Stories from Tuesday, May 15, 2018

A section of Bloomfield Road will be closed to traffic from Thursday afternoon until Friday morning for storm sewer repair, city officials said in a news release. Bloomfield Road will be shut down from South Broadview Street to Golden Street, starting at 4 p.m. Thursday. It will reopen at 6 a.m. Friday, weather and work permitting, city officials said...

In the former AMC Town Plaza 5 Cinema, construction is barreling along ahead of a late-summer open date for retail hardware store Harbor Freight. The 15,000-square-foot location will employ about 35 to 40 people, according to a company news release sent Monday. Harbor Freight has more than 850 stores nationwide, and was founded in 1977 in California...

Staff members cleaning, planning, stocking paper goods, technicians counting and running lines, workers’ equipment whining — a flurry of activity indoors and out at the new Buffalo Wild Wings location at 211 Siemers Drive in Cape Girardeau shows they’re on track to open Friday...

The Missouri Legislature has restored funding for autism services as part of the fiscal 2019 budget approved last week, much to the relief of area providers, local lawmakers and those receiving such services. Lawmakers restored $3.7 million in state funding for the Missouri Autism Project and budgeted $200,000 for the Tailor Institute in Cape Girardeau, which had lost all of its state funding last year in what state Sen. Wayne Wallingford called “an oversight.”...

Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley recommended today that David Robinson be released from prison after the Missouri Supreme Court had earlier ruled that Robinson's constitutional rights had been violated during his murder trial. In a letter to Scott County Prosecutor Paul Boyd, Hawley wrote that "this office recommends that the pending criminal charges against David Robinson be dismissed and he be released from the custody of Jefferson City (Missouri) Correctional Center."...

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- David Robinson walked away a free man Monday night, after nearly 18 years of being incarcerated for a murder he did not commit. His exoneration, which began May 1, was completed late Monday after some fierce legal wrangling. Finally, close to 10 p.m., the Department of Corrections relented its position. It temporarily argued the Supreme Court had ordered Robinson to be held for 30 days or for there to be a retrial...

Today in History Today is Tuesday, May 15, the 135th day of 2018. There are 230 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On May 15, 1968, two days of tornado outbreaks began in 10 Midwestern and Southern states; twisters were blamed for 72 deaths, including 45 in Arkansas and 18 in Iowa...

When was the last time something reminded you how fragile life is? For me, it was a little more than a week ago. A 44-year-old friend left his home for a walk and never returned. Just like that, he was gone. Originally, the report was that a distracted, texting driver hit and killed Steve Flesher of Illinois. ...

Coal is in the news again, thanks to the Trump Administration. But this time there's a new wrinkle. The administration is aiming for a high-tech approach that could appeal to climate change activists looking to secure realistic reductions in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. And for a state like Missouri, which relied on coal for roughly 80 percent of its electricity last year, this could be significant...

The Cape Girardeau City Council recently selected Ryan Essex as the temporary Ward 5 Cape Girardeau City Council member. The council seat was previously held by Bob Fox who was elected mayor in April. There were two candidates for the temporary position, Essex and Eric "Red" Redinger...

President Trump was elected in part on a promise to "drain the swamp" and change the way things had been done in Washington. One of the targets he hit hard in his campaign was the ridiculous profits drug companies were making and promised to work to change that. His "program" was recently released, and it is a joke...

It is believed by most people that mental health is just as important as physical health. Despite this, many people don't know how to have a conversation about it. Talking about mental health can be awkward, but it can really help. If you find a loved one in a mental health crisis, seize the awkward!...

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — A book nearly five decades overdue has been returned to the San Francisco Public Library. The copy of Eldridge Cleaver’s memoir “Soul On Ice” was due back at the Eureka Valley branch Dec. 9, 1970, making it 47 years, four months and 29 days late. ...

ST. LOUIS -- Missouri residents may see political signs in areas where they previously were restricted under new legislation. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported lawmakers passed a bill last week to prohibit homeowners' associations from banning political signs in some suburban subdivisions. The measure bars deed restrictions, covenants or other binding agreements not allowing political signs to be displayed...

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- From childhood onward, Eric Greitens has been ambitious. He's been a scholar, humanitarian, military officer, charity executive, author and public speaker. Now Missouri's governor, Greitens was facing trial this week on a felony invasion-of-privacy charge stemming from an extramarital affair. No trial date has been set on a second felony charge of tampering with computer data for using a charity donor list for his political campaign...

BAGHDAD -- In the years following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the young cleric Moqtada al-Sadr burst onto the scene as a renegade champion of poorer Shiites, leading militant fighters who carried out deadly attacks on American forces and were notorious for sectarian killings against Sunni Muslims...

MUNICH -- Charging an electric car away from home can be an exercise in uncertainty -- hunting for a lonely station at the back of a rest-area parking lot and hoping it's working. In Europe, some of the biggest automakers are out to remove such anxieties from the battery-only driving experience and encourage electric-vehicle sales by building a highway network of fast-charging stations. ...

BERLIN -- European intelligence chiefs warned Monday Russia is actively seeking to undermine their democracies by disinformation, cyberattacks and more traditional means of espionage. The heads of Britain and Germany's domestic intelligence agencies, as well as the European Union and NATO's top security officials, pinpointed Moscow as the prime source of hybrid threats to Europe, citing attempts to manipulate elections, steal sensitive data and spark a coup in Montenegro. ...

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip -- In a jarring contrast, Israeli forces shot and killed at least 55 Palestinians and wounded more than 1,200 during mass protests Monday along the Gaza border, while just a few miles away Israel and the U.S. held a festive inauguration ceremony for the new American Embassy in contested Jerusalem...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- A 72-year-old former police officer accused of being one of California's most elusive serial killers appeared in a courtroom cage used for defendants in jail Monday as a judge put off a decision on whether to release search and arrest warrants in the case...

PAHOA, Hawaii -- People nixing vacations to Hawaii's Big island has cost the tourism industry millions of dollars as the top attraction, Kilauea volcano, keeps spewing lava. Cancellations from May through July have hit at least $5 million, said Ross Birch, executive director of the island's tourism board...

WASHINGTON -- First lady Melania Trump underwent a "successful" procedure Monday to treat a benign kidney condition and was expected to remain hospitalized for the rest of the week, her staff said. President Donald Trump took a helicopter to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to visit her and tweeted his wife was in "good spirits."...

WASHINGTON -- Immigration officials have sharply increased audits of companies to verify their employees are authorized to work in the country, signaling the Trump administration's crackdown on illegal immigration is reaching deeper into the workplace to create a "culture of compliance" among employers who rely on immigrant labor...

JERUSALEM -- The opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem attracted more than a dozen Republican members of Congress, two billionaire GOP fundraisers and the president's eldest daughter, putting on a display of political muscle and Republican unity rare for the Trump era...

WASHINGTON -- A long-running dispute between American regulators and Chinese telecom company ZTE may have handed President Donald Trump some unexpected leverage in avoiding a trade war with Beijing. Trump's tweet Sunday he was working with President Xi Jinping of China to put ZTE "back into business, fast" after U.S. sanctions threatened ZTE's existence and 70,000 Chinese jobs caught many trade-watchers by surprise...

MADRID -- Lawmakers in Catalonia elected a fervent separatist as the new chief of the restive region Monday, ending a leadership vacuum of more than six months and setting the scene for more confrontations with the Spanish government. Quim Torra, a former corporate lawyer who went on to lead a prominent pro-secession group, vowed to build an independent Catalan republic by working under the leadership of his fugitive predecessor, Carles Puigdemont...

SURABAYA, Indonesia -- The Muslim family carrying out suicide attacks on three churches in Indonesia's second-largest city, killing a dozen people as well as its two young daughters, lived comfortably in an upper-middle class suburb and was on friendly terms with a Christian neighbor...

CAPE GIRARDEAU The Cape Girardeau Fire Department responded to the following calls: Friday n Medical assists were made at 12:35 a.m. on Vantage Drive, 8:33 a.m. on North Sprigg Street, 9:53 a.m. on South Silver Springs Road, 10:03 a.m. on Boxwood Drive and 5:26 p.m. on South Sprigg Street...

NEW YORK -- The World Health Organization has released a plan to help countries wipe out trans fats from the global food supply in the next five years. The United Nations agency has in the past pushed to exterminate infectious diseases, but now it's aiming to erase a hazard linked to chronic illness...

The annual May worship service is conducted at 172-year-old Apple Creek Presbyterian Church near Pocahontas in the morning, with the Rev. Bill Bernauer, a supply pastor at Lutesville (Missouri) Presbyterian Church, preaching the sermon; this historic church no longer serves a congregation, but is maintained and kept active through the Apple Creek Memorial Association...

Doris Lee Vangilder, 95, of Jackson passed away Sunday, May 13, 2018, at Saint Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau. She was born April 11, 1923, in Cape Girardeau, daughter of Eula Abernathy. Eula later married Clarence Ludwig and together they raised Doris. She and Ray S. Vangilder were married Nov. 29, 1941. He passed away May 7, 1991...

MORLEY, Mo. -- Stanley Rampley Jr., 42, of Morley died Thursday, May 10, 2018, at his home. A graveside service will be held at 1:30 p.m. today at Gravel Hill Cemetery in Bloomfield, Missouri, with the Rev. Gary Cooper officiating. Ford and Sons Funeral Home in Benton, Missouri, is in charge of arrangements...

Roy W. "Bud" McGuire, 89, of Cape Girardeau, formerly of Gordonville, passed away Saturday, May 12, 2018, at the Missouri Veterans Home in Cape Girardeau, where he had been a resident since 2012. He was born July 18, 1928, in Gordonville, son of Bern Frank and Bessie Marie Quade McGuire. He and Virginia LaVerne Dalton were married April 21, 1950. She passed away March 3, 1999...

CHAFFEE, Mo. -- Barbara Lee Lewis, 69, of Chaffee passed away Monday, May 14, 2018, at Saint Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau. She was born April 24, 1949, in Galveston, Texas, to the late Maple Franklin and Betty Jean Wright McClard. She married Marion Robert Lewis in 2015, and he preceded her in death June 22, 2017...

PERRYVILLE, Mo. -- Richard L. LaRose, 59, of Perryville died Sunday, May 13, 2018, at Perry County Memorial Hospital in Perryville. Visitation will be from 4 to 8 p.m., with a firefighters wake at 7 p.m. Wednesday and from 6:30 to 10 a.m. Thursday at Young and Sons Funeral Home in Perryville...

WASHINGTON -- A decision by the Supreme Court means American sports fans will soon have many more places to place legal bets on the results of football, baseball, basketball, hockey and other games. Five states have the edge in the race to legalize sports betting because they already passed laws contingent on the Supreme Court striking down the 1992 federal ban on such gambling, which the court did Monday. ...

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court gave its go-ahead Monday for states to allow gambling on sports across the nation, striking down a federal law barring betting on football, basketball, baseball and other sports in most states. The justices voted 6-3 to strike down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, a 1992 law forbidding state-authorized sports gambling with some exceptions. It made Nevada the only state where a person could wager on the results of a single game...

Father God, we are forever grateful for your glorious love. Amen.

CNN reports that the Democrats'' Congressional generic ballot lead has gone from 16 points in February to 6 points in March and is now a tie. And 60 percent now feel things are "going well" in the country. One can only hope that the Democrats keep parading out those angry spokespersons of Schumer, Pelosi, and Harris to regurgitate the only thing on the Democrat platform: Russia...

DIAMOND, Mo. -- The remains of a U.S. Navy sailor killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii have been returned to Missouri to be buried with full military honors. Clifford George Goodwin had been resting in a common grave at the National Cemetery of the Pacific in Hawaii for decades, the Springfield News-Leader reported...

LOS ANGELES -- Margot Kidder, who starred as Lois Lane opposite Christopher Reeve in the "Superman" film franchise of the 1970s and 1980s, has died. Kidder died Sunday at her home in Livingston, Montana, according to a notice on the website of Franzen-Davis Funeral Home. She was 69...

Daughter to Jacob Michael and Nicole Marie Klassen of Perryville, Missouri, Saint Francis Medical Center, 11:13 p.m. Tuesday, April 17, 2018. Name, Lacey Marie. Weight, 6 pounds. Second child, first daughter. Mrs. Klassen is the former Nicole Cavins, daughter of Shelly Moore of Perryville and the late Terry Cavins. ...

A state audit of Scott County government has begun, Missouri Auditor Nicole Galloway said Monday. The county’s most recent audit was released in December 2014. The county government, at that time, received an overall performance rating of “fair,” Galloway said in a news release...

ST. LOUIS -- Gov. Eric Greitens declared victory Monday as prosecutors abruptly dropped a felony invasion-of-privacy charge alleging he had taken a revealing photo of a woman with whom he has acknowledged having an affair. The St. Louis circuit attorney's office said it hopes still to pursue the case, either through a special prosecutor or an appointed assistant. But Greitens' attorneys said the case was crumbling under a lack of evidence and doubted any charge would be refiled...