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KALISPELL (AP) — Flathead County authorities say a Sunday morning shooting in Marion left one man dead and that another has been taken into custody. The Flathead County Sheriff's Office tells the Flathead Beacon reports (http://bit.ly/1eNDqAo) that Mark Ames has been taken into custody and is being held at the Flathead County Detention Center on suspicion of deliberate homicide. Police say the shooting took place about 1:45 a.m. outside a duplex owned by one of the men. Police say Ames' wife rented one of the apartments a...
HELENA (AP) — Prosecutors are recommending no prison time for a Blackfeet woman who pleaded guilty to participating in a scheme to defraud and embezzle from a federally funded program for troubled youth on the northwestern Montana Indian reservation. Charlotte New Breast is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday by U.S. District Judge Brian Morris on a charge of aiding and abetting theft from an organization receiving federal grant funds. New Breast, 53, was the administrative assistant for the now-defunct Po'Ka Project, which c...
HELENA nt. (AP) — The state Supreme Court has reversed an earlier ruling that made it difficult for individuals to file legal challenges against government agencies that ignore Montana's open meetings and open records laws. The 6-0 ruling Thursday says a person can sue an agency for violating the state constitution's right-to-know and right-to-participate provisions, even if that person doesn't have a direct personal interest in the matter. That undoes a 2006 Supreme Court ruling that required a person to first prove he w...
HELENA (AP) — The U.S. Attorney's Office in Montana collected $28.3 million in civil and criminal actions in Fiscal Year 2013. That includes $4.45 million from a Belgrade man for failing to report that a pharmaceutical company he previously owned was importing and distributing a fake cancer drug. Across the country, U.S. attorney's offices collected $8.1 billion from criminal and civil actions. U.S. Attorney Michael W. Cotter says Montana's collections included $20.5 million in civil actions, $5.8 million in criminal and c...
BILLINGS — The chancellor of Montana State University-Billings — and former interim chancellor at Montana State University-Northern — is retiring at the end of the school year. Sixty-seven-year-old Rolf Groseth said in a Thursday letter to students and faculty that he was retiring from the post for unspecified personal reasons. The Chicago native spent four years overseeing the 5,000-student school and more than three decades involved in the Montana university system. Before that, he was acting chancellor at Northern for 1...
HELENA (AP) — If Gov. Steve Bullock is any closer to deciding who to appoint to the U.S. Senate if Max Baucus is confirmed as the next ambassador to China, he isn't saying. Bullock told reporters Thursday the possibility of Baucus vacating the seat is still hypothetical and he will not discuss his intentions until there is an opening. President Barack Obama formally nominated Baucus for the ambassadorship Tuesday, and the Montana Democrat must be confirmed by the Senate. Montana law gives the governor the power to appoint a...
LINCOLN CITY, Ore. (AP) — A patrol car hit and injured a man and a woman later fatally shot herself during a police standoff as Oregon authorities closed in on the two accused of robbing a Montana coin shop. Sarah Jo Johnson died shortly before 9 p.m. Friday, Lincoln City Police Chief Keith Kilian said. She had been holed up in a vehicle with a handgun for hours, surrounded by the Oregon State Police SWAT team and officers from multiple agencies. The chief said Dale Edward Wallace, the man hit by a police car earlier F...
KALISPELL (AP) — Montana Public Service Commissioner Bill Gallagher says he is not seeking re-election after the pancreatic cancer he was diagnosed with in June spread to his liver. Gallagher, a 54-year-old Helena attorney, said Tuesday he plans to serve out his remaining term, which ends in January 2015. Gallagher tells the Daily Inter Lake that with chemotherapy, his doctors have given him a 3 percent chance to live for the next five years. He tells Lee Newspapers of Montana he wants to focus on his work, his family and "...
MISSOULA (AP) — A Missoula judge entered a not guilty plea on behalf of a 25-year-old man charged with beating his grandmother to death with a chair. Tyler Dan Perry is charged with deliberate homicide in the Dec. 14 death of 72-year-old Carole Ann Perry. On Tuesday, Perry's attorneys asked District Judge Karen Townsend if she could help expedite their client's evaluation at the Montana State Hospital in Warm Springs. Public defender Scott Spencer said he had been told it would take three to four months before Perry could b...
MISSOULA (AP) — Ryan Burke spent most of New Year's Eve on the couch feeling sore and fatigued. But the Montana Griz wide receiver wants to make one thing perfectly clear about his heroic and exceptionally thoughtful gesture on Monday: You don't have to be a college football player to help save a life by donating bone marrow. "I'd rather do that than take a shot from Brock or Jordan," joked the gregarious redshirt freshman from Billings, referring to Griz linebackers Brock Coyle and Jordan Tripp. "I just hope this is an infor...
HELENA (AP) — Senatorial candidate John Walsh misused his position as Montana's adjutant general by soliciting National Guard troops to become members of a private association for which he was seeking a leadership role, a 2010 investigation by the U.S. Army's inspector general concluded. The Aug. 25, 2010 report said Walsh, now the state's lieutenant governor, improperly used his government position for private gain, improperly endorsed a non-federal entity and improperly used government resources. He was not disciplined f...
CASSELTON, N.D. - Many residents evacuated a southeastern North Dakota town overnight after a train carrying crude oil derailed and exploded, and officials warned that acrid smoke could blow into the area. No one was hurt in Monday's derailment of the mile-long train that sent a great fireball and plumes of black smoke skyward about a mile from the small town of Casselton. The fire had been so intense as darkness fell that investigators couldn't even get close enough to count...
HELENA — An estimated 17,000 small businesses in Montana will be exempt from paying the state's business equipment tax under a new law that takes effect on Wednesday. The reduction in the business equipment tax is one of a handful of bills passed by the Legislature last spring that become law with the new year. Starting Wednesday, businesses will be exempt from paying taxes on their first $100,000 in equipment. That means if a small business has less than $100,000 in equipment, it won't have to pay any of the tax. P...
HELENA (AP) — Federal prosecutors oppose a former medical marijuana lobbyist's request to be removed from probation so he can tend to his sick mother without restrictions. Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Thaggard said Thursday in response to Tom Daubert's request that early termination is reserved for rare cases of exceptionally good behavior. Thaggard says the health of Daubert's 83-year-old mother and his desire to resurrect his consulting career do not justify ending his five-year probation sentence after only one year. U...
GREAT FALLS (AP) — The American Indian liaison for the state Department of Corrections says he's working to provide cultural awareness to agency staffers and to help Native American inmates prepare for their release. Harlan Trombley told the Great Falls Tribune (http://gftrib.com/1ad53Qh ) that after a month in the job, he's found that corrections staff often don't understand traditional practices such as smudging, when herbs are burned so the smoke can be used as a cleansing agent. "They don't know what that is or why i...
HELENA - U.S. Sen. Max Baucus' surprise announcement that he will not seek a seventh term in 2014 was Montana's top news story of 2013, according to The Associated Press' annual poll of state editors. This year's list includes maneuvering ahead of the 2014 elections, the pushback against anonymous campaign funding and the headaches surrounding the nation's health care overhaul. It highlights crime-fighting efforts in Indian Country and in the oil patch, along with notable...
BUTTE (AP) — Officials in Butte are considering a $92,000 loan request and a grant of $8,750 to help refurbish a 42-room brothel in what was once the middle of the city's red light district. The Urban Revitalization Agency has asked for more information about the plan that includes helping with outstanding debt for the Dumas Brothel, which now operates as a museum, The Montana Standard reported in a story Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1gX71Mn). The Dumas Brothel on East Mercury Street was built specifically as a brothel in 1890 a...
HELENA (AP) — A Montana judge on Friday blocked reductions to the annual cost-of-living raises on pension payments that thousands of retired local and state government employees receive. District Judge James Reynolds in Helena granted a preliminary injunction to the Association of Montana Retired Public Employees and individual retirees, Lee Newspapers of Montana reported. Lawmakers earlier this year passed a pension overhaul measure cutting retired public employees' annual inflationary increases from 3 percent to 1.5 p...
BILLINGS (AP) — Police in Billings say a woman has been shot to death and that a man has been taken into custody. Sgt. Ronda Fox tells the Billings Gazette (http://bit.ly/1d1xuoD) that 27-year-old Richard Reinert lived at the residence and was arrested at the scene after police responded at about 11:25 p.m. Saturday. He's being held at the Yellowstone County Detention Center on suspicion of felony deliberate homicide and obstructing a peace officer. Fox says Reinert and the victim weren't married, and it's unclear if she a...
HELENA (AP) — Authorities say two German shepherds belonging to a western Montana police chief are being held in quarantine after attacking a boy. The Independent Record reports (http://bit.ly/1hrPV6E) the dogs belonging to Boulder Police Chief Rick Streib will remain quarantined a minimum of 10 days. Boulder City Attorney Steven Shapiro says a complaint was filed to the police office reporting the dogs jumped a fence surrounding the police chief's yard on Dec. 13 and attacked a boy walking to school. Shapiro told The A...
HELENA (AP) — Gov. Steve Bullock joined other Montana political leaders Friday in lauding Max Baucus' 35-year career in the U.S. Senate, but the Democratic governor deflected questions on a possible replacement if Baucus is confirmed as the next ambassador to China. Bullock Chief of Staff Kevin O'Brien acknowledged the governor will likely have to appoint a replacement for Baucus, but he shed little light about whom Bullock was considering. "Today is about Max, his commitment to public service and the state of Montana. It a...
BILLINGS (AP) — Former state Judge Susan Watters has been sworn in as Montana's first female U.S. District Court judge. U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy swore in the 55-year-old Billings native in a Thursday ceremony at the federal courthouse attended by several dozen friends, colleagues and family members. Watters worked in private practice and as a prosecutor before becoming a state judge 15 years ago. She fills a vacancy on the federal bench created with the retirement of U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull. Other f...
POCATELLO, Idaho (AP) — An outspoken critic of Idaho's phosphate industry and its deadly impact on some animals has pleaded guilty to poaching two elk. Marv Hoyt, Idaho director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, will leave his job after acknowledging in court that he illegally killed two cow elk during a November hunting trip in Caribou County, the Idaho State Journal (http://bit.ly/SxHTxs) reported Tuesday. Hoyt has criticized mining and the resulting selenium pollution that has killed dozens of sheep and cattle that g...
BOZEMAN AP) — Three life-sized horse sculptures rustled from a herd of 39 displayed on a hillside in southwestern Montana have turned up on a nearby ranch with only minor damage. Broadwater County Deputy Brandon Harris tells the Bozeman Daily Chronicle (http://bit.ly/1cRtfvv ) a rancher checking on his cattle south of Townsend late Tuesday afternoon spotted some tracks in the snow in an area that is not normally traveled. He followed the tracks and spotted the steel sculptures of two horses and a colt. Harris says the r...
DES MOINES, Iowa — Former Democratic Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer isn't saying if he'll run for president in 2016. But if he does, he thinks he can connect with voters in Iowa. Schweitzer, who served as governor from 2005 through early 2013, was set to visit the early voting state of Iowa on Wednesday to speak to a liberal advocacy group. While the popular, outspoken ex-governor has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate, he told The Associated Press in a phone interview that he hasn't made any decisions abo...
