ST. LOUIS (AP) — A prominent young protester who serves on Missouri’s Ferguson Commission has been charged with assault stemming from a protest at St. Louis City Hall.

Twenty-two-year-old Rasheen Aldridge was among a group of young activists who met with President Barack Obama at the White House Monday. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that Aldridge was one of three demonstrators charged Thursday with misdemeanor assault.

The Forest Park Community College student was among several hundred demonstrators who marched to City Hall last week as part of a protest over a St. Louis County grand jury’s decision to not indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson in Michael Brown’s shooting death.

Several participants stormed the entrance of the building, which was quickly locked down. Police used pepper spray to disperse the crowd.

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) — Overland Park police say a man shot by U.S. Marshals was a suspect in several felonies in multiple jurisdictions.

The man was identified Thursday as 44-year-old Keith D. Angell, of Overland Park. He was shot Wednesday as U.S. Marshals were attempting to arrest him. Details of what prompted the shooting have not been released.

He remained in critical condition on Thursday. No officers were injured.

The Kansas City Star reports (http://bit.ly/1tTBSdT ) that Kansas City-area court and prison records show Angell has a criminal history dating back more than 20 years. He is currently wanted for failing to appear in court on various charges in Johnson, Wyandotte and Platte counties.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Kansas City couple will serve nine years in federal prison without parole for a scheme that targeted financially struggling clients.

Federal prosecutors announced Thursday that 43-year-old John Lee Norris and 39-year-old Julie Tina Hatcher defrauded 81 clients. They were each ordered to pay more than $1 million in restitution.

Norris and Hatcher pleaded guilty in May to conspiring to defraud debtors, the victims’ lenders and the federal government between August 2010 and June 2013. They also each pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud and Hatcher pleaded guilty to disability fraud.

Norris and Hatcher promised to help homeowners and others keep their homes and resolve their financial difficulties for monthly payments. They instead spent the payments on personal expenses.

Victims were from several states including Missouri and Kansas.

By Dave Ranney
KHI News Service

TOPEKA — The Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services has suspended voluntary admissions to Osawatomie State Hospital, one of the state’s two inpatient facilities for people with serious mental illnesses.

The decision, according to a memo sent to the state’s 26 community mental health centers late Tuesday afternoon, was driven by “ongoing and critical census challenges” at the state hospital. The memo also outlined procedures for handling patients who are involuntary admitted.
In recent months, the 206-bed hospital has admitted record and near-record numbers of patients, causing dozens of patients to be triple-bunked in rooms meant for two.

Last month, federal health officials announced that surveyors sent to the hospital in October had found that its services were “not … sufficient to meet the needs of its patients.”

KDADS officials were warned that if the hospital’s deficiencies were not corrected, it would not be paid for Medicare services provided to patients admitted after Dec. 8.

KDADS filed a correction plan with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services regional office in Kansas City in mid-November. Neither the survey nor the correction plan have been released to the public.

Federal surveyors returned to the hospital Monday.

“They are re-surveying the problem spots and determining (whether) we’ve addressed them and that situation has been rectified,” KDADS spokesperson Angela de Rocha said Wednesday.

De Rocha said the surveyors were aware of the department’s decision to suspend voluntary admissions.

The decision, she said, is allowed by state statute.

It’s not yet known how many would-be patients will be denied admission.

“It shouldn’t be a significant number,” de Rocha said. “It’s not going to have a significant impact on our census challenges, but at this point every little bit helps.”

According to the memo, would-be patients will be denied admission “if their sole diagnosis is anti-social personality syndrome, substance use disorder, or an organic mental disorder such as trauma or dementia.”

Community mental health centers will not be allowed to send patients to the hospital until an on-duty physician has reviewed their records and agreed to admit them.

The new policy will be in effect for as long as the hospital’s census exceeds 185 patients.

Typically, patients who are involuntarily admitted to the hospital have been involved in altercations with police and have been deemed a danger to themselves or others.

Kyle Kessler, executive director at the Association of Community Mental Health Centers (CMHCs) of Kansas, called the change in policy “a real concern,” adding that neither he nor his members were consulted about its potential impact on patients or the centers.

“This is a decision that the state made and that we didn’t have any input into,” Kessler said. “But the CMHCs will continue to do everything they can to treat people in their home communities.”

Between 2007 and 2012, state-funded support for a grant program that the centers use to offset the costs of treating the uninsured has dropped from $31 million a year to $10.9 million. Lawmakers last year agreed to set aside an additional $5 million for the program.

The state’s mental health advocates have long argued that community-based services for the mentally ill are significantly underfunded. And the decision to suspend voluntary admissions at Osawatomie, they say, will only make a bad situation worse.

“This just underlines the crisis that we have in mental health care in the state of Kansas,” said Rick Cagan, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness-Kansas. “There are solutions out there that have been talked about for years, but for whatever reason we, as a state, keep putting off the decision for making the appropriate investment in our mental health system. And then we keep closing our options for people who’ve gotten to a point where they really need inpatient treatment.”

Expecting the community mental health centers to take on volunteer-admission patients who, prior to Tuesday, would have been admitted to the hospital is unrealistic, Cagan said.

“Do we think community mental health centers ought to be doing a better job? Yes, we do,” Cagan said. “Do we think they have the resources they need to provide more robust services? No, we don’t.”

Keith Tully, chair of the board of directors of the Elizabeth Layton Center for mental health services in Paola, agreed.

“If the hospital isn’t going to admit people who need to be there and who’ve agreed to go there, then it’s going to put more pressure on us, more pressure on law enforcement, and more stress on families that are having to cope with someone who, say, has depression or is suicidal,” Tully said. “We’re in a crisis situation, and now what we hear is how the Legislature is going to have to cut spending. What’s happening, I think, is irresponsible.”
Greg Hennen is executive director at the Four County Mental Health Center in Independence. He said the directive will leave the centers in southeast Kansas with few good options after several hospitals in the region have closed their inpatient mental health units.

He said the closure of inpatient psychiatric treatment centers in Bartlesville, Okla., and, in recent years, in Pittsburg and Coffeyville have left community mental health centers with no place to send patients who need more intensive care.

“We’ve lost 47 private beds over the last five or six years,” Hennen said.

Hennen said when his center could refer patients to area hospitals, Osawatomie was a “last resort.” But with those inpatient beds no longer available, he said, the state hospital had become “our only resource.”

Asked about the impact of the state directive, he said: “It’s going to be chaos for a while.”

Commenting on the requirement that community mental health centers get prior approval from state psychiatrists before referring “involuntary patients,” Hennen said: “The jails will start to get full.”
Dave Ranney is a reporter for Heartland Health Monitor, a news collaboration focusing on health issues and their impact in Missouri and Kansas.

ROSEBUD (AP) – Demonstrators marching from Ferguson to Missouri’s capital to protest the police shooting death of Michael Brown were met with opposition as they passed through a rural town.

Television station KRCG reports that some people in Rosebud shouted obscenities and held signs telling them to “go home.”

The Columbia Missourian reports that at least one person displayed a Confederate flag, and the back window of a bus traveling with the marchers was broken by a bullet.

The protest march began after a grand jury decided last week not to indict Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson, who was white, for the Aug. 9 shooting of Brown, who was black and unarmed.

The protesters are expected to arrive Friday in Jefferson City.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A lawsuit against an Oklahoma-based company claiming it and other natural gas companies gouged two Kansas plaintiffs is headed for the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Topeka School District and Learjet are part of a lawsuit with more than a dozen other businesses and schools that say ONEOK and other natural gas companies illegally fixed prices between 2000 and 2002.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports oral arguments before the Supreme Court are scheduled for next month.

ONEOK used to own Kansas Gas Service, but the companies split in 2013. KGS and natural gas distribution companies in Oklahoma and Texas formed a new company called ONE Gas.

KGS spokeswoman Dawn Ewing says neither KGS nor ONE Gas is involved in the lawsuit.

ONEOK denies manipulating natural gas prices.

WASHINGTON – One year after Congress passed into law sweeping changes to how the military justice system handles sexual violence, the U.S. Senate and House will soon vote on a bipartisan package of additional reforms sponsored by U.S. Senators Claire McCaskill (Mo.), Kelly Ayotte (N.H.), and Deb Fischer (Neb.).

The current version of this year’s National Defense Authorization Act will include provisions of the Senators’ bipartisan Victims Protection Act—a set of policies to supplement those that were already enacted in last year’s annual defense bill. The Victims Protection Act would:

Eliminate the “good soldier” defense for servicemembers accused of sexual assault under most circumstances,
Allow victims formal input on whether their case is tried in military or civilian court,
Allow survivors to challenge their discharge or separation from service,
Strengthen the role of the prosecutor in advising commanders on going to court-martial,
Boost accountability of commanders for setting appropriate command climate,
And extend protections to the Military Service Academies.
The Victims Protection Act received unanimous approval in the Senate earlier this year, but had not yet received consideration in the U.S. House. The Senate and House will vote on the final negotiated version of the defense bill—including these new reforms—in the coming days. The Pentagon is also presenting a report this week to President Obama on progress combatting sexual violence in the ranks.

“A year ago, a sexual assault survivor in the U.S. military faced a daunting landscape, but things are different now,” said McCaskill, a former courtroom prosecutor of sex crimes and senior member of the Armed Services Committee. “We’re already seeing positive signs as a result of the historic reforms we passed last year—but even if this week’s report shows the continued progress we’re hoping for, these additional reforms are commonsense ways to keep empowering survivors, and holding commanders accountable to curb these crimes.”

“These measures are important steps that will build on the reforms passed last year to prevent sexual assaults in our military, strengthen prosecution of such crimes, and provide victims with the support, care, and resources they need. Our legislation changes the status quo by holding commanders more accountable for treating victims with dignity and respect, and helps ensure that perpetrators will be fully prosecuted under the law. Our bill also removes the ‘good soldier defense,’ so that defendants are prosecuted based on the evidence and nothing else,” said Ayotte. “We remain committed to ensuring that victims are supported, and I will continue to closely scrutinize our military’s progress in implementing these reforms.”

“Though we have already passed a series of significant, historic reforms to curb sexual assault in the ranks, we remain focused on achieving the intended results,” Senator Fischer said. “I am encouraged by the impact these changes have made: reporting is up and assaults are down. This is precisely the goal of our legislative efforts. We will continue to promote policies, like those within our Victims Protection Act, that empower victims and hold perpetrators accountable.”

As part of last year’s annual defense bill:

Commanders were stripped of the ability to overturn convictions, and are now held accountable under rigorous new standards.
Every victim who reports a sexual assault gets their own independent lawyer to protect their rights and fight for their interests—a reform that has no parallel in the civilian justice system.
Civilian review is now required if a commander decides against a prosecution in a sexual assault case when a prosecutor wants to go to trial.
Dishonorable discharge is now a required minimum sentence for anyone convicted of a sexual assault.
It is now a crime for any servicemember to retaliate against a victim who reports a sexual assault.
The pre-trial “Article 32” process, which came under scrutiny following a recent case at the Naval Academy, has been reformed to better protect victims.
And the statute of limitations in these cases has now been eliminated, a particularly important development in a sustained battle against sexual assaults.
As these reforms have been implemented across the military, the Pentagon recently released figures showing a spike in reporting of sexual assaults, indicating increasing confidence in the military justice system from victims of sexual assault.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas Supreme Court has declined a murder suspect’s request to have the Douglas County District Attorney’s Office disqualified from his case because his son lives in the home of one of the lead prosecutors.

Martin Miller was convicted of first-degree murder in 2005 for the July 2004 death of his wife at the family’s Lawrence home. Prosecutors say he strangled his wife in her sleep because he was having an affair and wanted to collect $300,000 in life insurance money.

The Lawrence Journal-World  reports the Kansas Supreme Court overturned his conviction in February. Miller’s next trial is scheduled for March.

Miller had sought a change of prosecutors because his son, 22-year-old Matthew Miller, is a friend of an assistant prosecutor’s son and lives in their home.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Tammy Dickinson, United States Attorney for the Western District of Missouri, announced in a press release Wednesday that a former Kansas City, Mo., attorney was sentenced in federal court for money laundering.

James C. Wirken, 70, of Kansas City, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Fernando J. Gaitan to one year and one month in federal prison without parole. The court also ordered Wirken to pay a fine of $4,000.

Wirken was a lawyer and principal at The Wirken Law Group until he surrendered his law license in 2012 and was disbarred by the Missouri Supreme Court. On May 12, 2014, Wirken pleaded guilty to one count of money laundering.

Wirken admitted that he withdrew money from his law firm’s trust account, which was being held for the benefit of a client, and deposited the funds into his law firm’s operating account. Wirken wrote six checks between December 2009 and Jan. 13, 2010, totaling $116,730. Wirken then used the funds for his personal benefit. All of the transactions were conducted without the client’s consent.

According to court documents, Wirken’s law firm was engaged in a long-term, unethical, unsustainable Ponzi-type business model that spanned over many years. As early as 2007, Wirken began improperly borrowing substantial amounts of money from clients, and then he refused to pay his clients back. Wirken borrowed over $800,000 from at least seven clients from 2007 to 2012, according to court documents.

For example, court documents cite one instance when Wirken borrowed $100,000 from a client and refused to make payments on the loan even when his client was diagnosed with cancer and needed money to pay for the treatments. Wirken’s client later died from the disease.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Roseann A. Ketchmark. It was investigated by IRS-Criminal Investigation.

COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Federal aviation officials are blaming power loss for a central Missouri plane crash that left three men seriously injured.

The Columbia Daily Tribune  reports that the National Transportation Safety Board has issued its preliminary report into last month’s Fulton crash. The report says the pilot of the twin-engine Cessna 401A lost power to one of engines after takeoff.

The plane got about 10 feet into the air before it came back down, ran off the runway and landed in a ditch. The complete investigation will take six to 12 months to complete.