SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) – Authorities in Sioux City are investigating an attempted abduction near a park.
Sioux City television station KTIV reports that a 12-year-old boy told police he was walking home from Highview Park shortly after 6 p.m. on Friday when a man in a black ski mask tried to lure him into a van.

The boy reported that the van was white with a blue air freshener inside. Police are still searching for the suspect. Sioux City Police Sgt. Kevin Heineman is urging parents to remind their children not to talk to strangers and to report any suspicious activity to an adult.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – An embattled Iowa high school principal says he wants school board discussions of his firing to be aired in public. The Des Moines Register reports that Red Oak High School Principal Jedd Sherman says he has nothing to hide, and he has requested that the Red Oak School Board conduct its talks about him in an open meeting.

Sherman says the board’s efforts to fire him are retaliation for him reporting two cases of student bullying. Sherman says top school officials were also unhappy after he requested that an already-planned bathroom remodeling project be done in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

School board member have declined to discuss their reasons for trying to fire Sherman, but have refused his request to conduct their discussion in public.

Firefighters in Atlantic were called to the scene of a possible house fire early this (Monday) morning. The Cass County Communications Center dispatched the fire department to 602 Mulberry Street at 4:51-a.m., following a report of the smell of smoke in a bedroom.

Law enforcement arriving on the scene also detected a burning, electrical smell, but could not locate a fire. Fire crews determined an electrical outlet on a bedroom wall was hot. The problem was confined to the single outlet.There was no fire however, and no one was injured.

Power to the home was restored and fire crews returned to their station by around 5:25-a.m.

Sheriff’s officials in Montgomery County report the arrest Sunday evening of a Red Oak man. 43-year old Richard Bryan Jenkins was taken into custody at around 7:45-p.m., for Driving While Barred. Jenkins was brought to the Montgomery County Jail and held on $2,000 bond.