A Kansas military school is again asking a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit by families of 11 former cadets alleging physical abuse.

Lawyers for St. John’s Military School in Salina filed a motion Wednesday seeking dismissal of the lawsuit or an order putting the dispute into arbitration.

The move is largely procedural since U.S. District Judge John Lungstrum denied a similar motion in June. The school says it renewed the request because four new cadets have since been added to the case and it wanted to preserve all legal issues for a potential appeal.

St. John’s has denied allegations that higher-ranking students were encouraged to discipline younger cadets, leading to abuse.

A 4-foot alligator that caused some concern while wandering through a small southern Kansas town is in police custody.

Police in Caldwell caught the alligator Wednesday evening at a hardware store.

The animal was seen wandering on main street earlier in the day. Because it escaped from a home about a block from an elementary school, students at the school were kept inside for recess. No one was injured.

It was not immediately clear what would happen to the alligator now.

Caldwell is about 60 miles southwest of Wichita.

The man suspected of opening fire in a Colorado movie theater had applied to the University of Kansas graduate school but withdrew his application before the school decided whether to admit him.

The university released James Eagan Holmes’ application on Wednesday in response to open records requests filed by The Associated Press and other news outlets.

Holmes applied to neuroscience programs at a half-dozen graduate schools and ended up at the University of Colorado, Denver. He withdrew at the end of his first year, about six weeks before the shootings.

Many parts of Holmes’ application to Kansas appear to be similar to his applications released by other schools.

The July 20 shootings killed 12 and wounded 58. Holmes is charged with murder and attempted murder. He hasn’t entered a plea.

A major theft at a Kansas farm has authorities wondering just how to track down some stolen livestock. After all, says Franklin County Sheriff Jeffry Curry, chickens aren’t tagged or branded.

One-hundred chickens were taken over the weekend from a farm in a rural part of the county. The thief or thieves also took a $1,000 mower and a four-wheel ATV.

Curry estimates the chickens’ value at $600.

The farm is owned by Bo Tran, who lives about 40 miles away in the Kansas City suburb of Leawood and works the property on weekends.

Since the chickens aren’t marked, the sheriff says he’s not sure how they’ll be identified. But he says detectives will do what they can to figure out who stole them.

A Wichita police officer is on administrative leave after firing at a man who appeared to aim a weapon at him.

No one was injured in the shooting overnight Tuesday.

Police say the officer was working on paperwork in a parking lot when he saw someone looking around the corner of a nearby building. The man went away and returned a few minutes later.

Police say the officer got out of the car and began firing after it appeared that the man aimed a rifle at him. The man ran away and police say it’s not clear if he was hit by any of the officer’s shots.

No one has been arrested.

A committee overseeing state employee pay is recommending about $11.4 million in raises for underpaid state workers, with corrections officers at Kansas prisons among the groups benefiting most.

The Joint Committee on Employee Pay Plan Oversight on Tuesday recommended 7.5 percent raises for more than a thousand corrections officers. The funds were appropriated during the 2012 legislative session.

Corrections Secretary Ray Roberts told the committee that the increases would bring officers who haven’t had a pay raise since 2009 closer to the market rate.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported the pay raises are part of a state program to raise the pay of certain state employees closer to similar private sector employees.

The pay increases range from 5 percent to 12.5 percent and will go to 4,296 state employees.

A Johnson County man who set up a nude photo shoot with a 14-year-old girl has pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography, U.S. Attorney Barry Grissom said today.

Kristopher Hausback, 30, Spring Hill, Kan., pleaded guilty to one count of possession of child pornography. In his plea, Hausback admitted he advertised on Model Mayhem, where aspiring models meet photographers. He mostly solicited friends and relatives to pose as models.

On Aug. 8, 2011, Leawood police officers were called to the Aloft hotel to take a report of a theft. Hausback told them his camera had been stolen. Investigation revealed Hausback had taken nude photographs of a 14-year-old girl who came to the hotel for a “photo shoot.” She had sent her brother a text telling him the name of the hotel and room number. Her stepfather went to the hotel and confronted Hausback. The two scuffled and the stepfather took the camera.

An examination of Hausback’s camera and computer revealed photos he took of another girl who was 16, as well as photos he possessed of minor girls engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

Sentencing is set for Dec. 10. Both parties have agreed to recommend a sentence of not less than 42 months and not more than 96 months in federal prison.

A Kansas drug enforcement unit checking a report of a suspected meth lab found something quite different.

Reno County investigators went to a Hutchinson apartment Tuesday where neighbors complained of a strong odor.

But instead of a meth lab, the suspicious contraption turned out to be a fuel cell — in simple terms, a device that converts the chemical energy of a fuel and an oxidant into electrical energy.

The man who was making the fuel cell was not arrested. But officers on the scene did take in another person suspicion of theft.

UPDATE 11:41 am: A federal judge has sided with the Kansas State Fair in a free speech challenge filed by an animal-rights group.

U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten on Tuesday ruled the fair is a so-called “limited public forum.” He said fair officials acted reasonably in requiring People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to shield people walking by its booth from easily seeing images depicting animal slaughter.

PETA sued the state, the Kansas Fair Board and the fair’s general manager, arguing the restrictions violate its free speech rights.

But the judge also denied a motion by the state to dismiss PETA’s lawsuit.

 

ORIGINAL 6:15 AM: With the opening of the Kansas State Fair just days away, a federal court is taking up a free-speech case against the fair by an animal-rights group.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is seeking an order to block the fair from forcing it to shield people walking by its booth from easily seeing videos or photos depicting animal slaughter.

U.S. District Judge J. Thomas Marten scheduled arguments Tuesday in Wichita.

PETA sued the state, the Kansas Fair Board and the fair’s general manager arguing the restrictions violate its free speech rights.

The state is being defended by the office of Attorney General Derek Schmidt, which contends the limits are lawful.

The fair opens Friday in Hutchinson.

An 8-year-old Wichita girl died after being struck by a bullet during a shootout at a mobile home park.

Wichita Police Lt. Chris Halloran said officers were called to the shooting at the Oaks Mobile Home Park early Tuesday.

They found a woman with a graze wound from a bullet and began searching mobile homes to see if anyone else had been hit. The woman was taken to a hospital with what are believed to be minor injuries.

KFDI reports the girl was found dead inside one of the homes.

Several people were taken into custody after the shooting.

Police were expected to release more details later Tuesday morning.

The relentlessly sunny skies during this year’s drought has made it a difficult year for a Kansas program that seeds the clouds to try and bring rain.

In a normal year, the Western Kansas Weather Modification Program, runs from late April to mid-September. The program would seed clouds about 40 days during that period.

Walter Geiger, project director for the program, says workers have been able to seed clouds only 17 days this year.

The good news is the drought has helped the project’s finances, keeping it alive for another season. The project uses silver iodide, which has increased in price from $6,800 gallons for 20 gallons to $31,000.