HUTCHINSON – A Kansas man arrested in Reno County on four felony charges including burglary of a vehicle and felony flee and elude entered guilty pleas to those two charges on Friday.

Judge Tim Chambers then sentenced Gilford Sherley Jr., 51, Maize, to 1-year and three months in jail.

In addition to the burglary and flee and elude crimes, Sherley was also charged with interference with law enforcement and criminal possession of a firearm. The state dropped those charges as part of a plea agreement.

On Jan. 16, 2012, a Reno County Sheriff deputy was dispatched to Arlington and Victory Roads in Reno County for the report of an auto burglary.

Two men had entered the vehicle and taken a shotgun. They then left northbound on Victory Road in a blue and gray suburban.

A Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper had located a vehicle that matched the suspect vehicle and tried to stop it.

The vehicle fled from the trooper and entering a field. The chase continued into Sedgwick County and ended in the area of 37th Street North and Maize Road, in the city of Maize.

The two occupants then fled on foot and were later found hiding nearby.

Sherley was driving the vehicle and Donald Cook was the passenger.
Cook was sentenced for this case and is currently serving time on these charges and for others in Sedgwick County.

Sherley also has convictions for robbery, kidnapping and drugs in Wyandotte County.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Insurance providers have asked Kansas lawmakers to approve a measure that would allow them to offer health plans requiring customers to only use the insurers’ network.

The plans are called Exclusive Provider Organization, or EPOs. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports  the current legislation would also mandate referrals from primary care physicians before covering specialty care.

Aetna, UnitedHealth Group and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas City have supported the proposal, which they say would help keep down the cost of insurance.

Rep. Willie Dove, R-Bonner Springs, has expressed concern, saying the proposal could limit customer choice.

The Kansas legislation remains in the House Insurance and Financial Institutions Committee.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A 29-year-old man has been convicted of fatally shooting his girlfriend in the parking lot of a home improvement store in Kansas City, Kansas.

The Wyandotte County prosecutor’s office announced Friday that George Lingenfelser, of Bonner Springs, was found guilty of second degree murder in the December 2014 killing of 29-year-old Janet Billings.

Lingenfelser was originally charged with first-degree murder for shooting Billings in the parking lot of a Lowe’s Home Improvement store. Other customers were present at the time of the shooting.

Sentencing is set for March 3.

GEARY COUNTY- Drug and alcohol related charges against 25 Fort Riley soldiers have been dropped.

The city attorney had dismissed all the charges, according to Grandview Plaza Police Chief Shawn Serrano.

The arrests involved 27 people at a loud party on Cannon View Lane on January 8.

The individuals were arrested on different charges ranging from misdemeanor Possession of Marijuana to Criminal Use of a Weapon, Hosting Minors Consuming Alcohol, and Unlawful Noise.

Twenty-one of those arrested were listed as Fort Riley residents, two from Grandview Plaza, and four from Junction City.

A check with authorities revealed when police responded to the scene there was an alleged lack of cooperation from those attending the party, and marijuana was in plain view on a table.
All of those in the general location of the marijuana were arrested. A small number of people at the party who were not in that immediate vicinity were not arrested.

By Megan Hart

Larned State Hospital could run out of room in its unit to treat sexual predators as early as next year, which may force the state to treat some offenders in community settings or set up a separate secured facility, according to a report from Legislative Post Audit.

The Larned program treats offenders who have completed their prison sentences but were involuntarily committed because a judge or jury found they were “sexually violent predators.”

The label applies to offenders who have a “mental abnormality or personality disorder” that makes it likely they will engage in sexual violence again if not treated.

As of December 2014, the sexually violent predator program was 92 percent full, and the number of offenders is expected to keep growing.

If current trends continue, the program likely will exceed its capacity between 2017 and 2020, senior auditor Lynn Retz told the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee on Tuesday afternoon.

“Unless changes are made, the sexual predator treatment program would exceed capacity in the next few years,” she said. “Far more offenders are committed to the program each year than are released.”

The Post Audit report also estimated costs would more than double by 2025 and that Larned would struggle to find enough staff for the program, mostly due to a lack of available labor in the rural area around it, Retz said. –

Treating low-risk offenders in a community setting would reduce the population of the Larned unit by 12 percent by 2025 and cut costs by $7.5 million to $8 million, Retz said.

On the other hand, it could raise the risk of an offender committing another crime, according to the audit. New York pursued a community-based program for lower-risk offenders, including regular visits from parole officers, GPS tracking, curfews and polygraph testing, according to the audit. Of the 152 who had been treated in community settings between 2007 and 2013, three have been charged with another sex crime, for a roughly 2 percent recidivism rate.

Concerns about community settings

Some committee members expressed disbelief that sexually violent predators could be treated in community settings.

“With that population, I think really the only low risk is those that are too old to be a threat to anyone else,” said Sen. Mitch Holmes, a Republican from St. John. Another option would be to separate “medically infirm” residents from the rest of the offender population, Retz said.

That would reduce the population in the program at Larned by 15 percent but would have little effect on costs, because any savings would be wiped out by the need to build and staff a new secured facility, she said.

Sen. Laura Kelly, a Democrat from Topeka, suggested the state could consolidate its veterans’ homes in Dodge City and Winfield into one facility and renovate the other for use as a facility for geriatric sexually violent predators.

Legislative Post Audit didn’t have a cost estimate for that idea. A third option would treat sexually violent predators with intellectual or developmental disabilities in a separate facility.

That would decrease the offender population by 13 percent to 16 percent but would increase costs by $6.5 million to $8 million, according to the audit. It might increase the number of offenders completing the program, however, Retz said. “This would likely be more beneficial to those residents, as they did not appear to progress through treatment,” she said.

Three other options weren’t found to be likely to reduce the offender population, and didn’t affect costs substantially or actually increased them.

The audit also found problems at Larned with understaffing, improper documentation and a program that didn’t appear to meet offenders’ treatment needs. The program has authorization for 359 staff positions, but the vacancy rate for nurses and mental health technicians was 38 percent as of February.

That has resulted in significant overtime expenses, and the audit said the state may want to consider building a second unit somewhere else if officials decide to pursue one.

“We noted the remote location of the program, the limited pool of applicants and undesirable working conditions all likely contributed to staffing shortages,” the audit said. Larned is one of two state-run inpatient treatment facilities for Kansans with severe and persistent mental illness. The other is in Osawatomie.

Problems with documentation

Kansas’ treatment program isn’t individualized, Retz said, and doesn’t use a risk assessment tool to determine which offenders represent a greater risk to the general population or what treatment each should receive.

The audit found that, in some cases, offenders who had completed the clinical requirements for their phase weren’t able to move on because they hadn’t spent enough time on recreational activities like walking or reading, meaning they would have to wait three months and reapply.

“Kansas placed a greater emphasis on nonclinical requirements to progress to the next stage than other states we looked at,” Retz said. Most offenders are in phase two or three of the seven-phase program, although the average offender had been in the program for eight years, Retz said.

Only three offenders have completed all seven phases since 1994, 13 have been released by courts on technicalities and 28 have died without completing their treatment.

The audit also found offenders who completed the first five phases of the treatment plan often still lacked skills to find a job or even shop and cook for themselves. The program also had problems with documentation, to the point that it wasn’t clear if offenders actually had completed a stage or received required therapies.

The Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services, later renamed as the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services, also failed to file annual reports to the Legislature from 2010 to 2014. “Staff could only estimate for us the frequency of resident participation,” Retz said.

The Post Audit report recommended that KDADS start using tools to determine the risk that an offender will commit another crime and how best to treat each offender. It also recommended that the agency regularly evaluate offenders’ progress and needs.

Tim Keck, interim secretary of KDADS, told the committee later Tuesday afternoon that the agency had made “significant” progress on addressing the audit’s recommendations since it first was released in April.

For example, 95 percent of offenders in the Larned program now have individualized treatment plans, he said. “We hope to have that at 100 percent soon,” he said.

The Larned program met most legal requirements related to patient rights, according to the audit, but may have run afoul of the statute mandating appropriate services because it didn’t offer some educational services, like GED classes or treatments for drug or alcohol addiction.

A law passed last year struck those requirements. The committee didn’t issue any recommendations on implementing the audit’s findings.

 Megan Hart is a reporter for KHI News Service in Topeka, a partner in the Heartland Health Monitor team. You can reach her on Twitter @meganhartMC

MARSHALL COUNTY- Two people were injured in an accident just before 9:30p.m. on Friday in Marshall County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2014 Polaris ATV driven by Jacob T. Belcher, 29, Blue Rapids, was northbound on 11th road seven miles southeast of Blue Rapids.

The vehicle struck another ATV driven by April C. Orr, 37, Blue Rapids, that overturned and both vehicles came to rest in the west ditch.

Orr was transported to Via Christi in Manhattan.

A passenger on her ATV Jeffrey A. Martin, 26, Glencoe, MO., was transported to the hospital in Marysville.

Belcher and a passenger on his ATV Abby L. Rottinghaus, 27 Axtell, were not injured.

WASHINGTON, D.C.– In a recent interview, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter admitted that any move to transfer prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay naval base detention center to America, and potentially to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas would be strictly illegal. Congresswoman Lynn Jenkins (KS-02) released the following statement in response:

“Once more, yet another top aide to President Obama has let slip that the administration knows transferring Guantanamo Bay detainees to the United States is illegal.

Given that this has been true since 2009, when a Democrat-controlled Congress first inserted language I helped draft into an appropriations bill prohibiting any transfer, it seems this realization has been a long time coming. While the President has taken the “go it alone” approach far too often, it is reassuring that he has acknowledged in this situation it would be illegal for him to do so.

My first bill I authored in Congress was to stop President Obama from fulfilling his campaign promise and I can assure you that I will work tirelessly to ensure this Congress will reject any plan by the President to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center that could lead to detainees at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

MANHATTAN- A Kansas man was sentenced to over 12-years in prison for attempted 1st degree murder and battery.

Samuel Dartez, 31, Manhattan will also have to register as a violent offender, and is to pay a restitution of $25,000 to the victim.

Dartez was arrested on November 13, 2014, after the Riley County Police Department received a 911 call in reference to a stabbing at the Manhattan Public Library.

Officers responded and found a 27-year-old woman, the mother of his children, with multiple puncture wounds to her neck and face. She was transported by EMS to a local hospital for treatment.
The same day, Dartez was stopped by authorities in Morris County and arrested following a standoff with law enforcement.

During Friday’s sentencing, Dartez showed remorse.

“I don’t know (what to say)….I committed a crime, worst of my life, and I don’t feel sorry because I was arrested but because it shouldn’t have happened,” he said

“I’m sorry for what I did and what happened. It’s my fault what happened.”

FORT RILEY, Kan. – A 1st Infantry Division Soldier with the 1st Battalion, 7th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, died Thursday, Jan. 28, in Al Asad Airbase, Iraq, of non-combat-related injuries.

The Soldier is identified as Sgt. Joseph F. Stifter, age 30, of Glendale,
California. He was a field artillery cannon crewmember.

“Sgt. Stifter was an exceptional Soldier and leader in our battalion,” said Col. Miles Brown, commander of the 2nd ABCT. “We are deeply saddened by the loss of a member of the ‘Dagger’ family. The thoughts and prayers of the entire Dagger brigade go to his family and friends during this difficult time. His memory will forever remain with those who served with him.”

Stifter joined the Army in May 2011. He arrived at Fort Riley in January 2012 and deployed with his unit in October to Iraq in support of Operation Inherent Resolve.

Stifter’s awards and decorations include three Army Commendation Medals, the Army Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Medal and the Combat Action Badge.

Stifter is survived by his wife, daughter, mother and father.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A man has been convicted of abducting an 8-year-old girl from her Topeka home, then drugging and raping her before she managed to free herself.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that 29-year-old Jeremy James Lindsey was found guilty Friday of 10 counts.

Witnesses testified that the girl vanished for about six hours in September 2014 before freeing herself from the telephone cords that bound her. She fled from the abandoned home where she was raped and sought help.

While she was missing, about 50 people had searched for her, some on four-wheelers.

A defense attorney questioned the victim’s testimony.

A woman is awaiting trial in the case. She’s accused of picking up Lindsey and the girl from a wooded area and dropping them off at the abandoned house.

BUTLER COUNTY – A Kansas man was injured in an accident just after 4 p.m. on Friday in Butler County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2012 Volkswagen Jetta driven by Douglas Goodwin, 52, Augusta, was traveling on Santa Fe Lake Road three miles west of Augusta.

The driver attempted to pass a 2007 Jeep Wrangler driven by Jeffery Arnn, 37, Augusta, as he was making a left hand turn onto Southwest 110th.

The Jetta struck the Jeep, traveled into the went into west ditch and rolled.

Goodwin was transported to Wesley Medical Center.
Arnn was not injured.

Goodwin was not wearing a seat belt, according to the KHP.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — President Barack Obama has nominated a Lawrence attorney to serve on the federal bench in Kansas.

The president announced Thursday that his choice of Terrence J. Campbell for the U.S. District Court. He would succeed U.S. District Judge Kathryn Vratil, who in 2014 took senior status, a form of semi-retirement.

He must still be confirmed by the Senate.

Campbell practices civil and criminal litigation at the law firm of Barber Emerson, L.C., a Lawrence firm he joined in 1999. His resume includes stints as a traffic judge pro tem for the District Court of Douglas County and as an adjunct professor teaching contracts at the University of Kansas School of Law. He began his legal career as a law clerk to U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum from 1997 to 1999.