Montana
Woman to appeal sentence in new husband’s death
MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — A Kalispell, Mont., woman who pleaded guilty to pushing her new husband off a cliff in Glacier National Park last summer plans to appeal her 30-year prison sentence for his death.
Attorneys for 22-year-old Jordan Linn Graham filed the notice of appeal with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday. She was sentenced late last month for the death of 25-year-old Cody Johnson.
The notice says Graham plans to appeal over several issues, including prosecutors raising the issue of premeditation in a sentencing memorandum. Graham pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, which does not involve premeditation.
The notice says she also plans to appeal Molloy’s decision not to allow her to withdraw her guilty plea.
Virginia
State AG files brief supporting gay marriage
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia’s attorney general has told an appellate court reviewing a judge’s ruling that the state’s gay marriage ban is unconstitutional that homosexuals have just as much right to marry as interracial heterosexual couples.
Attorney General Mark Herring made the argument in a brief filed Friday in the Richmond-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Arguments are set for May 13.
Herring is backing two gay couples who filed the lawsuit. He says in the brief that the judge who struck down the ban in February was correct in citing the 1967 Supreme Court case that invalidated state laws prohibiting interracial marriage. Herring says the U.S. Constitution’s equal protection clause protects the fundamental right to marry and trumps the states’ authority to decide the issue.
New York
Man with 1st name ‘God’ sues credit agency
NEW YORK (AP) — A New York City man claims that a credit reporting agency falsely reported he had no financial history because his first name is God.
According to the New York Post, God Gazarov of Brooklyn says in a lawsuit that Equifax has refused to correct its system to recognize his name as legitimate.
He says an Equifax customer service representative even suggested that he change his name to resolve the issue.
Gazarov is a Russian native who is named after his grandfather.
The 26-year-old owns a Brighton Beach jewelry store and is a graduate of Brooklyn College.
He says he has high scores with two other major credit agencies.
The Post says Equifax did not return calls or emails seeking comment.
Delaware
Doctor gets 3 years in waterboarding case
GEORGETOWN, Del. (AP) — A former Delaware pediatrician has been sentenced to three years in prison for waterboarding the daughter of his longtime companion by holding her head under a faucet.
A judge also sentenced Melvin Morse to probation on Friday for other charges related to the girl’s abuse.
Morse’s attorney asked the judge for mercy, saying Morse is suffering from prostate cancer and other health conditions. But prosecutors said Morse deserved prison time for years of emotional and physical abuse of the girl.
Before he was sentenced, Morse turned to the girl, apologized and told her he hopes that one day she can forgive him.
The girl and her mother testified that Morse used waterboarding as a threat or punishment.
Defense attorneys said “waterboarding” was a term jokingly used to describe hair washing.
Washington
Woman: 911 down when man breaks into home
EVERETT, Wash. (AP) — A woman from Everett, Wash., says she called 911 at least 37 times early Thursday when an intruder broke into her home, but she couldn’t get through during a statewide outage of the emergency call system.
Alicia Cappola told KIRO she armed herself with a knife and confronted a man who crawled through a window. He ran out of the house.
Cappola finally reached someone about an hour after her first call.
Police Lt. Robert Goetz (gets) said Friday that an officer took a report about the incident. A Snohomish County dispatch center said there wasn’t anyone available early Friday to comment.
CenturyLink spokeswoman Kerry Zimmer said there was no word yet on the cause of the outage in Washington. She says it was unrelated to a similar Oregon outage caused by a technical problem.
Nebraska
Omaha suspect in 4 slayings files to plead guilty
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A man accused of killing four people in Omaha within weeks of his leaving prison has filed paperwork to change his pleas to guilty.
Twenty-seven-year-old Nikko Jenkins filed the motion Friday in Douglas County District Court. He’d previously pleaded not guilty to killing the four last summer. A court hearing on Jenkins’ motion is expected to be held Wednesday.
Earlier this week Jenkins tried to plead no contest to the charges, but Douglas County District Judge Peter Bataillon said he wouldn’t accept the pleas because of the severity of the cases.
In February Bataillon ruled that Jenkins was mentally competent to stand trial on the four counts of murder.
Iowa
Court overturns coach’s sexual exploitation case
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A divided Iowa Supreme Court has thrown out the sexual exploitation conviction of a former Bloomfield basketball coach who had sex with a 16-year-old girl claiming he doesn’t fit the definition of a school employee under Iowa law.
In a 5-to-2 decision the court says charges against 36-year-old Patrick Nicoletto must be dismissed.
The court says Friday that a coach without a teaching certificate doesn’t fall under the state law prohibiting sexual exploitation by a school employee.
Nicoletto, a coach from 2007 through 2009 was convicted and sentenced to five years. He was sentenced to prison in 2012 but has been free on bond during appeal.
Two justices disagreed calling the majority opinion absurd saying there’s no persuasive indication the Legislature intended to exclude coaches from the sexual exploitation law.
