Cass County Emergency Management Coordinator Mike Kennon reports the ability to call 911 has been restored for Westel phone company customers in the Anita area. The outage was originally reported to have occurred late Thursday morning, and left landlines unable to call 911.

(Radio Iowa) — There appears to be little relief from the rain in the forecast. Crews in Davenport are erecting wider and taller barriers in the same place where a temporary flood wall was breached earlier this month. Parts of SOUTHWEST Iowa were hit with heavy rain overnight Thursday into Friday morning. Montgomery County Emergency Management Coordinator Brian Hamman says rainfall amounts in and around Red Oak vary from four-to-seven inches. “All of our rivers, streams, creeks, tributaries are full,” Hamman says. “Some of them are out.”

Crews started assessing the condition of roads in the county and began putting up barricades on some roads before sunrise. Hamman says the potential for flash flooding remains if there’s more rain. “Obviously, we’ve already got a lot of rain this spring. The ground is saturated, so it’s not a good situation on our already-vulnerable roads,” Hamman says.

In Page County, a flood warning has been issued for the Nodaway River at Clarinda through Sunday afternoon. The National Weather Service said the river crested more than two feet above flood stage Friday morning.

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — A secretary at Iowa’s school for juvenile offenders has been fired after using her job to purchase pain pills from a former student who later demanded monthly payments to keep quiet about the transaction, records show. Kelly Reed lost her 19-year position at the State Training School for Boys in Eldora in March after reporting what she called a 9-month blackmail scheme to the institution and police, according to records related to her termination and request for unemployment benefits obtained by The Associated Press. The former student threatened that, if he was not paid, he would tell the school and news outlets of the purchase she made last year when she was desperate to relieve back pain, Reed alleges. In reporting the case, she said she could no longer tolerate the threats and wanted them to stop.

The Division of Criminal Investigation and the county attorney are now investigating the purchase of pills, which occurred off school grounds, and the alleged threats and payments that came afterward. So far no charges have been filed against Reed or the former student, who was not identified in the records. The State Training School is for boys ages 12 to 18 who have committed felonies involving violence or substance abuse and have been ruled delinquent. There, they can undergo a range of treatment and education programs designed to transition them back into society. The school has a history of controversy that includes assaults of employees by students and allegations that boys are placed in isolation rooms too frequently and mistreated in other ways.

At a recent hearing in her unemployment case, she testified that the former student had left the program about five years earlier and called the school in May 2018 seeking a copy of his transcript. Reed said she was suffering from pain that was unbearable at the time. She had a rapport with the ex-student and called him back to ask if he could help her obtain prescription drugs. Her doctor was planning to reduce her pain medications before she planned to enroll in a program at the Mayo Clinic in a couple months. “I was going to go to Mayo on July 9. I needed a little help to get there and asked (the former student) if he would help me out and he said yes,” Reed testified, according to audio obtained by the AP. She said she wasn’t thinking clearly because of the pain but that she knew her actions were wrong. The man got her some prescription pain medications and then “started blackmailing me once a month,” she said.

“He was going to go to my employer and the media and smear my name,” she said. Reed said after receiving a threatening text message in February of this year, she reported the alleged blackmail to leaders of the training school and was placed on paid administrative leave. She testified that she had been making the payments to protect the school, herself and her family but “I just couldn’t do it anymore, so I came forward.” Reed said that she turned over text messages and other information to the DCI.

Reed, 38, had worked at the school since 2000 and had no prior record of discipline. She testified that she did not expect to be terminated given the circumstances. She said that she completed a three-week pain rehabilitation program at Mayo and that her “life was much better” afterward, a fact confirmed in a letter from her therapist to state officials. The Department of Human Services, which operates the school, ended Reed’s employment on March 8 after an internal investigation, her termination letter shows. The department concluded that she had violated several policies, including those that bar unauthorized contact with former students and illegal conduct.

Administrative Law Judge Christine Louis denied Reed’s claim for unemployment benefits. Louis said she understands that Reed was in a “dire mental state at the time the situation occurred” but that her actions nonetheless amounted to serious misconduct. The school’s human resources supervisor, Ed Gilliand, testified at the hearing that the misconduct in Reed’s case “would kind of be off the charts” since it involved multiple violations. “It was truly an egregious act,” he said.

Montgomery County Emergency Management Director Brian Hamman reports “Unfortunately with the heavy rains that fell overnight, comes more damage to our already vulnerable secondary roadways. Crews are out assessing the damage and blocking off roads as needed. Water is starting to recede in some areas but more rain is expected through the weekend. Stay weather aware and don’t drive across flooded roadways if you encounter them.”

Photo’s by Montgomery County EMA

Hamman says current road closures include:

• A Ave between 260th x 270th
• Q Ave between 110th x 120th

Four people have been arrested in connection with a shooting incident early Thursday morning in Council Bluffs. Council Bluffs Police said today (Friday): 27-year old Tyler Raiti, of Council Bluffs, was charged with Attempted Murder, Felon in Possession of a Firearm; 29-year old Kevin White, of Council Bluffs, was charged with Attempted Murder and Burglary; 37-year old Samuel Pirowski, and 27-year old Tara Stoops, both of Council Bluffs, each face a charge of burglary.

Tara Stoops

Samuel Pirowski

Kevin White

Tyler Raiti

Council Bluffs Police Detectives, acting off tips from the public, arrested the suspects, who are believed to be responsible for the incident that happened a little after 4-a.m. Thursday, and resulted in 20-year old Carmen Hernandez being shot in the leg. The incident began when Hernandez and 19-year old Eric Martinez, who are residents of 2902 Avenue K, were awakened by the sound of someone starting one of the residents’ vehicles, which was parked in a detached garage.

They left the house to investigate, and saw three men near their garage. The three men took off running eastbound through an alley, with Hernandez in a foot pursuit. During the chase, one of the three suspects fired multiple rounds toward her from a handgun. Hernandez was struck once in the lower leg. Hernandez was taken by ambulance to Jennie Edmundson Hospital for treatment. Her injury is not life threatening. Officials say it appears the suspects were unable to steal the vehicle, because they could not open the garage door. Responding officers were initially unable to locate any of the suspects in the area.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Omaha’s sewage treatment plant is back online after severe flooding forced public works officials to shut it down and pump raw sewage into the Missouri River for a month. The Omaha World-Herald reports that the city’s Papillion Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant was knocked offline March 15, when statewide flooding forced evacuations and led to hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. The plant resumed full treatment last week.

Plant manager Dave Sykora says he thought it would take much longer to restore the plant. The flooding caused $35 million in damages at the plant and forced the Omaha Public Works Department to send raw sewage to the Missouri River for 33 days. The longest time the plant had previously released sewage into the river was for three days in 2017.

Sheriff’s officials in Union County report 49-year old Candace Rhenee Bisbee, of Creston, was arrested at 9:50-p.m. Thursday, for domestic abuse assault. Bisbee was arrested at her home in Creston, was was being held without bond for Union County in the Adams County Jail, until seen by a Judge.