Thursday, March 24, 2011
EKB Capsule News...West Virginia...3-25-'11
- The Cabell County Career Technology Center was temporarily put on lockdown Thursday after students saw the ex-boyfriend of a student driving by in his car brandishing a weapon.
- A trial for Donald Good, a man accused of the 1987 Huntington Mall rapes, is scheduled to start next Tuesday. A motion's hearing will be held Friday after a motion was filed to disqualify Judge Alfred Ferguson from the case. Ferguson was appointed the case after Judge Dan O'Hanlon recused himself.
- Deshawn Romail Dukes, 30, of Charleston, will spend a year in jail after pleading guilty to grand larceny for stealing $4,000 cash from Sam's Uptown Cafe, where he worked, on on April 1, 2010. In exchange, prosecutors recommended he be given the minimum sentence. He could have been sentenced to up to 10 years in prison. Dukes was ordered to make restitution to the restaurant.
- Raleigh County deputies arrested Basil Young Allen, 33, of Fairdale, Jason Lytton, 33, of Beaver, and Melody Ann Stewart, 33, of Crab Orchard, on charges, including breaking and entering, grand larceny, obtaining a controlled substance by fraud, possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, delivery of a controlled substance and conspiracy. They're accused of robbing the Crab Orchard Pharmacy on March 6th, stealing drugs worth about $75,000 on the street.
- Charleston law firm Hill, Peterson, Carper, Bee & Deitzler, PLLC has sent a "notice of claim" and a "screening certificate of merit" to Cabell Huntington Hospital, as well as Radiology Inc., showing their intent to file a class action complaint on behalf of patients who it claims were exposed to excessive amounts of radiation during CT scans of the head and neck with and without contrast between October 9, 2009 and November 23, 2010. The patients have claimed hair loss, fatigue and burning sensations in the head and neck area. Cabell Huntington Hospital says staff has contacted every patient affected by the excessive radiation by phone and mail. Cabell Huntington Hospital and Radiology Inc. have 30 days to respond, request mediation or request a more definite statement of claims before a law suit can be filed.
- Jimmie Terrell, a 44 year old homeless man was taken to Charleston Area Medical Center after being stabbed in the back during a dispute Wednesday night in Elkview. Kanawha County Deputies sayTerrell and four other homeless people had been camping in tents in a rural area near 84 Lumber. Terrell was intoxicated, according to police, and angrily made threats toward the other people at the campsite while swinging a big stick. A woman stabbed him in the back with a knife to try to make him stop. Deputies found Terrell at a gas station where his friends had taken him. The woman will not be charged because of Terrell’s threats and his behavior.
- Marvin Keaton, 29, of Columbus, Ohio, pleaded guilty Wednesday to possession with intent to distribute cocaine. On March 29, 2010, the Beckley Drug Unit executed a search warrant at Keaton’s motel room in Beckley and found 12 grams of cocaine approximately 54 grams of cocaine base, which Keaton admitted he brought to Beckley to sell. Keaton faces up to 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine when sentenced on July 21, 2011.
- Wednesday, Michael Aaron Blankenship, 29, of Beckley admitted to selling 1.28 grams of methamphetamine to an undercover police officer in Bradley on April 22, 2010 and that he had manufactured about 30 grams of methamphetamine. He faces up to 20 years in prison and a $1 million fine when sentenced on July 28, 2011.
- Tina Vance, 33, of Mud Fork, in Logan County, was sentenced Wednesday to three years probation after pleading guilty in December 2010 to selling one OxyContin 80-milligram pill to a confidential informant in exchange for $100 at her home on July 27, 2009.
- West Virginia will spend $18.2 million less than what lawmakers proposed during the next budget year. Acting Governor Earl Ray Tomblin applied the line-item veto power before approving a now-$11.3 billion spending plan. Most of Tomblin's cuts to the budget bill reduce spending backed by general tax revenues. The largest amount vetoed, $5.8 million, reduces funding for the Department of Education's improved instructional programs. Tomblin deleted $5 million in one-time, surplus-funded spending for relocating the Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. Another veto cut $3.7 million from the Development Office's Local Economic Development Assistance program, leaving it with $3.9 million. Tomblin left intact $67 million for permanent pay raises for teachers, school workers, the elected judiciary and an array of state employees.
Members of the Cabell County Commission voted Thursday morning to give all county employees a $1,000 pay raise and to open two new deputy positions. Those are expected be filled July 1st when the budget goes into effect.
# posted by Homer Owens @ 10:07 PM 
