The Missouri Department of Labor and Industrial Relations announces the state minimum wage rate for 2023 has been established, according to state law, at $12.00 per hour, effective January 1, 2023. According to Proposition B, which was approved by Missouri voters on November 6, 2018, the minimum wage will increase by 85 cents per hour […]
The American Heart Association is drawing attention this holiday season to a startling study conclusion: More people have fatal heart attacks on Dec. 25, followed by Dec. 26 and Jan. 1, than any other time of the year. The study, in the Heart Association journal Circulation, pointed to disruptions in people’s routines and the added stress the […]
With Community Health Centers’ funding facing challenges from pharmacy benefit managers, some state lawmakers are getting involved. The centers are a nonprofit safety net created by Congress in 1965 to provide health care services to medically underserved communities both urban and rural. They are the medical home for 600,000 Missourians. They are funded by private insurance […]
(Missouri Independent) – There have been more bills pre-filed for Missouri’s 2023 legislative session regarding transgender athletes than there are transgender athletes currently competing according to their identity in public schools. Republican lawmakers in both the House and Senate have combined to file 10 bills seeking to restrict the ability of transgender minors to play […]
A Jefferson City, Mo., business owner has been sentenced in federal court for tax evasion and for failing to pay more than $500,000 in payroll taxes. Gina Marie Volmert, 58, of Jefferson City, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Bough on Wednesday, Dec. 21, to one year and one day in federal prison […]
The owner of the Rockstar Burgers restaurant in Kansas City, Mo., has pleaded guilty in federal court to allow his former restaurant building to be used in a drug trafficking conspiracy that is alleged to have distributed more than 150 kilograms of methamphetamine and more than 10 kilograms of heroin, valued at more than $1.7 […]
Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt announced that his office has filed a lawsuit against Missouri propane gas supplier, Gygr Gas. The lawsuit alleges that Gygr Gas abruptly closed in the cold winter months of late 2022, failed to notify its customers that it would stop making the propane deliveries they depended on, and failed to […]
Colonel Eric T. Olson, superintendent of the Missouri State Highway Patrol, announces that 19 troopers graduated from the Patrol’s Law Enforcement Academy on December 22, 2022. The ceremony took place at 10 a.m. in the Academy gymnasium, 1510 East Elm Street, Jefferson City, MO. The graduation ceremony, as it was live-streamed on the Patrol’s Facebook […]
On Monday, a man from Texas admitted targeting a St. Louis woman in a $1.2 million romance scam. Rotimi Oladimeji, 37, pleaded guilty in front of U.S. District Judge Rodney W. Sippel to two counts of mail fraud, two counts of wire fraud, and one count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud. […]
A man from St. Louis was arrested Thursday on an indictment that accuses him of manufacturing and selling fake temporary vehicle license tags. Mario C. Cooks, 34, was indicted in U.S. District Court in St. Louis Wednesday on six felony counts of fraudulent transfer of an authentication feature. The indictment says Cooks used a fake […]
U.S. District Judge Ronnie L. White on Tuesday sentenced a former St. Louis County, Missouri high school counselor who had sexual contact with one student and inappropriate contact with nine others to 15 years in prison. After James Q. Jenkins, 38, is released from prison, he will be on supervised release for life and will […]
U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Clark on Wednesday sentenced a man who carjacked two people in 2021, including a grandmother and her granddaughter, to 28 years and 10 months in prison. Darius Eubanks, 28, first stole a 2012 Chevrolet Malibu at gunpoint at a north St. Louis grocery store on the afternoon of June 27, […]
U.S. District Judge Matthew T. Schelp on Wednesday sentenced a man who sold the fentanyl that killed a St. Peters, Missouri woman in 2020 to 18 years and four months in prison. Nathan Matson, 27, of O’Fallon, Missouri, met with the victim in the driveway of her home on July 4, 2020, and sold her […]
A Chanute, Kansas, man serving with the Army National Guard was sentenced in federal court for sexually exploiting an 11-year-old southwest Missouri victim to produce child pornography. Christian Sinclair, 22, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Stephen R. Bough to 16 years in federal prison without parole. The court also sentenced Sinclair to 15 years […]
Three Rogersville, Mo., and Springfield, Mo., men have been sentenced in federal court for their roles in a scheme to transport tens of thousands of stolen catalytic converters across state lines as part of a multi-million-dollar business. “These three defendants were the ringleaders of a scheme that impacted thousands of area residents,” said U.S. Attorney […]
Two Mexican nationals have been convicted in federal court of kidnapping and murder. Jonathan M. Bravo-Lopez (also known as “Jonathan Vravo,” and “Shadow”), 27, and Juan D. Osorio (also known as “Spexx”), 28, both of whom are citizens of Mexico residing in Kansas City, Mo., were found guilty on Friday, Dec. 16, of conspiracy to […]
(Missourinet) – State Education Commissioner Margie Vandeven says Missouri’s K-12 public schools continue to deal with chronic absenteeism. Her response follows the nation’s report card showing reading and math test scores declined among Missouri’s K-12 public school students from 2019 to 2022. Randolph County R-4 School District in northern Missouri recently closed temporarily […]
(Missouri Independent) – The homicide detective who led the investigation of the 1994 murder that landed Lamar Johnson in prison told a St. Louis courtroom that he had no evidence connecting Johnson to the murder, echoing what the prosecutor in the case said earlier in the week. Joseph Nickerson, who retired from the St. Louis Metropolitan Police […]
A new federal grant is giving schools in three Missouri counties and St. Louis City a fresh look at the challenges of students of color living with disabilities. Missouri students of color with disabilities face harsher school disciplinary practices than their white peers, which can lead them into the juvenile justice system. Disrupting this path […]
A Missouri man who led on a high-speed chase Thursday was charged Friday with a federal gun crime. Anthony L. Rogers, 35, of St. Louis, was charged by complaint in U.S. District Court in St. Louis with being a felon in possession of a firearm. The criminal complaint says the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department […]
