National Roundup

Montana
Exxon Mobil to pay $1M to ­settle oil spill in river
HELENA, Mont. (AP) — A judge has approved an agreement for Exxon Mobil Corp. to pay $1.05 million to settle federal pollution violations over a 2011 pipeline break that sent oil into Montana’s Yellowstone River.

U.S. District Judge Susan Watters accepted the deal Monday.

It resolves the last outstanding federal enforcement case against Exxon after 63,000 gallons (238,474 liters) of crude oil spilled into the river downstream from Yellowstone National Park.

Flooding in 2011 scoured the river bottom and exposed the buried pipeline, causing it to break along a stretch of river popular with anglers and boaters.

Exxon previously paid $12 million over natural resource damage and $2.6 million for pipeline safety and state pollution violations.

The Irving, Texas-based company also spent an estimated $135 million on a monthslong cleanup and repairs.

Wisconsin
State Supreme Court upholds cold case ­murder ­conviction
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court has upheld the conviction of a man sentenced to life in prison for a 1998 murder that had been cold for over a decade.

The court on Wednesday agreed with a state appeals court ruling last year that upheld the conviction of Peter Hanson in the killing of Chad McLean in Oconto County.

McLean disappeared in February 1998 and his body was found a month later in the Pensaukee River. He had been shot four times in the head.

The case went cold until 2009 when Hanson’s estranged wife told investigators that Hanson had killed McLean.

Hanson argued on appeal that the trial court improperly admitted portions of his testimony during trial and that his attorney was ineffective.

But the Supreme Court, in agreeing with the appeals court, rejected all of his arguments.

Hawaii
Corruption trial reveals evidence of fictional notary
HONOLULU (AP) — A former city attorney in Hawaii got a state government job using correspondence from a fictional notary public, prosecutors said.

Federal prosecutors Monday linked Katherine Kealoha to a nonexistent notary public named “Alison Lee Wong,” The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Tuesday.

The false name was on a letter to state officials supporting Kealoha’s bid to become director of the state Office of Environmental Quality Control in 2008, prosecutors said.

Authorities charged Kealoha, a former Honolulu deputy prosecutor, and her husband, retired Honolulu Police chief Louis Kealoha, with attempting to frame a man for theft to keep him from revealing fraud that financed their lavish lifestyle.

Katherine Kealoha also sent emails to the fake notary in 2011 to create the appearance she was closing trust accounts for two people while concealing the misappropriation of nearly $150,000, prosecutors said.

Kealoha was appointed director of the Office of Environmental Quality Control and two years later returned to the Honolulu prosecutor’s office.

No notary public named Alison Lee Wong, or various iterations of those names, existed in Hawaii, according to testimony Monday by Shari Wong, a deputy state attorney general who oversees all of the state’s notaries public.

An online order for a “Hawaii Notary Seal Metal Embosser” was placed for Alison Lee Wong in May 2008 and shipped to the address of the Office of Environmental Quality Control, according to Kal Tabbara, president of the American Association of Notaries Inc.

Monday was the eighth day of the conspiracy trial of the Kealohas and three former and current police officers.

West Virginia
AG: Abortion ordinance ­raises concerns over free speech
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia’s top prosecutor says Charleston’s new ordinance to target protests at abortion clinics could run afoul of Constitutional law.

Attorney General Patrick Morrisey on Tuesday released a statement saying the ordinance is problematic because it targets free speech.

News outlets report the Charleston City Council voted 21-5 on Monday to approve restrictions on approaching people as they enter health care facilities. The law forbids people from blocking an entrance or exit and says protesters can’t come within 8 feet of someone who is within 100 feet of a front entrance to advocate a message or provide pamphlets without the person’s consent.

The American Civil Liberties Union has also raised concerns in a statement about the ordinance being too broad. Anti-abortion protesters have threatened legal action.


New York
Medicaid bought sex offenders’  drugs for ­erectile ­dysfunction
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Registered sex offenders in New York received $63,000 worth of erectile dysfunction drugs and other sexual treatments courtesy of the state’s publicly funded Medicaid program, according to an audit released Wednesday.

Federal rules bar Medicaid coverage of sexual treatments for all recipients, not just sex offenders. Yet state Medicaid officials approved $930,000 in improper payments for the drugs between 2012 and 2018, according to the audit released by state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and first reported by The Associated Press.

According to the audit, 47 of those Medicaid recipients were also state sex offenders, who are prohibited from getting Medicaid-covered sexual treatments under a state law.

The lapses identified in the audit show the need for immediate action by state health officials to increase accountability and oversight, DiNapoli said.

“There are clear rules about what conditions Medicaid will cover when it comes to erectile dysfunction drugs,” DiNapoli said. “Paying for sex offenders who’ve committed terrible crimes to get these drugs should never be lost in the bureaucratic administration of this program.”

State health officials dismissed much of the criticism, noting that under Medicaid rules, erectile dysfunction drugs can be prescribed to treat other conditions, such as prostate problems.

The auditors “either ignored the law or the facts, which undermines any value that can be associated with its findings,” the department said in a formal, written response to the audit.

But auditors discounted that explanation, noting that in many cases the medications were approved for Medicaid recipients who had no relevant diagnosis.