OVERLAND PARK, Kan. (AP) — Authorities say a woman was killed after she got out of a wrecked car and was struck by a passing vehicle in suburban Kansas City.

The crash happened around 12:30 a.m. Thursday on U.S. 69 in Overland Park, Kansas.

Police say the woman was a passenger in a car whose driver lost control and crashed into a median. The woman then got of the vehicle and was hit. She died later at a hospital.

The crash is under investigation.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (AP) — Flooding has closed nearly 280 Missouri roads and forced officials to evacuate some campgrounds.

The National Weather Service has issued flood warning and flash flood warnings across a large swath of the state.

The Springfield News-Leader reports that the overnight storms dumped 6 inches or more of rain on many parts of the Ozarks, sending river levels soaring. In the Springfield area, the James River jumped from 5 feet (1.5 meters) in just a few hours. People camping along the river and at Roaring River State Park near Cassville were told to leave.

In eastern Missouri, waters are rising along the Mississippi River. It was expected to crest Friday in Hannibal at the third-highest level on record. Meanwhile, several Missouri River levees are projected to overtop.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) — The Giants have told Corey Ballentine to skip the team’s upcoming rookie minicamp to mourn the death of a Washburn University teammate who was killed in a shooting that also wounded New York’s sixth-round pick just hours after being taken in the NFL draft.

The Giants draft choices and rookie free agents were to report on Thursday. Practices are scheduled on Friday and Saturday.

In a statement released by the Giants on Wednesday, the team said it has been in contact with Ballentine since Sunday.

“We have encouraged Corey to stay in Kansas this week to be with his family and friends as they mourn the loss and celebrate the life of his good friend and teammate Dwane Simmons,” the statement said.

Simmons, a fellow defensive back, was killed early Sunday outside an off-campus party. Ballentine was wounded. He was treated and released from a hospital on Sunday.

The university said Ballentine is expected to make a full recovery. No one has been arrested.

It’s all a crazy dream until you do it. I can’t even explain the emotions I have right now. S/o the people that told me to pick a more realistic career. This is as real as it gets. Thank you to the Giants organization for believing in me. It’s only up from here. #GiantsPride pic.twitter.com/86EiwIP4fM

— Corey Ballentine🇯🇲 (@cbxiii__) April 27, 2019

“Corey will be with us when it’s appropriate,” the Giants said.

Services for Simmons of Lee’s Summit, Missouri, are scheduled for Saturday.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Advocates for expanding Medicaid in Kansas are looking to block passage of the state’s next annual budget to force an expansion plan through the Republican-controlled Legislature over conservative leaders’ objections.

Legislators reconvened Wednesday after an annual spring break, and the state Senate rejected an effort by its top Democrat to expedite an expansion debate. The Senate has yet to act on a measure approved by the House in March, and top Republicans want to delay action until next year.

The next Senate vote was 23-13 on pulling an expansion billout of the committee where it’s been stuck for weeks, one short of the 24 votes supporters needed under the chamber’s rules. Even before the vote, expansion supporters were focusing on the alternative of tying up the $18 billion-plus budget that lawmakers must pass to keep state government operating after June.

“It’s the best leverage we have right now,” said House Minority Leader Tom Sawyer, a Wichita Democrat. “There’s been a lot of discussion.”

Medicaid expansion is one of new Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s priorities and its approval would be her biggest victory so far in her first months in office. Expansion has enjoyed bipartisan support for at least several years, but Kelly’s conservative Republican predecessors were vocal critics of the 2010 federal Affordable Care Act that encouraged it.

During an Associated Press interview, Kelly brushed aside top Republicans’ concerns about needing more time to consider the details of an expansion as “just a stall tactic.” She said he doubted that lawmakers could draft a better plan with more time.

“It is very clear that a strong majority in the Kansas Senate support Medicaid expansion and want the opportunity to debate and vote on it this year,” Kelly said after the vote. “Now is the time to get it done.”

Senate leadership must stop blocking a vote on Medicaid expansion. 77% of Kansans agree with me. Despite broad support, Senate President Wagle & Senate Majority Leader Denning have been obstructing progress. Call your Senator & ask them to vote ‘yes’ on Medicaid expansion. #ksleg pic.twitter.com/3zuy373jjP

— Laura Kelly (@LauraKellyKS) May 1, 2019

A small group of expansion supporters stood outside the entrance to the Statehouse parking garage Wednesday morning, holding signs and chanting, “Health care is a human right! Expand Medicaid now!” Advocates have been pushing for an expansion for at least five years.

Still, top Republicans argue that Kelly is trying to rush the debate and that they want to avoid pitfalls that could drive up the state’s costs.

“It needs a lot of due diligence and structure to protect the patients as well as the taxpayers,” said Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning, a conservative Kansas City-area Republican.

Kelly’s plan for expanding Medicaid health coverage to up to 150,000 additional Kansas residents is based on a bill that passed in 2017 with bipartisan support, only to be vetoed by then-Gov. Sam Brownback, a Republican.

Denning called the House-passed expansion bill “regurgitated” and said the state needs policies in place to curb health costs and encourage Medicaid participants to seek preventative care. GOP lawmakers also have mentioned imposing work requirements and even drug testing.

Denning said he agrees with Kelly that expansion “is inevitable” but added, “She’s going to have to wait, I hope, until the second year so we can do the massive and complicated plan correctly, rather than in a rush.”

The Affordable Care Act was Democratic former President Barack Obama’s signature domestic policy and it encouraged states to expand Medicaid by promising that the federal government would cover most of the cost. Thirty-six states have expanded Medicaid or seen voters approve ballot initiatives.

Kelly’s administration has projected that the first full year of Kansas’ expansion would come with a net cost of $34 million to the state. Some supporters believe the influx of federal dollars will spur economic activity, generate new state tax revenues and offset those costs. Many Republicans are skeptical and believe the state’s next costs could be much higher.

The Senate’s top Democrat, Minority Leader Anthony Hensley, of Topeka, tried to pull the expansion bill from a Senate committee.

Democrats hold only 11 seats in the Senate and were forced to rely on Republicans to bypass the normal committee process. It was a tough sell to some moderate GOP senators who lead committees themselves and don’t want to face a similar tactic in the future.

“This issue’s not going to go away,” Hensley said after the vote.

Blocking the budget is “all we have left,” said Rep. Susan Concannon, a moderate Republican and expansion supporter from western Kansas.

“If we support Medicaid expansion, that’s our leverage,” she said.

CLAYTON, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri police officer who says she meant to use her stun gun but mistakenly grabbed her service revolver was indicted on a second-degree assault charge Wednesday for shooting a suspected shoplifter outside a grocery store.

St. Louis County prosecutor Wesley Bell said suburban St. Louis officer Julia Crews, 37, is charged in the April 23 shooting on the parking lot of a Schnucks store in Ladue, one of Missouri’s wealthiest communities. The woman who was shot was seriously hurt, Bell said.

The 33-year-old woman, who is black, remains in a hospital. While authorities said she will survive, her father, Robert Hall, said she is “fighting for her life.” Authorities haven’t released her name, but her family identified her as Ashley Hall.

She hasn’t been charged in the shoplifting.

Crews’ attorney, Travis Noble, said after Bell’s announcement that Crews meant to use her stun gun but mistakenly grabbed her service revolver and shot the woman once. Noble described the officer as “devastated,” and called the shooting a case of “weapon confusion” that didn’t merit the criminal charge.

“The officer pulled what she believed to be her Taser,” Noble said. “Tragic accident.”

The shooting is among at least 13 since 2001 in which officers said they mixed up their guns and stun guns, University of Missouri-St. Louis criminologist David Klinger said. He noted that police officers typically train by drawing their gun, not their stun gun, and that becomes habit.

“Occasionally, what will happen is when police officers move to draw the Taser, which has the same basic feel as a service pistol, they draw the wrong weapon,” Klinger said. Noble said that’s exactly what happened to Crews.

Police were called to the store on a report of a shoplifting. The officer encountered one of two women accused of trying to leave with stolen merchandise. Police said the suspect apparently fell while trying to flee and was complaining about her injuries to the officer.

The officer, who is white and a 13-year veteran of the department, called for an ambulance and tried to handcuff the suspect, Noble said. The woman broke free and began to run.

Noble said the officer drew what she believed to be her stun gun and screamed ”’Taser! Taser! Taser!” The officer realized her mistake as soon as the woman went down, he said.

Bell said the shoplifting case is still under investigation.

Bell was elected prosecutor of Missouri’s largest county last year, upsetting longtime incumbent Bob McCulloch in the August Democratic primary and running unopposed in November.

McCulloch was prosecutor for 28 years and was perceived as a staunch supporter of police, a reputation heightened when he deferred to a grand jury after a white police officer fatally shot 18-year-old Michael Brown, who was black and unarmed, in 2014 in Ferguson. The grand jury declined to indict the officer, Darren Wilson, who resigned in November 2014. The shooting led to months of often-violent protests.

Bell, who is black, was elected to the Ferguson City Council in April 2015. In his longshot bid to unseat McCulloch, Bell campaigned as a reformist, saying that while he supports police — his father also was an officer — he would hold those who act outside the law accountable.

Klinger said most officers who mistake their gun for their stun gun aren’t charged, typically because prosecutors deem the shootings accidents rather than acts of intentional harm.

But Bell said those other officers were facing threats to their own safety.

“In this case, the officer’s safety was not in question,” Bell said.

A prosecutor in April declined to charge a New Hope, Pennsylvania, police officer who shot inmate Brian Riling during a scuffle inside a police holding cell, ruling the shooting was accidental. The suspect was critically wounded but survived.

Former Lawrence, Kansas, police officer Brindley Blood was charged with aggravated battery in 2018 after shooting a man attacking another officer. Charges were dropped in March after a judge ruled that Blood meant to use the stun gun and grabbed the wrong weapon. Akira Lewis, who is black, survived the shooting and accused the white officers of racial profiling.

White volunteer sheriff’s deputy Robert Bates fatally shot Eric Harris, an unarmed black man, in 2015 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, while Harris was on the ground being restrained by other deputies during an illegal gun sale sting. Bates was convicted of manslaughter despite claiming he meant to use the stun gun. He served less than half of a four-year sentence before being paroled.

In the Ladue case, the mother of the woman who was shot said she forgives the officer, who could face up to seven years in prison if convicted.

“I’m going to pray for her and pray for my daughter at the same time,” Karen Carter said.

OLATHE, Kan. (AP) — A prosecutor has determined that a suburban Kansas City police officer was justified in shooting and wounding an 18-year-old homicide suspect.

The Johnson County, Kansas, district attorney said Tuesday in the ruling that Matthew Bibee Jr. made comments that indicated his intent to kill the officer.

Bibee began shooting on March 31 after an officer confronted him because he matched the description of a suspect in an attempted carjacking. Bibee sustained shrapnel wound to his wrist. Investigators said that as Bibee was being led to a police car, he shouted that he was trying to take the officer’s “life first.”

Bibee is jailed on $1 million bond on charges that include battery on a law enforcement officer and first-degree murder in the March 29 killing of 17-year-old Rowan Padgett.

TOPEKA – April tax receipts came in $81.2 million above estimates at $1.2 billion; $256.4 million more than the same month last year.

Individual income tax receipts are $69.8 million more than the estimate at $808.1 million. Corporate income taxes receipts are $8.5 million above estimates at $104.8 million; $6.0 million more than April 2018.

“Increases in the receipts can be attributed to one-time tax payments on capital gains income and economic growth coupled with changes in federal and state income tax law,” Secretary Mark Burghart said. “While we are seeing our state begin to stabilize following years of turmoil, it’s important that we continue to be cautious.”

Retail sales tax receipts show $200.5 million in collections, a decrease of approximately $2.4 million, or 1.2% below April 2018.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A dispute among Missouri Republican senators over school choice is delaying a proposal for a $22 million adult scholarship program, an important piece of Gov. Mike Parson’s workforce development agenda.

The so-called Fast Track bill would provide money for adults seeking undergraduate degrees later in life for high-demand jobs.

But State Sen. Andrew Koenig, of Manchester, said Tuesday the proposal won’t pass unless it includes Missouri Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, which would give families tax credits for money spent on schools, whether public, private or online.

The Kansas City Star reports that Koenig’s threat is the latest move by the six-member Conservative Caucus, which has challenged other Republicans on Parson’s workforce agenda.

Fast Track is sponsored by state Sen. Gary Romine, a Farmington Republican who has filibustered school choice efforts in the past.

Koenig said stalling the Fast Track bill, which has been approved by the House, was payback after efforts to compromise on the voucher bill were resisted.

“I wanted to reciprocate the very thing he did to me,” Koenig said on the floor.

Some Caucus members who don’t like the Fast Track program said they would allow it to go to a vote of the full Senate if school choice is included.

“I cannot see a path for the so-called ‘Fast Track blank check to the Department of Higher (Education)’ bill to get forward to make it through this process without options for children and their parents that are not being well-served by public schools,” said Republican state Sen. Bob Onder of Lake Saint Louis.

Parson lobbied Conservative Caucus members personally last week to find a way to vote on Fast Track.

“We have to see the governor help us more with charter school expansion and ESAs,” said state Sen. Bill Eigel, a member of the caucus, when asked whether Parson’s appeal reduced caucus opposition.

After about four hours of debate Tuesday, the Fast Track bill was tabled. The legislative session ends May 17.

MILLER COUNTY — One person died in an accident just after 6:30a.m. Wednesday in Miller County.

The Missouri State Highway Patrol reported a 1997 Ford F150 driven by Virgil S. Holder, 77, Eldon, was northbound on Route Y just north of Crews Road. The pickup crossed the center line, traveled off the road and struck a tree.

Holder was pronounced dead at the scene. He was not wearing a seat belt, according to the MSHP.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas Senate has overridden Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto of a bill requiring abortion providers to tell patients about a disputed treatment to stop a medication abortion after it’s been started.

The vote Wednesday was 27-13, just the two-thirds majority needed.

The House would vote next, possibly Wednesday, and appears to have the two-thirds majority needed to override the veto.

Kelly said the bill is an unwarranted intrusion between patients and their doctors.

Abortion opponents say such measures ensure that women harboring doubts about ending their pregnancies will learn that they can stop a medication abortion after the first of two pills. Abortion-rights supporters say such mandates force doctors to present patients with dubious information.

Arkansas, Arizona, Idaho, Utah, South Dakota, North Dakota and Kentucky all have similar laws.