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Thursday, June 5, 2008
Police recover truck of missing Robinson man
Police today recovered the truck of a Robinson man missing since Memorial Day.
Police were called at 3 p.m. to the 4600 block of Spring Valley Road between Hewitt and Moody where they found a white 1999 Ford F-350 tpickup, said Robinson police Lt. Tracy O’Connor.
Investigators determined the truck belonged to Russell Petter, 44, who was last seen May 24 when he visited his father in Seguin, according to a Robinson police release.
The truck was found next to a barn, behind a house along Spring Valley Road, O’Connor said. Investigators had yet to search the truck, since O’Connor said they would need to obtain a search warrant first.
The pickup, which had no visible damage, has been impounded, he said.
A cursory search of the property yielded no signs of Petter, O’Connor said.
Petter left from his father’s home headed for Robinson on May 26, and he has not been seen nor heard from since, the release stated.
O’Connor said police don’t suspect foul play is involved in Petter’s disappearance.
He asked anyone with information about Petter to call the Robinson police at 662-0525.
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Complaint filed against 10th Court of Appeals Chief Justice Tom Gray
A complaint against 10th Court of Appeals Chief Justice Tom Gray has been referred to Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle’s Public Integrity Unit.
Travis County Assistant District Attorney Greg Cox, director of the Public Integrity Unit, confirmed this week that his office has received a complaint involving Gray.
Gray, contacted today by phone, declined comment.
“I am not going to be able to comment much except to say we have received a complaint,” Cox said. “It does not relate to any campaign finance regulations, but beyond that, I won’t be able to have any comment.”
Earle’s Public Integrity Unit has statewide jurisdiction and investigates potential wrongdoing by elected officials. His office filed charges against former House Majority leader Tom DeLay and prosecuted U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. Charges against Hutchison were eventually dropped.
Cox would not say where the referral to his office came from.
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Some Texas customers dumped by electrical providers
More than 30,000 Texas electricity customers have been forced into a state backup program in recent weeks after their retail providers defaulted on payments to the operator of the state’s largest power grid.
The latest provider was Denton-based Etricity. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates the grid for most of the state, said it switched about 12,220 Etricity residential customers into the provider-of-last-resort program.
While those customers may have to pay higher prices until they sign with a new provider, it allows them to avoid having their electricity turned off as Texas heats up for the summer.
The Public Utility Commission urges customers to shop for lower rates at http://www.powertochoose.org.
Two other companies, Pre-Buy Electric LLC and National Power Co., also stopped serving about 24,000 customers in the last couple of weeks.
Texas deregulated its electricity market in 1999 and allowed customers to start choosing their providers in 2002. Critics contend deregulation hasn’t reduced prices as promised, and lawmakers disappointed with the results failed in an effort to revamp the system during the last legislative session.
— The Associated Press
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Unknown if Continental cuts will affect Waco
Continental Airlines says it is cutting its capacity by 11 percent as a cost-cutting move in the wake of record-high fuel costs and an industry in “crisis.”
It is not yet clear if the Continental Connection that flies four times daily between Waco Regional Airport and the Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston will be affected by the cuts.
Continental, which is based in Houston, contracts with Colgan Air to provide the commuter service to Houston. Colgan uses Saab turboprops on the flights.
In its announcement of capacity cuts, Continental mentions only mainline aircraft. Richard Howell, who manages Waco Regional Airport, said mainline aircraft would not include the smaller planes used to provide the Continental Connection.
A manager at the Continental Connection ticket office at Waco Regional Airport said he does not believe the cuts would affect the Waco-to-Houston service. But he said official comment must come from Continental’s corporate office.
The Tribune-Herald has a call into that office.
The airline says it’ll start pulling back on flights in September, when it expects mainline departures will be down about 16 percent year-over-year. This will result in a total capacity reduction of about 11 percent, the airline says.
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Report: Stowaways could ruin Mars missions
Scientists have expressed concern that the current mission to Mars and upcoming missions to the Red Planet in the search for a sign of past or present life could have a false detection because of biological contamination.
A story on space.com says: New research adds to these concerns with evidence that ATP — an energy-storage molecule vital to life on Earth — could survive for months or even years onboard a Martian probe.
Read the full story here.
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Kelsey Grammer out of hospital
The publicist for Kelsey Grammer says the actor has returned home from the hospital, four days after suffering a mild heart attack.
Stan Rosenfield said today that the Cheers and Frasier star is resting comfortably at his home in Kona on Hawaii’s big island. He says Grammer thanks those who called and wrote expressing concern.
Grammer was paddle-boating with his wife, Camilla, on Saturday when he experienced symptoms and was taken to a Kona hospital. Doctors determined the 53-year-old actor had suffered a heart attack that Rosenfield described as “mild.”
Rosenfield says he doesn’t know if Grammer has a history of heart trouble.
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World War II vet who earned Medal of Honor at 17 dies
Jack Lucas, who at 14 lied his way into military service during World War II and became the youngest Marine to receive the Medal of Honor, died today in a Hattiesburg, Miss., hospital. He was 80.
Lucas had been battling cancer. Ponda Lee at Moore Funeral Service said the funeral home was told he died before dawn.
Jacklyln “Jack” Lucas was just six days past his 17th birthday in February 1945 when his heroism at Iwo Jima earned him the nation’s highest military honor. He used his body to shield three fellow squad members from two grenades, and was nearly killed when one exploded.
He was the youngest serviceman to win the Medal of Honor in any conflict other than the Civil War.
— The Associated Press
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Schwarzenegger: California is in drought
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proclaimed a statewide drought Wednesday, warning that California’s water supply is falling dangerously low because of below-average rainfall and court-ordered water restrictions aimed at protecting fish, according to this story from the Los Angeles Times.
“We must recognize the severity of this crisis we face,” Schwarzenegger said at a news conference. He said this spring has been the driest on record in Northern California, which supplies most of the water to the state.
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Low-performing Austin school being shut down
After four years of “unacceptable” state ratings, Austin’s Johnston High School is being shut down.
Johnston is one of only four schools in the state as historically low performing as Waco’s G.L. Wiley Middle School. The verdict is not in on the fate of Wiley yet, which was threatened with closure more than a year ago.
Read the full story on Johnston here.
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Minor-league baseball fan wins free funeral
This is just too nutty not to share. Read the Associated Press story that follows:
Elaine Fulps is thrilled about the prize she won at a minor league baseball game. But she’s hoping she doesn’t have to collect on it anytime soon. Fulps, 60, won a $10,000 paid funeral at Tuesday night’s Grand Prairie AirHogs game.
The prize won’t expire until after Fulps does, said Ron Alexander, the sales manager at Oak Grove Memorial Gardens, which partnered with the team and Irving’s Chapel of Roses Funeral Home to sponsor the event.
“I almost croaked many times,” said Fulps, who was wearing a neck brace — the most recent effect of about 20 surgeries she’s undergone for various medical problems. “God still has me around for a reason. To win a funeral.”
Fans in this Dallas suburb were eager to join in the grim fun.
Some finalists for the prize arrived dressed in black or looking like death. The finalists participated in a pallbearer’s race, a mummy wrap and a eulogy delivery.
Fulps, randomly chosen as the winner at night’s end, said she’ll choose a casket and plot as soon as she recovers.
“I’m going to pick a spot under a tree out of the Texas heat,” she told The Dallas Morning News. “And let’s hope it’s a pet-free cemetery. I don’t want to get watered on.”
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Al-Qaida claims attack on Danish embassy in Pakistan
Denmark shared a video of the suicide car bombing against its embassy in Islamabad with Pakistani investigators, as an Internet posting today purportedly by al-Qaida claimed responsibility and threatened more attacks.
The statement said Monday’s attack was carried out to fulfill Osama bin Laden’s promise to exact revenge for the reprinting in Danish newspapers of a cartoon of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban.
The attack killed six people, including one Danish citizen.
The authenticity of the statement, which was posted on a Web site frequently used by Islamic militants, could not be independently verified. It was signed by al-Qaida commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed and dated Tuesday.
It warned if Denmark fails to apologize for the cartoons, more attacks will follow and Monday’s blast will “only be the first drop of rain.”
— The Associated Press
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Robinson man missing
Robinson police are seeking the public’s help in the search for a missing resident. Russell Edward Petter, 44, hasn’t been seen since leaving his father’s home in Seguin on the morning of Memorial Day, according to Robinson Police Lt. Tracy O’Connor.
Petter visited his father in Seguin during the Memorial Day weekend and his father told police that his son left Memorial Day to return to Robinson.
Petter was last seen driving a white 1999 Ford F-350 Club Cab dually pickup with Texas license plate 17K-JN3. The photo from his driver’s license is at right.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Robinson Police Department at 662-0525.
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Astronauts to have spacewalk today
Space shuttle Discovery astronauts Michael Fossum and Ronald Garan Jr. were headed outside today for their second spacewalk in three days to outfit Japan’s billion-dollar Kibo lab, which was delivered by the shuttle.
They will be setting up TV cameras around Kibo’s robotic arm and removing thermal covers from the robot arm and do some advance work for a nitrogen-gas tank replacement scheduled for their third and final spacewalk this weekend.
And in perhaps the news most of us wanted to know, the toilet on the International Space Station is working again.
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Ex-Obama fundraiser convicted of corruption
The Washington Post today reported that Antoin Rezko, a Chicago businessman and longtime fundraiser for Sen. Barack Obama, was convicted of 16 felony corruption charges Wednesday.
It’s a case that has alleged influence peddling in the administration of Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
The Post story says:
After two months of vivid testimony about political profiteering in Illinois state government, the 12-member jury found Rezko guilty of using his clout as a Blagojevich insider to shake down companies hoping to do business with the state. The 16 counts included fraud, money laundering and abetting bribery. Rezko was acquitted of eight counts, including extortion.
Here’s more from The Chicago Tribune.
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Mart product in tonight’s Fear Itself episode
Jesse Plemons, who grew up in Mart, is in tonight’s debut episode of Fear Itself, a horror anthology that runs on Thursday nights this summer on NBC (Channel 6). You also may know him as Landry Clarke on NBC’s Friday Night Lights.
The Fort Worth Star-Telegram today has this question-and-answer piece with the 20-year-old.
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Sept. 11 mastermind, others go before war-crimes tribunal
The accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and four alleged confederates are facing a military judge today in their long-awaited first appearance before a war-crimes tribunal.
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other alleged al-Qaida figures sat at defense tables alongside their lawyers before the judge, Marine Col. Ralph Kohlmann.
All five wore cream-colored clothing and turbans, in contrast to the disheveled hair and T-shirt Mohammed wore when he was captured in Pakistan in 2003. Mohammed was later held in CIA custody at secret sites and transferred to the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2006.
— The Associated Press
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Gay couples cheer Calif. high court ruling
Gay and lesbian couples around California are planning their nuptials following a refusal by the state’s highest court to delay its decision legalizing same-sex marriage, according to an Associated Press story.
The California Supreme Court’s announcement Wednesday cleared the final hurdle for same-sex couples in the nation’s most populous state to wed beginning June 17, when state officials have said counties must start issuing new gender-neutral marriage licenses.
Conservative religious and legal groups had asked the justices to stop its May 15 order requiring state and local officials to sanction same-sex unions from becoming effective until voters have the chance to consider the issue in November. The justices’ decisions typically become final after 30 days.
An initiative to ban gay marriage has qualified for the Nov. 4 ballot. Its passage would overrule the court’s decision by amending the state constitution to limit marriage to a man and a woman.
There’s also this story out of Seattle about the furor that’s erupted since a lesbian complained that an usher at Safeco Field asked her to stop kissing her date because it was making another fan uncomfortable during a Mariners baseball game.
According to this AP story, the incident has exploded on local TV, on talk radio and in the blogosphere and has touched off a debate over public displays of affection in generally gay-friendly Seattle.
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Continental Airlines to cut 3,000 jobs, reduce flights
Continental Airlines said today that it is cutting 3,000 jobs and reducing capacity by 11 percent, citing record fuel costs that have pushed the industry into its worst crisis since 9/11. It also said its two top executives will forgo pay for the rest of the year.
The job cuts represent about 6.5 percent of the company’s work force of 45,000.
Houston-based Continental said it will begin pulling back on flights in September, when departures on its mainline operations will be about 16 percent below the numbers of September 2007. For the year, capacity will fall 11 percent.
The company also said Chairman and Chief Executive Lawrence Kellner and President Jeff Smisek will not take salaries or incentive pay for the rest of the year.
Here is Continental’s daily flight schedule from the Waco Regional Airport, as of June 1.
— The Associated Press
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Missing Cape Cod lighthouse found in California
I found this to be an interesting story about a Cape Cod lighthouse believed destroyed instead was found moved to the California coast.
According to this Associated Press story, local historians for decades had thought the 30-foot tall lighthouse that once overlooked Wellfleet Harbor had been taken down and destroyed in 1925.
The fate of the cast-iron tower was uncovered last year by lighthouse researchers and reported by Colleen MacNeney in this month’s edition of Lighthouse Digest.
MacNeney told the Cape Cod Times in Wednesday’s edition it was her most exciting discovery.
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More winds, some sprinkles
It’s another windy day in Central Texas, with south winds between 25 and 30 mph and gusts hitting 40. I was surprised to see some sprinkles on the windshield coming into the office until cloudy skies.
The clouds are supposed to give way to partly sunny skies with a high near 94 degrees and heat-index values up to 99.
Don’t get blown away today.
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