National Roundup

New York Fatal car crash results in $2.7 million settlement CORTLAND, N.Y. (AP) - A central New York automobile accident that killed seven people in 2013 has resulted in a $2.7 million settlement. The Post-Standard of Syracuse reports 33-year-old Shawn Mead, the lone survivor of a minivan carrying eight people, will receive $1.4 million under the settlement. The remaining $1.3 million will go to the estates of the seven victims, including four children. The crash occurred after a tractor-trailer came apart and the trailer struck the minivan on Route 13 in rural Truxton in Cortland County. Sheriff's investigators determined a broken locking mechanism on the tractor's rig was responsible. Mead was traveling with his two children, his girlfriend, her two daughters and two others. Court documents say Mead hasn't returned to work due to his injuries and suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and survivor's guilt. Massachusetts Judge: Mother competent to stand trial WORCESTER, Mass. (AP) - The mother of a 5-year-old boy whose remains were found last year wrapped in a blanket and packed in a suitcase by the side of Massachusetts highway has been deemed competent to stand trial. A Worcester judge ruled Wednesday that Elsa Oliver will stand trial on assault, kidnapping and child endangerment charges. Her former boyfriend, Alberto Sierra Jr., faces similar charges. The ruling was based off testimony from a court-appointed psychologist who spoke on the state of Oliver's mental health. She said that Oliver understands the charges against her and is able to assist her lawyer in her defense. The remains of Jeremiah Oliver were found in April 2014 on Interstate 190 in Sterling after he was missing for months. No one has been charged in connection to the homicide. New York Man charged with stealing hearse at funeral BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) - A 28-year-old man has been charged with stealing a hearse from outside a Buffalo church while a funeral was underway. Joe Brown of Buffalo tells that he was among the pallbearers carrying his father's casket out of St. Michael's Roman Catholic Church on Wednesday morning when the funeral director told them the hearse was gone. Brown's family had to wait a half hour for another hearse to arrive. Police recovered the hearse about two hours later in nearby North Tonawanda. A Niagara Falls man has been charged in connection with the theft. @ROUND UP Tagline:New York Ex-investment exec gets prison for fraud scheme NEW YORK (AP) - A former New York investment executive has been sentenced to 21 months in prison and $10 million in restitution for a scheme that caused the collapse of an Oklahoma insurance company. Allen Reichman of Irvington, New York, was sentenced Wednesday in Manhattan. He'd pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Reichman worked for an unidentified investment bank and financial services company. U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara (buh-RAH'-ruh) says Reichman and others schemed to defraud the New York firm into providing a $30 million loan to finance the purchase of Oklahoma-based Providence Property and Casualty Insurance Company. After that, they lied to get Oklahoma insurance regulators to approve the purchase. Reichman got at least $200,000 in commissions. The insurance company collapsed in 2009 because of the loan. Three other men previously pleaded guilty. Delaware No dismissal of suit challenging GPS monitoring DOVER, Del. (AP) - A Delaware Chancery Court judge has refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a Delaware law that requires GPS monitoring of certain convicted sex offenders on probation. The judge this week rejected a dismissal motion by the Department of Correction, which argued unsuccessfully that the lawsuit belonged in Superior Court. The complaint, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, targets a 2007 law that requires GPS monitoring of high-risk sex offenders who have been released from custody. The Delaware Supreme Court ruled in 2011 that such GPS monitoring was not punitive and could therefore be applied retroactively. But the ACLU argues that if monitoring is not punitive, it must be applied only on a case-by-case basis, and that if it is, it cannot be applied retroactively. Kansas Parents plead guilty to abusing adoptive child WICHITA, Kan. (AP) - A Wichita couple has admitted to beating and abusing their adopted daughter who authorities say was starved, chained up in a windowless basement and given a bucket to use as a toilet. The couple pleaded guilty Wednesday to charges including child abuse, aggravated battery and criminal restraint, the Wichita Eagle reported. The parents initially denied the abuse allegations. A child-in-need-of-care petition alleges that the parents chained the girl to a bed in the basement that was rigged with a door alarm and forced her to relieve herself in a bucket. It says they punished her with scalding showers and sometimes fed her only bread for dinner. She was subject to beatings, the petition says. The abuse continued for as long as five years. The girl, who was 14 at the time, and three other children were taken into protective custody in March 2014. Authorities say the girl weighed just 66 pounds when she was removed from the home. The girl, now 15, and the other children remain in foster care pending the outcome of their child-in-need-of-care case. The Eagle has not named the parents in order to protect the identity of the children. The court gave the newspaper access to child-in-need-of-care petitions early last year on condition it would not identify any of the children involved. The Associated Press generally does not identify juvenile victims of abuse. The parents face a maximum prison term of five years and eight months if convicted, but they could get probation because neither has a substantial criminal history. Sedgwick County Assistant District Attorney Angela Wilson told District Judge Patrick Walters she plans to ask the court to impose the heftier sentence. One of the parents' attorneys, Michael Cleary, said he thinks the court "will want" to give the parents probation. Sentencing is set for Oct. 7. Published: Fri, Jul 17, 2015