Students and staff members are being offered the help of counselors as they deal with the death of a student at Mondovi High School. Seventeen-year-old Dylan Passa died Wednesday. Superintendent Jeff Rykal calls the death a “truly devastating time for our entire community.” A letter was sent to students and their parents last week. Passa had tested positive for COVID-19 and was hospitalized for treatment of pneumonia on September 14th. He was moved to intensive care the next day, then developed blood clots in his legs and was airlifted to Children’s Hospital in Minnesota where he died.
One person was injured in an ATV accident on Moritz Lane in Rural Pepin County on Friday. According to the Pepin County Sheriff's Department, 52yr old Michael Hollister of Eau Galle was alone and attempting to retrieve a deer he harvested when he lost the brakes on his ATV and rolled into a deep ravine. Due to the remoteness of the incident and troubles locating Hollister, it took an extended amount of time to rescue Hollister from the woods. He was med flighted to a hospital with serious injuries.
Motorists with electric vehicles will have a new charging station available starting today. A ribbon-cutting ceremony is being held at the 29 Pines as a new level 3 charger has been installed. Dunn Energy Cooperative CEO Jesse Singerhouse says the level 3 charger can fully charge a vehicle in 30 minutes. Singerhouse hopes the new charging network will encourage more Dunn Energy Cooperative members to consider purchasing an electric vehicle.
Most of Wisconsin’s “critically high” coronavirus activity is in rural, western counties. The Department of Health Services says Washburn, Barron, Rusk, Buffalo, Trempealeau, Forest, Oconto, and Green Lake counties are on the “critically high” list. The Department of Health Services says that may be a reflection of population as much as anything. Most of the rest of Wisconsin is classified as having a “very high” coronavirus burden on local health care resources.
Due to the increasing covid-19 cases in Dunn County, The Dunn County Health Department is recommending mass gathering sizes of not more than 25 individuals indoors and 100 individuals outdoors. “Mass gathering” is any planned or spontaneous, public or private event or convening that will bring together or is likely to bring together 100 or more people in a single room or single confined or enclosed space at the same time. As of last week, Dunn County currently has a very high case burden with 886.6 cases per 100,000 people based on the last two-week time period.
The U-W-La Crosse College Republicans are saying their free speech rights were violated this week when their chalk messages were erased. The messages were written in opposition to a university mask requirement. Republican club members say they were careful to follow the university’s protest guidelines. Chalking is a long-running tradition on the La Crosse campus. It’s used to announce public events and make political statements. Club members say they saw other students pouring water on their chalked messages to erase them.
Wisconsin Republicans say a lawsuit over redistricting in the state doesn’t belong in the federal courts. They’re asking the U-S Supreme Court to dismiss the case brought by Democrats. The state Supreme Court has already agreed to hear a similar argument from Republicans. Democrats filed the suit asking a federal court to be the one to redraw political district boundaries.
A federal judge has ruled a high school student's First Amendment free speech rights were violated when a law officer demanded she take down some social media posts last year. When the suit was first filed by Amyiah Cohoon the Marquette County Sheriff’s Department countered by saying her messages caused panic. Cohoon said a deputy threatened to arrest her and put her in jail if she didn’t delete posts saying she was infected with COVID-19. The Marquette County Sheriff’s Department says no threat of arrest or jail was made.
Four people face drug charges after a major fentanyl bust in the La Crosse area. State and local authorities searched four homes Thursday and found 296 grams of fentanyl worth an estimated 41-thousand dollars and 194 grams of marijuana. The four suspects jailed in La Crosse County are Antoine Hardie Junior, John Lathan III, Elise Love, and Dante Williams.
Nearly 40 of Governor Tony Evers' appointments are up for confirmation votes Tuesday in the Wisconsin Senate. The session calendar shows several cabinet members are on the list including Department of Safety and Professional Services Secretary Dawn Crim, the Department of Transportation’s Craig Thompson, Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection Secretary Randy Romanski, and Melissa Hughes with the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. Evers' appointment of Sandra Nass to the Natural Resources Board is not on the schedule. She was named to the post in May, but chair Fred Prehn refused to step down when his term ended.
The Wisconsin Assembly is scheduled to vote next Tuesday on a Critical Race Theory ban. The bill approved in committee is being called part of a nationwide conservative effort to stop C-R-T from being taught. Lawmakers were told at a Wednesday committee meeting that the concept of systemic racism and implicit bias are discussed mostly in graduate-level courses and it is never presented as fact. Both political parties anticipate that Democratic Governor Tony Evers will veto the measure when it reaches his desk.
More information has been released to the public about the two Afghan refugees jailed for sex crimes at Fort McCoy. Federal prosecutors say one of the suspects told his victims he would beat them up if they told anybody else. Twenty-year-old Bahrullah Noori is accused of trying to force two boys – 14 and 12 years old – to have sex with him in a restroom on the military base. A witness says he walked in on the crime while it was happening. The second man facing federal charges is 32-year-old Mohammad Haroon Imaad. He’s accused of beating and strangling his wife – and threatening to send her back to Afghanistan to let the Taliban deal with her. Both men have entered not guilty pleas to the charges they face in Madison federal court.
A voter in Fond du Lac County is charged with casting an illegal ballot during the 2020 presidential election. The criminal complaint doesn’t identify the felon who wasn’t eligible to vote and it doesn’t indicate whether the person is a Republican or Democrat – or who he voted for. District Attorney Eric Toney says the charge doesn’t mean that the election was stolen by President Joe Biden. The person charged is only the third one out of about three million voters who cast ballots in Wisconsin on Election Day.
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin says he’s out of money and doesn’t have an attorney. Chauvin filed his own appeal Thursday after telling the court he has been denied representation by a public defender. Judge Peter Cahill granted “pauper status” to the man found guilty of killing George Floyd last year – setting off riots nationwide. Pauper status means Chauvin doesn’t have to pay court costs and filing fees. Chauvin made 10 allegations in his appeal, including that the court “abused its discretion" when it denied defense motions for a new trial, a change of venue, and sequestration of the jury during the proceedings.
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