A traffic stop Wednesday afternoon in Fremont County resulted in the arrest of two men on charges of Harboring a Runaway. At around 3:15-p.m., a deputy with the Fremont County K9 Unit stopped a black 1999 Honda Accord for a registration violation near the 15-mile marker of southbound Interstate 29 near the Percival exit.

During the investigation, it was determined that a 15-year old female located in the vehicle was listed as a missing juvenile out of Granite Falls, MN. Deputies arrested 20-year old Tyjuan Brown and 18-year old Caleb Smith, both of Tulsa, Oklahoma, for Harboring a Runaway, an aggravated misdemeanor. Smith was also charged with Possession of Marijuana 2nd Offense. Both men were being held at the Fremont County Jail on $2,000 bond.

Caleb Smith

Tyjuan Brown

The Fremont County K9 and the Iowa Department of Transportation assisted the Fremont County Sheriff’s Office.

Police in Council Bluffs Wednesday afternoon released still frame images of an Isuzu Rodeo believed to have been involved in an accident that sent six people to the hospital Tuesday evening, one of them critically.

Possible suspect vehicle involved in the crash

The accident happened in the 3400 block of Veterans Memorial Highway (VMH) at around 6:22-p.m. Authorities say 29-year old Anna Sanchez, of Omaha,  was driving a 2004 Ford Explorer was eastbound on the VMH, approaching 35th Street, when the suspect vehicle, a red Isuzu Rodeo with a spare tire on the back, pulled out in front of her. To avoid striking the SUV, Sanchez tried to swerve around the vehicle. He SUV began rotating clockwise and entered the south ditch before it rolled over and came to rest on its roof.

There were a total of eight accident victims, all of whom are from Omaha. One of the victims, 16-year old Rosa Sanchez, suffered critical injuries. Seven-year old Gendri Ramirez Sanchez suffered a non-life threatening injury. Both were transported to the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.

The driver, and three other passengers ages three, 15 and 17, suffered minor injuries ranging from a bumps and bruises to a broken arm.

The Council Bluffs Police Traffic Unit is conducting an investigation into the crash. Anyone with information regarding the Isuzu Rodeo is asked to contact police at 712‐328‐4948 or 712‐328‐STOP.

A Red Oak man was arrested by Red Oak Police on Wednesday afternoon on a valid Red Oak PD warrant for Breach of Peace.  52-year-old Scottie Allen Cetnar of Red Oak was arrested at 1:38pm in the 100 Block of West Washington Street in Red Oak.  Cetnar was taeken to the Montgomery County Jail and held on $300 cash bond.

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa (AP) – A school for the deaf in Council Bluffs has held its 20th memorial service for deceased students and staff buried on its campus. The Daily Nonpareil reports that Shirley Hicks held a memorial service for the former Iowa School for the Deaf members Tuesday as she told stories about each of the 10 people who were buried on campus between 1879 and 1900. Hicks is a former student and teacher at the school, and she now works as a volunteer to preserve the institution’s history.

The graves were moved in the 1950s to accommodate the widening of a nearby highway. Today, the remains have been relocated to a common casket on the school grounds and marked with a monument. Nine of the headstones are preserved in the school’s museum.

Members of the Cass County Board of Review appeared before the Cass County Board of Supervisors this (Wednesday) morning, to address any concerns they may have, and those of the public, with regard to property assessments in the County. Review Board Chair Melissa Ihnen, said they welcome the opportunity to talk with any taxpayer who has issues with their assessments.

She said “There’s a certain time when a protest can be filed, and we want to make sure that the process continues to be open, or that people can do it [protest], because that’s why that process is there. In the past, we’ve lowered peoples’ assessments, we’ve kept them the same, and in some instances if there’s been major changes to a property we go look at, unfortunately sometimes it does have to be raised to make it like everyone else’s. That’s our goal, is keep all the assessments so we’re doing the same thing to everyone who has a similar type of property. And then we look at the sales.”

She says there are misconceptions out there, about what the Board of Review can do, and how they react to complaints. Ihnen says a taxpayer told them they were told by someone on the Board of Supervisors, that the Board of Review would “Run all over them, if they came and talked to us.” Ihnen says that’s not true, that they are more than happy to help people understand the process and take care of their concerns.

She said the current inventory of homes in Cass County is “Extremely low, lower than it’s been for many, many years, so prices are high. They’re going up, even in two years, we’ve seen big increases in sales prices. Ihnen said the State looks at those prices, and the Assessor’s Office is required to be within a certain percentage of those sales.

She asked the Supervisors to direct persons with complaints or concerns to anyone on the Board of Review. She said they won’t be adversarial and raise your taxes just because you come before them to protest your assessments.