SHAWNEE, Kan. (AP) — Eastern Kansas police have arrested a 48-year-old man they suspect of poisoning a neighbor’s dog twice.

According to Jonson County District Court records, the poisoning incidents occurred in December and earlier this month. The dog is a 3-year-old shepherd-pointer mix named Ginger and survived after receiving emergency veterinary care.

Shawnee police arrested the man Thursday on a warrant, and he faces animal cruelty charges. He has been released from custody after posting a $25,000 bond.

His next court appearance has been set for March 25.

MILWAUKEE (AP) — A Milwaukee-based motorcycle manufacturer has announced 169 workers will be laid off at its plant in Missouri.

Harley-Davidson Inc. says the layoffs are effective May 11 at the Kansas City, Missouri, plant and are expected to continue through September. The company says the layoffs reflect production needs, the outsourcing of work performed at the off-site Materials Velocity Center some related sub-assembly work.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports about 750 people are employed at Harley’s Kansas City plant, where Dyna, Street and V-Rod motorcycles are manufactured.

The company says no layoffs are planned for its Wisconsin plants or its operation in York, Pennsylvania.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas legislative committee has broached the idea of reversing part of a big break for business owners and farmers to help close a budget shortfall.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports (https://bit.ly/1x0eK5N ) that the Senate Assessment and Taxation Committee had a hearing Thursday on a bill to revive the state’s tax on passive business income, including income from rental property.

The measure would raise $65 million for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Legislators must close a projected shortfall of nearly $600 million in the budget for the next fiscal year.

Lawmakers cut personal income taxes in 2012 and 2013 to stimulate the economy. One policy exempted 281,000 business owners and 53,000 farmers.

Some lawmakers now argue that the policy went further than intended.

But business groups criticized the bill.

Hutch Post

HUTCHINSON. — A coach for Trinity Catholic School in Hutchinson is jailed on a $150,000 bond faces Jessica’s Law charges.

Reno County District Attorney Keith Schroeder says he plans to file formal charges against Patrick Kent Blevins for aggravated criminal sodomy and four counts of aggravated indecent liberties with a child.

The arrest and pending charges stem from two incidents involving a child under the age of 14.

Schroeder wouldn’t specify the exact age of the child or even the sex of the child at this point because the child apparently attends Trinity. He says one of the incidents happened last summer and the second in January of this year. These will be Jessica’s Law charges because of the child being 14 or under. That means if convicted,

Blevins could be looking at multiple life sentences.
Schroeder wanted to stress with us that neither incident occurred at the school or during any school activity.

Blevins should make a first appearance on the charges Friday morning and Schroeder may have the formal complaint ready at that time.
Schroeder says Blevins has been suspended from being involved at the school because of this incident. He said he worked with the Junior High girls basketball team.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas lawmakers are considering a proposal to replace the Teacher of the Year program with a cash awards system.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that the proposal establishes the Kansas Legislature Award for Teaching Excellence Program, which would dole out thousands of dollars to chosen teachers, and prohibits the Kansas Department of Education from running any similar awards program.

Teacher of the Year winners are currently selected by a large committee composed of educators, administrators, boards of education, parents and other education organization representatives. Winners receive a $4,000 prize and can earn up to nine free credit hours a year from several Kansas colleges and universities.

The proposed replacement would see winners selected by 13-member committee comprised of three administrators, a superintendent, four business representatives chosen by House and Senate leaders, four members of the legislature and a previous winner.

One outstanding teacher would receive $20,000. Four finalists would get $15,000 and at least 10 semifinalists would receive $10,000 each.

According to Budget Director Shawn Sullivan, the program would cost the state about $340,000 per year.

STEPHEN OHLEMACHER, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal investigator says fake IRS agents have targeted more than 366,000 people with harassing phone calls demanding payments and threatening jail time as part of a huge nationwide scam.

A deputy inspector general for the agency says more than 3,000 people have fallen for the ruse since October 2013. He says they have been duped out of a total of $15.5 million.

In testimony before Congress Thursday, Timothy Camus said it is the largest scam of its kind in the history of the agency. Camus said people in every state have been targeted.

He said two people in Florida have been arrested. They were accused of being part of a scam that involved people in call centers in India contacting U.S. taxpayer

By DAN MARGOLIES
A federal judge has thrown out Centene Corp.’s abuse-of-process claim against a former employee who alleged she was fired after complaining about the managed care company’s business practices.

Centene is the parent company of Sunflower State Health Plan Inc., one of three for-profit companies managing KanCare, Kansas’ privatized version of Medicaid.

The employee, former Sunflower executive Jacqueline Leary, filed a federal whistleblower lawsuit against Centene and Sunflower in October, alleging Sunflower had ordered employees to shift KanCare members away from high-cost health care providers. Leary called the practice unethical and possibly illegal.

Centene and Sunflower fired back in a counterclaim two months later, contending Leary had demanded a $3 million payment in return for not reporting the companies to the Kansas attorney general’s Medicaid fraud unit.

Calling her allegations “spurious,” Centene and Sunflower alleged Leary was trying to extort them.

In dismissing the abuse-of-process claim, U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum on Tuesday ruled that even if Leary’s lawsuit was filed to extort or harass the defendants, “the mere filing or maintenance of a lawsuit, even for an improper purpose, is not a proper basis for an abuse of process action; abuse of process contemplates some overt act done in addition to the initiating of the suit.”

Lungstrum, however, declined to throw out Centene’s and Sunflower’s additional counterclaim against Leary for defamation. That was based on the companies’ contention that Leary, after her termination, told an executive at a Topeka hospital that Centene and Sunflower had directed her to do “something inappropriate” and that she was fired after she contacted their compliance department.

Lungstrum ruled that dismissal of the defamation claim was not proper because it and Leary’s whistleblower claim arose out of the same set of facts and the evidence underlying both will overlap.

Attorneys for Leary and for Centene and Sunflower could not immediately be reached for comment.

Leary was vice president of contracting and network development for Sunflower before she was terminated in January 2014. Her central allegation is that Sunflower, motivated by financial losses, ordered her to steer Sunflower members away from health care providers that had contracted to be reimbursed at rates higher than 100 percent of standard Kansas Medicaid rates.

Sunflower maintains that Leary was fired for poor job performance. It notes that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration investigated her claims and concluded she was not fired in retaliation for expressing concerns about Sunflower’s business practices.

Kansas’ $3 billion KanCare program put private companies in charge of managing the state’s Medicaid program. The program was launched by Gov. Sam Brownback in early 2013 and moved nearly all of the state’s Medicaid enrollees into health plans run by Sunflower and two other managed care organizations, Amerigroup and UnitedHealthcare.

Dan Margolies, editor of the Heartland Health Monitor, a news collaboration focusing on health issues and their impact in Missouri and Kansas.