FERNANDO PEINADO, Associated Press

MIAMI (AP) — The number of U.S. real estate agents is increasing as the housing market recovers from the Great Recession.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri voters have decided to bolster legal protection of electronic communications through a state constitutional amendment on digital privacy.
Amendment 9 was approved as voters went to the polls Tuesday. The electronic privacy measure was one of five proposed state constitutional amendments on the ballot.
The amendment requires police to obtain warrants before searching or seizing “electronic communications and data,” such as cellphones, emails and computer flash drives.
Supporters say the broader legal definition will help guard against excessive government intrusion such as the recent National Security Agency eavesdropping scandal.
Earlier this year, Missouri lawmakers easily approved a resolution to place the measure on the ballot. The amendment faced no organized opposition, with groups representing police and prosecutors remaining largely quiet during a brief election campaign.

JOHN HANNA, Associated Press

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts has defeated tea party-backed challenger Milton Wolf in Kansas’ Republican primary.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A former Kansas legislator has captured the Democratic nomination in the Kansas City area’s 3rd Congressional District and will challenge Republican Congressman Kevin Yoder.

Former state Sen. Kelly Kultala, of Kansas City defeated retired Lenexa electrician Reginald Marselus in Tuesday’s primary.

Yoder is seeking his third, two-year term and was unopposed in the Republican primary.

Kultala served on a local school board and on the commission of the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas before being elected to the state Senate in 2008. She served a single, four-year term there before losing her seat in 2012.

Beating Yoder in the November election could prove difficult. He’s amassed more than $2 million.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback has won the state’s Republican primary as expected, but the results suggest significant dissention within the GOP over his policies.

Officials in both parties were watching for signs of a protest. Jennifer Winn is the owner of a Wichita-area property management firm, and her platform included legalizing marijuana.

They had agreed that a single challenge was likely to receive about 20 percent of the vote under any circumstances.

But Brownback is facing a tougher-than-expected race from Democratic challenger Paul Davis because of questions about whether massive personal income tax enacted at the governor’s urging are boosting the economy as promised or wrecking the state’s finances.

 

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A Missouri man is charged with second-degree murder for a collision that killed a motorcyclist in eastern Kansas.

The crash occurred late Sunday on Interstate 635 in Kansas City, Kansas. Authorities said 61-year-old Melody Hinshaw, of Kansas City, Missouri, was thrown from her motorcycle when it was hit from behind by a car.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported that Hinshaw was wearing a helmet and goggles.

The Wyandotte County district attorney on Tuesday charged 36-year-old Shaun Moton with second-degree murder, leaving the scene of an injury accident and misdemeanor driving under the influence of alcohol.

Moton, also of Kansas City, Missouri, was jailed in lieu of $500,000 bond. He did not have a lawyer.

WASHINGTON – New highway safety legislation introduced by U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, is aimed at keeping American travelers safe on the road and holding accountable companies who ignore or violate safety laws.

McCaskill introduced the Motor Vehicle and Highway Safety Enhancement Act, a six-year renewal of highway and motor vehicle safety funding at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

“With millions of Americans behind the wheel every day, and more than 33,000 killed on our roads each year, we’ve got to do more to keep our cars and the roads we drive them on safe,” McCaskill said. “Painful recent examples at Toyota and GM have shown us we also must make it easier to hold accountable those who jeopardize consumers’ safety. For too long, auto safety resources have remained virtually stagnant while cars and the safety challenges they present have become more complex. This bill addresses those challenges by giving safety regulators the financial and enforcement resources necessary to modernize and better protect American consumers.”

The bill incorporates modified text of the Raechel and Jacqueline Houck Safe Rental Car Act, which McCaskill introduced last year with Senators Chuck Schumer of New York, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Barbara Boxer of California—reflecting an agreement that McCaskill helped broker between rental companies, auto safety advocates, and other stakeholders, including General Motors, to ensure recalled rental vehicles are fixed before a consumer gets behind the wheel.

The legislation covers three distinct areas of vehicle and highway safety:

Highway Safety

• Reauthorizes Highway Safety funding from the Highway Trust Fund for six years.
• Updates highway safety programs to address emerging traffic safety issues.
• Revises the criteria states must meet to receive ignition interlock grant funding.

Motor Vehicle Safety

• Reauthorizes Motor Vehicle Safety funding for six years, doubling NHTSA’s funding for vehicle safety over six years to help the agency modernize and meet evolving and increasingly complex auto safety challenges.
• Amends legal requirements related to recalls for manufacturers going through bankruptcy.
• Increases civil penalties for auto safety violations, eliminating the maximum total penalty, which is currently set at $35 million.
• Overhauls criminal penalties for auto safety violations.

Rental Car Safety

• Prohibits rental or sale of rental vehicles subject to a safety recall.
• Requires rental companies to ground vehicles under a safety recall.
• Permits rental companies to rely on temporary measures identified by manufacturers.
• Ensures NHTSA has the tools necessary to protect consumers.
• Maintains the status quo between rental companies and manufacturers.

McCaskill has held two hearings examining GM’s response to the defective ignition switches that have been linked to at least 13 deaths, including a fatality in Missouri, and resulted in the recall of 2.6 million vehicles earlier this year. McCaskill also led a hearing last year on rental car safety.

The subcommittee’s work on auto safety issues will continue, with a hearing being planned for the fall to examine various legislative proposals aimed at modernizing and better equipping auto safety regulators to ensure the tragedies and failures associated with the GM recall are not repeated.

JIM SUHR, Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — A published report says Russian hackers have stolen 1.2 billion user names and passwords in a series of Internet heists affecting 420,000 websites.

The New York Times says the thievery was uncovered by Hold Security, a Milwaukee firm that has a history of sifting out online security breaches.

Hold Security didn’t immediately respond to inquiries from The Associated Press.

The identities of the websites that were broken into weren’t identified by the Times. The newspaper says nondisclosure agreements required Hold Security to keep some information confidential.

The reported break-in is the latest incident to raise doubts about the security measures that both big and small companies are using to protect people’s information online.

Security experts believe crooks will continue breaking into computer servers unless companies become more vigilant.