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Journal Gazette from Mattoon, Illinois • Page 7
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Journal Gazette from Mattoon, Illinois • Page 7

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Journal Gazettei
Location:
Mattoon, Illinois
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Page:
7
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www.jg-tc.com JG-TC FRIDAY, JANUARY 1 3, 201 2 0 LOCAL STATE NATION A7 COURT ROUNDUP i i y- Midwest gets first big snow Guilty DUI plea will get local man prison time V- i The Telegraph, John BadmanAssocialed Press Alton firefighters carefully help a woman from her car after she apparently slid off a snow-covered Edwards Street and was stopped from plunging into the creek along Rock Spring Drive on Thursday In Alton. Firefighters quickly secured the car by cable to their rescue truck before attempting to remove the woman. More than 500 flights canceled at Chicago airports CHICAGO (AP) Airlines canceled more than 525 flights at Chicago airports as a snow storm sweeps across the region. The Chicago Department of Aviation said Thursday afternoon that more than 400 flights were canceled at O'Hare International Airport BY CARRIE ANTLFINGER Associated Press MILWAUKEE An unusually mild winter finally gave way to the Midwest's first big snowstorm of the season Thursday, blanketing a region unfazed by a white Thanksgiving in a layer of powder and pack that forced all-too-happy snow plow drivers off their couches and into the streets. The storm dumped several inches of snow on western parts of Wisconsin and Iowa before moving eastward into Milwaukee, St.

Louis and Chicago, where up to eight inches were expected to fall by this morning. In a typical year, such a storm would hardly register in the upper Midwest. But for virtually the entire season, cold air has been bottled up over Canada. La Nina, the cooling of the equatorial Pacific Ocean that affects weather worldwide, has nudged the jet stream farther north. And air pressure over the northern Atlantic has steered storm systems away from the East Coast.

For Steve Longo, a 47-year-old chiropractor from Wauwatosa, the wait to try out the cross country skis he got for Christmas was excruciating. He and friend Alex Ng, 56, wasted no time in hitting the trails at the Lapham Peak cross country ski area, about 25 miles west of Milwaukee. "I wasn't worried," Longo said. "I was just anxious." "This is Wisconsin," a confident Ng said. "There's going to be snow." The storm dumped 2 to 6 inches of snow on eastern Iowa by Thursday evening, and was expected to drop 3 to 8 inches total on southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois as it moves further into the Northeast today, according to Richard Castro, a National Weather Service gist.

While the dry weather has been an unexpected boon to many cash-strapped communities, which have saved big by not having to pay for plowing, salting and sanding their streets, it has hurt the seasonable businesses that bank on the snow. "If people don't see it in their yards they are not likely to come out and ski and snow- possession of cannabis was dismissed and he was sentenced to two years in prison. Records show that Gill has at least six prior felony convictions in Coles County, including convictions for aggravated battery, unlawful restraint and failure to register as a sex offender for which he served prison time. Case records indicate that Gill was a passenger in a car stopped for a traffic violation and the car's driver told the officer that he had the marijuana. Glenn accepted a plea agreement that Assistant State's Attorney Eric Neumann and defense attorney Jeannine Garrett recommended.

Dustin R. Adair, 28, 2413 Stoner Drive East, Charleston, to a trespassing charge alleging he was at an apartment on 12th Street in Charleston without permission on Dec. 21. The charge was reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor and a misdemeanor property damage charge alleging Adair damaged a door was dismissed. He received two years of conditional discharge, supervision with fewer restrictions than probation, with terms including other counseling and a requirement that he not return to the apartment or have contact with the people who were there.

Bucher and defense attorney Brian Bower recommended the plea agreement. Loren F. Howard, 36, 717 DeWitt Mattoon, to a theft charge alleging he stole money from the now-closed Premiere Video store in Mat-toon on May 20. The charge was reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor and Howard was placed on probation for two years. Terms of his sentence included payment of nearly $790 in restitution plus a $250 fine, counseling and five weekends in jail beginning Jan.

27. Assistant State's Attorney Tom Bucher and Lutz recommended the plea agreement. Contact Fopay at or 238-6858. 'V of snow in Chicago and Joliet and 4 to 6 inches in Rockford, Dixon, LaSalle and Pontiac. Between 2 and 5 inches of snow are forecast in central Illinois.

Ice- and snow-covered roads were reported around Freeport, the Quad Cities, Bloomington and Jacksonville. than it normally gets. The ice and snow may have caused headaches for travelers, but 44-year-old Mike Norman, of Evanston, 111., said it's about time. Norman co-founded Chicago Endurance Sports, which offers a Winter Warriors program to help runners stay committed to their training and teach them about the right gear for winter. But he said because of the unseasonably warm weather temperatures exceeded 50 degrees on Wednesday the program hasn't really geared up.

"It's one of my favorite times of year to run. It's clean. It's crisp. It's quiet," Norman said. "It's fun to put footsteps in the fresh snow." Lisa Taylor, the director of the North American Vasa cross-country ski race near Traverse City, said the storm, which hadn't reached the areaet, would help reinforce the thick base of snow on the rolling trails that they needed for races.

"There's been a great feeling of confidence that we'd get some good snow," Taylor said. "Up in the hilly areas where the trails are, there's already more snow than you'd think." "There's been a great feeling of confidence that we'd get some good snow. Up in the hilly areas where the trails are, there's already more snow than you'd think. Stolen vehicle charge dropped BY DAVE FOPAY JG-TC Stall Writer CHARLESTON A man faces the possibility of up to six years in prison for a conviction for driving while intoxicated but apparently won't be prosecuted for having a stolen vehicle. Jason P.

Reincke, 30, for whom records list an address of an apartment at 814 Monroe Charleston, pleaded guilty to a charge of aggravated driving under the influence alleging he was intoxicated when a police officer stopped him in Charleston on ''May 20. The car Reincke was driving was reported stolen and he was also charged with possession of a stolen vehicle, but with the agreement reached his case that will charge will be dismissed. There was no other agreement on sentencing, which Circuit Judge James Glenn scheduled for March 9. The DUI is a felony because of prior convictions and normally can result in a prison sentence of one to three years or probation. His prior convictions make him eligible for the-extended term.

I Case records indicate that I Reincke admitted to the offi- cer that he was intoxicated but said he borrowed the car I from someone and didn't i know it was stolen. A convic-! tion for the stolen vehicle offense would have required prison time, up to 14 years, also because of earlier con- victions. Assistant State's Attorney Rob Scales is prosecuting the case and Public Defender Lonnie Lutz represents Reincke. I In other cases in court recently, Glenn also accepted guilty pleas from: Bernard D. Gill, 36, of Decatur, formerly of Mat-I toon, to an obstructing jus- tice charge alleging he tried to hide marijuana from I police in Charleston on Dec.

22, 2010. A misdemeanor charge of 132.8 inches in 1954-55. Two atmospheric patterns are behind the state's massive snowfall: the Pacific weather pattern known as La Nina, and another called the Arctic-Oscillation that has been strong this year, changing air patterns to the south and keeping the coldest winter air locked up in the Arctic. "Alaska is definitely getting the big dump," said Bill Patzert, a climate expert at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Many of the lower 48 states have seen an unusually mild start to the winter.

A storm dumped several inches of snow on northwestern Wisconsin and western Iowa before moving eastward and to start blanketing Milwaukee, St. Louis and Chicago, which was expected to get up to 8 inches by Friday morning. In the ice-choked frozen waters of the Bering Sea, a Russian tanker loaded with 1.3 million gallons of fuel progressed steadily toward Brady drops legislative scholarship program and delays from deicing were averaging 20 minutes. Southwest Airlines planned to resume flights at 6 p.m. after canceling more than 100 flights at Midway International Airport earlier in the day.

The National Weather Service in northern Illinois predicted between 6 and 8 inches unexpected day of sledding, hundreds of would-be air travelers had to scramble to come up with a Plan B. More than 400 flights were canceled at O'Hare International Airport on Thursday and flights that did depart were delayed 20 minutes, on average, because of deicing, the Chicago Department fo Aviation said. Across town at Midway International Airport, more than 100 flights were canceled, although Southwest Airlines said it planned to resume its flights Thursday evening. In New York state, the storm dumped up to 8 inches of snow on the southern Adirondacks and forced scores of schools to cancel or delay the start of classes. The weather service said until Thursday's storm, Albany had received only 6.5 inches of snow this winter, which is about 10 inches less Alaska winter.

piles on more snow BY MARK THIESSEN and RACHEL D'ORO Associated Press ANCHORAGE, Alaska -The worst winter anyone can remember in Alaska has piled snow so high people can't see out the windows, kept a tanker in ice-choked waters from delivering fuel on time and turned snow-packed roofs into sled runs. While most of the nation has gone without much seasonal snow, the state already known for winter is buried in weather that has dumped more than twice as much snow as usual on its largest city, brought out the National Guard and put a run on snow shovels. As a Russian tanker crawled toward the iced-in coastal community of Nome to bring in much-needed fueL weather-weary Alaskans awoke Thursday to more of the white stuff and said enough was enough. "The scary part is, we still have three more months to go," said Kathryn Hawkins, a veterinarian who lives in the coastal community of Valdez, about 100 miles southeast of Anchorage. "I look out and go, 'Oh my gosh, where can it all More than 26 feet of snow has fallen in Valdez since November.

The 8-foot snow piles outside Hawkins' home are so high she can't see out the front or back of her house. Her 12-year-old son has been sliding off the roof into the yard. In the nearby fishing community of Cordova, more than 172 inches of snow has fallen since November; snow began board so this is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful for us," said Kim Engel, owner of Sunburst Ski area in Kewaskum in southeastern Wisconsin, as she watched the snow come down out the window. Rob Moser, a snow plow driver from Elkhart, said he couldn't wait for the flakes to start to fall. The weather service said lake effect snow could mean parts of Michigan and northern Indiana could get up to a foot.

"I love it. I make money plowing snow and I'm all about snowmobiling, so I love it," Moser said. "We haven't had enough snow to do much." The storm was an annoyance for most commuters, and authorities said it caused hundreds of traffic accidents and at least three road deaths two in Iowa and one in Missouri. And while some lucky grade-schoolers cheered an have drawn the interest of federal investigators for distributing the perks to the sons and daughters of campaign con- tributors, Brady used a panel of community and education leaders to evaluate applications and select scholarship recipients without political influence. He said he was not involved in the decision-mak- -ing process.

Based on a count this week by the Herald-News in Joliet, Brady becomes at least the 78th of 177 members of the House and Senate to eschew distributing the scholarships, which allow lawmakers to give tuition breaks to students attending public universities. State Rep. Jason Barickman, R-Champaign, issued a press release Monday renewing his opposition to the program and state Sen. A.J. Wilhelmi, D-Joliet, also recently announced he was ending his participation in the program, which costs universities an estimated $14 million annually.

comment about the pending hearing, which came in response to a Chicago Sun-Times report identifying Cellini-linked companies as managing more than a dozen buildings for agencies like the state police and the Illinois Department of Transportation. Cellini, a Republican fundraiser involved in numerous business enterprises linked to the state, was convicted in November as part of the federal case that also brought down former Gov. Rod Blagojevich; He is appealing his conviction. -r- is 4 T- BY KURT ERICKSON JG-TC Springfield Bureau SPRINGFIELD Add the former Republican candidate-for Illinois governor to the growing list of lawmakers no -longer doling out free college tuition to students in their districts. In an announcement Thurs day, state Sen.

Bill Brady, R- Bloomington, said an inability by lawmakers and Gov. Pat Quinn to reform the controversial legislative scholarship program triggered an end to his participation. "In these difficult economic times for Illinois and our colleges and universities, we must look at every opportunity to maximize the use of our resources," Brady said. "I just feel it wasn't prudent to do it anymore." Brady's decision was a quick turnaround from just a week ago when his office sent out a notice calling for applicants to the latest round of shcolarships. Unlike some lawmakers, who Loren HolmesyAssociated Press On Thursday, 14-year-old Doug Hamrick shovels snow off of his family's roof in Anchorage.

The National Weather Service was predicting a total snowfall of 8 to 16 Inches Thursday, putting Anchorage on track to have the snowiest winter on record. Cellini building lease probe to start next month Nome, following the path being painstakingly plowed by a Coast Guard icebreaker. Thick ice, wind and unfavorable ocean currents had ini tially slowed the vessel down; but as of 2 p.m. Thursday the tanker and the icebreaker were 46 miles from Nome and likely to arrive Friday, said Coast Guard spokesman David Mosley. The city missed its final pre-winter delivery of fuel by barge when a big storm swept the region last fall.

Without the delivery, Nome could run short of fuel before another barge arrives in late spring, forcing fuel to be flown in and raising prices as high as $9 a gallon. Gasoline was selling for Gasoline was selling for $5.43 on Thursday. The weather has put a strain on the state, which estimates the cost of paying for guard members in Cordova, heavy equipment, fuel and other costs at $775,000, said emergency management spokesman Jeremy Zidek. falling again after midnight Wednesday. tThe Alaskan National Guard was called in to help move the snow, and the city is running out of places to put it.

Front-end -loaders are hauling snow from dump piles to a snow-melting machine. "That's our big issue, getting our snow dumps cleared for the next barrage of snow," Cordova spokesman Allen Marquette said. Anchorage had 88 inches fall as of Thursday more than twice the average snowfall of 30.1 inches for the same time period. The weather service counts July 1 through the end of June as a snow season. More than 7 inches had fallen on Thursday and more than a foot was expected.

This year's total already broke the record 77.3 inches that fell during the same period in 1993-94. If it keeps up, Anchorage is on track to have the snowiest winter ever, surpassing the previous record of BY KURT ERICKSON JG-TC Springfield Bureau SPRINGFIELD State officials could begin trying to unwind their complicated, long-running relationship with convicted felon William Cellini and his business interests next month. In action Thursday, members of a panel overseeing state building leases set a Feb. 9 date to launch a probe into the Springfield businessman's connections to businesses that manage state office space. Members of the Procurement Policy Board had little 1.

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