KWIT: Regional News for 7/8 (2008-07-08)

In Iowa...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - The federal government is opening
conservation land in 16 states to livestock grazing as part of a
response to record flooding in the Midwest.
U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Ed Schaefer says
Midwest flooding created a crisis situation that required "drastic
action."
The USDA's decision affects counties which have been declared
Presidential Disaster Areas or counties that are nearby. That
includes dozens of counties in Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Indiana
and Illinois.
The land, which is a part of the Conservation Reserve Program,
is typically left idle with strict limits on its use.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - The state has reached a nearly $3
million settlement with two companies that distributed or operated
TouchPlay machines banned in Iowa.
Under the settlement, the state will pay $2.9 million to Greater
America Distributing and Nebraska Technical Services Inc., both
based in Omaha, Neb.
The State Appeal Board approved the settlement yesterday.
The settlement requires the companies to give up their claims
against the state and dismiss their portions of a lawsuit that
involves dozens of plaintiffs.
Trial in that case is scheduled for September 8th.
The Legislature ended the TouchPlay game in May 2006 after
widespread public criticism about the machines, which resembled
slot machines.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) - Authorities have identified the pilot of
a small plane that crashed at the Iowa City airport.
Police say 64-year-old Keith Roof, of North Liberty, was the
only one in the single-engine plane when it crashed last week next
to a runway.
Roof was transported to University Hospitals, but officials
wouldn't release his condition.
According to a police statement, Roof was standing away from the
burning wreckage when emergency officials arrived at the scene of
the crash.
The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating the
incident, which happened on Thursday afternoon.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Officials say a shortage of kosher meat
in Nashville has been exacerbated by an immigration scandal at the
country's largest kosher meatpacking plant in Iowa.
Keeping kosher in Nashville has been tough in recent months
because of rising fuel prices and a national shortage of kosher
meat.
Then in May, federal officials arrested almost 400 workers on
immigration charges at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, Iowa.
The arrests at the Jewish-owned company have members of some Jewish
congregations worried, as well as some butchers.
Peter Swerdlow is president of Griller's Pride, an Atlanta-based
kosher butcher that delivers to Nashville.
He says his company only does business with companies that
follow kosher standards and treat their employees well. Once news
of the Agriprocessors raid hit, Swerdlow says his company was
bombarded with calls.
In response, he sent a letter outlining his company's labor
policies to customers.

In Nebraska...

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - Federal officials are working with Nebraska
Beef Ltd. to improve food safety after the company recalled more
than 5 million pounds of meat.
USDA spokeswoman Amanda Eamich (EE-mitch) said Monday the
company was slow to respond to reports that two samples at
processors that bought the meat from Nebraska Beef had tested
positive for E. coli.
The meat Nebraska Beef produced between May 16 and June 26 has
since been linked to an outbreak of E. coli illnesses affecting 41
people in Michigan and Ohio.
Nebraska Beef spokesman Bill Lamson says the company has hired
an outside lab to test company products as it moves ahead with the
recall.
The E. coli 0157:H7 variant can cause severe illness and even
death in humans.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Nebraska's health agency has asked a judge
to dismiss a lawsuit that says the agency shouldn't have denied
some Medicaid coverage.
The Nebraska Appleseed Center for Law in the Public Interest
filed the lawsuit in May in Lancaster County District Court. The
lawsuit names the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services
and various state officials as defendants.
The lawsuit challenges what it says is Health and Human
Services' policy of removing Medicaid coverage from parents who
fail to fully meet work requirements under Nebraska's
welfare-to-work program.
Todd Landry, the director of the state agency's Division of
Children and Family Services, says the lawsuit is frivolous.

In South Dakota...

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) - A South Dakota man serving a life sentence
for the murder of his wife continues to argue he should get a new
trial because his conviction was based partly on the testimony of
an expert who has been caught lying about his credentials.
David Aesoph (AY-sop) has lost two appeals in state courts. He
now is asking a federal judge to order that he be given a new trial
for the 1999 murder of his wife, Tania.
Aesoph argues that his wife died after she fell down a flight of
stairs in their home 30 miles northeast of Highmore. A pathologist
testified that the woman was beaten and strangled.
One of the prosecution witnesses against Aesoph was Saami
Shaibani -- a physicist who said the woman could not have fallen
down the stairs as her husband claimed.
In other cases around the nation -- courts have determined that
Shaibani misrepresented his credentials when he said he was a
clinical professor at Temple University. His affiliation with
Temple apparently ended in 1998.

WINONA, Minn. (AP) - After three college-age people in Minnesota
died from alcohol-poisoning after nights of drinking, The
Associated Press began looking into these types of deaths.
An AP analysis of federal records found that 157 college-age
people, ages 18 to 23, drank themselves to death from 1999 through
2005. That's the most recent year for which figures are available.
The number of alcohol-poisoning deaths among that age group per
year rose from 18 in 1999 to 35 in 2005.
Over the seven-year span, 83 of the college-age victims were
under the drinking age of 21.
The federal data shows deaths spiking on weekends -- when young
people are more likely to go out with the goal of getting drunk --
and in December, when college students wrap up finals. Most of the
dead were men.
The federal figures don't indicate whether a victim was a
student or not. But the 2006 National Survey on Drug Use and Health
showed that adults ages 18 to 22 in college full-time are more
likely to binge-drink than those not in school.

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) - Convicted sex offenders in South Dakota who
are transients or homeless must disclose their locations to police.
That's the substance of a new law that took effect July first.
The requirement closes a loophole that apparently allows
footloose sex offenders to avoid disclosure of places where they
can be found.
The statewide sex-offender registry also is being expanded to
include the names and addresses of those who've been convicted of
intentionally exposing sex partners with the AIDS virus.

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) - According to the weekly crop report,
dry weather last week helped South Dakota's crops develop -
although they're still behind average.
Average corn height is 25 inches, compared to a five-year
average of 38 inches. Also, 78 percent of the first cutting of
alfalfa is done, compared to the five-year average of 90 percent.
The crop report, from the National Agricultural Statistics
Service, says topsoil moisture dropped last week because of the dry
weather.