CHARLESTON, West Virginia (AP) — Five state attorneys general have announced new lawsuits against the maker of OxyContin as they seek to hold the drug industry responsible for an opioid crisis. Filings were announced Thursday by officials in Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, West Virginia and Wisconsin. With the suits, 45 states are now taking legal action against OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma, asserting that the company downplayed the addiction risks of its powerful prescription drug.

Several states are also other drugmakers or distributors. Pennsylvania’s attorney general also announced a suit this week against Purdue, saying the company was not working in good faith on a settlement agreement. Purdue disputes that. The company had a legal win this month when a North Dakota judge dismissed that state’s claim against the company.

URBANDALE, Iowa (AP) — Officials say a Powerball ticket worth $2 million was bought at a convenience store in the Des Moines suburb of Urbandale. The ticket bought at a Kum & Go on 156th Street matched the first five numbers drawn Wednesday night but missed the Powerball number and a chance of winning the $250.3 million jackpot. The ticket buyer has yet to step forward.

Iowa Lottery says the buyer also purchased the Power Play option, which multiplied the normal $1 million prize to $2 million. No one won the jackpot, so it’s expected to climb to around $270 million for Saturday’s drawing. Wednesday’s winning numbers were 7, 17, 33, 61, 68 and Powerball 4.

MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa (AP) — Authorities say an 8-year-old boy died at a Des Moines hospital after being struck by a vehicle while crossing a street in Marshalltown. Police say officers and medics were dispatched to the accident site around 3:30 p.m. Wednesday. The injured boy was taken to a Marshalltown hospital before being flown to Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines. Police say he died there later.

Police say the boy was crossing West Main Street on his way home from Franklin Elementary School when he was hit by a vehicle that was turning onto West Main from South 13th Street. His name hasn’t been released. The vehicle driver has been identified as 71-year-old Marilyn Diggins, of Marshalltown.

(Radio Iowa) — Near-record heat is in today’s (Thursday) forecast, with 80s expected across northern Iowa and low 90s for Iowa’s southern half. With the hot, humid air comes the greater risk of severe weather. Meteorologist Brooke Hagenhoff, at the National Weather Service in metro Des Moines, says some areas may see summer-like temperatures 20-degrees hotter than usual. “While we’ve been cooler-than-normal for most of May so far, it’s a pretty big change here, especially today, the warmest day in our seven-day forecast,” Hagenhoff says. “It’s really due to the increased southerly flow which is allowing warmer air to come up across the Southern United States and into Iowa.”

With the dramatic change as we shift from cooler to much warmer weather, there’s always the risk of rough weather, including powerful thunderstorms. “For today, we’re looking at a risk over mainly central and northern Iowa and the main threat with that is going to be hail and possibly damaging winds,” Hagenhoff says. “That will be mostly confined to this evening and tonight.” Many Iowans are rarely very far from their smart phones, which can be set up to provide you with potentially-life-saving weather data. “We know that with the warmer weather, after the cool start to spring, a lot of people are antsy to get outside,” Hagenhoff says. “It’s important that whether you have outdoor plans or not that you have ways while you’re outside to receive severe weather warnings and information, just so you’re prepared.”

The weather should cool a bit Friday and Saturday, she says, with highs by Sunday only creeping into the 60s. On the subject of severe weather, Iowa saw 69 tornadoes touch down last year. So far this year, there hasn’t been a single twister reported statewide.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — An Iowa City man has been given 25 years in prison for beating to death his father. Johnson County District Court records say 31-year-old Flannery Kennedy-Meier was sentenced Tuesday after pleading guilty to attempted murder. Prosecutors had reduced the charge from first-degree murder in exchange for Kennedy-Meier’s plea.

Kennedy-Meier was arrested Nov. 13, 2017, after police were called to an Iowa City residence and found the injured Meier. Officers say Kennedy-Meier had hit his father in the head with a weapon, causing a skull fracture and brain bleeding.

Meier died of his injuries on Dec. 4, 2017, and an autopsy blamed the November beating.

The Iowa Department of Transportation will hold a public information meeting Tuesday, June 4th to discuss the proposed improvements to the I-80 bridges over the South Raccoon and North Raccoon Rivers and the Old Portland Road bridge in Dallas County. Traffic north of I-80 would be detoured during construction using 323rd Place and U.S. 169. Traffic south of I-80 would be detoured using 347th Street and U.S. 169.

All interested persons are invited to attend this meeting anytime between 4:30 and 6 p.m. at the De Soto Intermediate School, 317 Spruce Street, in De Soto. The meeting will be conducted utilizing an open forum format. Iowa DOT staff will be present to informally discuss the proposed improvements. No formal presentation will be made. The meeting space is accessible for persons with disabilities. However, if you require special accommodations at the meeting, please notify Scott Suhr, transportation planner, Iowa DOT District 4 Office in Atlantic, by calling 712-243-3355, 1-800-289-4368, (or by email scott.suhr@iowadot.us), by no later than May 31st.

The Pottawattamie County Sheriff’s Office reports 48-year old Patrick John Shea turned himself-in to the Sheriff’s Office, Wednesday. Shea was found to have had a warrant out of Council Bluffs, for Assault with intent to inflict serious injury. He was placed under arrest and transported to the jail. An inmate at the Pott. County Jail, 38-year old Jason Joseph Nichols, of Council Bluffs, was presented with a warrant, Wednesday, for Domestic Abuse Assault/Strangulation, and Harassment in the 1st degree/threaten forcible felony. Nichols was returned to the custody of corrections staff.

Another jail inmate, 28-year old Ryan Patrick Mickey, of Carter Lake, was presented with a warrant for Violation of Probation, Wednesday. He was also returned to the custody of jail staff. And, 39-year old Shannon Rae Cotnoir, was transported from a jail in Kansas City, KS, to the Pott. County Jail, Wednesday. Cotnoir was wanted on a Pott. County warrant for Violation of Probation.

More State and area news from KJAN News Director Ric Hanson.

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(Radio Iowa) — A new report says Iowa’s infrastructure is in urgent need of investment. Paul Skoutelas, president and C-E-O of the American Public Transportation Association, says a study of things like roads, bridges and airports nationwide gives our public transit systems a letter grade of D-minus.  “It’s reflective of the existing condition of our bus fleets and that certainly applies in Iowa, the stations, the facilities in general, and says that we need to make a larger investment,” Skoutelas says.

The study identifies a 232-billion dollar backlog in needed infrastructure investment nationwide, but did not provide a specific figure for Iowa. Skoutelas says some Iowa communities with bus systems haven’t upgraded them in many years, and he singles out Dubuque, Sioux City and Cedar Rapids. Skoutelas says, “As it relates to Iowa, we’re talking about investments to replace their bus fleets, to replace their stations, their facilities that help provide the service every day to their customers.”

While many buses operate on diesel, he says advances with ground transportation, including light rail, are much less reliant on fossil fuels. “We’ve got a big movement going on in the country towards electricification,” Skoutelas says. “More and more cities are going to alternate propulsion systems, whether it’s compressed natural gas and in many cases now, electricification, that takes new investment to make that happen and the infrastructure to support that.”

This spring’s flooding caused significant damage to roads and bridges in Iowa, especially in the southwest. Skoutelas says it’s clear the infrastructure needs to have resiliency built-in in order to weather Mother Nature’s extremes. “That also points to the need to be able to provide emergency-related services,” Skoutelas says. “We’ve had a number of cities and transit agencies that have been called into service in these kinds of situations to do evacuations to make sure people are placed out of harm’s way.”

The report claims an investment in infrastructure brings a four-to-one return in economic activity over the next 20 years.

(Radio Iowa) — The state Transportation Commission has approved the latest draft of its five-year Transportation Improvement Program. D-O-T spokesman Stuart Anderson says they expect to have around three-point-five BILLION dollars available — which is similar to past years.  “It stays relatively stable from year-to-year. The last significant change in the amount of money that is available for the commission to spend on the state highway system increased back in 2015 when the legislature passed the fuel tax increase And that provided about 100 million dollars a year in additional revenue,” Anderson says.

Some projects are completed and drop out of the plan every year and Anderson says new projects are then added to the fifth year. That includes several corridor projects this year — including the final stretch of two-lane expansion of Highway 61 in southwest Iowa. “A project to build a bypass of Missouri Valley on U-S 30, which would also include not only a bypass, but includes some levee work in the Missouri Valley area, because the bypass would act as a levee. Also allowed them to add the replacement of the Iowa 9 Mississippi River bridge crossing up in Lansing — which would be a joint project with the state of Wisconsin,” Anderson says.

And there is a project planned for Highway 63. “A northwest bypass of the city of Oskaloosa,” according to Anderson, “to try to get some of the semi traffic out of the central business district of the city.” The plan also includes interstate projects that include I-29 reconstruction in Sioux City, six-lane improvements on I-35 in Polk and Story Counties, the I-74 Mississippi River Bridge replacement in Bettendorf, the I-80/380 Interchange reconstruction near Iowa City, six-lane improvements on I-80 in Johnson and Cedar Counties, I-380 in Hiawatha for the Tower Terrace Interchange, and the I-80/I-29 system in Council Bluffs. Millions of dollars in damage was done to road this year by flooding — but Anderson says that is not something that’s included in this plan. “Roads that have been impacted by flooding are typically addressed outside of the five-year program. And those are typically covered with federal emergency relief funding,” Anderson explains.

You can see the entire plan online. “It is available on the Iowa D-O-T website. So, it is available for public review and comment. And all comments will be shared with the commission, and at their meeting June 11th, they will take action on the final five-year program,” Anderson says. A majority of the fund for the highway program comes from the federal government.