Alabama
State Supreme Court rejects appeal of man in wife’s death
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The Alabama Supreme Court rejected the appeal Friday of a one-time campus security officer convicted of reckless manslaugher in the death of his wife, an online adult model whose body was found outside their suburban home.
The court, in a brief ruling, refused to overturn a decision by the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals, which last fall rejected a challenge by William Jeffrey West, 48, in the death four years ago of Kathleen Dawn West, 42.
Known as “Kat” to friends, West was found dead on the street in front of the couple’s suburban home in Calera in January 2018. Jurors accepted prosecutors’ claims that West killed the woman with a blow to the head from a liquor bottle and rejected defense arguments that she died in an accidental fall.
The woman publicly posted lingerie photos online and charged viewers to see sexier images. The defense told jurors that her adult pictures didn’t not cause problems between the couple and that her husband assisted her.
West, an Army veteran, worked in security at Birmingham-Southern College before his arrest. Sentenced to 16 years in prison, he is serving time in a community-based program, prison records show.
Oklahoma
Ex-police officer gets 25 years for 2014 killing
TULSA, Okla. (AP) — A former Oklahoma police officer was sentenced Friday to 25 years in prison for the 2014 killing of his daughter’s boyfriend after being convicted of second-degree murder the fifth time he went on trial in the case.
U.S. District Judge Gregory Frizzell sentenced Shannon Kepler, 61, to 300 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release. He also ordered Kepler, a former Tulsa police officer, to pay restitution to cover the cost of a headstone for Jeremey Lake, who was 19 years old when Kepler killed him.
“Kepler, at the time, was sworn to uphold the law but instead made a series of decisions that led to the young man’s murder,” U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson said in a statement. “Today’s 25-year sentence provides a measure of justice to Mr. Lake’s family, though I know their healing continues.”
Kepler’s attorney, Stan Monroe, didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment about the sentence. He previously indicated that Kepler plans to appeal his conviction.
Kepler testified at his trial that he fired in self-defense because he thought Lake had pointed a handgun at him. No gun was found at the scene.
There also was a racial undercurrent to the trials. Kepler killed Lake, who was Black, days before a white police officer killed Michael Brown, a Black 18-year-old, in Ferguson, Missouri, sparking protests and fanning the national debate over the treatment of Black people by law enforcement.
The trial was Kepler’s fifth but his only one on federal charges. His first three murder trials in state court ended with hung juries. The fourth trial ended with a manslaughter conviction and a 15-year prison term, but the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals overturned that conviction based on a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that found that Oklahoma lacks jurisdiction for crimes that happen on tribal reservations in which the defendants or victims are tribal citizens.
Kepler is a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and the shooting occurred on land within the tribe’s historic reservation.
Illinois
Mom charged after body of boy is found in Indiana
NORTH CHICAGO, Ill. (AP) — The mother of a missing Illinois boy was charged with murder Saturday after the 6-year-old’s body was discovered near an abandoned house in northwestern Indiana, authorities said.
Damari Perry of North Chicago was reported missing Wednesday. His body was found in Gary.
Police were initially told that the boy was missing from Skokie, another Chicago suburb, but the investigation turned to Damari’s home “after the family’s story was contradicted,” the Lake County state’s attorney said.
“Our hearts ache over the murder of 6-year-old Damari Perry. ... Prosecutors, investigators, and victim support professionals worked late into the night and into the early morning to make sure we understood this tragic crime now,” Eric Rinehart said.
Jannie Perry, 38, was charged with first-degree murder and other crimes. Two other family members also face charges.
It wasn’t immediately known if Perry has a lawyer who could comment on the allegations. She was expected to appear in court Sunday.
North Carolina
Man admits embezzling from employer after owner’s death
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina man has pleaded guilty to embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from his employer following the company owner’s death, according to a prosecutor.
Benjamin Padua Jr., 56, of Huntersville, pleaded guilty to wire fraud on Thursday and was released on bond, U.S. Attorney Dena J. King said in a news release.
Prosecutors said that from September 2019 to February 2021, Padua abused his senior finance position with an unidentified trucking company. He used falsified documents and improper accounting entries to embezzle hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to the news release.
Following the company owner’s death in October 2019, Padua forged the owner’s signature on a fake employment agreement that he created and backdated to prior to the owner’s death, prosecutors said.
The fraudulent employment agreement aimed to increase Padua’s compensation through higher wages, bonuses, and life insurance benefits. After Padua created the fake employment agreement, he received compensation he wasn’t entitled to, Padua admitted in court.
Padua could be sentenced to a maximum of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. A sentencing date has not been set.
Georgia
Woman gets prison time for COVID relief fraud
ATLANTA (AP) — A Georgia woman has been sentenced to serve nearly three and a half years in federal prison for fraudulently taking more than $6 million in COVID relief funds.
Federal prosecutors say 49-year-old Hunter VanPelt of Roswell submitted six false loan applications to the Paycheck Protection Program from April to June 2020. She requested a total of more than $7.9 million and received more than $6 million, prosecutors said in a news release.
Prosecutors said VanPelt, who legally changed her name from Ellen Corkrum in July 2016, owned or controlled six companies and lied about the average monthly payroll and number of employees at each company. She also filed false tax, bank and payroll documents along with those applications.
The Paycheck Protection Program represents billions of dollars in forgivable small business loans for Americans struggling because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s part of the coronavirus relief package that became federal law in 2020.
The federal government has been able to recover about $2.1 million of the money she received.
VanPelt pleaded guilty in August. The prison term of three years and five months that she received Tuesday is to be followed by five years of supervised release. The judge also ordered her to pay restitution of more than $7 million and to forfeit more than $2 million.
“The Paycheck Protection Program is meant to help legitimate businesses and their workers through the depths of the pandemic,” U.S. Attorney Kurt Erskine said in the release. “Unfortunately, VanPelt decided to use the program as her personal bank. A significant federal sentence, such as the one she received, hopefully deters others from following the same path.”
Detroit
U.S. judge tosses gay corrections officers’ suit
DETROIT (AP) — A federal judge in Michigan has tossed a lawsuit brought by two gay corrections officers, ruling that some of their discrimination claims weren’t sufficiently proven and that statutes of limitation barred others.
Michelle Wood alleged in the 2020 suit that she was regularly singled out for taunts and homophobic slurs, then was retaliated against after she complained about them, the Detroit Free Press reported Friday.
Her partner, Loretta Smith, alleged she was demoted to a midnight shift and faced a hostile work environment after Wood complained, the lawsuit alleged.
The Detroit-based attorney for the plaintiffs, Jonathan Marko, expressed disappointment in U.S. District Judge Victoria Roberts’ ruling and said an appeal was a possibility, according to the newspaper.
“My clients are devastated,” Marko was quoted as saying. “They feel revictimized today.”
Wood retired in 2019 after more than 25 years in the job, saying in the lawsuit that she was under so much pressure in a hostile environment that her departure felt like she had been fired.
In her ruling, the judge also said Wood was unable to prove her claims that the department used rule violations as a mere pretext for denying her promotions and that the denials were actually based on illegal discrimination.
Earlier, department spokesman Chris Gautz had said it “takes allegations of discrimination in the workplace, no matter what type — race, sex, orientation, identity — seriously and investigates such claims as soon as they become known to the department.”
Ohio
2nd acquittal in charges in 2017 nursing home death
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio judge has acquitted a certified nurse practitioner of involuntary manslaughter and other charges in the 2017 death of a man at a Columbus nursing home, the second acquittal since the indictment of seven workers at the facility.
A Franklin County judge acquitted 55-year-old Kimberly Potter of Delaware of all charges Wednesday, ruling that prosecutors had failed to make their case and the defense didn’t need to respond, the Columbus Dispatch reported. Defense attorney Gregory Peterson called it “an ill-conceived prosecution from the very beginning.”
The Ohio Attorney General’s office indicted Potter and six nursing home employees in 2019 on patient neglect and records tampering counts; three were charged with involuntary manslaughter in the March 2017 death at Whetstone Gardens and Care Center on the city’s northwest side. The indictments alleged failure to treat serious wounds on the patient who died, and falsification and forged signatures about treatment in a second case.
In October, a county jury acquitted Jessica Caldwell, 33, a floor nurse and unit manager at the nursing home, of involuntary manslaughter and gross patient neglect in connection with the death.
“From the beginning, Whetstone vehemently disagreed with any suggestion that our employees contributed to the tragic death of a former patient,” said Ryan Stubenrauch, spokesman for the nursing home.
A third involuntary manslaughter trial is scheduled next month; prosecutors have dismissed felony forgery charges against three other nursing home employees, all floor nurses, in exchange for guilty pleas to misdemeanors.
