National Roundup

Ohio
Convicted killer: Civil rights violated when dreadlocks cut
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A convicted killer in an Ohio prison claims in a federal lawsuit that his civil rights have been violated by the repeated cutting of his dreadlocks.

The lawsuit filed on behalf of inmate Cecil Koger says his faith of Rastafarianism requires him to wear his hair in dreadlocks.

The lawsuit filed last week says the prison has forcibly cut his hair five times, impeding his ability to practice his religion.

The lawsuit says Ohio’s prison system has allowed dreadlocks for other inmates and seeks to force the prison system to recognize Rastafarianism as a religion. A message was left with the Ohio prisons system seeking comment.

The 35-year-old Koger is serving a 33-year sentence for aggravated murder and aggravated robbery.

New York
NYT reporter suspended for harassment charge probe
NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Times says it has suspended White House reporter Glenn Thrush while it investigates charges that he made unwanted advances on young women while he worked as a reporter at Politico.

Laura McGann, a Politico colleague of Thrush’s, wrote on Vox on Monday that Thrush kissed her and placed his hand on her thigh one night in a bar, after urging another person who had been sitting with them to leave.

The Times, in a statement, said “the alleged behavior is very concerning” and not in keeping with the Times’ standards.” The newspaper said it supports Thrush’s decision to enter a substance abuse program. Thrush didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment.

He worked at Politico from 2009 to 2016.

Vermont
2 charged after man died from septic shock due to bed sores
BARRE, Vt. (AP) — A Vermont man and his companion have been charged with manslaughter and Medicare fraud after authorities say his severely disabled son died of septic shock from infected bed sores in which his skin was “rotting away.”

Fifty-one-year-old Jeffrey Kittredge and 42-year-old Jennifer Cote, of Montpelier, pleaded not guilty last week to charges in the July 2016 death of 20-year-old Jeffrey A. Kittredge II.

They are free on bail. There are no attorneys listed for either Kittredge or Cote.

The Times Argus reports Kittredge and Cote were caregivers who received federal benefits for caring for the man, who suffered from spina bifida and a brain development birth defect and needed 24-hour care.

He was hospitalized with bed sores in early 2016, but the elder Kittredge told authorities he felt the sores had been getting better.

Virginia
Deputy went to Halloween party in blackface  
POQUOSON, Va. (AP) — A white Virginia sheriff’s deputy has been reassigned after attending a Halloween party in blackface.

The Washington Post reports Deputy Jean Browning, a 20-year veteran of the York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office in southeast Virginia, attended a party dressed as U.S. Rep. Frederica Wilson. She was accompanied by her boyfriend, who was dressed as President Donald Trump.

Trump publicly feuded with the Florida congresswoman last month after she criticized comments he made to the widow of a soldier killed in Niger.

Sheriff J.D. Diggs said in a news release that based on the circumstances and “the need for the community to realize that the sheriff’s office takes race relations seriously,” he had reassigned Browning to another job within the department. She was previously an anti-drug officer in the local school system.

New York
Police: Man uses mom as getaway driver in fast food heist
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) — Authorities in western New York say a man had his mother serve as his getaway driver while he robbed a fast-food restaurant at gunpoint.

Police in the town of Orchard Park, just south of Buffalo, say a 30-year-old man entered a Mighty Taco restaurant around 2 a.m. Sunday armed with a gun and demanded cash from the register.

Officers say he ran out and got into a van that was seen leaving the parking lot around the same time the robbery occurred. Police pulled over the van moments later and found the suspect in the passenger seat.

Officials say the man’s 56-year-old mother was driving the van. Both have been charged with robbery and criminal possession of stolen property.

The mother has been freed after posting bail while her son remains in the Erie County Jail.

Oklahoma
Ex-Tulsa officer gets prison in daughter’s boyfriend’s death
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — A white former police officer in Oklahoma was sentenced Monday to 15 years in prison for the fatal off-duty shooting of his daughter’s black boyfriend, after four trials spanning nearly a year including three that resulted in hung juries.

Former Tulsa officer Shannon Kepler was convicted last month of first-degree manslaughter in the 2014 slaying of 19-year-old Jeremey Lake.

Tulsa County District Court Judge Sharon Holmes also issued him with a $10,000 fine.

Kepler’s lawyers said the 24-year police veteran was trying to protect his daughter because she had run away from home and was living in a crime-ridden neighborhood. Kepler, who retired from the force after he was charged, told investigators that Lake was armed and that he shot him in self-defense. Police never found a weapon on Lake or at the scene, and several neighbors testified that they didn’t see a gun, either.

There also was a racial undercurrent to the trials. Kepler killed Lake days before the fatal shooting of an unarmed black 18-year-old by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, fanned a national debate over the treatment of minorities by law enforcement.

A single black juror was seated for each of Kepler’s four trials, and civil rights activists accused Kepler’s lawyers of purposely trying to exclude potential black candidates, a charged that they denied.

The first three juries deadlocked 11-1, 10-2 and 6-6, forcing the judge to declare mistrials. Prosecutors said after the drawn-out case finally ended with a conviction last month that it took so long because many citizens are reluctant to send a law enforcement officer to prison.

Oklahoma law sets out a minimum sentence of four years for the charge but has no maximum term, leaving it up to Holmes to decide on the final punishment. Jurors had recommended a 15-year term.