he slept in 2006 at the U.S. Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield. Court records say another inmate survived being stabbed.
Jones also has been convicted of two robberies and murders in 1979 and 1980 in Washington, D.C., and another prison murder in Virginia.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) – Missouri’s unemployment has dropped slightly.
