Stories from Friday, December 2, 2022

The latest 2022 death toll on roadways in the 25-county Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) Southeast District, which includes Cape Girardeau, Perry and Scott counties, stands at 120. The fatality count is roughly on par with the 119 that had been recorded at this time in 2021...

Influenza, particularly influenza A, is being seen earlier than usual this year, according to Cape Girardeau County Public Health Center. "In a typical year, we probably wouldn't be seeing numbers quite as high as what we're seeing right now," said Autumn Grim, the department's epidemiologist and project coordinator, who reports monthly to the health center's Board of Trustees on communicable disease in the county...

Two Southeast Missouri churches, one in Perry County and the other in Bollinger County, formally voted Wednesday, Nov. 30, to disaffiliate from America's second-largest Protestant denomination, the United Methodist Church (UMC). n Perryville UMC voted unanimously, 26-0...

State Highway Patrol officials recently presented Honorary Trooper Certificates to Jacob Shelton of Jackson and Donald Pritchard of Marble Hill, Missouri. Capt. Phillip Gregory of Patrol Troop E honored the men at a ceremony at Bollinger County Health Center in Marble Hill...

Hundreds will gather this weekend at the Osage Centre in Cape Girardeau to pack meals for impoverished children overseas. La Croix Church has been a regular participant in the Feed My Starving Children program for more than a decade. The program, a Christian not-for-profit, was started in 1987 and coordinates the packaging and distribution of food to malnourished children in nearly 70 countries...

When the Respect for Marriage Act comes to the floor of the U.S. House, Southeast Missouri GOP congressman Jason Smith says he'll be voting "no" on the legislation. The U.S. Senate narrowly approved the measure Tuesday, Nov. 29, which needed 60 votes to pass, by a 61-36 vote. Missouri's Republican senators were divided on the bill, with retiring Roy Blunt voting "yes" and Josh Hawley voting "no."...

House of Paws Grooming Salon is located at 2031 Cape LaCroix Road, in LaCroix Village. We offer full-service dog grooming in a fun and loving atmosphere. Whether it’s a simple bath or full groom, we groom your dog to breed standard or your preference. We take care of your furry family member like our own!...

O Lord God, we lift our eyes to you, our loving Father. Amen.

It sure is nice to have local football teams playing games after Thanksgiving. That was the case last weekend as both Cape Central High School and Southeast Missouri State University played postseason games on the same day. SEMO finished its regular season as the Ohio Valley Conference Champions and earned a spot in the FCS playoffs. Their opponent: University of Montana...

I'm thankful for Coach Gibbs and his Cape Central players. You boys did it the right way and made it all the way to the final four! No screaming at each other on the sidelines. No cursing. No wasting money on nine different uniform combinations. Way to go Tigers!...

Kevin McCarthy's quest for the House speaker's gavel is a near perfect inside-the-Beltway story because it's about pure politics and personal ambition without many narrative-muddling concerns about principles, governing philosophy or policy considerations...

Parents, teachers and neighbors opposed to the proposed halfway house for clients of the Missouri Division of Probation and Parole turned out in force last night to voice their objections to the program, slated to operate in the Gibson Recovery Center, 1112 Linden; they never got the chance; Jeff Hine, an attorney for the Gibson Center, asked the council to table action on two issues -- a request for rezoning the center from R-4 multiple family residential to C-1 local commercial and the special use permit -- that would allow the program to begin operations; the issue will go back before the City Council at its Jan. ...

CAPE GIRARDEAU Cape Girardeau Fire Department responded to the following calls. Nov. 30 n Medical assists were made at 1 a.m. on Lynwood Hills Drive; 8:38 a.m. on Melrose Avenue; 11:41 a.m. on Shirley Drive; 1:35 p.m. on Franks Lane; 3:48 p.m. on South Mount Auburn Road; 5:09 p.m. on North Kingshighway; 8:44 p.m. on William Street; and 10:39 p.m. on Sheridan Drive...

CAPE GIRARDEAU Cape Girardeau Police Department responded to the following calls. Arrests do not imply guilt. Arrests n A warrant arrest was reported on Elm Street. DWIs n Driving while intoxicated, failure to drive on right half of roadway when roadway was of sufficient width resulting in an accident and driving while revoked/suspended were reported on William Street...

CHARLESTON, Mo. — William DeWayne Kirkpatrick, 60, of Diehlstadt, Missouri, was called to his eternal home in Heaven on Wednesday, Nov. 30, 2022. He was born May 25, 1962, in Lutesville, Missouri, to the late George "Willie" Kirkpatrick and Dorothy Mae Welker Kirkpatrick...

CLAYTON, Mo. -- A suburban St. Louis police officer who shot into a fleeing car, seriously injuring the driver, has been sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to give up his police officer's license. Christopher Gage, 40, was sentenced Wednesday for the shooting in February 2020 when he was a Velda City officer, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported...

MEXICO, Mo. -- A former student at the Missouri Military Academy alleges in a lawsuit that school administrators did nothing to stop routine beatings he suffered at the school. The student filed a personal injury lawsuit this week against the school in Mexico, which is a college preparatory military boarding school for boys in grades seven to 12...

Aline Kominsky-Crumb, an American cartoonist known for her feminist themes and often brutally frank, highly personal and self-critical work, has died at the age of 74. Kominsky-Crumb, who was a close collaborator of her cartoonist husband, Robert Crumb, died of cancer Tuesday at their longtime home in France, said Alexander Wood, manager of the website that sells Crumb's work...

NEW YORK -- If you've ever had trouble solving a Rubik's Cube, a good piece of advice is to break it down into steps. It's worth a shot: That advice is from the man who invented it. "Problem solving is a very basic activity of the human mind and if a problem is complex you need to divide the problem into smaller elements," says Erno Rubik, who invented the cube in 1974...

HONG KONG -- Videos of hundreds protesting in Shanghai started to appear on WeChat on Saturday night. Showing chants about removing COVID-19 restrictions and demanding freedom, they would stay up only a few minutes before being censored. Elliot Wang, a 26-year-old in Beijing, was amazed...

CHICAGO -- Emboldened by the results of November's midterms, abortion rights supporters say they are preparing for even bigger fights in state legislatures and pivotal elections to come, including 2024 races for Congress and president. Victories for abortion rights ballot measures and candidates who support abortion provided a roadmap for how to win future campaigns, Democrats and leaders of several organizations say. ...

HONOLULU -- Prayer. Bombs. Walls. Over the decades, people have tried all of them to stanch the flow of lava from Hawaii's volcanoes as it lumbered toward roads, homes and infrastructure. Now Mauna Loa -- the world's largest active volcano -- is erupting again, and lava is slowly approaching a major thoroughfare connecting the Big Island's east and west sides. And once more, people are asking if anything can be done to stop or divert the flow...

KYIV, Ukraine -- Sleep plunges the soldier back into the horrors of Ukraine's battlefields. He can hear bombs falling again and picture explosions. He imagines himself frantically running, trying to save himself and others. The nightmares are so vivid and frightening that he pleads with his doctor for help. "It will blow my mind," he warns. "So do something."...

PHOENIX -- A rural Arizona county certified its midterm election results on Thursday, following the orders of a judge who ruled that Republican supervisors broke the law when they refused to sign off on the vote count by this week's deadline. Two Republicans on Cochise County's three-member board of supervisors balked for weeks about certifying the election, even as the deadline passed on Monday. ...

NEW YORK -- Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said Wednesday the company does not have plans to stop selling the antisemitic film that gained notoriety recently after Brooklyn Nets guard Kyrie Irving tweeted out an Amazon link to it. Pressure has been mounting on Amazon to discontinue sale of the film, called "Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America," since Irving shared the link to the documentary with his millions of Twitter followers in October. ...

BEIJING -- More Chinese cities eased anti-virus restrictions and police patrolled their streets Thursday as the government tried to defuse public anger over some of the world's most stringent COVID measures and head off more protests. Following weekend demonstrations at which some crowds made the politically explosive demand that leader Xi Jinping resign, the streets of major cities have been quiet in the face of a crackdown that has been largely out of sight...

MADRID -- Police in Spain detonated a suspicious parcel discovered at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid, Spanish officials said Thursday, a day after a similar package sent to the Ukrainian Embassy ignited upon opening and injured an employee. "We can confirm a suspicious package was received at the U.S. Embassy in Madrid, and are aware of reports of other packages sent to other locations throughout Spain," the American embassy said in a response to an Associated Press inquiry...

LONDON -- Renewed allegations of racism at Buckingham Palace threatened to overshadow Prince William's trip to the United States after campaigners said the palace needed to acknowledge a wider problem that goes beyond one member of staff. The controversy erupted Wednesday when a Black advocate for survivors of domestic abuse said a senior member of the royal household interrogated her about her origins during a reception at the palace for people working to end violence against women. ...

BENGALURU, India -- India officially takes up its role as chair of the Group of 20 leading economies for the coming year Thursday and it's putting climate at the top of the group's priorities. Programs to encourage sustainable living and money for countries to transition to clean energy and deal with the effects of a warming world are some of the key areas that India will focus on during its presidency, experts say. ...

WASHINGTON -- Legislation to avert what could have been an economically ruinous freight rail strike won final approval in Congress on Thursday as lawmakers responded quickly to President Joe Biden's call for federal intervention in a long-running labor dispute...

HILO, Hawaii -- The spectacle of incandescent lava spewing from Hawaii's Mauna Loa has drawn thousands of visitors and is turning into a tourism boon for this Big Island town near the world's largest volcano. Some hotels in and around Hilo are becoming fully booked in what is normally a slower time of the year for business. Helicopter tours of Mauna Loa, which began erupting Sunday after being quiet for 38 years, are also in high demand by tourists and journalists...

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court agreed Thursday to decide whether the Biden administration can broadly cancel student loans, keeping the program blocked for now but signaling a final answer by early summer. That's about two months before the newly extended pause on loan repayments is set to expire...

WASHINGTON -- A unanimous federal appeals court on Thursday ended an independent review of documents seized from former President Donald Trump's Florida estate, removing a hurdle the Justice Department said had delayed its criminal investigation into the retention of top-secret government information...

WASHINGTON -- The first White House state dinner of President Joe Biden's administration drew big names Thursday from fashion, entertainment, politics and business who turned out to help celebrate French President Emmanuel Macron and the return of large social events after the pandemic...