LITTLE ROCK — Air Force chief
set to visit 188th
FORT SMITH - The Air Force’s chief of staff plans to visit the 188th Fighter Wing in Fort Smith as the base is likely set for closure under a defense spending bill.
Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Welsh III on Thursday told the state’s Senate delegation that he wanted to visit the unit before a final decision is reached on its future.
The Southwest Times Record reported that Arkansas Sens. John Boozman and Mark Pryor had urged Welsh to visit the base before making a closure decision.
The base flies A-10 jets, which are known for their ability to attack enemy tanks.
A date for the visit will be set later.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Struck in street, pedestrian dies
A West Memphis woman died Thursday after she stepped into the street and was struck by a pickup, according to Arkansas State Police preliminary accident reports.
About 5:30 p.m., Barbara Darby, 59, stepped into a lane of traffic on East Broadway in West Memphis, when a westbound 2002 Toyota Tacoma driven by Sid Riley, 49, of West Memphis, hit her, the report states.
Darby died at the scene.
Riley was not injured, state police said.
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE Sentencing for club owner is delayed
Sentencing for Helena-West Helena nightclub owner Wayne Webb, who pleaded guilty in August to money-laundering, has been reset for Jan. 30.
U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr. set the new sentencing date Friday.
Webb, 64, has admitted to earning about $90,000 from illegal gambling in his Queen of Clubs bar and restaurant. His admission came about 10 months after authorities revealed that they seized 11 video-gambling machines from his club and had linked him to eight other machines seized elsewhere.
Federal agents also said they had secretly recorded Webb boasting about how much money he made from illegal gambling.
Webb tentatively faces a negotiated sentence of three years’ probation and a $4,000 fine if the judge accepts the plea agreement after reviewing a presentence report.
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE
Inmate accused of guard attack
TULSA - A Tulsa man accused in a deadly April shooting rampage is to face trial on unrelated charges alleging he assaulted a jail guard.
Jake England was charged after he purportedly elbowedand cursed a guard as he was being taken to his cell at the Tulsa jail from the recreation yard Nov.
Online court records indicate he was ordered to trial Thursday after a preliminary hearing.
England and Alvin Watts face murder and hatecrime charges in the April rampage that killed three and wounded two others.
They’re to be arraigned on those charges Jan. 9.
All five shooting victims were black, and authorities said England may have targeted black people because he wanted to avenge his father’s shooting death by a black man two years ago.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS State urges judge to dismiss appeal
OKLAHOMA CITY - The Oklahoma attorney general’s office has urged a Delaware County judge to dismiss the latest appeal of a man sentenced to life in prison for the death of a Missouri banker.
Shannon Wayne Agofsky was convicted in the death of Dan Short in October 1989. Prosecutors said Short was abducted from his Northwest Arkansas home and taken to the State Bank of Noel, Mo., where he was forced to open the vault.
Short was then driven into northeast Oklahoma, tied to a weighted chair and dumped alive into Grand Lake near Grove.
His body was found five days later.
Agofsky has filed a motion to set aside his murder conviction and life sentence. He is currently on federal death row in Terre Haute, Ind., for stomping another inmate to death.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESSMan, 20, charged in cabbie stabbing
KANSAS CITY, Mo. A Kansas City man was charged with stabbing a cabdriver and fleeing with her cab.
Julian Rodriguez, 20, was jailed in Jackson County on charges of robbery and armed criminal action. No attorney was listed for him in online court records.
Cabbie Shelli Hopkins told The Kansas City Star that her attacker laughed as he stabbed her.
She said that before the Dec. 20 attack, he asked whether she thought it was dangerous for a woman to be driving a cab. She told him she had four children at home and needed the money.
Rodriguez was still driving the cab the day after the attack and was arrested after fleeing from police.
Court records said he confessed, telling authorities the robbery and stabbing were “exhilarating.” - THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 10 on 12/29/2012