Police are investigating an overnight shooting that damaged a home in Waterloo. Neighbors called police after hearing gunfire just after 10:30 Wednesday night. Officers found bullets struck a home in the 600 block of Warren Drive. The resident was home, but no injuries were reported. Police say they don’t think the house was the intended target.
Two 13-year-old males have been charged following break-ins at Riverfront Stadium in Waterloo Wednesday night. Officers were first called to an alarm at the press box around 6 o’clock Wednesday, but the perpetrators had left the area. A second alarm came just after 10:30 p.m., this time at the stadium’s concessions stand. Officers caught the two nearby and charged them with third-degree burglary.
A longtime spokesperson for the Iowa Department of Public Health has been ousted from her job, and she thinks it was because she aggressively shared information on the coronavirus outbreak and other issues with news organizations. Polly Carver-Kimm had been the department’s lead media relations liaison for a dozen years, until she was called in Wednesday morning and told to resign or be fired. She says department director Gerd Clabaugh told her the position was being eliminated. But Carver-Kimm says it was the culmination of a pattern to diminish her role, starting in March when she was told she would no longer handle any media inquiries about the coronavirus. She worked for Waterloo radio stations early in her career before moving to Des Moines radio, before taking the DPH position.
A federal judge has denied an Iowa drug kingpin’s requests to delay his execution, which is scheduled for Friday. U.S. District Judge Leonard Strand wrote Tuesday that he would not intervene to delay Dustin Honken’s execution date due to the coronavirus pandemic. He said the Bureau of Prisons was in the best position to weigh the health risks against the benefits of carrying out the execution. Strand also denied Honken’s motion to declare his execution void due to an alleged procedural error by the government. He affirmed the executive branch’s power to set the date for executions.
Des Moines police found two bodies in a home after responding to a 911 call from a child who believed his mother had been injured. The child called 911 just after 1 p.m. Wednesday to report his mother had been hurt, prompting officers and medics to go to the home on the city’s south side. Sgt. Paul Parizek says the first-responders found the bodies of a woman and a man, and both had traumatic injuries. Parizek says a homicide investigation was underway but there didn’t appear to be a threat to the community. The names of those killed weren’t released so relatives could be notified.
Sheriff’s officials in central Nebraska have identified two men killed in a head-on crash involving a car and semitrailer as Iowa residents. The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office says in a news release that the crash happened Tuesday evening on U.S. Highway 83 about seven miles north of North Platte. Investigators say a northbound car crossed into the southbound lanes directly into the path of the truck, which tried but could not avoid a head-on crash. Deputies say both vehicles caught fire, and two men in the car died at the scene. Authorities later identified the driver killed as 32-year-old Robert Islas and his passenger as 59-year-old Gilbert Vasquez, both of Sioux City, Iowa. The truck driver suffered minor injuries.
