Kentucky News Now

COMER-FARMER

Comer navigates Richie Farmer backlash

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Agriculture Commissioner James Comer will formally announce his candidacy for governor on Tuesday amid a small but vocal Republican backlash over his handling of the investigation and indictment of his Republican predecessor, Richie Farmer.

Farmer is serving a 27-month federal prison sentence after pleading guilty to corruption charges last year. Comer called for the audit that contributed to Farmer's downfall.

Farmer remains popular in his birthplace of eastern Kentucky after his starring role on the 1992 University of Kentucky basketball team. James Phillips and Roger Schott, Republican elected officials in Clay and Laurel counties, say it will be difficult for Comer to get a foothold in eastern Kentucky because of his outspokenness on Farmer.

Comer said he will always do what he thinks is right and said history will show he did the right thing.

ARMY CRASH-LAWSUIT

Makers of Army helicopter sued in fatal Ga. crash

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — A lawsuit says a tiny missing part caused an Army helicopter to spin out of control and crash during a training flight in Georgia eight months ago, killing the co-pilot and seriously injuring two crew members.

The lawsuit filed Monday blames the manufacturer of the MH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, Sikorsky Aircraft Corp., and others that make its components for the Jan. 16 crash at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah.

The mother of Capt. Clayton O. Carpenter, who died, and the two injured crew members are seeking unspecified damages. The crew belonged to the elite 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment.

Attorney Timothy Loranger says a missing safety cotter pin caused a malfunction in the helicopter's tail rotor.

A spokeswoman for Sikorsky did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

DEATH ROW-SURGERY

Death row inmate loses suit over hip surgery

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — A Kentucky death row inmate has lost his bid to force the state to find a place to perform surgery on his degenerating hip.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Edward B. Atkins rejected a lawsuit brought by 57-year-old Robert Foley aimed a requiring the medical procedure. Foley claimed the state's inability to find a hospital amounted to unconstitutional cruel and unusual punishment.

Foley was convicted of killing six people in eastern Kentucky in 1989 and 1991. Court documents obtained through a public records request and Foley's lawsuit show his status as an extremely dangerous prisoner was a key factor in the state's difficulty finding a surgeon and hospital.

Atkins concluded that the state put forth an effort to find a facility for Foley but was unable to do so despite the efforts.

KENTUCKY EXECUTIONS-WILSON

Kentucky high court to case of condemned inmate

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — The Kentucky Supreme Court has opted to hear oral arguments in the case of a death row inmate convicted in a 1987 kidnapping and slaying of a woman.

The justices set an Oct. 16 hearing date for 57-year-old Gregory L. Wilson. Wilson was convicted on Oct. 31, 1998 of kidnapping and killing Deborah Pooley of Kenton County 19 months earlier.

Wilson and a female accomplice forced Pooley into the back seat of her car. Wilson raped the victim and later strangled her while the accomplice was driving.

The arguments will center on Wilson's claim that his appeals counsel was ineffective and on issues related to DNA evidence.

Kentucky is under a judge's order halting all executions in the state because of questions about how condemned inmates are handled.

CHILE-US WOMAN DIES

Police say Kentucky woman likely slain in Chile

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) — Police in Chile are investigating what appears to be the slaying of a U.S. citizen in the South American country.

Twenty-two-year-old Erica Faith Hagan was found in the bathroom of her apartment in the southern city of Temuco Saturday morning. A local prosecutor says she suffered at least three injuries to her head with a sharp object and police are investigating.

Hagan was a recent graduate of Georgetown College in Kentucky.

Chilean police said in a statement Monday that the woman had been in Temuco since July 28 working as a teaching assistant at a local school.

The Georgetown College site says Hagan was from Murray, Kentucky, and had been scheduled to return home in December.

TERROR PLOT-INMATE

Inmate involved in terror plot moved to Colorado

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — An Iraqi man convicted of trying to ship arms and cash from Kentucky to Al-Qaida in Iraq has been sent to a maximum-security prison.

The Bureau of Prisons listed 33-year-old Waad Ramadan Alwan as incarcerated at Florence ADMAX United States Penitentiary in Florence, Colorado. Alwan spent several years at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Alwan is serving 40 years in prison after pleading guilty to taking part in a plot to ship cash and weapons from Kentucky to al-Qaida in Iraq in 2010 and 2011. His co-defendant, Mohanad Hammadi, is serving a life sentence at the facility.

Prosecutors say the men worked with the Mujahidin Shura Council, a group that claimed responsibility for the June 2006 deaths of three soldiers from the Fort Campbell-based 101st Airborne Division.

EXPORTS GRANT

Kentucky receiving funding to help exports

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky is receiving a $300,000 State Trade Export Promotion grant to foster international trade among the state's small businesses.

Gov. Steve Beshear's office says the program's goals include increasing the number of small businesses that begin to export and increasing the value of exports for small businesses that currently export.

Kentucky received a $276,000 grant through the program in 2012 and $427,000 during the first round in 2011.

The funds help make it more affordable for small businesses to participate in international trade missions, sales trips and subscription services provided by the U.S. Commerce Department. The money also helps with international marketing campaigns, export trade show exhibits, training workshops or other export initiatives.

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH

Appalachian research center receiving $5M grant

LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) — A center at the University of Kentucky is receiving a five-year, $5 million grant to improve occupational health and safety in central Appalachia and Kentucky.

UK says the region reports higher rates of occupational injuries and fatalities than the rest of the nation.

The Central Appalachian Regional Education and Research Center at UK's College of Public Health was formed in 2012, combining resources at UK as well as at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond.

UK says the center provides interdisciplinary graduate education for students and health professionals in five programs, including agricultural safety and health, occupational epidemiology, mining engineering safety and health, occupational health nursing and occupational safety.

The funding comes from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

OIL TRAINS-KENTUCKY

Oil trains crisscross Kentucky on weekly basis

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky Emergency Management officials say freight trains loaded with volatile crude oil crisscross seven Kentucky counties on a weekly basiss.

As many as five CSX Corp. trains carry oil from the upper Great Plains' Bakken shale fields into Boyd and Greenup counties in northeastern Kentucky. A similar number rolls through Henderson, Webster, Hopkins, Christian and Todd counties in the western part of the state.

WDRB-TV in Louisville reports that the trains skip the state's largest cities but skirt areas along the Ohio River near the Ohio and West Virginia borders and pass directly through Henderson, Hopkinsville and other cities in western Kentucky.

Until earlier this year, railroads had no obligation to notify communities where large quantities of that oil rumbled past their schools, homes and businesses.