KANSAS CITY- A Kansas semi driver was injured in an accident just after 11 a.m. on Friday in Wyandotte County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2002 Peterbilt semi driven by Irving S. Haney, 53, Topeka, was northbound on U. S. 73 at Polfer Road in Kansas City.

A 2005 Honda Pilot driven by Susan M. Gardner, 39, Independence, Mo., drifted into the semi’s lane.

The semi attempted an avoidance maneuver, but struck the Honda pushing it up the roadway and causing it to spin out. The semi went to the right, and the trailer flipped.

Haney was transported to KU Medical Center. Gardner was not injured. The KHP reported both drivers were properly restrained at the time of the accident.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri said in a new report that surveillance devices in a part of St. Louis threaten what’s left of people’s privacy.

The organization described the devices installed in the city’s central corridor from the Mississippi River to Forest Park as an “unchecked rise” in surveillance of the public in their two-year study.
The group’s executive director, Jeffrey Mittman, said the surveillance network is maintained by various groups that often don’t coordinate and have few guiding policies. He said what’s more troubling is that there was little public discussion before the web of surveillance was established.
“We are becoming a surveillance society,” Mittman said Thursday.

According to the report, using such technology to track individual movements on a “mass scale” was once considered unlikely. Now, it can be done, because of the widespread use of surveillance cameras. Images can be saved for months or years.

The city of St. Louis is in the middle of expanding its surveillance capacity. Within the past two years, officials have linked four surveillance networks and established a central monitoring center at Soldiers Memorial.

The mayor’s chief of staff, Jeff Rainford, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (http://bit.ly/1vYctF5 ) that the report exaggerates the extent of the city’s surveillance network. He promises city officials will seek public commentary before it’s expanded.

“Surveillance cameras, if they are done correctly and if they are monitored correctly, absolutely will make a neighborhood or a place safer,” Rainford said.

But the report says some studies suggest surveillance cameras have little impact on reducing crime.
Mayor Francis Slay’s office has been in talks with ACLU about surveillance technology, and “when we do start expanding the use of surveillance cameras, we will certainly take their point of view into account,” Rainford said.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A Lawrence woman has pleaded guilty to arranging the shooting of her ex-boyfriend on a highway south of Lawrence.

The Lawrence Journal-World reports that 22-year-old Brittany Nicole Smith pleaded guilty Friday to conspiracy to commit first-degree murder. The victim, 24-year-old Skylar Workman, survived after being shot May 26 on Highway 59.

Testimony at a preliminary hearing in July indicated that Smith persuaded 25-year-old Edward Joseph Parker to shoot Workman.

Sentencing was scheduled for Jan. 9.

Parker pleaded not guilty in July to attempted first-degree murder. His trial is scheduled for Dec. 1.

PHILIP ELLIOTT, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats’ campaign arm is borrowing $10 million for a last-minute boost to their fundraising as officials see their majority increasingly in peril.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee on Friday said it also received $1.5 million from the Democratic National Committee and $6.5 million from donors between Oct. 1 and Oct. 15. DNC officials say their transfers to the DSCC will total $5 million by Election Day on Nov. 4.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee said it collected $10.1 million during the first two weeks of October. Of that, $4 million was from the Republican National Committee.

Democrats are trying to fend off Republicans, who could capture the majority for the first time since 2006’s elections if they can net six Senate seats.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri board has approved a bond issuance to finance a new mental health facility at the Fulton State Hospital.

The vote this week by the Missouri Development Finance Board authorizes the issuance of $98 million of bonds this year as an initial phase in the financing.

By approving the project, the board also signaled its intent to authorize up to a total of $220 million of bonds, with additional rounds of bonding expected in 2015 and 2016.

The Fulton State Hospital is Missouri’s only maximum-security psychiatric facility.

The bonding is the result of a measure passed this year by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Jay Nixon. It will pay to demolish old buildings and replace them with 413,000 square feet of new facilities.

JOHN HANNA, AP Political Writer

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) — After lifting the spirits of Kansas Democrats eager to oust conservative Republican Gov. Sam Brownback, challenger Paul Davis now appears to be losing ground. The state’s longstanding GOP loyalties and negative television ads seem have been eroding his onetime lead in the polls.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas Supreme Court has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of a man who admitted shooting abortion provider Dr. George Tiller to death at his Wichita church in 2009.

But the court also overturned Scott Roeder’s sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for 50 years and ordered him to be resentenced. Roeder was sentenced under an older version of the state’s “Hard 50” law later deemed unconstitutional under a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2013.

Roeder testified that he killed Tiller to prevent future abortions. Tiller’s clinic in Wichita was among a handful in the U.S. known to perform late-term abortions.

The state Supreme Court rejected Roeder’s argument that he should have been allowed to present a defense that the shooting was necessary to stop abortions.

JESSICA GRESKO, Associated Press

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — The owner of the iconic Hotel Savoy in Kansas City says he’s confident the business will reopen.
Fire officials are investigating the cause of a fire Thursday afternoon at the Hotel Savoy, which houses the city’s oldest restaurant, the Savoy Grill. No injuries were reported. Long-term residents of the hotel were evacuated and no customers were inside the restaurant when the fire started.

The hotel’s current owner, Don Lee, says there was some smoke and water damage but no structural damage.
An operator of historic hotels, 21c Museum Hotels of Louisville, Kentucky, is planning a $47.5 million makeover of the original 1888 structure and the 1903 addition housing the restaurant. The company said it was still gathering information on the fire. It hopes to close on the purchase by December.