National Roundup

New Mexico
Woman awarded $1.2M from Santa Fe stolen car, police crash
SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — A Santa Fe County jury has awarded an 80-year-old woman more than $1.2 million after she was injured in a crash involving a stolen car chased by Santa Fe police.

The Santa Fe New Mexican reports the jury late Friday decided that Arlena Jackson was entitled to damages following the April 2016 crash.

Jackson filed a lawsuit against the Santa Fe Police Department, the city of Santa Fe and a local Toyota dealership where police say 30-year-old Jeremy Chavez had stolen the vehicle.

Jackson’s lawsuit argued that police acted negligently when they chased Chavez.

The lawsuit says the crash left her with eight fractured ribs, a fractured pelvis, bleeding in the lungs and other injuries.

Attorney Scott Hatcher, who represented the city of Santa Fe, says police were only doing their jobs.

Georgia
Court: Pardon lifts requirement to register as sex offender
ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s highest court says a man convicted of sexually abusing a young girl no longer must register as a sex offender after receiving a pardon.

Barry Craig Davis pleaded guilty in 1995 to aggravated sodomy of the young girl. After his release from prison, he registered as a sex offender as required.

He later applied to the State Board of Pardons and Paroles for a pardon, and the board granted a pardon in February 2013.

Authorities later got a warrant for his arrest and charged him with failing to register as a sex offender. A judge ruled in January 2016 that pardon didn’t remove obligation to register.

The Georgia Supreme Court on Monday issued an opinion concluding the pardon lifted Davis’ requirement to register as a sex offender.

North Carolina
Man accused of driving car into restaurant, killing daughter
BESSEMER CITY, N.C. (AP) — A man intentionally rammed a vehicle into a steak and seafood outlet in North Carolina on Sunday, killing his daughter and daughter-in-law who had been seated inside the restaurant with other family members, police said.

The vehicle’s driver, Roger Self, was immediately arrested and the preliminary evidence indicates he purposely drove all the way into the Surf and Turf Lodge about noon, authorities said. Jail records show he’s been charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of his daughter, Katelyn Self, a deputy with the Gaston County Sheriff’s Office, and his daughter-in-law, Amanda Self, a nurse. The Gaston Gazette reports Amanda Self was the wife of Roger Self’s son, Gaston County Police Officer Josh Self, who also was seriously injured, along with Roger Self’s wife, Diane, and the 13-year-old daughter of Josh and Amanda Self. They are all expected to survive their injuries.

Police said they were opening a homicide investigation but they gave no initial indication what circumstances led up to the crash that sent stunned patrons scrambling at the eatery about 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Charlotte.

Footage from the restaurant scene showed emergency responders treating people on the ground outside as shocked patrons milled about Sunday afternoon.

Katelyn Self, 26, was a four-year veteran of the Gaston County Sheriff’s Office, Sheriff Alan Cloninger told The Charlotte Observer. She had worked as a corporal in the jail and was off duty when she was fatally injured.

The Gaston Gazette identified Roger Self as being from Dallas, North Carolina. A 2017 profile in the Gazette said Roger Self ran a private investigations business called Southeastern Loss Management. It said the business opened in 1989 and mostly helped companies investigate employees’ wrongdoing.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police spokesman Rob Tufano called the crash a “mass casualty” incident, and reports said some of the victims were flown by helicopter to a medical center. There was no immediate count on the number of injured or the extent of the injuries.

The Gaston Gazette identified the vehicle as a sports utility vehicle and photographs showed a shattered opening in a restaurant wall. Others showed people being treated on the ground outside the restaurant.


West Virginia
Audit looks further into cost of high court travel
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — An audit has looked further into West Virginia Supreme Court employees’ travel expenses.

The audit was released Sunday during legislative interim meetings in Charleston.

It found Justice Robin Davis reserved a court vehicle seven times where a destination was provided but no purpose was specified to substantiate the vehicle’s use.

The audit also found ex-court administrator Steve Canterbury had 20 instances of renting a car for personal use and was improperly reimbursed $911. In addition, he reserved a court vehicle six times without providing a purpose or destination.

The audit found during an IRS audit of the court’s 2015 federal employment tax returns, it did not provide information regarding Justice Menis Ketchum’s use of a court vehicle for commuting.

An earlier audit found Ketchum and Justice Allen Loughry ignored mandatory reporting guidelines for personal use of state-owned vehicles.


New Hampshire
Head of prep school rocked by sex abuse cases leaving early
CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — The head of an elite New England prep school that’s been rocked by years of sexual abuse claims is stepping down a year earlier than planned.

St. Paul’s School Rector Michael Hirschfeld is leaving as of June 30. He originally planned to leave after the 2018-19 school year.

Hirschfeld has been rector since 2011. He hasn’t been accused of wrongdoing. He wrote to Board of Trustees President Archibald Cox Jr., on Monday that it’s been “an unusually painful time for the entire school community and also for my family.”

Cox thanked Hirschfeld for his leadership while dealing with “unprecedented challenges on numerous fronts.”

The state attorney general’s office began investigating last summer after St. Paul’s put out its own report about sexual assaults by teachers. Claims date to 1948.