SPRINGFIELD (AP) – Springfield police say an inmate who escaped from a police car last week has been recaptured.

Nick Gamblin was arrested early Wednesday in Springfield. Police did not immediately release details of his arrest.

Gamblin, from the Springfield area, escaped last Thursday while he was being taken from Strafford to Springfield.

Stafford Police Chief Justhan Webster says Gamblin was handcuffed behind his back while in a Strafford police car but somehow managed to unlock the car and jump out of the moving vehicle.

When he escaped, Gamblin had four active warrants for first-degree tampering, first-degree assault, first-degree robbery and resisting arrest.

The Springfield News-Leader reports Gamblin also has escaped while handcuffed from Missouri state troopers in February 2013 and from a Springfield police car in late June.

BURLINGTON, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas House of Representatives candidate says his arrest on suspicion of having an open container of alcohol and traffic violations was a mistake.

Burlington Police Chief Doug Jones said Jeff Freeman, a Republican running against incumbent state Rep. Peggy Mast of Emporia in the Aug. 5 primary, was booked into the Coffey County jail Sunday.

Freeman said Wednesday he was stopped after not signaling a turn at a stop sign. He contends he had no alcohol in his car.

He says he had some alcohol at a memorial service in Neosho Falls earlier in the day but said he was sober when he was stopped.

Freeman called the arrest a distraction from the important issues of the campaign and said he would stay in the race.

KANSAS CITY (AP) – The foundation trying to build a memorial to remember the 1981 collapse of the Hyatt Regency Hotel skywalk in Kansas City has raised 70 percent of its goal.

Thursday is the 33nd anniversary of the July 17, 1981, disaster that killed 114 people and injured more than 200 others.

The Kansas City Star reports the Skywalk Memorial Foundation recently received $10,000 from The Builders Association and the Kansas City chapter of the Associated General Contractors of America. The foundation says several law firms also have made contributions.

The memorial would honor the victims, survivors and rescue workers of the tragedy.

Donations have reached about $383,000. The group’s goal is $546,000, which includes a 25 percent maintenance endowment.

DETROIT (AP) — BMW is expanding a recall of its most popular models to fix a growing air bag problem that is hitting much of the auto industry.

The German automaker says it will recall 1.6 million 3-Series cars from model years 2000 to 2006 across the world, including 574,000 in the U.S.

The company says it’s a precaution because other automakers using similar systems have reported problems.

Air bag inflators in systems made by Takata Corp. can rupture. If that happens, the bags might not work properly, and shards could fly out and cause injury.

BMW says it has no reports of problems in its vehicles. Dealers will replace the passenger-side front air bags. The new recall excludes 42,000 BMWs recalled in May 2013 for the same problem.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Missouri Attorney General’s office is suing several home-repair businesses for allegedly defrauding Missouri customers after storms.

Attorney General Chris Koster said in a release Tuesday that the lawsuit names 16 home-repair businesses. He says complaints about home repair and remodeling businesses are common and that there’ve been more than 330 such complaints so far in 2014. Many of the complaints involve so-called storm chasers, who follow severe storms, stay long enough to collect initial payments and rarely finish the repairs.

He says consumers should check the references of contractors before signing a contract or providing any partial payment and should be wary of crews that appear unexpectedly after heavy storms.

JEFFERSON CITY (AP) – A new report says Missouri unemployment rate fell slightly in June to 6.5 percent from 6.6 percent the month before.

Tuesday’s report from the Department of Economic Development says the arts, entertainment and recreation industries added 1,800 jobs. The professional, scientific and technical services industries also gained 1,100 jobs during the month.

The department says, however, that the state’s nonfarm payroll employment decreased by 1,800 jobs in June.

Revised data for May also showed an employment increase of 8,200 jobs, up from the 3,700 new jobs originally reported.