VANDERBURGH COUNTY FELONY CHARGES
Below is a list of felony cases that were filed by the Vanderburgh County Prosecutor’s Office on Tuesday, November 26, 2013
Charles Becker                 Burglary Resulting in Bodily Injury-Class A Felony
Battery by Means of a Deadly Weapon-Class C Felony
Jason Hoon                       Domestic Battery-Class D Felony
Strangulation-Class D Felony
Billy Patrick                       Maintaining a Common Nuisance-Class D Felony
Dealing in Synthetic Drug or Synthetic Drug Lookalike Substance-
Class D Felony
Possession of a Synthetic Drug or Synthetic Drug Lookalike Substance-
Class A Misdemeanor
Johnny Phillips                Maintaining a Common Nuisance-Class D Felony
Dealing in Synthetic Drug or Synthetic Drug Lookalike Substance- Class D Felony
Possession of a Synthetic Drug or Synthetic Drug Lookalike Substance-
Class A Misdemeanor
For further information on the cases listed above, or any pending case, please contact Kyle Phernetton at 812.435.5688 or via e-mail at KPhernetton@vanderburghgov.org
Under Indiana law, all criminal defendants are considered to be innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.
Indiana State Police to Add Extra Thanksgiving Patrols
In an effort to make the upcoming Thanksgiving Holiday travel period safer, the Indiana State Police has partnered with approximately 250 other law enforcement agencies statewide in participating in the annual Safe Family Travel, Operation Pull Over campaign. The campaign began November 8th and runs through Sunday, December 1st.
The Indiana State Police will be conducting high visibility enforcement efforts including sobriety check points and saturation patrols looking for impaired drivers and unrestrained motorists.
To help ensure the safety of all motorists during this holiday period, the Indiana State Police will also be participating in Operation C.A.R.E. (Combined Accident Reduction Effort) from November 27th through December 1st. Operation C.A.R.E. is a federally funded program and will allow additional troopers to patrol Hoosier roadways during this upcoming holiday weekend.
According to the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute, in 2012, alcohol-impaired driving in Indiana was linked to 158 fatalities (a 12.9% increase from 140 fatalities in 2011) and more than 2,112 injuries. Alcohol-impaired collisions were less than 3 percent of all Indiana crashes, but accounted for 20.3% of Indiana’s 779 traffic fatalities in 2012.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, safety belt use is the most effective strategy a person can employ to prevent death and minimize injury resulting from traffic collisions.
Please help do your part to make the Thanksgiving Holiday travel period safe by observing the following safety rules:
•When planning to travel, make sure you are well rested, as a fatigued driver is a dangerous driver.
•Increase your following distance; remember the two-second rule.
•Decrease your speed according to traffic and road conditions
•Beware of bridges, overpasses and intersections where ice tends to form first in cold inclement weather.
•Don’t use cruise control on slick roads.
•Make sure everyone in your vehicle is properly restrained.
•DON’T BE DISTRACTED-Pull over and stop to use electronic devices.
•DON’T DRIVE IMPAIRED-Have a designated driver.
•MOVE OVER and SLOW DOWN for emergency and highway service vehicles.
The Indiana State Police remain committed to making Hoosier highways safer by reducing crashes, educating the public on the main causes of crashes and patrolling in high crash areas. For more information on Indiana crash statistics please visit the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute’s web site at http://www.in.gov/cji/2572.htm
Road Rage Incident Ends With Driver Being Arrested For DUI And Resisting
Gibson County – Indiana State Police arrested a 47-year-old Fort Branch man this afternoon for driving while intoxicated and resisting law enforcement after being stopped on US 41 for a road rage incident.
At approximately 4:15 this afternoon, Trooper Wes Kuykendall was patrolling northbound US 41 at Fort Branch when he stopped a Ford Mustang and a small gray passenger car just north of SR 168 for a road rage incident. As Trooper Kuykendall was talking to the driver of the gray passenger car he observed the driver of the Ford Mustang quickly turned left across northbound US 41 using a cross-over and then proceeded southbound on US 41. Trooper Kuykendall activated his emergency lights and siren and attempted to stop the Mustang, but the driver refused to stop. The driver of the Mustang approached the intersection of SR 168, made an unsafe lane movement and then drove east on Vine Street into Fort Branch. The driver continued on Hillcrest and then onto Walnut Street before finally stopping. The driver was identified as Darrell J. Bowlds, 47, of Fort Branch. Trooper Kuykendall detected an odor of an alcoholic beverage while talking to Bowlds. Further investigation revealed he had a blood alcohol content of .14%. Bowlds was arrested and taken to the Gibson County Jail where he is currently being held without bond.
ARRESTED AND CHARGES:
• Darrell J. Bowlds, 47, 7883 S. Andee Lane, Fort Branch, IN
1. Driving While Intoxicated, Class A Misdemeanor
2. Resisting Law Enforcement, Class A Misdemeanor
Indiana State Police to Add Extra Thanksgiving Patrols
In an effort to make the upcoming Thanksgiving Holiday travel period safer, the Indiana State Police has partnered with approximately 250 other law enforcement agencies statewide in participating in the annual Safe Family Travel, Operation Pull Over campaign. The campaign began November 8th and runs through Sunday, December 1st.
The Indiana State Police will be conducting high visibility enforcement efforts including sobriety check points and saturation patrols looking for impaired drivers and unrestrained motorists.
To help ensure the safety of all motorists during this holiday period, the Indiana State Police will also be participating in Operation C.A.R.E. (Combined Accident Reduction Effort) from November 27th through December 1st. Operation C.A.R.E. is a federally funded program and will allow additional troopers to patrol Hoosier roadways during this upcoming holiday weekend.
According to the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute, in 2012, alcohol-impaired driving in Indiana was linked to 158 fatalities (a 12.9% increase from 140 fatalities in 2011) and more than 2,112 injuries. Alcohol-impaired collisions were less than 3 percent of all Indiana crashes, but accounted for 20.3% of Indiana’s 779 traffic fatalities in 2012.
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, safety belt use is the most effective strategy a person can employ to prevent death and minimize injury resulting from traffic collisions.
Please help do your part to make the Thanksgiving Holiday travel period safe by observing the following safety rules:
•When planning to travel, make sure you are well rested, as a fatigued driver is a dangerous driver.
•Increase your following distance; remember the two-second rule.
•Decrease your speed according to traffic and road conditions
•Beware of bridges, overpasses and intersections where ice tends to form first in cold inclement weather.
•Don’t use cruise control on slick roads.
•Make sure everyone in your vehicle is properly restrained.
•DON’T BE DISTRACTED-Pull over and stop to use electronic devices.
•DON’T DRIVE IMPAIRED-Have a designated driver.
•MOVE OVER and SLOW DOWN for emergency and highway service vehicles.
The Indiana State Police remain committed to making Hoosier highways safer by reducing crashes, educating the public on the main causes of crashes and patrolling in high crash areas. For more information on Indiana crash statistics please visit the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute’s web site at http://www.in.gov/cji/2572.htm
VANDERBURGH COUNTY FELONY CHARGES
 Below is a list of felony cases that were filed by the Vanderburgh County Prosecutor’s Office on Monday, November 25, 2013
Gerrick Dennis Theft-Class D Felony
Angela Smitha Criminal Trespass-Class A Misdemeanor
(Enhanced to D Felony Due to Prior Convictions)
For further information on the cases listed above, or any pending case, please contact Kyle Phernetton at 812.435.5688 or via e-mail at KPhernetton@vanderburghgov.org
Under Indiana law, all criminal defendants are considered to be innocent until proven guilty by a court of law.
The Magnitude of a Lie
Let’s think for a second about the immensity of what was done to the American people. The lie that was told. And continues to be told. And the resulting, awful, and unavoidable conclusion that your government cannot be trusted.
Obama’s claim, stated ad nauseum, that you could keep your health insurance, your doctor, your hospital, your proctologist, and so forth, was not just untrue. It was about as far from the truth as Harry Reid is from being a Martian.
On second thought, that’s not so far. But you get what I’m talking about.
The claim wasn’t even in the ballpark. Because not just a few people’s plans are going to change. Most of them will. Tens of millions. And Obama knew it.
Because the notion that your insurance must change is not just a fun fact about Obamacare; it’s central to its premise.
Obamacare guarantees certain benefits. Therefore, ergo, and so . . . PLANS THAT DON’T OFFER THESE BENEFITS HAVE TO CHANGE OR END.
Obama likes to note that while he gets called a lot of things, stupid isn’t one of them. I think he’s a little overrated as an intellect, but he’s no doubt extremely smart. And therefore, he must have understood the basic facts of Obamacare.
Earlier this month, the White House was confronted with the evidence that millions on the individual market would lose their insurance because their plans didn’t meet Obamacare’s requirements. “A tiny segment of the market,†sneered a barely chastened White House. The overwhelming majority with employer-sponsored plans need not worry.
Not true. The lying continues.
Many moons ago, in June 2010, the administration published in the federal register an estimate that suggested around half of the 156 million Americans with employer-provided health insurance held plans would not be “grandfathered†into qualifying as compliant with Obamacare and that would have to change:
The Departments’ mid-range estimate is that 66 percent of small employer plans and 45 percent of large employer plans will relinquish their grandfather status by the end of 2013.
For those like our intellectual leader who perhaps didn’t want to comb through the fine print, it was spelled out in a handy little graph.
Some of these people would just lose their insurance outright, since the new Obama-blessed plans would cost employers more.
As you may have seen in the CBS news item below, in April 2010, just after the law was signed, the Obama administration itself estimated that Obamacare would “collectively reduce the number of people with employer-sponsored health insurance by about 14 million.â€
Others would continue to have insurance provided by their employers. But all would have their insurance change. What’s more, if you have great, expensive insurance from your generous employer – or a stingy employer forced to provide a good deal by a prickly union – your employer may also trim your benefits to avoid a tax Obamacare slaps on these so-called “Cadillac Plans.â€
And what about the supposed $2,500 average annual savings on premiums that families were promised? Or the “bending†cost curve that doesn’t seem to be bending so much, at least not in response to Obamacare? Or the promise that Obamacare wouldn’t harm the deficit, when the cuts used to pay for it can no longer be used for deficit reduction?
We weren’t just lied to. We were sucker punched, kicked on the ground, and thrown in a trench.
I’d say we were sold snake oil, but at least snake oil has the benefit of a placebo effect.
This was all inevitable, because it’s in the law. So where was the 5,000-word exposé in the New York Times? Why wasn’t Romney hammering away, You’re going to lose your insurance, your going to lose your insurance, until voters were hypnotized into voting for him?
How do we trust Obama when he makes promises about Iran and nuclear weapons, promises that relate to world peace and the very existence of our republic? Forget where you stand politically. Obama is our president for another three years. America needs to trust its president and the government he commands – at least a little more than it trusts a used car salesman.
It can’t. And that’s a tragedy.
Source: White House Dossier
IS IT TRUE THAT CCO HITS TRAFFIC MILESTONES?
IS IT TRUE that the City County Observer  on November 16, 2013  hit the 1 Million page views for the year milestone which leads to a projection at year end of nearly 1.2 Million page views?  …the number of unique visitors associated with this traffic is just over 100,000?  …unique visitors in this case means unique IP (internet protocol) addresses as opposed to different people. If a couple both access the CCO through one router those two people actually count as one?  …in 2012 this milestone was not hit until December 6th?
IS IT TRUE that Our projections for 2014 based on the traffic from the last quarter since the Courier & Press started charging $10 per month to access what they consider premium content is that the CCO should enjoy over 1.5 Million page views in 2014 from over 150,000 unique visitors?  … our is source is Google Analytics?
IS IT TRUE November 26, 2013
IS IT TRUE November 26, 2013
IS IT TRUE that after all of the posturing that delayed the approval of Don Mattingly Way because of the need to do it right, not a single member of the Evansville City Council were there for the unveiling this past weekend?…a survey of the crowd and asking other people in attendance if they saw any City Council members resulted in a big ZERO?…t appears that they were MIA?…according to some that worked on the project, Councilman Jonathan Weaver was a big help but was out of town on his honeymoon and could not attend?…the CCO would like to congratulate Councilman Weaver on his marriage?…we are always proud to read about Evansville’s own Donny “Baseball†Mattingly who is still in the news regularly as the Manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers?
IS IT TRUE the CCO has learned that the Kansas City company that received a double payment of over $300,000 for work at the Ford Center has paid the City of Evansville back the surplus funds?…it is a sad shame that it took a lawsuit to get these people off the dime to return money that was never theirs in the first place?…it would be appropriate for this slow walking company that had to have known they had been double paid to also pay interest for the use of the money and to absorb all of the legal costs incurred by the City in the effort to get that money back?…we guess the presumption of honesty was not merited in this case?…this money should be set aside in a fund to someday put in the storage facility that was needed at the Ford Center yet overlooked in the design process?…we hear that tigers do not like the cold and are not appreciative of the sleeping quarters in the back 40 lot when the circus comes to town?
IS IT TRUE City Council Attorney Scott Danks has answered a question to City Councilman John Friend regarding the Federal Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and the accrual of comp time by public employees?…Danks’ conclusion are identical to what the CCO has been publishing for nearly a month now that comp time is mandated to be accrued at “time and a half†rates and accrual cannot exceed 480 hours (320 hours worked) for fire and police personnel and 240 hours (160 hours worked) for regular public employees?…Mr. Danks’ opinion continues the streak of unanimous opinions that the City of Evansville is in serious and habitual violation of federal labor laws?…this law is just as valid and simple to understand as the minimum wage?…it is on the same page as the minimum wage designation in the DOL summary page?…we wonder just how loud the outcry would be if this or any city in America pleaded ignorance for violating federal minimum wage laws for an extended period of time?…for an organization with 1,200 employees to fail to educate themselves and their department heads about basic labor laws is as out of touch with reality as a bus driver that does not know a steering wheel from a pair of shoes?…the CCO openly wonders why there is not more concern expressed by the citizens of Evansville for their leaders being asleep at the wheel?
IS IT TRUE another unanswered question about the FLSA violations is who other than the HR Director and the Department Heads should have caught this failure?…one would expect that the heads of the police and fire unions would be competent enough to know these things and cognizant enough to make FLSA violations known, but they didn’t?…one would expect that the people from the Indiana State Board of Accounts would catch such a thing in the annual audit but they didn’t?…one would expect that someone on the City Council (John Friend) that has knowledge of balance sheets would ask a question about accrued liability for labor and catch such failures but they didn’t?…the list of people that should have been in the “checks and balances†loop is quite long but no one caught this even after Sherman Greer was outed for letting an employee accumulate 1,100 hours of comp time?…why was the legal limit of comp time never questioned even after Greer was admonished in the media by Mayor Winnecke?…it seems as the only was Evansville will learn this lesson is for the federal government (which is dealing with mass incompetency itself) to come to town and administer mass spankings?
IS IT TRUE when it comes to qualifications for public jobs it is time to start considering some litmus tests with regard to who can run for certain offices?…one can run for City Council, School Board, or any other elected office without so much as demonstrating an ability to read or add a column of numbers?…if we want competence in government it is time to demand it?…something like an 8th grade ISTEP test would be a step up for Indiana cities to filter out candidates that are unqualified to be the equivalent of a member of the board of directors of a $300 Million+ company in Evansville’s case?