DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The union representing workers at pork processing plants has sued the federal government to challenge new rules finalized in September that allow companies to set line speeds and turn more food safety tasks over to company employees.
The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union and local unions in Kansas, Minnesota and Iowa have joined with nonprofit consumer advocacy group Public Citizen to file the lawsuit in federal court in Minnesota.
The lawsuit alleges that the new rules announced in September by the U.S. Department of Agriculture violate the Administrative Procedure Act because it is not backed by reasoned decision-making and should be set aside.
A USDA spokeswoman says the agency does not comment on pending litigation.
SALINE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas man on sex allegations.
Holmes photo Saline County
Following an investigation into allegations that arose over the summer that included a five-year-old girl and a nine-year-old girl, deputies arrested have Archie Lee Holmes, 50, Gypsum, on suspicion of multiple counts, including rape and aggravated indecent liberties with a child, according to Saline County Sheriff Roger Soldan.
One of the girls was a family member and one was a friend of the family, according to the sheriff.
The incidents allegedly occurred at Holmes’ residence in Gypsum and were reported to the Saline County Sheriff’s Office by the Kansas Department for Children and Families.
Holmes remains in custody on requested charges of Rape, Aggravated indecent liberties with a child, Aggravated intimidation of a witness, Aggravated criminal sodomy, according to online jail records.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court is preparing to consider how far states can go toward eliminating the insanity defense in criminal trials as it reviews the case of a Kansas man sentenced to die for killing four relatives.
The high court planned to hear arguments Monday in James Kraig Kahler’s case. He went to the home of his estranged wife’s grandmother about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Topeka the weekend after Thanksgiving 2009 and fatally shot the two women and his two teenage daughters.
Not even Kahler’s attorneys have disputed that he killed them. They’ve argued that he was in the grips of a depression so severe that he experienced an extreme emotional disturbance that disassociated him from reality.
In seeking a not guilty verdict due to his mental state, his defense at his 2011 trial faced what critics see as an impossible legal standard. His attorneys now argue that Kansas violated the U.S. Constitution by denying him the right to pursue an insanity defense.
The nation’s highest court previously has given states broad latitude in how they treat mental illness in criminal trials, allowing five states, including Kansas, to abolish the traditional insanity defense. Kahler’s appeal raises the question of whether doing so denies defendants their guaranteed right to due legal process.
“Maybe they will establish some ground rules,” said Jeffrey Jackson, a law professor at Washburn University in Topeka. “They’ve been vague about what the standard is, and maybe now they’re going to tell us.”
Until 1996, Kansas followed a rule first outlined in 1840s England, requiring defendants pursuing an insanity defense to show that they were so impaired by a mental illness or defect that they couldn’t understand that their conduct was criminal. Now Kansas permits defendants to only cite “mental disease or defect” as a partial defense, and they must prove they didn’t intend to commit the specific crime. Alaska, Idaho, Montana and Utah have similar laws.
Christopher Slobogin, a professor of both law and psychiatry at the Vanderbilt University, said even seriously mentally ill defendants typically intend to the commit their crimes, even if their acts result from delusions.
“John Hinckley intended to kill President Reagan. He would not have had a defense in Kansas,” Slobogin said. “Name an insanity case, the person would not have had a defense in Kansas.”
Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt argues that the Supreme Court has previously taken a “laboratories of democracy approach” so that states can try to improve criminal justice.
“Scholars and practitioners have struggled for literally hundreds of years to decide to how to handle evidence of a criminal defendant’s mental condition,” Schmidt said in an interview. “Kansas is merely continuing the long tradition of trying different approaches.”
Kahler’s attorneys contend he snapped under the strain of crumbling personal and professional lives. His estranged wife, Karen, was in a relationship with another woman and was seeking a divorce. He had lost his job as utilities director in Columbia, Missouri, and moved back to Kansas weeks earlier to live with his parents.
Karen Kahler and their three children were spending the Thanksgiving 2009 weekend at the home of Karen’s grandmother, Dorothy Wight, in Burlingame. James Kahler shot the women, then found his daughters and killed them. His young son, Sean, fled to a neighboring house and later testified at his father’s trial.
Slobogin, who helped write a handbook for attorneys and mental health professionals on psychological evaluations for courts, said insanity defenses typically arise in less than 1% of felony cases, and when those cases go to trial, the defendant loses three out of four times.
Still, Kansas legislators enacted the tougher standard in response to a push by crime victims, family members and friends.
They argued that defendants who escaped prison could be released from a state mental hospital after a relatively short stay. A report to state lawmakers in 1994 said that in the previous five years, 39 people who had been found not guilty by reason of insanity were confined to a state hospital. The average length of stay was 14½ months.
Supporters also argued that the new method was more straightforward for juries. Schmidt called it “simpler, cleaner and less confusing.”
But Jackson said: “Most standards that eliminate part of the defense are simpler for juries to understand.”
SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a fatal shooting that left a man dead and after asking the public for help, received a tip through crime-stoppers and arrested 42-year-old David Pressley.
Pressley photo Sedgwick Co.
At approximately 12:30 a.m., on Sunday Sept. 29, officers were dispatched to a shooting call at Magoos Bar and Grill located in the 2300 block of S. Oliver. Upon arrival, officers located the scene of a shooting, but no victim was located. Shortly after, 29-year-old Demario Cooks arrived by private vehicle at an area hospital with critical injuries. Cooks later died of his injuries.
On Saturday night, police locted Pressley at 13th and Perry and he was arrested without incident.
He is being held on a $250,000 bond on charge of second-degree murder, possession of a firearm by a felon, possession of narcotics, unlawful possession of hallucinogenics and a Kansas Department of Corrections warrant.
Pressley has ten previous convictions for aggravated robbery, aggravated burglary and for drugs, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections.
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SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a fatal shooting that left a man dead and asking the public for help in locating 42-year-old David Pressley.
Pressley photo Wichita Police
Pressley currently has a Kansas Department of Corrections Arrest and Detain order and investigators are wanting to speak to him in reference to Sunday’s criminal homicide in the parking lot of Magoos Bar and Grill in the 2300 block of South Oliver, according to officer Charley Davidson.
Just after 12:30 a.m. Sunday, police were dispatched to a shooting call outside the bar, according to officer Kevin Wheeler. Upon arrival, officers located the scene of a shooting, but no victim was located.
Shortly after, the victim identified as 29-year-old Demario Cooks of Wichita arrived by private vehicle at an area hospital with critical injuries and later died, according to Police Captain Brent Allred.
The preliminary investigation has revealed that the Cooks was inside the bar attending a birthday party, and a disturbance occurred between several other men. They moved into the parking lot, and multiple shots were fired, striking the victim.
If you know the whereabouts of Pressley, please call 911 or Crime Stoppers at 316-267-2111.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — An autopsy reports says a 50-year-old Topeka woman suffered methamphetamine intoxication when she collapsed and died while fleeing a home she apparently was burglarizing.
Henderson photo KDOC
The report, released Friday, said her death in June was accidental, according to a copy of the report from the Shawnee County District Court Clerk’s office.
Topeka police Lt. Andrew Beightel said officers found Henderson had collapsed near a home. The autopsy said she fled the home and was seen on video collapsing three times.
Kansas Department of Corrections records show Henderson was paroled in 2012 after serving prison time for two counts each of burglary, robbery and theft and one count each of aggravated robbery and obstructing the legal process. The crimes were committed in Shawnee, Wyandotte, Butler and Sedgwick counties.
RENO COUNTY—One person died in an accident just after 9:30a.m. Sunday in Reno County
A vehicle driven by Evelyn Diane Black, 64, McPherson, was traveling on 69th Avenue at Willison Road, according to the Reno County Sheriff’s Department.
The vehicle traveled off an embankment at the T-intersection. A deputy at the scene reported having to force entry into the locked vehicle and make contact with Black. She was the sole occupant and pronounced dead at the scene.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas man has pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder in the July 2018 beating and stabbing deaths of his estranged wife and her cousin.
Sportsman -photo Shawnee Co.
Bradley Sportsman, 41, of Hollenberg, man entered the plea Friday in Shawnee County District Court and faces nearly 46 years in prison when he’s sentenced Nov. 20.
Sportsman is one of three men charged in the Topeka home invasion deaths of 28-year-old Lisa Sportsman and her 17-year-old cousin, Jesse Polinskey. Police say the women had been stabbed and beaten to death.
A first-degree murder trial is set Dec. 9 for 32-year-old Richard D. Showalter, of Greenleaf. Twenty-year-old Matthew Hutto, of Clay Center, was sentenced to two life terms after pleading guilty to two first-degree murder counts. Hutto is seeking to withdraw that plea and has a Nov. 15 hearing on the motion.
Police on the scene of the investigation late Sunday morning image byKelli Taylor courtesy KCTV News
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — Two men opened fire inside a bar in Kansas City, Kansas, early Sunday, killing four people and wounding five others in a shooting believed to have stemmed from an earlier dispute, police said.
Authorities were searching Sunday for the two gunmen, said Officer Thomas Tomasic, a police spokesman. He said the two men had apparently gotten into some sort of disagreement with people inside Tequila KC Bar, left, then returned with handguns.
“We think there was something that happened in the bar earlier probably,” Tomasic said. “Unfortunately, they left and decided to take it to another level, came back and started shooting.”
Around 40 people were inside the small bar when gunfire erupted around 1:30 a.m., Tomasic said. The gunfire sent people running for the exits, with the injured leaving trails of blood as they fled. One of the injured was trying to get a ride to the hospital when ambulances arrived.
“It’s a pretty small bar, so if you have two guys come in and start shooting, people are just running, running anywhere they can,” Tomasic said.
All four men who were killed were Hispanic, but Tomasic said authorities do not believe the shooting was racially motivated. The shooting happened in a neighborhood with a large Hispanic population.
Tomasic cautioned that police were still investigating exactly what happened. He said they were reviewing surveillance video and interviewing witnesses while looking for the gunmen.
“Obviously being a bar at 1:30, stories vary a lot,” he said.
Among the dead was one man in his late 50s, another in his mid-30s and two in their mid-20s, police said. Authorities did not immediately release their names.
However, Juan Ramirez, of Kansas City, Kansas, told The Kansas City Star that his 29-year-old nephew was among those killed. He said his nephew left behind a 6-year-old son and a 4-year-old daughter.
“I don’t wish this upon anybody,” Ramirez said.
Bartender Jose Valdez told the newspaper that he had refused to serve one of the suspects on Saturday night because the man had previously caused problems at the bar. Valdez said the man threw a cup at him and left, but returned later with another man shortly before closing time.
The gunfire created smoke inside the business, Valdez said, and he thought the building was “going to cave in.”
“I don’t know what to make of it. A sad day for everybody who lost their lives and their families,” he said, choking up. “How can you go into a place full of people and just start shooting?”
SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a pair of armed robberies and have made an arrest.
Williams photo Sedgwick Co.
Just before 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, police responded to an armed robbery at the Family Dollar in the 2300 block of South Seneca in Wichita, according to officer Charley Davidson.
Upon arrival, an employee reported an unknown suspect entered the business, pointed a handgun at her and demanded money. Money was taken by the suspect who fled on foot.
Just before 11a.m. Thursday, police responded to an armed robbery at Family Dollar in the 1000 block of South Meridian in Wichita. Upon arrival, an employee reported an unknown suspect entered the business, pointed a handgun at her and demanded money. Money was taken by the suspect who fled on foot.
No injuries occurred in either case, according to Davidson.
Through the investigation, investigators were able to identify 25-year-old Toney Williams of Topeka allegedly being involved in the two crimes.
He was arrested this Friday in the 500 block of Chautauqua from a vehicle.He is being held requested charges that include two counts of aggravated robbery regarding two armed robberies and two warrants, according to Davidson.
