MIDWEST

CONTRIBUTOR TO ILLINOIS GOVERNOR RECEIVED $522,000 IN CONTRACTS

SPRINGFIELD, Ill.-A major contributor to Governor Rod Blagojevich has received a half a million dollars in contracts for cleaning work that experts say is unnecessary or could be performed less expensively by state employees.

In one case, PWS Environmental Incorporated got more than $7,000 to clean a brand-new, unused dome built to store road salt and apply a corrosion-resistant concrete sealer – duplicating work the dome’s builder performed just months before, according to documents and Associated Press interviews.

Over the past five years, the Cicero firm has made political contributions totaling $65,000, mostly to Democrats. It has been hired by the state to wash road-salt domes, office buildings, bridges, rest-area structures, and Illinois Department of Transportation trucks, although state-owned equipment could be used for the work. IDOT spokesman Mike Claffey said one reason the department hired the company to wash corrosive salt from bridges rather than assigning state employees to do the work is that the agency is understaffed because of budget cuts. He said IDOT was cleaning salt storage domes to cut deterioration and extend the domes’ lives. The president of the Salt Institute trade organization, Richard Hanneman, said he had never heard of washing a concrete-and-wood salt dome. “I’m having a hard time envisioning why you would do it,” he said. In all, PWS Environmental has received contracts for $522,000 in state work this year, up from just $2,860 in 2001.

– Associated Press

BTK SUSPECT’S TRIAL SCHEDULED TO BEGIN TODAY

WICHITA, Kan. – A trial is scheduled to begin today for the man accused of being the notorious BTK serial killer, blamed for the killings of 10 people, but no one outside the defense has any idea what’s going to happen. Aside from an early routine defense motion for discovery of evidence, the court record on the case against BTK suspect Dennis Rader has been unusually silent. None of the typical defense strategies have been filed, a Wichita criminal defense attorney who has watched the case, Jim Pratt, said. No motion for a change of venue is on record in the highly publicized case. There are no motions to suppress evidence or even for a detailed juror questionnaire.

It was only last month that Mr. Rader was arraigned, standing mute as District Judge Gregory Waller entered a not guilty plea on his behalf. The judge set the trial to begin today, but nearly everyone expected that to be postponed, given the complexity of the 10-count, first-degree murder case. Getting a continuance would have been easy; all it usually takes in Sedgwick County is a call to the prosecutors and scheduling clerk rather than a formal motion, Mr. Pratt said. But Mr. Rader’s court-appointed attorneys have not been talking. Their spokesman, Mark Orr, would say only that whatever happens in the case will happen in court.

– Associated Press

EAST

FATHER QUESTIONS POLICE SEARCH FOR BOY FOUND DEAD WITH TWO OTHERS

CAMDEN, N.J. – As authorities began investigating why police failed to search a car trunk where three missing boys were found dead, the father of one of the children said yesterday he could not understand how they died so close to home.

Anibal Cruz, 38, said the family assumed that police looked in the trunk of the car that was parked just steps from where the boys were last seen playing.

“That was the first place to look,” Mr. Cruz said. “You can look through the windows and check inside. That is simple. Maybe they should have looked in the trunk.” Officials said the boys suffocated after climbing into the trunk on their own. Their bodies were found by David Agosto, whose 6-year-old son Daniel had gone missing along with 5-year-old Jesstin Pagan and 11-year-old Anibal Cruz.

– Associated Press

SOUTH

14-YEAR-OLD GIRL WAS FAR FROM FLORIDA SHORE WHEN SHARK KILLED HER

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Beaches reopened yesterday with extra lifeguards along a stretch of the Florida Panhandle coast where a shark killed a 14-year-old girl, as coastal residents reported seeing at least one shark hunting fish close to shore.

Jamie Marie Daigle of Gonzales, La., was swimming on a boogie board with a friend at least 100 yards from shore when she was attacked Saturday in the Gulf of Mexico, said a Walton County sheriff’s captain, Danny Glidewell. Daigle was vacationing with friends while the rest of her family was at home. One of the men who tried to rescue Daigle said he heard screams for help and saw her boogie board – but no rider. He rushed into the water and found the unconscious girl being towed to shore by a surfer on his board.

– Associated Press

WEST

U.S. PLANS TO PRODUCE PLUTONIUM

America plans to produce plutonium 238 for the first time since the cold war, according to a dispatch on the New York Times Web site last night. The program will produce about 330 pounds over a period of 30 years, according to the report. The plutonium will cost roughly $1.5 billion and will be manufactured at the Idaho National Laboratory, a large facility 100 miles west and upwind from Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

The plutonium is intended for use in secret missions aimed to aid national security. According to the Times, the missions will not involve nuclear arms, satellites, or weapons in space.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun