SHAWNEE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities have identified the man who died in an accident while walking on a Kansas highway Friday in Shawnee County.

Just after 4a.m., the Shawnee County Emergency Communications Center received a 911 call reporting that there was a man later identified as Colton L. Griggs, 21, Topeka, walking in the middle of the road on SE Hwy 40 East of K-4 Highway, according to Sgt. Scott Wanamaker.

Deputies were dispatched and while traveling to the scene, the emergency communication center received a second 911 call notifying them that a car had struck a pedestrian.

At that time, medical personnel were dispatched. When the first deputy arrived to the scene he located Griggs and found that he was deceased, according to Wanamaker.

The initial investigation of the scene indicates that Griggs was walking westbound in the middle of the highway when he was struck by the westbound 2017 Hyundai Accent driven by Kevin Dixon of Lawrence.

There is no suspicious activity believed to be involved in this accident and no signs of impairment of the driver of the vehicle, according to Wanamaker. 

Officials shut down SE Highway 40 for an extended time from the Kansas 4 Highway interchange to SE Tecumseh Road. Motorist were advised to use alternate routes of travel until the scene is cleared.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas police officer who fatally shot an unarmed man while responding to a bogus emergency call is suing over wages.

Justin Rapp alleges in the lawsuit filed Thursday that he wasn’t allowed to resume his usual jobs “in a reasonable amount of time” after fatally shooting 28-year-old Andrew Finch in December 2017. He says that caused him to lose out on $31,000 from his regular police duties in Wichita and a city-approved off-duty security job.

Rapp wasn’t charged. He said he feared Finch was reaching for a firearm when he fired, not knowing that a hoaxer had reported a fake homicide and hostage situation at Finch’s home. A lawsuit filed by Finch’s family is pending.

The city’s attorney declined to comment on Rapp’s allegations.

SEDGWICK COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a series of armed robberies and have made an arrest.

Police involved with the investigation identified 20-year-old Darren Green as a suspect involved in the robberies beginning in July on July 8, when employees at Burger King, 3500 S. Meridian, reported an unknown suspect robbed the business at gunpoint, according to officer Charley Davidson.

On August 28, an employee at Meridian Grocery, 2719 S. Meridian, reported an unknown suspect robbed the business at gunpoint. The next day, an employee at Domino’s Pizza, 2047 W. 21^st Street North, reported an unknown suspect robbed the business at gunpoint.

On October 20, employees at the Money Center inside of Walmart, 3030 N. Rock Rd., reported an unknown suspect robbed the business at gunpoint. The following day, an employee at Check into Cash, 2424 S. Seneca, reported an unknown suspect attempting to rob the business at gunpoint. Later that day, employees at Advance America, 601 N. Ridge Road, reported an unknown suspect robbed the business at gunpoint.

No injuries were reported in these incidents.

On Wednesday evening police arrested Green at his home without incident.

The investigations are ongoing, and they will be presented to the Sedgwick County District Attorney’s Office.

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A judge has denied a new trial for a Kansas home day care worker who was convicted in the death of a 9-month-old baby.

The sentencing for 44-year-old Carrody Buchhorn is now set for Nov. 18. She faces nine to 10 years in prison.

Her sentencing had been delayed while she argued that she deserved a new trial. She got new attorneys after she was convicted last year of unintentionally but recklessly causing the death of Oliver Ortiz in 2016 in Eudora.

Her new attorneys challenged the work of her trial attorneys and how they handled the testimony of the coroner, who ruled that the baby’s death was a homicide. A judge ruled last week that her trial attorneys “were not ineffective.”

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas prosecutor is retiring amid calls for her to step down after a Missouri judge overturned the double murder conviction of a man whom she helped send to prison more than two decades ago.

The Douglas County, Kansas, district attorney’s office said in a statement this week that Chief Assistant District Attorney Amy McGowan is transitioning her cases to other attorneys in preparation for her Nov. 1 retirement. The statement provided no other explanation.

McGowan didn’t immediately return a message from The Associated Press left for her through the prosecutor’s office.

McGowan had been the subject of recent protests by the KC Freedom Project after a judge found that, while working in the Jackson County, Missouri, prosecutor’s office, she failed to disclose exculpatory evidence in Ricky Kidd’s case. He was freed from prison in August after a judge found clear and convincing evidence that he was wrongfully convicted of the February 1996 deaths of George Bryant and Oscar Bridges in Kansas City, Missouri. Prosecutors subsequently decided not to retry him.

“She should be disbarred,” Kidd told The Kansas City Star’s Editorial Board in September.

McGowan also was accused of withholding evidence in the case against Richard Buchli II, a Kansas City attorney who spent about five years in prison in the 2000 death of his law partner before his conviction was overturned. Charges later were dismissed. And in 2013, the Kansas Supreme Court found McGowan made improper comments during closing arguments in five cases between 2007 and 2009. In one instance, the court vacated a sentence in a child-exploitation case.

After Kidd was freed, protesters held signs and chanted in Douglas County and in downtown Topeka in front of the state agency tasked with investigating complaints against attorneys.

Cheryl Wright Kunard, a spokesman for the Douglas County district attorney’s office, told the Lawrence Journal-World it would be inappropriate to respond to questions about whether the protests influenced McGowan’s decision to retire.

The Douglas County prosecutor’s office previously defended McGowan in a statement, saying that while she did make errors in Kidd’s case, the verdict was overturned primarily because the main witness recanted.

“False and grossly misleading rumors are being spread that Ms. McGowan was ‘found guilty,’ ‘convicted,’ and ‘disciplined,'” the statement said. “Ms. McGowan has never been convicted nor disciplined by the Missouri Court System or the Kansas Supreme Court.”

SEDGWICK COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas man on child sex charges and have made an arrest.

Just before 6p.m. Tuesday, a police officer was attempting to contact 50-year-old Larry F. Brannan at a residence in the 11600 block of E. 71st Street South in Wichita, regarding an outstanding warrant for aggravated indecent liberties with a child, according officer Charley Davidson.

The officer located Brannon and attempted to take him into custody.  Brannon resisted, battered the officer and nearly struck the officer with his vehicle.

The officer eventually arrested Brannon with the assistance of the his K9.

Brannon was treated at a local hospital for minor injuries from a dog bite and then booked into jail on requested charges of aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer, simple battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest and the outstanding Sedgwick County Warrant.

He was held on a bond of $100,000, according to online jail records and is no longer in custody.

 

 

 

KANSAS CITY– A Kansas City man pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to participating in a romance fraud scheme that bilked victims across the United States and overseas of nearly $900,000, according to the United State Attorney.

Ronayerin K. Ogolor, 50, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Nigeria, pleaded guilty before U.S. Chief District Judge Beth Phillips to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

Ogolor, who was arrested at Kansas City International Airport on Oct. 19, 2018, before he boarded a plane to Frankfurt, Germany, remains in federal custody.

By pleading guilty, Ogolor admitted that he participated in a conspiracy since 2013 that targeted people, some of them elderly, in search of companionship or romance through online websites such as Facebook, ChristianMingle.com, or Hangout.com. Ogolor defrauded his victims of $878,489 in total. Under the terms of today’s plea agreement, Ogolor must forfeit that amount in a money judgment to the government.

The perpetrators of the romance scams created several profiles on online dating sites. Conspirators then contacted men and women throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe, with whom they cultivated a sense of affection and often romance. Having established relationships with the victims, the perpetrators of the romance scams ultimately requested money for hospital fees, travel fees, “customs expenses,” “gold import taxes,” or investment opportunities. Conspirators directed the victims to wire transfer or deposit money into various bank accounts, including accounts established and maintained by Ogolor. Often after the victims transferred money into the specified accounts, conspirators claimed more money was needed, “to release the package” or “to pay customs expenses” on money or gold.

On other occasions, conspirators fraudulently obtained checks through business email compromise, and had the victims deposit the checks into their accounts and wire and deposit money into various accounts, including accounts established and maintained by Ogolor. In a business email compromise, the conspirators hack into a business email account, and then send an email from what appears to be an employee with authority to approve payments, instructing that a check be disbursed in the victim’s name and sent to the victim. By using victims to deposit the checks and distribute the money, the conspirators distanced themselves from the business email hacking and fraud.

In furtherance of the scheme, Ogolor opened several bank accounts in his name and in the names of sham businesses. The romance fraud victims wired and deposited their money and money from counterfeit or fraudulently obtained checks into Ogolor’s accounts. Soon after receiving the fraudulently obtained wires or deposits, Ogolor wired money to co-conspirators and/or withdrew the money in cash.

Court documents refer to 13 victims (in Alabama, Ohio, Washington, Arizona, Florida, Illinois, California, and Italy) who each sent tens of thousands of dollars to Ogolor. One victim (a widow in Indiana who received a friend request on Facebook) believed a co-conspirator was a widower working on an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana; she lost a total of $450,000 to Ogolor and others. Another victim in Texas, who believed a co-conspirator was a widower and U.S. Army general deployed in Afghanistan, lost at least $300,000.

Under federal statutes, Ogolor is subject to a sentence of up to 20 years 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.

WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A state oversight board has revoked the certification of a fired Wichita police recruit who admitted to battering his girlfriend.

The Kansas Commission on Peace Officers’ Standards and Training wrote in the order of revocation that Lauro Garcia III lacks “conduct that warrants the public trust.” Garcia admitted as part of a diversion agreement that he battered and screamed at his girlfriend while at bar before going home and throwing her belongings into a pond.

Garcia said in Sedgwick County District Court that he was guilty of domestic battery and criminal damage to property.

The order, dated Sept. 26, was released on Monday following a Kansas Open Records Act request.

Garcia was fired in March 2018 before he completed the training academy.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A Republican-dominated Senate committee has endorsed a plan for expanding government-funded health care for poor and working-class Kansans, despite concerns that it raises tobacco taxes and doesn’t have a work requirement for participants.

The Medicaid expansion proposal written by Kansas Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning differs significantly from an expansion plan backed by Gov. Laura Kelly and fellow Democrats.

Denning’s plan is designed not only to expand the state’s $3.8 billion-a-year Medicaid program but also to lower premiums paid by Kansas consumers who buy their insurance through an online federal marketplace set up under the 2010 federal Affordable Care Act. The goal is to keep some Kansans in private health plans, rather than having them move to Medicaid, as plans favored by Democrats would do.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reports the plan would offer health care coverage to an estimated 150,000 Kansans. It would raise tobacco and vaping taxes by $50 million and add a $31 million surcharge on hospitals and $63 million in fees for managed-care organizations serving Medicaid clients.

Denning, a Kansas City-area Republican, said tax and fee hikes are necessary to pay for expansion.

“We can’t put any more stress on the state general fund,” he said.

Denning and other top Republican senators blocked a Medicaid expansion plan favored by Kelly earlier this year, arguing that it could prove too costly to the state and that lawmakers needed to take more time to get the details right. Kelly made expanding Medicaid a key promise in her successful campaign for governor last year. At the end of the legislative session Republican leaders vowed to work on a plan to consider in 2020. Kelly also has a panel studying the question.

Medicaid covers about 342,000 low-income, elderly and disabled Kansas residents. Non-disabled adults without children don’t qualify, and adults with children must have incomes well below the poverty level to be eligible.

Thirty-six states and the District of Columbia have expanded Medicaid. Kansas is among 14 states that declined, largely because Republican leaders said it would end up costing the state despite a federal government promise to pay for most of the cost.

Democrats this week criticized Denning’s GOP plan as unnecessarily complicated.

“We need a Medicaid expansion plan that is simple, effective and sustainable for Kansas,” Kelly said in a statement. “We don’t need to create extra bureaucratic red tape, raise taxes, and create more hurdles to access to health care.”

Conservative Republican senators on the committee questioned lack of a specific provision in the bill prohibiting abortions to be paid by Medicaid, while others were concerned about insurance cost shifts from individuals to the commercial sector.

Under Denning’s plan, the state would ask Medicaid participants whether they are employed and, if they are not, what issues keep them from working, so the state can address them. But it’s not a requirement that Medicaid participants be employed or undergo job training. Some Republicans see a work requirement as crucial.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Shawnee County authorities have arrested 18 people and served 23 warrants during a domestic violence crackdown.

The sweep occurred Wednesday, as part of the 17th annual National Family Violence and Apprehension Detail. Shawnee County Sheriff Brian Hill says more than 300 law enforcement agencies from 29 states participated.

Of the 18 arrests in Shawnee County, 14 were for domestic violence suspects, clearing 18 warrants. Four other arrests were for other crimes, clearing five warrants.

HOYT, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas high school student was allowed to remain in school after he was accused of sexually assaulting a female classmate, even though he was facing charges for other sex crimes, according to a federal lawsuit.

The suit alleges that the Royal Valley School District was aware that the male student was a “known danger” and already had been charged with sex crimes in two other cases when the girl reported that she had been raped at school in November 2017. Both students attended Royal Valley High School in Hoyt, about 17 miles north of Topeka.

The suit, which was filed Tuesday in federal court by the girl’s father, says his daughter was “forced to continue walking the same hallways and be in the same classrooms as the perpetrator who raped her.” That led her to transfer to another school “because of the trauma of being raped and because Defendants permitted her assailant to remain in school” and to participate in extracurricular activities, the suit said.

The male student, identified in the suit as W.H., initially was charged with rape and aggravated sexual battery in the school case, but pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of sexual assault, the suit says. No details were released about his sentence.

Superintendent, Aaric Davis, who also is named as a defendant in the suit, said he was “not aware of the lawsuit being filed” and couldn’t discuss pending litigation.

Christopher Dove, the plaintiff’s attorney, said the school district failed to protect the student and wouldn’t provide information to her parents after she was assaulted.

“It becomes a legal matter because the school didn’t want to take care of her on the front end and even after it happened didn’t want to take steps to make her feel that it was a school she wanted to return to,” Dove said.

The suit said that for “a long period of time” before the girl was assaulted, the district knew that her attacker was “sexually assaulting and harassing multiple female students in the School District.”

The male student also was charged in March 2016 with multiple counts of sexually soliciting minors, sexual exploitation of minors and making a criminal threat of sexual assault against a minor, according to the suit. The charges stemmed from incidents that occurred during November and December 2015.

In August of 2017, according to the suit, he was charged with aggravated indecent liberties with a child.

His criminal records are filed under seal in juvenile court. The suit provided no details on how the cases were resolved.

The lawsuit claims the district violated its own policy against sexual harassment and bullying and failed to protect students when it chose not to act against W.H. before or after the November 2017 assault.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — A survey of the state of Kansas’ 8,000 executive branch employees shows that the biggest concern for most of them is low pay and poor benefits.

While 65% of respondents from 14 Cabinet agencies are satisfied with their jobs, three in five cite low pay and benefits as their most significant workplace concern.

The Kansas Department of Administration released findings Wednesday of the anonymous, voluntary survey. It was conducted in June at the urging of Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly.

The department said 54% of employees from the Cabinet agencies responded.

“We know the past several years have been difficult for our public employees,” Kelly said. “Their well-being and satisfaction dramatically affect the efficiency and effectiveness of the services Kansans receive. Better working conditions for public employees lead to a better government for the citizens of Kansas.”

Of the survey respondents, 60% said they weren’t reasonably compensated, while 24% cited training, technology and equipment inadequacies as their top concern.

The Department of Administration said eight in 10 employees were convinced their work advanced their employer’s mission and agreed their supervisors valued input from staff.

Agency managers and supervisors dealt ineffectively with poor job performance, according to 40% of respondents. Also, 13% said they didn’t feel physically or emotionally safe at work.

Lawmakers this year approved a bill signed by Kelly to provide state employees with a 2.5% pay raise. Health insurance plan premiums for state workers were lowered in 2019 by 6%. That followed increases of more than 30% from 2016 to 2018.

DeAngela Burns-Wallace, secretary of the Department of Administration, recently told legislators that low salaries of information technology employees complicated hiring efforts.

“You can see on-the-ground results when the employees of the state are adequately compensated and treated as professionals,” she said.

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SALINE COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a Kansas man on theft and traffic violations after a brief chase and crash.

Just before 12:30a.m. Thursday, police were called to the parking lot behind Big Nose Kate’s in the 100 block of North Seventh Street in Salina, for the report of a person who appeared to be intoxicated driving a white pickup in circles in the parking lot, according to captain Paul Forrester.

Upon arrival, the officer recognized that the 2006 white Chevrolet Colorado traveled in circles was one that had been reported stolen from Lindsborg on Wednesday.

As the officer approached the pickup, it left the parking lot and headed south on Seventh Street with the officer in pursuit, according to Forrester.

The pickup ran the stop sign at the intersection of Seventh Street and Iron Avenue, and continued south until turning east onto West Walnut Street where it struck the curb and a tree as it drove up onto the sidewalk, flattening the passenger-side tires.

The pickup then made a u-turn in a parking lot, and as it was heading out of the parking lot to West Walnut Street, it struck and became stuck on a light pole.

Officers found numerous open containers of alcohol inside the pickup, according to Forrester.

They arrested the driver identified as Matthew Mickey, 40, Lindsborg, on requested charges that include, Felony flee and elude, possession of stolen property, Reckless driving, Driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, Operating a motor vehicle without a license, Transporting an open container, Failure to stop at a stop sign and other traffic violation, according to Forrester.

The pickup, valued at $4,000, was towed back to Lindsborg.