RV fire; biblical assault; rabbi ejected

BOISE, Idaho — The governor said Thursday he is concerned with the number of children who die in Idaho because their parents choose faith healing for religious reasons over medical assistance.

Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter said he has asked state House Speaker Scott Bedke and Senate Pro Tem Brent Hill to form a committee to study the issue in the next few months.

The Republican governor believes the state can find a balance that protects children and supports religious freedom.

"At what point does that become child neglect or abuse is a question I can't answer," Otter said. "I think everybody cares about the health of children, but we have to understand the No. 1 thing in the First Amendment was freedom religion."

Idaho's faith-healing exemption allows families to cite religious reasons for medical decisions without fear of being charged with neglect or abuse.

The exemption has attracted criticism over the years amid the deaths of children among members of the Followers of Christ in southwestern Idaho from treatable conditions, including pneumonia and food poisoning.

Many children are buried at a cemetery overlooking the Snake River.

"It's not faith healing, it's child abuse," said House Minority Leader John Rusche of Lewiston. "I think Gov. Otter is seeing this as significant problem, but we don't need a working group to see that."

Those concerns, however, have yet to result in action by the Idaho Legislature because many Republican lawmakers are leery of impeding on religious rights.

In 2015, a working group appointed by the governor found that the deaths of two children occurred because the families withheld medical assistance for religious reasons. One death was related to complications of diabetes and the other followed a prolonged gastrointestinal illness. The report concluded the deaths could have been prevented.

The working group, however, did not recommend any sweeping changes, explaining that "because members are supportive of religious freedom, they recommend that the standard for state intervention be limited in scope."

Otter cited the work of the group along with increased legislative interest as a reason he was calling for more review of the issue.

The state does not compile comprehensive figures on child deaths related to the religious exemption.

Earlier this year, Democratic Rep. John Gannon of Boise announced he was reviving his efforts to revise the exemption. Gannon was given tentative approval for an initial hearing before the Senate Health and Welfare Committee but no date has been set.

Update: Prosecutors declined to file charges in this case.

PHOENIX (AP) — A Phoenix woman is being accused of child abuse after allegedly hitting her daughters with an electrical cord.

Phoenix police say 46-year-old Denisa Renee Simpson was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of two counts of child abuse.

It wasn't immediately clear Thursday if she has a lawyer.

A police report says Simpson's 10-year-old daughter came to school Monday with a "closed-end loop mark on her left cheek."

The student told school officials the injury was caused when her mother hit her with an extension cord and a belt.

Police say the girl also had multiple linear marks to her back, right arm and hand, and her cheek.

The girl's 9-year-old sister also told school officials her mother had hit her with an extension cord and she had bruises on her back.

CHINO VALLEY, Ariz. — A rabbi was removed from a town council meeting in Northern Arizona after she protested when the mayor read a Christian invocation.

Rabbi Adele Plotkin was escorted out of the Chino Valley council meeting Tuesday after she protested when Mayor Chris Marley, a pastor, read a disclaimer that he intended to do an invocation and again when he ended his prayer in the name of Jesus, The Daily Courier reported.

"I pray all these things in the name of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ," Marley ended his prayer at the meeting.

Marley announced before the Jan. 26 council meeting that he would not perform an invocation until council members had a chance to discuss how they planned to conduct invocations after receiving criticism. He confirmed his intention to halt the prayers to media after the Jan. 26 meeting.

Plotkin, of Chino Valley's Beit Torah congregation, contacted a reporter before the Tuesday meeting to confirm those plans, saying she couldn't attend if they prayed to Jesus.

"He lied," Plotkin said of the mayor's reversal.

She said her faith considers appearing to approve of worshipping Jesus as idolatry and that she has contacted the American Civil Liberties Union to contest the town's invocation policy.

Marley said at the Tuesday meeting that he decided to continue with the invocation despite his previous comments because some council members said he should do so.

"Unfortunately, the content of the invocations offered here in Chino Valley has become the subject of some contention, so we — your Town Council — will deal with it," Marley said.

Marley argued that the Bill of Rights protects council members' right to freely worship. He said he feels like the country has lost a number of other freedoms, including the right to assemble and protection against search and seizure, but that he won't let his right to pray be taken away.

"I can't speak for the rest of the Council, but I believe it is time to draw a line in the sand, at least for me it is."

The council voted to make no changes to the current tradition of a member of the council giving an invocation if they wish to do so.

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Information from: The Daily Courier, http://www.dcourier.com

SALT LAKE CITY — A lawyer for Olympic gold-medalist skier Picabo Street said Thursday that she was defending herself during a December fight with her father and will demand a jury trial on domestic violence and assault charges.

Attorney Joe Wrona said that the ex-Olympian called 911 for help after her father attacked her, and she doesn't plan to strike a plea deal with prosecutors.

"We're not interested in a sweetheart deal. We're interested in being vindicated at trial," he said.

Street is accused of throwing her 76-year-old father down the stairs and locking him in the basement during a fight at her home near Park City, Utah, on Dec. 23.

Street, 44, told 911 dispatchers that she "put" her father Roland Street down the stairs after he pulled her hair and scratched her face, according to a recording of the call. Her mother can be heard in the background disputing that version of what happened.

Picabo Street told dispatchers her dad started the fight after he bumped his car into her house in snowy weather and she tried to help dig it out so her parents could use her car.

Prosecutors say an investigation found Picabo Street was the primary aggressor. Roland Street has not been charged in the fight near Park City, Utah. Summit County prosecutor Ivy Telles didn't immediately return a call seeking comment Thursday.

Roland Street told police his daughter got angry and started yelling after he hit the house while trying to leave, documents show. He said the physical altercation broke out after they re-entered the house and she pushed him down two flights of stairs. Police saw cuts on Roland Street's elbow and neck.

Picabo Street is facing three counts of misdemeanor domestic violence in the presence of a child and one count of misdemeanor assault. A hearing is set for Tuesday.

Picabo Street had an illustrious skiing career highlighted by a gold medal at the 1998 Winter Olympics in the women's super-G event. She also won silver in the downhill at the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, and competed in the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City.

She was the first American woman to win the World Cup downhill season title in 1995, and she repeated as champion the next season. She totaled nine downhill victories in World Cup races during her career.

More recently, she worked as an analyst for Fox Sports during the 2014 Winter Games from Sochi, Russia.

BOISE, Idaho — Twenty wolves have been killed in the Clearwater Region in northern Idaho to bolster elk populations in the area, the Idaho Department of Fish and Game says.

The agency in a statement Wednesday said the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services killed the wolves using a helicopter starting last week, and the wolf-control effort has ended.

"Predation impacts to elk calf and cow survival is the primary factor limiting recovery of the Lolo elk population," Fish and Game officials said in the statement.

The agency said elk numbers in the region in the last 25 years have fallen from 16,000 to fewer than 1,000. As a result, the agency has eliminated all rifle cow hunts and reduced by half rifle bull hunting.

The Defenders of Wildlife conservation organization revealed the aerial shooting of wolves last week and decried it as based on anti-wolf politics and not sound science

Suzanne Stone of Defenders of Wildlife said Thursday that large fires in the early 1900s created good habitat for elk that has since grown in over the decades with fire-suppression efforts, causing elk numbers to fall. Killing wolves won't change that situation, she said.

"We feel that this action is misguided and is not going to result in any meaningful change on the ground as long as the habitat in the Lolo is not sufficient to support the elk herd objective set forth by the state," she said.

An Idaho board in charge of killing wolves declined on Monday to tell lawmakers how many wolves it had killed in 2016 or how much it cost. Officials said they didn't want to provide details while the wolf-control program was operating in northern Idaho.

Last year, 19 wolves were killed in the area and 23 were shot in 2014. The Lolo zone had a minimum of 38 wolves, including six documented packs and five other wolf groups at the end of 2014, according to the state's latest wolf population report.