(Bedford, Iowa) – An arrest was made Sunday in connection with a house fire that seriously injured a woman from Bedford. According to the Taylor County Sheriff’s Office, the fire occurred at 1871 Orange Avenue, in Bedford. The incident was discovered at around 2:46-a.m.  A woman living in the residence was able to escape, but suffered serious injuries. She was treated by Taylor County EMS before being flown to a burn center for treatment.

Sheriff’s Deputies began an investigation into the origin of the fire, which led to the belief that it was caused by an act or arson.  As a result of their investigation, 68-year-old Ellis Houk, of Kellerton, was arrested on a charge of Arson in the 1st Degree. Additional charges are pending. Houk was located and is being held in Texas, awaiting extradition to Taylor County on a no bond warrant.

The Taylor County Sheriff’s Office thanks the following agencies for their assistance: Sharpsburg, Gravity, Bedford and New Market Fire Departments; Taylor County EMS (Bedford and Lenox); Air Evac; and the Adams and Ringgold County Sheriff’s Offices.

*All persons charged with a crime are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

(Rural Union County, Iowa) – A man from Taylor County suffered possible, unknown injuries during an accident Saturday evening in Union County. The Sheriff’s Office reports 54-year-old Mitchell Louis Bond, of Sharpsburg, was driving a 1999 Dodge pickup southbound on the High and Dry Road, when, according to Bond, he saw a deer in the middle of the road. Bond said when he swerved to avoid hitting the animal, he crashed his vehicle into the east ditch, causing front end damage.

A Deputy who questioned Bond discovered the man was under the influence of alcohol. He reportedly had bloodshot, watery eyes and the odor of an alcoholic beverage coming from his person. Bond consented to testing and a Data Master Test, the results of which indicated a Breath Alcohol Content (BAC) of .287%, or more than three-times the legal limit of .08%.

No citations were issued.

(Mongtomery County, Iowa) – A traffic stop northeast of Elliott at around 4:05-a.m. today (Sunday), resulted in the arrest on drug charges, of a man from Adams County. The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports Deputies conducted the traffic stop on 100th Street and O Avenue. As a result of an investigation, 43-year-old Joshua James M. Mullen, of Corning, was arrested for Possession of Methamphetamine/3rd offense, a Class-D Felony, and Interference with Official Acts, a Simple Misdemeanor.

Mullen was transported to the Montgomery County Jail, where his bond was set at $5,000. Red Oak Police and the Cass County (IA) Sheriff’s Department assisted during the traffic stop.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – The City of Atlantic’s Department of Parks and Recreation Board, will meet 5:15-p.m. Monday (11/21), in the Council’s Chambers at City Hall. During their regularly scheduled session, the Board will receive a Splash Pad Project update from Snyder and Associates Engineer Dave Sturm, and act on a location for the pad.

Elsewhere under “Old Business” on their agenda, the Board will hear reports on Trees Forever, from Board Member Erin McFadden, and the Trails, from Board Member Shirley Jensen. They will also discuss any new developments on the Hotel/Motel Tax.

New Business includes a Board Vote/action on:

• The appointment of Erin McFadden, Board Chair Jolene Smith, and Assistant Parks Director Jeff Christensen, to the Splash Pad Executive Committee.
• The appointment of Board Member Jeremy Butler as Splash Pad Fundraising Committee Chair with the authority to form the Committee and Recruit Volunteers.
• Ross Camblin Shelter repairs
• and other matters.

The Board will also receive an update on filling the position of Parks and Rec Director that was vacated by the resignation last month of former Director Bryant Rasmussen, who has accepted a position with the USDA. A committee in charge of searching for a park director will be interviewing four candidates for the position by Zoom, next month. The hope is they can narrow the field down and hold in-person interviews after that.

In his report, Assistant Director Jeff Christensen will talk about the Bill Reilly Talent Show, Zombie Run, Maintenance Building Cleaning & Security, and the Thanksgiving Turkey Giveaway.

In an update to our previous posted reports, the Iowa State Patrol says three people were injured during a head-on collision this (Saturday) afternoon, northeast of Lewis. They were identified as 24-year-old Shane D. Dunkeson, of Elliott, 19-year-old Trinity N. Ericksen, of Lewis, and 18-year-old Ty W. Eblen, of Cumberland.

Photo courtesy Cass County Sheriff’s Deputy Kyle Quist

The Patrol says the accident happened at around 1:30-p.m. A 1995 Ford Ranger pickup driven by Dunkeson was traveling east on Nishna Valley Road, at the same time a 2014 Chevy Silverado pickup driven by Eblen was traveling west, approaching 550th Street. The pickups collided head-on when the Ranger was on the left side of the center of the road, for reasons unknown. The crash remains under investigation.

Shane Dunkeson was transported by LifeFlight to the UNMC in Omaha. Trinity Ericksen was transported by Cass EMS to the Cass County Memorial Hospital in Atlantic, and Eblen was transported to CCMH by private vehicle.

The Patrol was assisted at the scene by the Cass County Sheriff’s Office, Griswold Rescue, Lewis Fire and Rescue, Unity Point Lifeflight and Cass EMS.

(Cass County, Iowa) – Rescue crews from Lewis and Griswold, as well as Cass EMS, were dispatched to the scene of a head-on crash north of Lewis, at around 1:30-p.m., today (Saturday). The crash occurred near Iranistan, or 550th and Nishna Valley Road. Early reports indicated one male was trapped in his vehicle with leg or ankle injuries. A second person was more critically hurt and unresponsive. (Photos courtesy Cass County Sheriff’s Deputy Kyle Quist)

Two helicopters were initially requested. One was LifeFlight out of Audubon.

(Update 2-p.m.): Two people in a Ford Ranger were among those injured. The male was flown from the scene by helicopter to a trauma center, while a female was transported by ambulance to Cass Health in Atlantic. A third person was said to be transported to the hospital by private vehicle.

Medical Helicopter transported one of the accident victims from CCMH to a trauma center.

The agencies responding to the accident were; the Cass County Sheriff’s Office, Cass County Drone Team, Iowa State Patrol, The Iowa State Patrol Traffic Investigation Unit, Cass EMS, Lifeflight, Griswold Fire and Rescue, and Lewis Fire and Rescue.

The crash remains under investigation by the Iowa State Patrol.

(Atlantic, Iowa) – Historians generally agree that the sport of baseball likely came to America from England, but how did the sport get to Iowa? That’s the topic of a free presentation set to take place this Sunday, in Atlantic. John Liepa, long time baseball fan, life-long baseball card collector, historian and professor, will discuss the origins of baseball and how it came to Iowa. His presentation, entitled “How Iowa Met Baseball: The Myths, The History, The players,” serves to dispel some of the myths regarding the invention of baseball, origins and evolution of the early game in the United States, and how the Civil War played a role in accelerating the spread of the game. The very first mention of the game coming to Iowa, he says, was in 1858.

Iowa had 222 major league baseball players over the years, including Hall-of-Famer Bob Feller, from Van Meter.

A Bob Feller baseball card. (photo frpm John Liepa)

He says over 40 Iowans have made it to the Major Leagues, and during their careers played less than 10-games. There were seven Hall-of-Fame inductees.

Leipa will bring a lot of memorabilia with him to use as part of the presentation, including three cases with old baseball cards.

His free presentation will be held Sunday, November 20, 1:30 pm at the American Legion Memorial Building (also known as “The Armory,” in Atlantic. The program is sponsored by Atlantic Rock Island Society Enterprise (ARISE), and supported by Atlantic Community Promotion Commission.

(Radio Iowa) – Representatives of the Utah-based company that owns mobile home parks in Iowa City have met with residents who say they’re not getting answers about rent hikes and diminishing services. Havenpark Communities recently bought the Modern Manor Mobile Home park in Iowa City. A resident who gave his name as Jim attended the meeting. “We got no answers whatsoever. They’ve owned it 11 months and they’re checking into everything,” he said. “It’s about just what I expected from a big corporation like that and they’ve raised the rents and cut services on all of ’em.”A woman named Debra says she’s lived in the park for 35 years.

“They didn’t give us straight answers,” she said. “They just went around in circles. They just kept talking about market values and inflation. Well, if it’s inflation, why do you want to raise the rent on us, then?” Both residents declined to give their last names, fearing retribution for speaking out. Residents of mobile home parks CAN buy their home, but typically cannot buy the land on which it sits, so they pay rent to the property owner.

The Cedar Rapids Gazette reports Havenpark bought the Modern Manor and Lake Ridge Mobile Home Parks in Iowa City last January for 33-and-a-half million dollars. Havenpark owns several other mobile home parks in the state and the company has argued rent increases are necessary to match rates at similar properties. Since 2019, mobile home residents have been lobbing legislators to limit rent hikes — but the new Iowa law that went into effect July 1st now requires an additional 30 days notice of rent hikes and utility increases — for a total of 90 days prior notice to mobile home park residents.

(Radio Iowa) – The number of edible cannabis products in Iowa and surrounding states has created problems in trying to figure out which ones meet the state’s guidelines for legal medical use. Kelli Flanagan of the D-C-I crime lab spoke to the medical marijuana program board, Friday, and says edibles pose a volume problem.  “We would have to test every different type of edible out there. And as you know, things like gummies, and the suckers, brownies, any type of edible like that, they have very high complex matrices,” she says. She says they do an analysis of plant materials or concentrates and that each product requires a dedicated optimized sample preparation.

“So for every edible out there, we would have to have a separate procedure. Now with that, every procedure then needs to be validated according to our accreditation guidelines,” Flanagan says. She says developing those procedures is time consuming. “Just for getting the procedure involved for plant materials, and the concentrates that I spoke of earlier, took approximately four to six months just to get to the validation procedure,” according to Flanagan. “So now you can imagine how cumbersome that would be to do it for every possible matrix out there.” Flanagan says they reached out to the D-E-A and found federal officials face the same issue.

“Essentially, they’re saying the same things that I’ve just said that developing and validated quantitative T-H-C and T-H-C A methods for the hundreds of sample matrices out there is almost impossible. And they tend to focus, as they say, in the last line there, they tend to prioritize the other controlled substances that they get in on a daily basis, such as fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and heroin and etcetera,” she says. Flanagan says the D-C-I has taken the same type of focus as federal officials on the issue. She says another issue is the number of products and their size and trying to figure out the total T-H-C by weight. And they can’t determine whether the source of the cannabinoids are naturally occurring, or whether they were synthetically produced

“In court should we have to testify to this, we would not be able to determine the source of the cannabinoids that are present, whether they were naturally occurring, or the or whether they were synthetically produced,” Flanagan says. “C-B-D can be converted to Delta-eight with heat. And so does that make it synthetically produced? That’s just one of the problems we run into because we can’t really answer that question with any degree of certainty on that.” Flanagan was invited to speak because of the questions the board gets about the legality of edibles. The Bureau Chief of the medical cannabis program says the edibles sold legally under Iowa’s programs are tested by the State Hygienic Lab to certify that they meet state standards.

(Radio Iowa) – Republican Todd Halbur has abandoned his call for a statewide recount of his race against State Auditor Rob Sand and has conceded today (Friday). County officials have been conducting the official canvases of votes this week. According to the Iowa Secretary of State’s website, Sand finishes the race with 27-hundred-13 more votes than Halbur. Sand is the only Democrat on the statewide ballot to win this year. A week ago, Halbur said he would ask for a recount because he didn’t feel confident in the unofficial results. Now, Halbur says his campaign lacks the resources and manpower to conduct a legitimate recount in this statewide race — and Halbur says the Iowa Republican Party and its leadership team failed to provide any support and resources for a recount and has abandoned his campaign.

Halbur loaned his campaign 10-thousand dollars in the last fundraising period and had about four-thousand dollars left in the bank in mid-October. Halbur did not receive financial support from the Iowa Republican Party and was not included in the campaign events Governor Kim Reynolds hosted in the weeks leading up to Election Day.

A spokesman for the Iowa Republican Party says hard-working candidates win elections by attending events, talking to voters and raising money — and the Iowa G-O-P looks forward to defeating Sand in his next election. In October, a jury awarded Halbur a million dollar settlement in his lawsuit against the State of Iowa. Halbur was fired as comptroller of the Iowa Alcoholic Beverages Division in 2018. Halbur argues he was fired for determining the state was overcharging restaurants, bars and retailers who have to buy liquor and alcohol from the state’s wholesaling agency. Attorneys for the State of Iowa are exploring an appeal of the jury’s verdict.