HUTCHINSON— Country star Luke Bryan’s Friday night concert that was to be held in a farm field near Douglass has been moved to the Kansas State Fairgrounds in Hutchinson.

Luke Bryan Farm Tour organizers reached out to fair officials Thursday after the Douglass venue received several inches of rain. The relocated concert will take place in the fair’s Parking Lot C, just east on Plum Street.

Cole Swindell, Mitchell Tenpenny and DJ Rock are all scheduled to perform.

“It’s unfortunate the rain is forcing a location change from Douglass, but we are glad we can help accommodate Luke and his fans at the Kansas State Fairgrounds,” fair General Manager Robin Jennison said.

On Friday, the fair’s parking areas will open at 2 p.m., gates to the concert area open at 5 p.m. and the concert is scheduled to start at 6 p.m.

The fair is working with the City of Hutchinson and the Hutchinson Convention and Visitors Bureau to handle the event.

This is Bryan’s 11th consecutive Farm Tour, which this year was scheduled for six farms between Sept. 6 to Oct. 5. The idea behind the tour is to bring full production concerts to small towns.

Bryan’s hits include “Country Girl (Shake It For Me),” “Drunk on You” and “Rain is a Good Thing.”

For those attending the concert, the following advice should be noted:

All vehicles should park in Lots A and B — with limited parking in Lot C.
All concert traffic will follow the instructions of the traffic attendants on-site.
All motor vehicle traffic not attending the concert is urged to avoid the eastern end of the fairgrounds. Plum Street from the south end of the fairgrounds to 23rd Avenue will be closed at noon Friday.
Tickets can still be purchased at www.lukebryan.com/farmtour. Tickets will be available on-site beginning at 2 p.m. For information on local accommodations, call 800-691-4262, email [email protected] or visit www.visithutch.com.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – A Missouri, man pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to transporting a Kansas minor across state lines to engage in criminal sexual activity, according to the United State’s Attorney.

Nathan Roger Belcher, 29, Carl Junction, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge David P. Rush to one count of transporting a minor across state lines with the intent to engage in criminal sexual activity. Belcher remains in federal custody until his sentencing hearing, which has not yet been scheduled.

By pleading guilty today, Belcher admitted that he transported a child victim, identified in court documents as “Jane Doe 1” with a date of birth in 2003, from Kansas across the state line into Missouri. They engaged in criminal sexual activity on two occasions, once at a residence in Missouri and once near a creek outside Neosho, Missouri, in 2017.

Under federal statutes, Belcher is subject to a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in federal prison without parole, up to a sentence of life in federal prison without parole. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendant will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.

This case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Ami Harshad Miller. It was investigated by the FBI, the Columbus, Kan., Police Department, and the Cherokee County, Kan., Sheriff’s Department.

NEOSHO, Mo. (AP) — An $8,000 reward is being offered for information in the case of a pet beagle that was skinned alive in southwest Missouri.

Neosho police Lt. Jason Baird says the dog’s entire backside was removed from its neck to its tail and down to the top of its legs. He says a subdivision resident reported seeing the injured animal emerge from a wooded area Sept. 23. Baird says the beagle was in obvious pain when officers caught it, and the decision was made to put it down.

Baird says the dog was left inside a home while its owner was out of town and may have gotten out through an unsecured door.

The community has contributed $3,000 to the reward, and the Humane Society of the United States announced Thursday that it’s chipping in $5,000.

WICHITA, KAN. – A retired city clerk of Caney, Kan., pleaded guilty Thursday to embezzling city funds, according to U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister.

Carole Sue Coker, 70, Oronogo, Mo., pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud. Coker, who served as city clerk for about 40 years, admitted she took money from payments made to the city in the form of cash and checks.

In some cases, she did not deposit cash payments from customers into the city’s accounts. In other cases, she deposited only a portion of payments made in the form of checks.

In her plea agreement, Coker agreed to pay more than $150,000 in restitution.

Sentencing is set for Dec. 19. She faces a penalty of up to 20 years in federal prison.

WYANDOTTE COUNTY — The Kansas Highway Patrol is investigating a Saturday fatal hit and run accident and have identified the victim.

Just after midnight September 28, Angela M. Riley, 35, Topeka was walking on Interstate 35 at 7th Street in the #4 lane when she was struck by an unknown vehicle.  She was pronounced dead at the scene.

Authorities are still asking the public for information in the case.

By BRIAN GRIMMETT
Kansas News Service

When it comes to electric scooters, it seems that people either love them, or want to see them all thrown into a river — literally.

On Monday, Dusty Lehman of Wichita posted a video to Facebook showing he discovered seven scooters in the Arkansas River. In the same Facebook post, Lehman wrote that he found at least 14 scooters on that particular bike ride.

Dockless electric scooters landed in Wichita in June. The resulting vandalism, based on what’s happened in other cities, appears entirely predictable. Driven partly by resentment of motorized devices that complicate road traffic or clog sidewalks, they’ve been targeted in almost any city where they’re deployed.

Last year, officials pulled more than 60 scooters out of Lake Merritt near Oakland, California, in one month. And earlier this year, rescue divers doing training in the Willamette River near Portland, Oregon, pulled out 57.

“We advise those people not to park scooters in the river,” Sgt. Brandon White from the Multnomah County Sheriff’s office told the Oregonian.

The phenomenon is so widespread it’s spawned websites and Instagram accounts dedicated entirely to documenting scooter abuse.

Wichita city officials have said scooter companies bear the responsibility of retrieving scooters from the river.

Left in the water, the electronics and batteries in a scooter can leak toxic chemicals into the river.

But scooter companies typically can salvage their gizmos even after they’ve been dunked.

Between the app used to unlock and use the scooters and the onboard instruments such as GPS, the scooters collect quite a bit of data. It’s pretty easy for companies to see where the scooters are at all times, including if they end up in large bodies of water.

VeoRide and Spin, the two companies with scooters in Wichita, would not comment on how many scooters they’ve lost in the Arkansas River.

“We think that the systems that both of them have in place and both of the reactiveness of the groups themselves,” said Wichita Transit Director Mike Tann.

“It will be a problem that will be short-lived from the standpoint of getting people held accountable for it.”

Wichita city officials said they collect data on the whereabouts and traffic patterns of the scooters under a trial program that lets the companies operate for a year. Tann said he’s now interested in getting information about how many get destroyed.

The companies say they’re working to keep their scooters out of the river.

“We … work closely with the community and local authorities to prevent these acts from happening in the first place,” Spin officials said in an email.

Part of the solution may be geo-fencing — programming that shuts down the scooters when they reach boundaries governed by satellite navigation. The companies also shift where scooters are staged each night based on usage patterns and if they discover areas where damage is more likely to happen.

But Tann, Wichita’s transit director, said this weekend’s discovery is the first time he’s heard about large-scale scooter vandalism in Wichita. He suspects it won’t be a frequent problem.

“Obviously,” he said, “there was somebody trying to make a statement.”

Brian Grimmett reports on the environment, energy and natural resources the Kansas News Service. You can follow him on Twitter @briangrimmett or email him at [email protected].