Stories from Monday, April 13, 2020

A man with “apparent gunshot wounds to his back” was located shortly after 8 p.m. Saturday in the 1000 block of South Ellis Street in Cape Girardeau, according to Cape Girardeau police Sgt. Joey Hann. The victim was conscious, Hann stated, and was transported to a local trauma center where he is currently being treated...

The Cape Girardeau office of the Better Business Bureau last week warned its Facebook followers of a scam targeting businesses that may be vulnerable because of the pandemic. Whitney Quick, regional director of the Cape BBB, spoke to small business owners in a Wednesday Facebook video warning them about phony grants offered by scammers impersonating the U.S. Small Business Administration...

The Missouri Department of Economic Development will receive $13.6 million in community development block grant (CDBG) funds from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to support Missouri's COVID-19 response efforts. "The rapid response from HUD will greatly aid us in our efforts to provide assistance to Missourians while we fight this pandemic together," said Gov. Mike Parson in announcing the CDBG funding last week...

The numbers are mind-boggling. Over a three-week period between mid-March and April 4, approximately 16.8 million American workers filed unemployment claims after being laid off by businesses that have either permanently or temporarily closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic...

Never doubt the power of Facebook. Cliff Brooks, chief financial officer of Schaefer's Electrical Enclosures in Scott City read a Facebook post recently from a friend. The friend, a nurse anesthetist concerned about COVID-19, wondered whether Schaefer's could make a sturdy yet usable intubation shield for health care workers dealing with patients suspected of having the new coronavirus...

Cape Girardeau County Public Health Center officials reported Sunday no new COVID-19 cases in the county. Positive cases in the county remained at 29. To date, 11 patients in the county have recovered from the disease, and one person died from COVID-19...

Worshippers traditionally flock to Bald Knob Cross of Peace in Alto Pass, Illinois, for the annual Easter sunrise service. The tradition was disrupted this year by the spread of the coronavirus, and the same can be said at churches around the globe. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, however, there were a few people at the cross Sunday to conduct the service and share it with the masses...

Today is Monday, April 13, the 104th day of 2020. There are 262 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On April 13, 1964, Sidney Poitier became the first black performer in a leading role to win an Academy Award for his performance in "Lilies of the Field."...

Holly Kennedy agrees to one short podcast, 10 minutes spent talking about her experience after losing her husband, Gerry. After seven years, Holly has moved on with her life. She has started dating and plans to move in with her boyfriend, Gabriel. And there are even days when she doesn’t feel Gerry’s presence in the room with her...

O Lord, may our love abound more with knowledge and all discernment. Amen.

Marshal Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto commanded the Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II until he was killed in April 1943. Despite the dialogue from the 1970 WWII film "Tora! Tora! Tora!" Yamamoto probably did not say in the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor attack, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve."...

NEW YORK -- For all the planning that went into "CBS This Morning" putting on a broadcast with its anchors working remotely, no one thought about the pillow. It sat -- slightly crookedly -- on a chair behind Gayle King in the makeshift studio set up in her family room. And that pillow, every time the camera caught it, was driving one viewer nuts...

You’ve seen the cartoons, viewed images and read stories, but it’s worth repeating: Not all superheroes wear capes. Some don scrubs. Our front-line health care workers have certainly met the challenge as the world battles COVID-19. Amber Morgan is a respiratory therapist who resides in Jackson. Now she’s in the midst of a 21-day assignment in New York where she volunteered to put her skills to use in one of the biggest coronavirus hot spots in the United States...

DENVER -- It starts with a few people letting loose with some tentative yelps. Then neighbors emerge from their homes and join, forming a roiling chorus of howls and screams that pierces the twilight to end another day's monotonous forced isolation...

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- America's roads are a lot less congested, due to coronavirus shutdowns that have kept millions of commuters, shoppers and vacationers parked at their homes. While that makes it easier to patch potholes, it also could spell trouble for road and bridge projects. The longer motorists remain off the roads, the harder it will be for states to afford repairs in the months and years ahead...

WASHINGTON -- Blood tests for the coronavirus could play a key role in deciding whether millions of Americans can safely return to work and school. But public health officials warn that the current "Wild West" of unregulated tests is creating confusion that could ultimately slow the path to recovery...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- OPEC, Russia and other oil-producing nations on Sunday finalized an unprecedented production cut of nearly 10 million barrels, or a tenth of global supply, in hopes of boosting crashing prices amid the coronavirus pandemic and a price war, officials said...

NEW YORK -- Desperate small-business owners who hoped for a quick government lifeline to help them survive the coronavirus crisis are still without funds, instead battling red tape, wary banks and swamped computer systems. Thousands of owners who applied for loans under the government's Paycheck Protection Program are in their second week of waiting for their money...

JACKSON, Miss. -- Strong storms pounded the Deep South on Sunday, killing at least six people in south Mississippi and damaging up to 300 homes and other buildings in northern Louisiana. Mississippi Emergency Management Agency director Greg Michel said one person killed was in Walthall County, two were killed in Lawrence County and three were killed in Jefferson Davis County. All three counties are more than an hour's drive south of Jackson, near the Louisiana state line...

Opal Pensel-Duncan passed away on Sunday, April 12, 2020, at the Lutheran Home in Cape Girardeau. She was born Jan. 17, 1923, in Vanita, Oklahoma, daughter of Joseph F. and Myrtle M. Duschell. Growing up in Pink Root Holler, Opal attended grade school at Indian Creek School and was a graduate of College High School in 1940. She was also a graduate of Steimle Business School...

Paul F. Pautler, 86, of Cape Girardeau died Friday, April 10, 2020, at Chateau Girardeau. He was born Feb. 7, 1934, at the family home in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, the third child and only son of Herman L. and Edna A. Petrequin Pautler. He married Hallie B. McHenry on Dec. 14, 1962, in Hogan, Missouri. She preceded him in death July 5, 2003. He married Ruth Jones McHenry on Sept. 18, 2004. She survives...

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- For the first time in its modern history, Missouri will offer an elk-hunting season later this year, with five permits drawn in a lottery. The Missouri Conservation Commission on Wednesday approved issuing four general permits to the public and one permit to a qualified land owner. The permits will be issued through a lottery...

ST. LOUIS -- Former Gov. Eric Greitens and his wife, Sheena Greitens, are divorcing, the couple announced on social media Saturday, nearly two years after Greitens resigned amid accusations he took a compromising photo of a woman without her consent during a 2015 extramarital affair...

O'FALLON, Mo. -- Charlene Gulliford at Gandy Dancer never figured there would come a day when the Michigan restaurant known for its steaks and seafood would sell toilet paper and cartons of eggs, but the coronavirus has restaurants in survival mode...

ST. LOUIS — Missouri’s health department on Sunday reported 136 more confirmed cases of coronavirus, bringing the state’s total to 4,160. The Department of Health and Senior Services reported 110 people have died from the virus in Missouri so far, up one from Saturday...

President Donald Trump slammed the World Health Organization at a news briefing last week and was immediately accused of scapegoating. Peter Baker of The New York Times tweeted that “Trump has found a new villain for the coronavirus pandemic,” and The Guardian newspaper described the president as “in an increasingly frantic effort to shift blame.”...

Cape Girardeau County Presiding Commissioner Gerald Jones couldn't imagine why people kept calling him yesterday morning hinting Kathy Swan and Pat Ruopp would resign from the Cape Girardeau School Board; under a rarely used state law, the Cape Girardeau County Commission will appoint three members to the school board; John Campbell resigned April 7, and Ruopp and Swan resigned Wednesday...

The city needs to clean out the drainage ditch from Dorothy Street where they widened the ditch between the two houses on Dorothy and put rock in wire cages to Hopper Road. Then from along Kingshighway through Arena Park, which only has a very small ditch, to the larger drainage ditch that is behind the National Guard Armory. This has been a problem for years. It shouldn’t have to be for the property owners to take care of the stormwater problems that the city has created. ...

SEMO Dining Team and Chartwells Higher Education Donate Snacks & Bottled Drinks to Local Salvation Army Despite the move to online learning, Southeast Missouri State University Dining Services continue to support students and members in the local Cape Girardeau community...