A Buffalo County
Sheriffs Deputy has been recognized for saving a life. Sgt. Logan
Olson was presented a life saving award during the Buffalo County Law
Enforcement Committee meeting on February 20th.
Olson was responding to
a suicidal person call late in 2019. The person was actively
trying to harm themselves as Sgt. Olson arrived on scene. Sgt.
Olson was able to physically stop the threat to the person and talk
the person into receiving assistance from Medical Emergency
Responders. The award was presented to him from the American Police
Hall of Fame.
The search is officially on
for a new superintendent of schools in Altoona after the current
district leader was arrested. Dan Peggs was taken into custody
on charges of sex trafficking and child pornography last week.
The school board tabbed Ron Walsh for the position on an interim
basis Thursday. Peggs isn’t on administrative leave yet.
He’s currently using vacation days while sitting in federal
custody.
A Menomonie man has been
charged in Dunn County Court with 10 counts of possessing child
pornography. According to authorities, The Menomonie Police
Department received a tip on Jan. 3 from a national agency that four
images deemed as child pornography had been uploaded using an app.
The account was traced back to an IP address in a home in Menomonie.
Police obtained a search warrant and entered the home on Feb. 12 and
seized two laptops. Police say 46yr old Joseph Ellis admitted to
using one of the laptops to access the website used for uploading the
pornography. A forensic search found multiple videos with the
documents listing Joseph Ellis as the author. Ellis was arrested and
is facing up to 15yrs in prison on each charge if convicted.
An Elk Mound man,
convicted of OWI 12th
offense has been sentenced to 4yrs in prison. Last week, 60yr old
Keith Bondie pleaded guity to the charge in Eau Claire County Court.
Authorities had found Bondie passed out in a vehicle in the parking
lot of a convenience store and arrested him for the OWI charge. He
was also sentenced to five years extended supervision, fined $600 and
had his driver's license revoked for three years.
The State Building Commission
has given its approval to a new 49-million-dollar fieldhouse for the
campus at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. The approval
was granted at a Thursday meeting in Madison. No state money
will be used for the project. The university started planning
for the field-house six years ago. School officials say
construction will start in August and the facility will be completed
two years later.
The Dakota County Sheriff's
Office says the Lakeville man fatally shot by a deputy was wanted an
active warrant for assault on a peace officer. Deputies and
Lakeville police officers were serving an emergency order for
protection Friday when the suspect allegedly fired on them. One
sheriff's deputy returned fire, killing the man. Investigators
say the 36-year-old man had past contact with Lakeville police.
The officers involved were placed on administrative leave while the
B-C-A continues the investigation.
A recount in the Maple River
School District confirms passage of a 63-million-dollar bond
referendum on February 11th. Voters approved the measure for a
new pre-K through-12 school by ten votes - but the recount found it
passed by just six votes. This was the southern Minnesota
district's fourth attempt of getting the community to support a new
185-thousand square foot school building off Highway 7 south of
Mapelton.
A Wisconsin Appeals Court
struck down an Ozaukee County court ruling Friday that ordered more
than 200-thousand people removed from the state's voter rolls.
The ruling also invalidates a lower court decision that found the
Wisconsin Elections Commission in contempt for failing to purge the
voter rolls. The 4th District Court of Appeals issued a
temporary stay in the case last month. The A-C-L-U of Wisconsin
is applauding today's ruling, saying, "we will continue to fight
to ensure every eligible voter can make their voice heard."
The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty intends to file an appeal
with the Wisconsin Supreme Court. WILL filed the initial
lawsuit seeking the voter purge.
The patient with Wisconsin's
lone confirmed case of coronavirus is now out of isolation.
Public Health Madison and Dane County says it has been testing the
patient for the virus every other day for the past several weeks and
they are feeling well. Two tests for coronavirus have come back
negative, which means they can leave isolation and resume normal
activities. The Dane County resident who traveled to China had
been isolated at home since January 30th. The Milwaukee Health
Department is reportedly monitoring four people for coronavirus who
recently returned from China. The four patients are in
voluntary home isolation.
Governor Evers spent Friday
signing and vetoing a package of bills sent to his desk in February.
Four out of those six vetoes were aimed at parts of a G O P 'tough on
crime' package. Evers vetoed bills that would have required sending
people back to prison for being charged with a crime while on
release, a bill that would have expanded the sorts of crimes that a
child could be tried as an adult, and a bill that would have limited
crimes that can be eligible for parole. Evers did sign bills that
toughen the state's drunk driving laws, increased the pay for State
Troopers, and requires police to make body camera footage available
upon request
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Congressmen Collin Peterson of
Minnesota and Rob Bishop of Utah introduced legislation today which
would delist the gray wolf from the Endangered Species Act in the
lower 48 states. The American Wild Game and Livestock
Protection Act gives states the ability to make their own rules about
hunting and culling gray wolf populations. Management was
transferred from the state to federal level following two 2014
federal court decisions. Peterson said this bipartisan
legislation will allow states "to protect the livelihood of
their livestock owners and preserve a healthy balance of wild animal
populations."
Both law enforcement and
company sources say the 51-year-old man who shot five co-workers to
death Wednesday had been involved in a feud with one of them for a
long time. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is reporting Anthony
Ferrill had worked as an electrician at the plant for 17 years.
Ferrill believed he was the victim of discrimination on the job
because he was African-American. Neighbors call Ferrill a good,
family man, expressing disbelief that he was responsible for the
killings.
Approval of a resolution
earlier this week means Monroe County has become the fourth county in
Wisconsin to declare itself a Second Amendment sanctuary.
Wednesday’s 15-to-1 vote means the county opposes any
constitutional changes to the “right to bear arms.” Board
Chairman Pete Peterson says he has heard complaints that the issue
was pushed through too quickly without enough community notice and
time for debate and discussion. He says taking it slower would
have lessened the outcry, but it would have passed anyway.
The former Jefferson County
deputy who was fired amid allegations she broke into people’s homes
has been arrested again. In December, Janelle Gericke was
accused of burglarizing the homes of people while they were attending
funerals. This time, investigators say Gericke broke into a
residence to steal pills. Prosecutors filed the new charges
Monday. The homeowner says he saw Gericke on his home
surveillance video, then noticed some hydrocodone was missing.
A northern Wisconsin tribe is
requesting a 45 million dollar settlement from Enbridge Energy of
Canada. Mike Wiggins Junior, Chairman of The Bad River Band of Lake
Superior Chippewa said in a letter the 45 million is a settlement for
trespassing on reservation lands, in addition to shutting down and
decommissioning the company’s oil and gas pipeline within the Bad
River watershed, in order to resolve a federal lawsuit the band filed
last July. Wiggins said the tribal council weighed similar
settlements, the company’s continued operation under expired
easements, and Enbridge's profits in arriving at the proposal.
Company officials said Thursday that they're working quickly to move
forward with permitting and rerouting Line 5.
It’s no big surprise to
Wisconsin homeowners: they pay some of the highest property
taxes in the nation. A report from the financial website
WalletHub ranks the Badger State fifth for taxes among the 50
states. WalletHub based its rankings on a 205-thousand-dollar
home. That’s the median home value in the U-S.
Democratic Governor Tony Evers and Republican leaders of the
legislature are offering competing plans to lessen the property tax
burden.
The Minnesota D-N-R is
reminding ice anglers that fish houses need to be removed from lakes
in the southern two-thirds of the state by Monday night. The
ice removal deadline for northern Minnesota lakes is March 16th.
Conservation officers say anglers should plan ahead and also make
sure the area around their fish house is free of trash.
Temperatures are expected to be in the 40s today in southern
Minnesota and it could be sloppy getting the structures off the ice.
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