Region/state digest 07/24/04

Cape man pleads guilty to weapons charge

A Cape Girardeau man pleaded guilty in federal court Friday to being a previously convicted felon in possession of firearms. Derrick Williams, 23, faces a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. He will be sentenced Oct. 13. According to the court, two rifles were stolen from a car in Cape Girardeau County on June 22, 2003. On July 24, a resident took two rifles into Shooters Supply in Cape Girardeau and asked for an appraisal. The store employee recognized the rifles as those his store sold to the victim. Police traced the possession of the firearms to Williams, who later admitted that he knew the guns were stolen. Williams was convicted in 1999 in California for importation of marijuana.

First human West Nile case of 2004 confirmed

O'FALLON, Mo. -- An 8-year-old St. Charles County boy tested positive for West Nile virus, the first confirmed case in Missouri this year, health officials said Friday. The child was hospitalized after becoming ill in early July, but he's now recovering at home from the disease, caused by mosquito bites. "He's been released and he's been out playing," said Karen Yates, coordinator of the vector-borne disease program for the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services. Health officials said there was no way to determine if the child contracted the disease in Missouri or in Arizona, where the family vacationed earlier this summer.

Auditor accused of taking porn industry donations

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Gov. Bob Holden's re-election campaign on Friday accused Democratic challenger Claire McCaskill of accepting a few thousand dollars in donations from the pornography industry and called on her to return the money. Holden's campaign cited contributions to McCaskill's campaigns as long as a decade ago, when she was Jackson County's prosecutor, to as recently as March 31. Some of the donors operated strip clubs or adult entertainment shops or were lawyers defending the industry, according to Holden's campaign. McCaskill, the state auditor, said she would return some donations of which she had been unaware and which made her uncomfortable. But her campaign said Holden was trying to divert attention from issues in the Democratic primary race.

-- From staff, wire reports