(Sac City, Iowa) – Officials with the Sac County Attorney’s Office report a man from Lytton was sentenced Monday to four consecutive 10-year prison sentences, after being convicted on four Class-C felony counts of Lascivious Acts with a Minor. According to the report, the victim of Antonio Pharms was under the age of 14 when the offenses were committed.

Pharms was ordered by District Court Judge Derek Johnson, to immediately begin serving his sentences, the maximum allowed by law. He was also be placed on the Iowa Sex Offender Registry for the remainder of his life.

The crime was investigated by the Sac County Sheriff’s Office and prosecuted by Sac County Attorney Ben Smith.

Publicly accessible court file information on this and other cases, can be found HERE.

(Red Oak, Iowa) – Officials with the Red Oak Police Department report the arrest at around 11-a.m. Tuesday, of  a man wanted on a Red Oak P-D warrant for 5th Degree Theft.  32-year-old Cody Robert Cunningham, of Grandview, MO., was taken to the Montgomery County Jail and held on $300 cash bond.

(Glenwood, Iowa) – Police in Glenwood report a man from Glenwood was arrested today (Tuesday), for Possession of Marijuana/3rd offense. 58-year-old Ralph Springs was being held in the Mills County Jail on a $2,000 cash or surety bond.

DES MOINES, IA – The U-S Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa reports that on November 2, 2023, a Des Moines man was sentenced to 32 years in prison after pleading guilty to the crime of transportation of child pornography and two additional years for violating his term of federal supervised release.

In 2022, Adam Christopher Evans, 39, amassed an extensive collection of child sexual abuse material. Over several months, Evans stockpiled over 500 images and 69 videos depicting the sexual exploitation of children, including infants and toddlers.

In 2021, Evans was convicted in federal court of failure to register as a sex offender. He was required to register as a sex offender because of a 2011 conviction for sexual exploitation of a minor under Iowa law. Evan’s supervised release was revoked, and he was sentenced to two years consecutive to his 32-year sentence.

Following his prison term, Evans will be required to serve 10 years of supervised release. There is no parole in the federal system.

Homeland Security Investigations and the United States Probation Office investigated this case. Assistant United States Attorney Laura M. Roan prosecuted the case.

The case was prosecuted as part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s “Project Safe Childhood” initiative, which was started in 2006 as a nationwide effort to combine law enforcement investigations and prosecutions, community action, and public awareness in order to reduce the incidence of sexual exploitation of children. For more information about Internet safety education, please visit https://www.justice.gov/psc and click on the resources tab.

The Holocaust Rails exhibit at the Sioux City Railroad Museum has become a busy place for student tours. Lou Ann Linblade help create the exhibit that is a replica of the cattle cars that the Nazis used to transport European Jews to concentration camps.

The exhibit opened in the fall of 2022 and Linblade says they offer a special lesson plan to teachers based on the exhibit displays.

The exhibit was created as part of “Tolerance Week” and includes photos of Holocaust camp prisoners and video displays, along with numerous items donated by concentration camp survivors and their families.

(Glenwood, Iowa) – Sheriff’s officials in Mills County report two men were recently arrested on separate drug charges. 18-year-old Anthony Emmaunel-Dwight Vassar, of Saint Joseph, MO., was arrested at around 11:10-p.m. Monday following  a traffic stop on I-29 at mile marker 43. Vassar was charged with Possession of Controlled Substance. His bond was set at  $1,000. And, at around 3-p.m. Monday, 31-year-old Keith Allen Wise, of Council Bluffs, was arrested at 287th and 3rd Streets in Mills County, for  Possession of Controlled Substance, Domestic Abuse Assault 1st and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia. Wise was being held without bond in the Mills County Jail.

At around 10:37-p.m. Monday, Mills County Deputies arrested 43-year-old Renne Lynn Adams, of Hastings, for OWI/1st offense. Her bond was set at $1,000.

Iowans are finishing up their lawn care for the fall with raking leaves, mulching and aerating, and as they prep for the winter ahead, one expert suggests they consider planting more than just grass next year. Botanist Paul Koch (COKE) says a flowering lawn is a good way to help the environment — as well as bees and monarchs.

Koch says these so-called “bee lawns” look nice while helping to make your property more sustainable.

Koch says just doing a “No Mow May” is not going to help bees and insects if your lawn has no flowers to help feed them.

State Banking Superintendent Jeff Plagge (PLAG-ee) says the Sac City bank he declared insolvent on Friday had heavy losses on some of its loans to commercial trucking firms.

Citizens Bank in Sac City reopened Monday as a branch of Iowa Trust and Savings Bank of Emmetsburg. An August court order identified some Citizens Bank loans to the trucking industry as higher risk than the bank had previously disclosed and Plagge says that sped up the already scheduled examination of the bank’s portfolio.

Plagge says they’re not seeing similar issues at other Iowa banks.

Trucking firms continue to face a shortage of drivers and supply chain issues, as well as high operating costs. Plagge, who was a commercial banker for 42 years, says there’s no reason to be concerned about the viability of Iowa banks in general.

Plagge has been state banking superintendent since September of 2019. Citizens Bank in Sac City was founded in 1929. Iowa Trust and Savings Bank in Emmetsburg acquired the bank’s nearly 59 MILLION dollars in deposits as well as all available loans.

The Board of Regents will hear a report from the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) study group at its meeting next week. Dar Danielson reports.

The D-E-I review is required by a bill the governor signed into law in June

Another potential federal government shutdown looms in ten days, and Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley predicts there will -not- be an agreement reached by November 17th, so another stopgap measure will be required to again extend the deadline. Grassley, a Republican, says progress is being made in both chambers.

Mike Johnson was elected as the new House Speaker on October 25th, less than a month after the Senate passed the House stopgap bill to avoid a government shutdown, pushing the deadline to November 17th. Grassley is certain the budget work won’t be finished by then.

During a Radio Iowa interview in late September, Grassley said it was “idiocy” to be going through this process again, with threatened shutdowns, but an accord on spending remains elusive in November.

A government shutdown would impact millions of federal workers, though many others would be forced to work without pay. In the past, they’ve always gotten back pay once the government restarts, but Grassley says there’s no guarantee that would happen.