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Judge approves Agriprocessors sale

July 20, 2009 By

A bankruptcy judge in Cedar Rapids has approved the sale of the kosher meatpacking plant in Postville. Federal agents raided the Agriprocessors plant in May of 2008 and arrested nearly 400 workers. The plant eventually shut down and its top managers now face charges for hiring illegal immigrants and children as workers.

SHF Industries, a company formed by a Canadian businessman and his son-in-law, has purchased the plant for $8.5 million. The company is assuming Agriprocessor’s sizable debts too, around $21 million. Company assets in Postville as well as in Florida and New York are worth about $25 million. The Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Gordon, Nebraska is to be sold separately.

Filed Under: Agriculture, Business

September 1 special election for southeast Iowa seat

July 20, 2009 By

Governor Culver has set Tuesday, September 1st as the date for a special election to fill a southeast Iowa legislative seat.

State Representative John Whitaker, a Democrat from Hillsboro, announced his resignation late Friday. U.S. Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack has appointed Whitaker to be the executive state director of the Farm Service Agency. Whitaker, who first won his seat in the Iowa House back in 2002, was president of the Iowa Farmers Union in the decade before that.

Curt Hanson, a Democrat from Fairfield, announced Friday evening that he intends to run for Whitaker’s seat in the House. The Republican leader in the Iowa House says Stephen Burgmeier, a Republican Lockridge, intends to run, too.

House District 90 includes all of Van Buren County and portions of Jefferson and Wapello Counties. August 7 is the deadline for candidates to get their paperwork filed with the Secretary of State so their name will appear on the Special Election ballots.

Filed Under: Agriculture, Politics & Government Tagged With: , , , ,

Clemons man to spend 15 years in federal prison

July 20, 2009 By

Ralph Edwin Johnson A 52-year-old man who was living in the small, central Iowa town of Clemons has been sentenced to 15 years in a federal prison on child pornography charges.

Last October, an undercover cop received child porn from Ralph Edwin Johnson over the Internet. It was part of a national sting operation.

In November, authorities searched Johnson’s home and found "numerous images and videos of child pornography on (his) computer." This past April, Johnson pled guilty to child pornography charges. His sentence was handed down this week.

Johnson has other convictions on his record, including a 2005 conviction for sexual exploitation of a minor in Marshall County. His name and picture are posted on the state’s Sex Offender Registry.

Filed Under: Crime & Courts, Technology Tagged With: , ,

Lamoni man gets 10 years in prison for "sexually-explicit chats"

July 20, 2009 By

A southwest Iowa man has been sentenced to 10 years in a federal prison on sex-related charges. 

Forty-five-year-old Robert Kevin Woodard of Lamoni pleaded guilty in March to a charge of “enticement of a minor for sex.” He was sentenced this week.

Authorities say back in 2007 — from the end of March ’til mid-June– Woodward had a number of “sexually-explicit online chats” with someone he thought was a 14-year-old girl. But Woodard’s chats were with an undercover officer from the Black Hawk County Sheriff’s Office.

Authorities examined Woodard’s computer and confirmed he was the one chatting online. They also found Woodard had downloaded and saved images of child pornography on his computer.

 

Filed Under: Crime & Courts, Technology Tagged With: , ,

Two go to prison for racially-charged fight in Muscatine

July 20, 2009 By

Prosecutors report a hate crime case in Muscatine is progressing, with two former Kansans being sent to a federal prison for their role in a bar fight.

The case dates back to December of 2007. Three men and a woman were accused of getting involved in two different fights with two black men who were at the Canterbury Pub in the Econolodge in Muscatine. Witnesses say racial slurs were used and four people started attacking one of the black men as he sat at the bar.

After the bartender and another customer got the first fight under control, the four people went after a second black man who was in the back of the bar by a pool table.

Two of the people involved in the melees have pleaded guilty and will be sentenced in late August. This week, Jeffery Thomas Lee was sentenced to nearly four years in prison and Wendie Kay Groen has been sentenced to just under three years.

All four have admitted the two men were attacked because they were black.

 

Filed Under: Crime & Courts Tagged With:

RAGBRAI riders enjoy cooler temps, cooling rain

July 20, 2009 By

Thousands of bicyclists are making their way across southwest Iowa on the 37th annual RAGBRAI, The Des Moines Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa, and they’re enjoying the cooler than normal temperatures.

After a 52-mile trek from Council Bluffs to Red Oak on Sunday, the bicyclists embarked on a more challenging, 72-mile journey this morning, taking them through Stanton, Villisca, Nodaway, Corning, Prescott, Williamson and Fontanelle before another overnight stop in Greenfield.

Some riders left Red Oak as early as 5 a.m. Virgil Buff of Vermont was among them, although his early departure was not by his choice.

"The people we ride with, they’re bike shop guys and they need to go to the next town and get a good spot for setting up next," Buff says. "So if we want our stuff to go, we’ve got to get up and let ‘em take it, otherwise it’s a long day packing."

Bicyclists from every state in the U.S. and at least 20 countries are participating. George Paulsen came all the way from New York to peddle across the Iowa countryside. Paulsen says RAGBRAI allows him to get away from it all.

"It’s the ‘funnest’ week out of my life, about," Paulsen says. "I get to just fall off the grid…I don’t usually, you know, watch too much TV this week; just kind of loose it into the Iowa scene."

Despite the challenging course, most riders were enjoying the trip’s early stages. Lance Ashland of Eagan, Minnesota, was among those anticipating a tougher ride today, but Ashland says it’s worth it, just to enjoy his native Iowa again.

"Growing up in Iowa, it’s kind of one of those things you have to do at least one," Ashland says, noting this is his second RAGBRAI. "I guess I wasn’t cured after the first one."

James Benningfield of Tuscon, Arizona, is making his second RAGBRAI trip, too. He has a few goals for the week.

"This is a social ride. This is not a pace-line race across the state. It’s a lot of fun," Benningfield says. "I had my piece of apple pie that I came after."

In addition to the cooler-than-normal temperatures, there was some light rainfall early this morning to cool the riders along today’s RAGBRAI route.

 

Filed Under: Health & Medicine, Human Interest Tagged With:

As RAGBRAI got ready to roll, 12 people shot in Omaha

July 20, 2009 By

While the Omaha/Council Bluffs area hosted thousands of bicycling enthusiasts over the weekend, police were kept very busy by several violent incidents. Omaha police say between Friday afternoon and Sunday night, an even dozen people were wounded in shootings. Omaha Police Officer Jacob Bettin says 12 shootings is excessive in one weekend and it does not appear they’re related.

"The investigators don’t believe that a handful of these crimes are connected," Bettin says. "It’s just the middle of the summer now and the weather has been really nice." He says they’re busy interviewing witnesses and persons of interest.

"Until we actually talk to all persons involved and figure out what the motives behind the shootings are, that’s when we can classify those as being related, but right now, it’s just too early," Bettin says.

None of the people who were shot died and it appears none of them were riders on RAGBRAI, this week’s bicycle ride across Iowa, which started Sunday morning in Council Bluffs. An economic impact of five-million dollars was expected for Council Bluffs for hosting the ride’s kickoff.

Back in Omaha, Officer Bettin says officers are increasing their presence in potentially violent neighborhoods. "We’ll basically saturate the area through uniform patrol officers and unmarked vehicles," he says. "There’s obviously some other things we’re taking into account also."

Bettin says they are using technology to help the determine where to focus their patrols. "We use data that’s gathered through the crime analysis unit to create these hot spot areas and that’s how we determine where to increase our patrols or where we think the likeliness of more violence will occur," he says.

Five people were hit in a single drive-by shooting incident in Omaha on Saturday morning. A 13-year-old boy was among the victims. Seven other people were shot in five other incidents.

Filed Under: Crime & Courts
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