New York
Inmates charged with sending threatening letters to DA
FORT ANN, N.Y. (AP) - Two convicted rapists have been indicted on charges of mailing white powder with letters threatening to blow up a western New York district attorney's office.
According to court records, the pair sent the letters to the Erie County district attorney's office in July. The white powder turned out to be ground soap.
The Post-Star of Glens Falls reports that Dionte Cooper and Michael Rispers were cellmates at Great Meadow Correctional Facility upstate when they allegedly sent the threatening letters.
Cooper is serving a 21-year sentence for three Buffalo-area rapes. He told authorities he was angry at the district attorney's office that prosecuted him.
Both men are currently incarcerated at Attica. They pleaded not guilty to the new charges Friday.
Information on attorneys for Cooper and Rispers wasn't available.
California
DA: Man kills self before child sex-abuse trial
SANTA ROSA, Calif. (AP) - Officials say a California man set to stand trial for child sex-abuse charges killed himself before jury selection.
The Press Democrat reports Mendocino County district attorney's office spokesman Mike Geniella says 51-year-old Aaron Douglas Burrows, who was facing a felony charge of criminal sexual penetration of a 9-year-old, killed himself Monday.
Geniella says Burrows failed to show up in court Monday morning for the start of jury selection. Butte County law enforcement found Burrows and determined he took his own life sometime Sunday night or early Monday.
Geniella says Burrows was charged with the crime for an incident that was reported following a camping trip to Fort Bragg, and a subsequent investigation uncovered a prior alleged victim of Burrows who was going to testify at the trial.
Maryland
Bomb, gun found in woods linked to suspect who died in 20
LINGANORE, Md. (AP) - An explosive device and loaded handgun found in Maryland over the weekend has been linked to a stalking case in which the suspect died by suicide in open court - nearly two decades ago.
News outlets cite a joint release from the Office of the Maryland State Fire Marshal and Howard County police saying "a series of documents" found alongside the items indicated they belonged to Alan Bruce Chmurny.
Chmurny was a vice president of Oceanix Biosciences when he was accused in 2000 of pouring mercury into the vents of an employee's car. Chmurny had left the woman threatening messages, including at least one mentioning a bomb. He died by suicide in 2001.
The finds were made by a passer-by in the woods Sunday and have since been disposed of.
Utah
State bans abortions after 8-weeks, legal showdown certain
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Utah Gov. Gary Herbert has signed a law banning most abortions after 18 weeks of gestation, setting the stage for a legal showdown.
Herbert spokesman Paul Edwards said Monday the governor is against abortion and believes the law sets an appropriate threshold.
But Planned Parenthood of Utah says it's clearly unconstitutional. They point to U.S. Supreme Court's holding that states cannot ban abortion before the fetus is viable outside the womb, at about 23 weeks. The American Civil Liberties Union of Utah has promised to sue.
The law comes as abortion opponents across the country are emboldened by President Donald Trump's appointment of conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices.
The Arkansas governor has also signed an 18-week ban, and several other states have considered or passed proposals to ban abortion much earlier, once a fetal heartbeat is found.
Utah
Man on state's death row for 30 years gets new hearing
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - A man who has been on death row in Utah for more than three decades will get a new hearing after raising questions about the testimony used to convict him of murder.
The Salt Lake Tribune reports the Utah Supreme Court in an opinion Friday found that testimonies by two witnesses were inconsistent at times and "tainted as a whole" in the case against Douglas Stewart Carter.
A jury in 1985 convicted Carter of killing 57-year-old Eva Olesen - the aunt of a former Provo police chief. He was sentenced to death.
Carter's attorneys asked the state Supreme Court for a new hearing, claiming police paid two witnesses' rent and instructed them to lie about the financial help.
A district court judge will hold an evidentiary hearing on the case.
Pennsylvania
$2M to victim of sex abuse by priest who made him confess
ERIE, Pa. (AP) - A Roman Catholic diocese in Pennsylvania has agreed to pay $2 million to a man who was sexually abused as a child by a priest who made him say confession after the assaults.
The settlement with the Diocese of Erie was announced Tuesday by the victim's attorney, Mitchell Garabedian.
The defrocked priest, David Poulson, was sentenced this year to 2 1/2 to 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to the sexual assault of one boy and attempted sexual assault of another.
Poulson is one of a handful of priests criminally charged as a result of a Pennsylvania grand jury investigation that detailed decades of abuse by 300 priests.
He was accused of abusing an altar boy more than 20 times in various rectories.
The diocese said it would not comment until later in the day.
Arkansas
6-year-old calls 911 to falsely report school shooting
CONWAY, Ark. (AP) - Police in central Arkansas say a 6-year-old child used a disconnected cellphone to call 911 and falsely report that several people had been shot at an elementary school.
The Conway Police Department says officers rushed to Marguerite Vann Elementary School after the call came in Monday afternoon from a young caller who said five people had been shot. Police say the child stayed on the phone but that the story was "continually changing."
Police say officers quickly determined that the phone call was a prank but searched the school as a precaution.
Conway police say the child's parents were home but did not realize the phone, which didn't have cell service, could still make an emergency call.
Published: Wed, Mar 27, 2019
