Fire reveals archaeological site; kids in car, mom's in bar; provolone poacher
- Updated
Odd and interesting news from the West.
- The Associated Press
KALISPELL, Mont. — The Montana Supreme Court has declined to rule in a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America by women who were raped by a scout leader as children.
William Leininger Jr. was convicted in 1976 of raping six female Explorer Scouts. He died in 2002.
The high court on Tuesday rejected the Boy Scouts' request that it dismiss the women's case because time had run out to file a lawsuit.
The five women plaintiffs say they only discovered within the last five years the connection between the rapes and the physical, mental and emotional harm they later suffered.
The justices say the issues surrounding the statute-of-limits argument must be sorted in district court.
The Daily Inter Lake reports District Judge James Reynolds had previously ruled the case must go to a jury trial.
- The Associated Press
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A New Mexico woman has been ordered to pay back more than $11,000 in unemployment benefits.
The Albuquerque Journal reports that the state supreme court last month ruled that Nancy Garduno is responsible for paying back the money she received after her former employer successfully appealed her benefits.
Garduno was fired from Albertsons in February 2010 for giving other employees deep discounts. The state Department of Workforce Solutions originally determined she was eligible for $402 in weekly benefits, which are available to employees who lost their job through no fault of their own.
Albertsons appealed the award and won in March but Garduno wasn't notified until August. She appealed the ruling, saying she wasn't notified in a timely manner.
- By GREGORY R.C. HASMAN Rock Springs Rocket-Miner
ROCK SPRINGS, Wyo. — J.C. Penney will bid farewell to Rock Springs on Friday after 113 years.
"It's going to be sad not having J.C. Penney anymore," Rock Springs Historical Museum technician Janice Brown said. "I guess that's what it is."
For decades it served as a mom-and-pop shop across the Union Pacific Railroad tracks on North Front Street before expanding and relocating to White Mountain Mall in 1978.
___
After graduating high school in Hamilton, Missouri, James Cash Penney worked as an apprentice at a dry goods store for J.M. Hale and Brothers, where he learned about business. He later worked for Guy Johnson and Thomas Callahan, who operated dry goods establishments called Golden Rule stores in Colorado and Wyoming.
Penney relocated to Kemmerer and helped operate a new Golden Rule store, which opened April 14, 1902. The one-room frame building was located between a laundry and boarding house off the main business district. He stocked merchandise and marked the price on every item, one price charged to all.
Penney operated a cash-only store, due to his opposition to credit, and within a year Johnson and Callahan made him an offer — improve profits at the Rock Springs Golden Rule store at 313 N. Front St., and Penney would become a part owner. In January 1906, he bought Johnson and Callahan's shares, worth $30,000, and took over Wyoming stores in Kemmerer, Cumberland and Rock Springs.
"You will have to accept my name on this note as your guarantee of payment," Penney said. "I will not give you a lien on the stock in any of the stores because you know, as well as I do, that to do that would hurt my credit."
Six months later, Penney's cousin William Partin came to Rock Springs and became his partner. Parton brought his sisters Belle and Anna to help him run it, and in 1910, Parton sold Penney his interests in the Kemmerer location while Parton acquired Penney's interest in the Rock Springs store.
Penney decided to change the name from Golden Rule to J.C. Penney and Company in 1912 because he felt the name was too common across the west and wanted the company to establish its own identity.
The first J.C. Penney's chain store in Rock Springs opened Jan. 7, 1928.
The 8,483-square foot building was located on 421 N. Front St., where Willow Ridge Crafts now resides. It had a first floor, basement and two balconies. It sold materials and patterns on the ground floor as well as operated a zip line, which was used to finish transactions between the store and customer.
The two-story brick building with a flat roof built was originally made out of wood frame in 1909 before being remodeled in 1929 with a brick fa?ade and solid masonry walls.
At one point the upstairs was used for apartments.
In 1929, Partin sold his interests in the company to P.W. Memovich, who remained at the store for nearly 20 years. Francis H. Switzer, Richard Hobbs, Marion A. Burt, Vernon A. Harmer, Floyd B. Weed, L.R. Redmond, Bruce E. Hand and Tom Trueblood operated the store at the North Front Street location.
"It is bigger than anything one individual could never create or be,"
Penney said. "Whatever I had to do with its beginning, by injecting a few cardinal ideas into the selling of merchandise, has come back to me a hundred gold in the confidence — and I think I may say, humble, the love — of my fellow associates."
___
Seven years after the death of J.C. Penney, the department store relocated to the White Mountain Mall on March 29, 1978.
Managers who ran the 33,949-square-foot location include Trueblood, Mike E. Quickenden, Beverly Lyndes, Kathy Paul and Troy Jones, who has been in charge since July.
In 1981, owners reorganized their executive structure around the office of the chairman and began changing the company from a mass retailer to national department store. The change from mom and pop to corporate was fully complete.
In January, the parent company announced it will close seven stores across the country.
"It's never easy taking actions that directly impact our valued customers, however, we feel this is a necessary business decision," Carter English, JC Penney public relations manager, said in January.
Despite the closure, J.C. Penney will always be a part of Rock Springs.
"It is a staple of this community," Jones told the Rock Springs Rocket-Miner (http://bit.ly/1YgImUW). "I think the community will miss it for sure."
The J.C. Penney legacy will continue to live on.
In the introduction to "Main Street Merchant: The Story of the J.C. Penney Company," Penney offered words of encouragement.
"What is needed today, as always, is the ability and the will to work hard toward the achievement of a goal, any goal, which is right and clean and decent and worthwhile."
- By RASHAH McCHESNEY The Associated Press
JUNEAU, Alaska — A bill that would allow concealed guns on University of Alaska campuses is headed to the state House after senators passed the measure Thursday.
The bill strips the University of Alaska Board of Regents ability to designate broad concealed-weapon free zones on its campuses, allowing them to be carried in classrooms and dorms. It does allow the university to restrict them in areas where disciplinary actions or sexual harassment and domestic crimes are investigated.
It also allows the university to track which students keep weapons in dorms in order to make housing decisions for students who don't want to share rooms those who have firearms.
The bill's sponsor, Sen. Pete Kelly, R-Fairbanks, said gun-free zones on campuses make them targets for killers. He highlighted the growing number of mass shootings in the United States in recent years.
"I don't want the students and the faculty at the University of Alaska to be a soft target as the dial seems to be ratcheted up over the last few years," he said.
Students have testified on both sides of the issue. Supporters of the bill said they want to be able to protect themselves on campus.
Others, such as University of Alaska Southeast student Lily Pothier, cautioned lawmakers against assuming that concealed weapons would make students as a whole feel safer.
"This could affect relationships between student to student, between staff to student," she testified to the education committee. "I also think that the change that happens in the atmosphere of a public space when people are aware that there are concealed weapons is not a positive change."
In the U.S., at least 19 states ban concealed weapons on college campuses, 23 states allow individual universities to decide whether to allow concealed weapons, according to a 2015 guns on campuses overview from the National Conference of State Legislatures.
In Texas, under a law that goes into effect Aug. 1, licensed gun owners will be able to carry concealed handguns on public university campuses. That measure has caused alarm for some faculty members at the University of Houston who told its regents staff that some sensitive subjects could become taboo in the classroom if students began bringing guns to class.
- The Associated Press
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a former Wyoming State Penitentiary guard against the state Department of Corrections.
The Wyoming Tribune Eagle reports that federal Magistrate Mark Carman issued an order last month in the lawsuit filed by Pierre Hardin.
Hardin had contended in his lawsuit that he experienced racial discrimination and harassment while working as a corrections officer at the Rawlins prison.
The judge said the lawsuit lacked specific evidence to support Hardin's arguments.
However, the judge is allowing Hardin the opportunity to provide any evidence in an amended complaint. Hardin has until April 22 to file the amended lawsuit.
Hardin's attorney, Mitchell Osborn, says he plans to file the amended lawsuit.
- The Associated Press
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Warm temperatures across Alaska might be getting bears out of their dens early.
Bear sightings have been reported all across the state, including a grizzly in the Fairbanks area this week.
State wildlife officials say black bears have been sighted in several parts of Anchorage. There also have been sightings of brown bear sows and yearling cubs in Kodiak, something that doesn't usually happen until later in the spring.
Given the early sightings, officials are urging Alaskans to take down bird feeders and clean up any seed, trash or pet food that has been left out over the winter. Poultry and small livestock owners should secure their animals behind electric fences, and garbage bins should be put away.
Officials say feeding bears, even unintentionally, is illegal and can result in fines.
- The Associated Press
PEORIA — A homeowner shot a masked intruder he found using a blowtorch to start a fire that destroyed his suburban Phoenix home, authorities said Thursday.
The wounded man and a resident pulled from the burning Peoria-area home by a firefighter were hospitalized in critical condition, a Maricopa County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman said.
The firefighter suffered burns that were not life-threatening, sheriff's Officer Courtney Palma said. At least one additional firefighter and several sheriff's deputies were treated for smoke inhalation.
The homeowner woke up Thursday morning to find a man setting a fire, then shot him in the abdomen. The wounded man ran away but was found about two blocks away, she said.
Investigators were trying to piece together what happened. It wasn't immediately known whether the wounded man knew any of those who lived at the home or what a motive could be, Palma said.
No identities have been released.
Arriving deputies responding to a call about a fire and home invasion were told by people outside that a person might be inside.
The deputies looked through a broken window and saw an unresponsive person lying on the floor, but they could not enter because of smoke and flames. A firefighter was able to go in and pull out the unconscious person, Palma said.
"His protective gear — his helmet, mask and coat — were also burned and pretty much destroyed, but it did its job in protecting him," said Deputy Chief Rick Picard of the Peoria Fire Department.
- The Associated Press
PRESCOTT — Prescott officials are divided on a regulation that would ban people from feeding wildlife in the city.
The Daily Courier reports (http://bit.ly/1TEitiP ) that the proposal would make it illegal to intentionally feed or attract wildlife. It is meant to prevent uncontrollable numbers of animals that could damage property or disrupt residents.
Residents would still be able to feed their own horses, hang birdfeeders and toss bread to ducks on lakes or ponds, among other activities.
Residents who support the ban say it is a public safety issue and cite problems with animals ranging from javelinas to mountain lions.
Some officials supported the change, while others expressed concerns that the rule would just create another burden for local law enforcement.
The City Council has not yet voted on the issue.
- The Associated Press
DENVER — A Moffat County jury has found Georgie Louise Hand guilty of kidnapping, aggravated robbery and disarming a peace officer after two law officers were held at gunpoint while checking out a suspicious vehicle.
Investigators say Hand and James Damon stripped the officers of a firearm, stun guns and radios and nearly took one of their vehicles before an officer got his gun back and Damon was shot and killed.
Neither officer was injured in the confrontation last year near the small town of Dinosaur, about 10 miles from the Utah border.
Hand told investigators she and Damon had been injecting meth at least once a day throughout the week, according to court records.
Sentencing is set for June 13.
- By BRETT FRENCH Billings Gazette
MALTA, Mont. — One season of research atop bluffs that skirt the Milk River north of here has revealed a collection of 800- to 1,000-year-old historical features and artifacts left by ancient people that are stunning in their breadth and depth.
"There's literally no site like this on the Northern Plains," said Josh Chase, a Bureau of Land Management archaeologist based in this northeastern Montana community, who has led the work.
This year, Chase is prepared to record even more features as another 600 acres is explored, twice as much as last summer.
"We're drastically changing topography this year, going into draws and lowlands as well as another bench that I'm sure will have the same density of features," he said while touring the scorched area last week. The pungent smell of fire still hung in the air as a jet-like wind roared across the Hi-Line.
Chase will discuss his work at the next meeting of the Montana Archaeological Society in Great Falls on April 15-17 at the Hampton Inn.
Rock features
Surpassing what has already been revealed seems impossible: human and animal effigies outlined in stone, teepee rings, large cairns, vision quest sites, and rows of rock extending for hundreds of yards — known as drive lines — along which bison were herded to kill sites or buffalo jumps.
Littering the ground around the teepee rings are hundreds of crude but efficient stone tools that were used to butcher the dead bison along with numerous rocks scarred by campfires. Buried just below the surface in coulees and at the base of cliffs are bison ribs, teeth, knuckles and other bones that Chase estimated were stacked in some areas up to 20 feet deep under the topsoil.
"Having all of that together in one location is exceedingly rare," Chase said.
It was previously known there were two buffalo jumps on the BLM land that has been protected from looters by surrounding private lands. As a result of last year's work Chase now estimates there are probably closer to six jumps based on the drive lines along which the bison were herded.
"Obviously Henry Smith is very unique, at least compared to sites we've recorded in that area," said Gary Smith, a BLM archaeologist based at the Billings Curation Center.
Bones and points
Although consultations with Indian tribes and other agencies started in 2010, last year was the beginning of new work at the site, named after the one-time landowner. The historical significance of the place was first noticed by locals in the 1930s as a buffalo jump for its bison bones and Avonlea-style arrowheads, carefully side-notched points.
Archaeological excavation took place below the bluffs in the 1980s. From the site about 300 to 350 points were collected and are now archived at the Billings Curation Center. The oldest dates to A.D. 770, about 200 years after it's believed native people switched from atlatls to bows and arrows.
"They look like they were stamped out with a cookie cutter," Smith said of the arrowheads. "All were made with the same precision from different material types."
Examination of some of the bison teeth collected from the site estimated it was mainly used for small drives of bison in the late winter and summer.
"The hypothesis of winter emphasis at the Henry Smith site, with repeated small-scale drives, is unprecedented for a site of this scale in northern Montana . " wrote Michael Wilson, of the University of Lethbridge, in his 1988 report.
Given the distant age of the site, no evidence has been found tying it to any of the modern Plains Indian tribes, although geographically the property is located where many of them hunted, including the Blackfeet, Gros Ventre and Assiniboine.
"There's nothing diagnostically we can pull from this site and attribute to one of those tribes," Chase said.
Revealing burn
Instead of digging like traditional archaeology, Chase has taken a different approach and the results have been startling. Last year he organized a controlled burn of 300 acres on the prairie uplands. Artifact samples were placed around the location to determine if they would be harmed by the fire. After the burn the area was flown with a drone that could collect standard photographic images as well as LIDAR, surveying technology that uses laser light.
By reviewing the photographs and other images 2,400 points of data were marked across the 300 acres — roughly a site every 3 feet. Before homesteading on the surrounding lands altered the landscape, Chase estimated similar sites could have stretched across the landscape.
The bird's-eye view is key to the large project.
"To record this site traditionally would be overwhelming," Chase said. "It would be time-consuming and tedious to pick out what is a cultural feature and what is glacial till.
"And you're not getting that overall view," he added. "It's much easier to get that overall perspective from the air."
This year, another 600 acres was burned on Easter Sunday and was flown with a specially equipped U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plane on Monday and Tuesday to record new data points. From what he's seen walking around this year's burn, Chase expects to document a lot more.
One of the stone features exposed after this spring's burn was a large vision quest site that also had a line of rocks leading up to it, a peculiarity Chase hadn't seen before. The rock circle was situated in a saddle between two benches. The coulee to the west provided a view down to the Milk River.
"It's amazing how it stands out now," said Scott Meneelly, the BLM fire operations officer who oversaw the burns. "We drove by this a number of times and never knew it was here."
Chase has been excited by the fact that "even the most novice 18-year-old firefighters" could pick out features like the drive lines.
Ground truthing
Although the aerial view has aided the work immensely, Chase said every rock or feature that is flagged from photos as possibly significant has to be verified and catalogued from the ground.
"All of the drones and aircraft in the world will never substitute for boots on the ground," he said.
In a year or more Chase will write a report to share all of what he has learned with the cooperating agencies, tribes and the public. He'd also like to see an interpretive site created some time in the future, although the property is landlocked by surrounding private parcels — probably what protected it from more looting. Chase also credited cooperating landowners Sterling Carroll, Gary Anderson and Jason Lamb for helping out.
"When you look out across this (landscape) it tells a story of people in North America throughout time," Chase said. "So we drove by a homestead on the way here, that's one part of the Hi-Line's history. We're now into this part of the site which is one part of the Hi-Line's prehistory.
"That's one thing about public lands as a whole, that these kinds of places are preserved," Chase said. "We're very fortunate in this country to have that.
"There are a lot of things going on here, that's what makes it so unique and special."
Working together
"Historically, the fire and cultural programs were at loggerheads," said Josh Chase, a BLM archaeologist. "This is an example of them working together."
Chase was standing amid this spring's burn of 600 acres of BLM land north of Malta. Three-hundred acres was burned last year for the same project spread across the Henry Smith archaeological site.
"A lot of times you do more damage on the suppression side" at archaeological sites, said Scott Meneelly, BLM fire operations officer. "If we were to come in and get real aggressive with our actions, we could do more damage than the fire."
In prairie grasslands, temperatures during a fire will hit about 1,300 degrees but usually remain that hot only 5 to 15 seconds, except where sagebrush or other heavier fuel is located. Even bone buried 3 centimeters beneath the soil won't be damaged by such a fast-moving fire, Chase said.
This spring's fire-blackened landscape looked like a dead zone - ash circles surrounded browned stalks of yucca, denuded branches of sagebrush poked skyward and grass was reduced to a low, dark, crunchy blanket. At the site of last year's burn, though, it's hard to tell fire torched the resilient countryside. The grass stands a foot tall.
"It's been a really interesting project from a lot of facets," Meneelly said.
- The Associated Press
KALISPELL, Mont. — The Montana Supreme Court has declined to rule in a lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America by women who were raped by a scout leader as children.
William Leininger Jr. was convicted in 1976 of raping six female Explorer Scouts. He died in 2002.
The high court on Tuesday rejected the Boy Scouts' request that it dismiss the women's case because time had run out to file a lawsuit.
The five women plaintiffs say they only discovered within the last five years the connection between the rapes and the physical, mental and emotional harm they later suffered.
The justices say the issues surrounding the statute-of-limits argument must be sorted in district court.
The Daily Inter Lake reports District Judge James Reynolds had previously ruled the case must go to a jury trial.
- The Associated Press
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A New Mexico woman has been ordered to pay back more than $11,000 in unemployment benefits.
The Albuquerque Journal reports that the state supreme court last month ruled that Nancy Garduno is responsible for paying back the money she received after her former employer successfully appealed her benefits.
Garduno was fired from Albertsons in February 2010 for giving other employees deep discounts. The state Department of Workforce Solutions originally determined she was eligible for $402 in weekly benefits, which are available to employees who lost their job through no fault of their own.
Albertsons appealed the award and won in March but Garduno wasn't notified until August. She appealed the ruling, saying she wasn't notified in a timely manner.
- By GREGORY R.C. HASMAN Rock Springs Rocket-Miner
ROCK SPRINGS, Wyo. — J.C. Penney will bid farewell to Rock Springs on Friday after 113 years.
"It's going to be sad not having J.C. Penney anymore," Rock Springs Historical Museum technician Janice Brown said. "I guess that's what it is."
For decades it served as a mom-and-pop shop across the Union Pacific Railroad tracks on North Front Street before expanding and relocating to White Mountain Mall in 1978.
___
After graduating high school in Hamilton, Missouri, James Cash Penney worked as an apprentice at a dry goods store for J.M. Hale and Brothers, where he learned about business. He later worked for Guy Johnson and Thomas Callahan, who operated dry goods establishments called Golden Rule stores in Colorado and Wyoming.
Penney relocated to Kemmerer and helped operate a new Golden Rule store, which opened April 14, 1902. The one-room frame building was located between a laundry and boarding house off the main business district. He stocked merchandise and marked the price on every item, one price charged to all.
Penney operated a cash-only store, due to his opposition to credit, and within a year Johnson and Callahan made him an offer — improve profits at the Rock Springs Golden Rule store at 313 N. Front St., and Penney would become a part owner. In January 1906, he bought Johnson and Callahan's shares, worth $30,000, and took over Wyoming stores in Kemmerer, Cumberland and Rock Springs.
"You will have to accept my name on this note as your guarantee of payment," Penney said. "I will not give you a lien on the stock in any of the stores because you know, as well as I do, that to do that would hurt my credit."
Six months later, Penney's cousin William Partin came to Rock Springs and became his partner. Parton brought his sisters Belle and Anna to help him run it, and in 1910, Parton sold Penney his interests in the Kemmerer location while Parton acquired Penney's interest in the Rock Springs store.
Penney decided to change the name from Golden Rule to J.C. Penney and Company in 1912 because he felt the name was too common across the west and wanted the company to establish its own identity.
The first J.C. Penney's chain store in Rock Springs opened Jan. 7, 1928.
The 8,483-square foot building was located on 421 N. Front St., where Willow Ridge Crafts now resides. It had a first floor, basement and two balconies. It sold materials and patterns on the ground floor as well as operated a zip line, which was used to finish transactions between the store and customer.
The two-story brick building with a flat roof built was originally made out of wood frame in 1909 before being remodeled in 1929 with a brick fa?ade and solid masonry walls.
At one point the upstairs was used for apartments.
In 1929, Partin sold his interests in the company to P.W. Memovich, who remained at the store for nearly 20 years. Francis H. Switzer, Richard Hobbs, Marion A. Burt, Vernon A. Harmer, Floyd B. Weed, L.R. Redmond, Bruce E. Hand and Tom Trueblood operated the store at the North Front Street location.
"It is bigger than anything one individual could never create or be,"
Penney said. "Whatever I had to do with its beginning, by injecting a few cardinal ideas into the selling of merchandise, has come back to me a hundred gold in the confidence — and I think I may say, humble, the love — of my fellow associates."
___
Seven years after the death of J.C. Penney, the department store relocated to the White Mountain Mall on March 29, 1978.
Managers who ran the 33,949-square-foot location include Trueblood, Mike E. Quickenden, Beverly Lyndes, Kathy Paul and Troy Jones, who has been in charge since July.
In 1981, owners reorganized their executive structure around the office of the chairman and began changing the company from a mass retailer to national department store. The change from mom and pop to corporate was fully complete.
In January, the parent company announced it will close seven stores across the country.
"It's never easy taking actions that directly impact our valued customers, however, we feel this is a necessary business decision," Carter English, JC Penney public relations manager, said in January.
Despite the closure, J.C. Penney will always be a part of Rock Springs.
"It is a staple of this community," Jones told the Rock Springs Rocket-Miner (http://bit.ly/1YgImUW). "I think the community will miss it for sure."
The J.C. Penney legacy will continue to live on.
In the introduction to "Main Street Merchant: The Story of the J.C. Penney Company," Penney offered words of encouragement.
"What is needed today, as always, is the ability and the will to work hard toward the achievement of a goal, any goal, which is right and clean and decent and worthwhile."
- By RASHAH McCHESNEY The Associated Press
JUNEAU, Alaska — A bill that would allow concealed guns on University of Alaska campuses is headed to the state House after senators passed the measure Thursday.
The bill strips the University of Alaska Board of Regents ability to designate broad concealed-weapon free zones on its campuses, allowing them to be carried in classrooms and dorms. It does allow the university to restrict them in areas where disciplinary actions or sexual harassment and domestic crimes are investigated.
It also allows the university to track which students keep weapons in dorms in order to make housing decisions for students who don't want to share rooms those who have firearms.
The bill's sponsor, Sen. Pete Kelly, R-Fairbanks, said gun-free zones on campuses make them targets for killers. He highlighted the growing number of mass shootings in the United States in recent years.
"I don't want the students and the faculty at the University of Alaska to be a soft target as the dial seems to be ratcheted up over the last few years," he said.
Students have testified on both sides of the issue. Supporters of the bill said they want to be able to protect themselves on campus.
Others, such as University of Alaska Southeast student Lily Pothier, cautioned lawmakers against assuming that concealed weapons would make students as a whole feel safer.
"This could affect relationships between student to student, between staff to student," she testified to the education committee. "I also think that the change that happens in the atmosphere of a public space when people are aware that there are concealed weapons is not a positive change."
In the U.S., at least 19 states ban concealed weapons on college campuses, 23 states allow individual universities to decide whether to allow concealed weapons, according to a 2015 guns on campuses overview from the National Conference of State Legislatures.
In Texas, under a law that goes into effect Aug. 1, licensed gun owners will be able to carry concealed handguns on public university campuses. That measure has caused alarm for some faculty members at the University of Houston who told its regents staff that some sensitive subjects could become taboo in the classroom if students began bringing guns to class.
- The Associated Press
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a former Wyoming State Penitentiary guard against the state Department of Corrections.
The Wyoming Tribune Eagle reports that federal Magistrate Mark Carman issued an order last month in the lawsuit filed by Pierre Hardin.
Hardin had contended in his lawsuit that he experienced racial discrimination and harassment while working as a corrections officer at the Rawlins prison.
The judge said the lawsuit lacked specific evidence to support Hardin's arguments.
However, the judge is allowing Hardin the opportunity to provide any evidence in an amended complaint. Hardin has until April 22 to file the amended lawsuit.
Hardin's attorney, Mitchell Osborn, says he plans to file the amended lawsuit.
- The Associated Press
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Warm temperatures across Alaska might be getting bears out of their dens early.
Bear sightings have been reported all across the state, including a grizzly in the Fairbanks area this week.
State wildlife officials say black bears have been sighted in several parts of Anchorage. There also have been sightings of brown bear sows and yearling cubs in Kodiak, something that doesn't usually happen until later in the spring.
Given the early sightings, officials are urging Alaskans to take down bird feeders and clean up any seed, trash or pet food that has been left out over the winter. Poultry and small livestock owners should secure their animals behind electric fences, and garbage bins should be put away.
Officials say feeding bears, even unintentionally, is illegal and can result in fines.
- The Associated Press
PEORIA — A homeowner shot a masked intruder he found using a blowtorch to start a fire that destroyed his suburban Phoenix home, authorities said Thursday.
The wounded man and a resident pulled from the burning Peoria-area home by a firefighter were hospitalized in critical condition, a Maricopa County Sheriff's Office spokeswoman said.
The firefighter suffered burns that were not life-threatening, sheriff's Officer Courtney Palma said. At least one additional firefighter and several sheriff's deputies were treated for smoke inhalation.
The homeowner woke up Thursday morning to find a man setting a fire, then shot him in the abdomen. The wounded man ran away but was found about two blocks away, she said.
Investigators were trying to piece together what happened. It wasn't immediately known whether the wounded man knew any of those who lived at the home or what a motive could be, Palma said.
No identities have been released.
Arriving deputies responding to a call about a fire and home invasion were told by people outside that a person might be inside.
The deputies looked through a broken window and saw an unresponsive person lying on the floor, but they could not enter because of smoke and flames. A firefighter was able to go in and pull out the unconscious person, Palma said.
"His protective gear — his helmet, mask and coat — were also burned and pretty much destroyed, but it did its job in protecting him," said Deputy Chief Rick Picard of the Peoria Fire Department.
- The Associated Press
PRESCOTT — Prescott officials are divided on a regulation that would ban people from feeding wildlife in the city.
The Daily Courier reports (http://bit.ly/1TEitiP ) that the proposal would make it illegal to intentionally feed or attract wildlife. It is meant to prevent uncontrollable numbers of animals that could damage property or disrupt residents.
Residents would still be able to feed their own horses, hang birdfeeders and toss bread to ducks on lakes or ponds, among other activities.
Residents who support the ban say it is a public safety issue and cite problems with animals ranging from javelinas to mountain lions.
Some officials supported the change, while others expressed concerns that the rule would just create another burden for local law enforcement.
The City Council has not yet voted on the issue.
- The Associated Press
DENVER — A Moffat County jury has found Georgie Louise Hand guilty of kidnapping, aggravated robbery and disarming a peace officer after two law officers were held at gunpoint while checking out a suspicious vehicle.
Investigators say Hand and James Damon stripped the officers of a firearm, stun guns and radios and nearly took one of their vehicles before an officer got his gun back and Damon was shot and killed.
Neither officer was injured in the confrontation last year near the small town of Dinosaur, about 10 miles from the Utah border.
Hand told investigators she and Damon had been injecting meth at least once a day throughout the week, according to court records.
Sentencing is set for June 13.
- By BRETT FRENCH Billings Gazette
MALTA, Mont. — One season of research atop bluffs that skirt the Milk River north of here has revealed a collection of 800- to 1,000-year-old historical features and artifacts left by ancient people that are stunning in their breadth and depth.
"There's literally no site like this on the Northern Plains," said Josh Chase, a Bureau of Land Management archaeologist based in this northeastern Montana community, who has led the work.
This year, Chase is prepared to record even more features as another 600 acres is explored, twice as much as last summer.
"We're drastically changing topography this year, going into draws and lowlands as well as another bench that I'm sure will have the same density of features," he said while touring the scorched area last week. The pungent smell of fire still hung in the air as a jet-like wind roared across the Hi-Line.
Chase will discuss his work at the next meeting of the Montana Archaeological Society in Great Falls on April 15-17 at the Hampton Inn.
Rock features
Surpassing what has already been revealed seems impossible: human and animal effigies outlined in stone, teepee rings, large cairns, vision quest sites, and rows of rock extending for hundreds of yards — known as drive lines — along which bison were herded to kill sites or buffalo jumps.
Littering the ground around the teepee rings are hundreds of crude but efficient stone tools that were used to butcher the dead bison along with numerous rocks scarred by campfires. Buried just below the surface in coulees and at the base of cliffs are bison ribs, teeth, knuckles and other bones that Chase estimated were stacked in some areas up to 20 feet deep under the topsoil.
"Having all of that together in one location is exceedingly rare," Chase said.
It was previously known there were two buffalo jumps on the BLM land that has been protected from looters by surrounding private lands. As a result of last year's work Chase now estimates there are probably closer to six jumps based on the drive lines along which the bison were herded.
"Obviously Henry Smith is very unique, at least compared to sites we've recorded in that area," said Gary Smith, a BLM archaeologist based at the Billings Curation Center.
Bones and points
Although consultations with Indian tribes and other agencies started in 2010, last year was the beginning of new work at the site, named after the one-time landowner. The historical significance of the place was first noticed by locals in the 1930s as a buffalo jump for its bison bones and Avonlea-style arrowheads, carefully side-notched points.
Archaeological excavation took place below the bluffs in the 1980s. From the site about 300 to 350 points were collected and are now archived at the Billings Curation Center. The oldest dates to A.D. 770, about 200 years after it's believed native people switched from atlatls to bows and arrows.
"They look like they were stamped out with a cookie cutter," Smith said of the arrowheads. "All were made with the same precision from different material types."
Examination of some of the bison teeth collected from the site estimated it was mainly used for small drives of bison in the late winter and summer.
"The hypothesis of winter emphasis at the Henry Smith site, with repeated small-scale drives, is unprecedented for a site of this scale in northern Montana . " wrote Michael Wilson, of the University of Lethbridge, in his 1988 report.
Given the distant age of the site, no evidence has been found tying it to any of the modern Plains Indian tribes, although geographically the property is located where many of them hunted, including the Blackfeet, Gros Ventre and Assiniboine.
"There's nothing diagnostically we can pull from this site and attribute to one of those tribes," Chase said.
Revealing burn
Instead of digging like traditional archaeology, Chase has taken a different approach and the results have been startling. Last year he organized a controlled burn of 300 acres on the prairie uplands. Artifact samples were placed around the location to determine if they would be harmed by the fire. After the burn the area was flown with a drone that could collect standard photographic images as well as LIDAR, surveying technology that uses laser light.
By reviewing the photographs and other images 2,400 points of data were marked across the 300 acres — roughly a site every 3 feet. Before homesteading on the surrounding lands altered the landscape, Chase estimated similar sites could have stretched across the landscape.
The bird's-eye view is key to the large project.
"To record this site traditionally would be overwhelming," Chase said. "It would be time-consuming and tedious to pick out what is a cultural feature and what is glacial till.
"And you're not getting that overall view," he added. "It's much easier to get that overall perspective from the air."
This year, another 600 acres was burned on Easter Sunday and was flown with a specially equipped U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plane on Monday and Tuesday to record new data points. From what he's seen walking around this year's burn, Chase expects to document a lot more.
One of the stone features exposed after this spring's burn was a large vision quest site that also had a line of rocks leading up to it, a peculiarity Chase hadn't seen before. The rock circle was situated in a saddle between two benches. The coulee to the west provided a view down to the Milk River.
"It's amazing how it stands out now," said Scott Meneelly, the BLM fire operations officer who oversaw the burns. "We drove by this a number of times and never knew it was here."
Chase has been excited by the fact that "even the most novice 18-year-old firefighters" could pick out features like the drive lines.
Ground truthing
Although the aerial view has aided the work immensely, Chase said every rock or feature that is flagged from photos as possibly significant has to be verified and catalogued from the ground.
"All of the drones and aircraft in the world will never substitute for boots on the ground," he said.
In a year or more Chase will write a report to share all of what he has learned with the cooperating agencies, tribes and the public. He'd also like to see an interpretive site created some time in the future, although the property is landlocked by surrounding private parcels — probably what protected it from more looting. Chase also credited cooperating landowners Sterling Carroll, Gary Anderson and Jason Lamb for helping out.
"When you look out across this (landscape) it tells a story of people in North America throughout time," Chase said. "So we drove by a homestead on the way here, that's one part of the Hi-Line's history. We're now into this part of the site which is one part of the Hi-Line's prehistory.
"That's one thing about public lands as a whole, that these kinds of places are preserved," Chase said. "We're very fortunate in this country to have that.
"There are a lot of things going on here, that's what makes it so unique and special."
Working together
"Historically, the fire and cultural programs were at loggerheads," said Josh Chase, a BLM archaeologist. "This is an example of them working together."
Chase was standing amid this spring's burn of 600 acres of BLM land north of Malta. Three-hundred acres was burned last year for the same project spread across the Henry Smith archaeological site.
"A lot of times you do more damage on the suppression side" at archaeological sites, said Scott Meneelly, BLM fire operations officer. "If we were to come in and get real aggressive with our actions, we could do more damage than the fire."
In prairie grasslands, temperatures during a fire will hit about 1,300 degrees but usually remain that hot only 5 to 15 seconds, except where sagebrush or other heavier fuel is located. Even bone buried 3 centimeters beneath the soil won't be damaged by such a fast-moving fire, Chase said.
This spring's fire-blackened landscape looked like a dead zone - ash circles surrounded browned stalks of yucca, denuded branches of sagebrush poked skyward and grass was reduced to a low, dark, crunchy blanket. At the site of last year's burn, though, it's hard to tell fire torched the resilient countryside. The grass stands a foot tall.
"It's been a really interesting project from a lot of facets," Meneelly said.
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