POSTVILLE, Iowa (KCRG) – Four people in Postville have been arrested in connection with a Forgery and Identity Theft Investigation. With the help of ICE agents and the Allamakee County Sheriff’s Office, the Postville Police Department executed a search warrant at the 200 block of Oak Drive around 5:15 Saturday night. Multiple fraudulent documents were seized. Four people were arrested: Vilma Canahui of Postville is charged with identity theft and forgery; Wilmer Morales of Postville is charged with forgery and possession of a fictitious license and ID card of form; Carlos Marroquin of Postville is charged with forgery and possession of a fictitious license and ID card of form; and Melvin Pacheco of Postville is charged with forgery and interference with official acts. Police said the investigation is still ongoing and more charges are pending.
CORALVILLE, Iowa (KCRG) — High school students from all across the state were in Coralville this weekend battling it out with their robots. Friday and Saturday were the FIRST Tech Challenge state championships. It’s a robotics program where students design, build, and program their very own robot. This year, the teams competed by picking up and moving blocks into a bucket or onto a structure. 72 teams participated in the championship, 12 of which are from Iowa City, Cedar Rapids, Marion, Solon, and Tiffin. However, the competition is more than just building a robot. “It teaches students about STEM skills, right? Science, technology, engineering, and math. But, also, it allows them to grow their soft skills, too. Effective communication, business planning, fundraising. They also have to do some CAD,” Rebecca Whitaker, program delivery partner with FIRST Tech Challenge Iowa, said. Four teams from this competition will advance to the April world championship in Houston, Texas.
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Good luck finding tickets for the Indiana Fever pre-season game against Brazil at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in May. Within 37 minutes of being made available to season ticket holders and donors Thursday, all the seats were snatched up. Iowa went to great lengths to ensure that so-called “bots” were not the ones buying the tickets and selling them for high prices. The words “Sold Out’ are plastered on the doors to Carver-Hawkeye Arena and the team website for tickets to see Hawkeye legend Cailin Clark and her Indiana Fever take on the Brazil women’s team in a pre-season game. School leaders said they didn’t have much say in ticket sales but were able to negotiate for season ticket holders and donors to have first access. One of the reasons was to keep bots or outside investors from buying all the tickets and selling them. The worry is those bots would then turn around and sell those tickets for exorbitant amounts of money. Iowa has eliminated more than 200 accounts in the last two years because they were brokers or people buying for the sole purpose of selling the tickets at higher prices. A bill in the Iowa legislature would stop investors from buying tickets for resale.
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – Cedar Rapids police are investigating after a dead body was found on the city’s southwest side on Friday. Police were called to the 2100 block of Westdale Drive Southwest at around 8:30 a.m. on Friday. Officers said they found a dead person outside. Investigators are asking that anyone with information regarding the person, or anyone with video footage from the area, call 319-286-5491.
