KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — A former Kansas man has been convicted in Missouri for his role in a $2.7 million mortgage fraud scheme.

The U.S. Attorney’s office says a federal jury in Kansas City took about 90 minutes Friday to find 48-year-old Terrence Matthew Brown guilty of conspiracy and wire fraud. Brown is a former Wichita resident now living in Round Rock, Texas.

Prosecutors said Brown took part in 2006 in a conspiracy that defrauded mortgage lenders in 10 separate loans for five properties. The loans totaling $2.7 million were used to buy properties in western Missouri and the northeast Kansas communities of Leawood and Overland Park.

Evidence showed Brown lied to lenders about his income and other information. He also received more than $200,000 in kickbacks from the scheme.

All of the properties were later foreclosed.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A new government report shows the number of Kansas farms is shrinking while those that remain are getting larger.

The Agriculture Department on Friday released its final 2012 Census of Agriculture showing Kansas had 61,773 farms that year, down 6 percent from the 2007 census.

Kansas land in farms was unchanged at 46.1 million acres. But the size of the average Kansas farm grew 6 percent over the five-year period to 747 acres, an increase of about 40 acres.

The report also said Kansas farmers are getting older, with principal operators averaging 58.2 years old in 2012. That compares with an average age of 57.7 five years earlier.

The 2012 market value of production was up 28 percent from 2007, at $18.5 billion.

 

ROXANA HEGEMAN, Associated Press

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — Heat and dry weather forecast for Kansas this weekend are expected to strain a winter wheat crop already battered by drought conditions and early spring freezes.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas senators have approved a budget that completes spending for state agencies for 2015, including bonuses for state workers and funds to shrink a waiting list of disabled people needing health services.

The Senate’s 22-18 vote Friday sends the bill to the House, which was to vote later in the day.

The bill also includes more than $360 million for the Department of Corrections for the fiscal year starting July 1.

It’s the last major spending bill standing between legislators and adjournment of the 2014 session.

 

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TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas legislators are preparing to take final action on a budget bill that includes salary raises for state workers and funds to shrink a waiting list of disabled people needing health services.

The Senate is scheduled to vote Friday morning on the bill, which also includes more than $360 million for the Department of Corrections for the fiscal year starting July 1.

Senate passage would send the bill to the House. It’s the last major spending bill standing between legislators and adjournment of the 2014 session.

Negotiators finished the bill Thursday, shaking off the previous day’s report that Kansas collected $92 million less in taxes than expected in April. Republicans blamed changes in the federal tax code.

 

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Nebraska Supreme Court has affirmed that two farming brothers should not have been found negligent in a 2007 fatal crash where tall corn created a blind intersection.

The crash occurred on Oct. 6, 2007, in Saunders County, when two pickups collided at an intersection where the view was obstructed by 7-foot-tall corn planted only feet from the road. The crash killed one passenger and left another, Thomas Latzel, a quadriplegic who died from his injuries three years later.

Latzel’s wife, Amanda, sued the truck drivers and the farmers who planted the corn. But a Saunders County District Court judge granted a motion to dismiss the farmers — Ronald and Doug Bartek — from the lawsuit, saying the fault was with the truck drivers for entering a blind intersection.

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — A lawyer for New Hampshire’s Exeter Hospital says more than two-thirds of the patients who sued after a traveling medical technician infected them with hepatitis C have settled their cases.

 

Attorney William Dailey said 10 lawsuits that remain from the original 33 are scheduled for mediation in the next few months. Any that don’t get resolved through mediation would go to trial next year.

The lawsuits seek to hold the hospital accountable for its management of David Kwiatkowski, who is serving 39 years in prison for stealing painkillers and replacing them with saline-filled syringes tainted with his blood.

Forty-six of his former patients in four states have been diagnosed with the same strain of the hepatitis C virus he carries, most of them in New Hampshire.

Kwiatkowski worked in the Hays Medical Center cardiac catheterization laboratory from May to September 2010.

Salina Post

SALINA — A traffic stop late Wednesday night has helped Salina Police clear several recently burglaries, including an April 14 burglary where 118 guns were taken a Salina sporting goods store.

Salina Police Capt. Mike Sweeney said Gregory Walburn, 27, and Mathew Hewitt, 32, both of Salina, likely will face federal charges in connection with the theft of the guns. Sweeney anticipates more arrest in connection with the case.

Walburn was taken into custody following the traffic stop Wednesday night on outstanding municipal and district court warrants, and Hewitt was arrested Thursday evening before a search warrant was executed at his apartment,  where 68 of the guns stolen from Cleve’s Marine reportedly were recovered. A total of 73 guns have been recovered.

Also reportedly found in Hewitt’s apartment were items taken in recent burglaries at Prairieland Market, Uptown Hair Salon, Jack Parr Associates and a home burglary.

Sweeney said the investigation continues.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The Kansas House is blocking debate on a new proposal for ending a mandate that utilities rely on wind and other renewable resources to generate some of their electricity.

House members Friday voted 63-60 against allowing both chambers to consider the measure drafted by House and Senate negotiators.

Supporters said they might try again.

The measure would repeal a requirement for utilities to have renewable resources cover 20 percent of their peak generating capacities by 2020.

Renewable resources still would have to cover 15 percent of utilities’ generating capacities, but that requirement would disappear in 2020.

Environmentalists are fighting the proposal. It has the backing of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce and the conservative group Americans for Prosperity, who contend that the mandate raises electric rates.