REGIONAL BRIEFS: Police seek help finding shooting witness
CLOQUET, Minn. -- Cloquet police are asking for the public’s help in locating a man wanted for questioning in the case of a Cloquet woman who is accused of shooting her husband.
From the Forum News Service
Minnesota
Police seek help finding shooting witness
CLOQUET, Minn. -- Cloquet police are asking for the public’s help in locating a man wanted for questioning in the case of a Cloquet woman who is accused of shooting her husband.
John Edwin Bemis III, 37, is not a suspect in the case, but is a possible witness, authorities say. He was last seen Monday; his family reported him missing Wednesday.
Bemis is white, 5 feet 11 inches tall, weighs 180 pounds and has brown hair and green eyes. Authorities said they believe Bemis is traveling in a 2005 red GMC Sierra extended-cab pickup truck with a Minnesota “Support Our Troops” license plate numbered 140DH and has a 2009 red Kawasaki Enduro motorcycle with Minnesota plates 60170MG.
Records indicated that Bemis lives at the same address that court records give for Marie Margaret Majerle, 36. Majerle was charged Tuesday with attempted murder in the first degree for allegedly shooting her estranged husband, Richard Alan Majerle, 38.
Bemis is Marie Majerle’s former husband, Cloquet Deputy Police Chief Terry Hill said.
Anyone with information on Bemis’ whereabouts is asked to call the Cloquet Police Department at (218) 879-1247, or the Carlton County Sheriff’s Office at (218) 384-4185 or 911.
(DNT photo)
Late educator leaves money to foundations
VIRGINIA, Minn. -- A Virginia High School graduate who dedicated his life to education and was careful with his money left $638,000 to the Virginia Community Foundation’s education fund. An equal sum was left to the South St. Paul Educational Foundation in the hometown of his late wife.
Marvin Hoyle Skaurud, 97, died Feb. 11, 2012, in Texas. His wife of 62 years, Ruth Andrus Skaurud, 84, died in 2005.
“He did it because he dedicated his life to education,” one of Skaurud’s nieces, Jane St. Romain of Winnsboro, Texas, said Thursday.
The Skauruds didn’t have children, so they traveled the world.
“They would save and save and save, then splurge on world trips,” St. Romain said.
Ruth Skaurud accompanied her husband when he taught summer sessions around the world for the University of Maryland. Skaurud visited 119 countries during his life, surviving a plane crash in South America, a cruise ship fire near Borneo, and being stranded in an undeveloped area of Africa without a guide.
Marvin Skaurud graduated from Virginia High School in 1932 and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees and a doctorate in history from the University of Minnesota. He taught history for the Minneapolis school system for years.
(DNT)
Brothers charged for stealing, damaging vehicles
OLIVIA, Minn. — Three Annandale brothers made their first court appearances Thursday on multiple felony theft and property damage charges for stealing multiple pickups from Buffalo Lake businesses and damaging the vehicles by sawing off the catalytic converters.
Phillip Lee Harrison, 23, Billy Curtis Harrison, 21, and Charles Lee Harrison, 19, each face a total of six felony charges, including four for motor vehicle theft and one each of theft and property damage in Renville County District Court.
Each of the brothers also faces felony charges for receiving stolen property in Wright County District Court.
The complaints against the trio alleged that they stole four pickups valued at $37,000, took $9,657.21 worth of property from the four pickups and caused $16,832.75 worth of damage to the vehicles by crashing one of the trucks and sawing the catalytic converters off all four of the vehicles.
(WCT)
North Dakota
Alleged GF pimp to fight human trafficking charge
GRAND FORKS, N.D. -- A Grand Forks man charged with pimping a 17-year-old girl turned down a plea deal Thursday in court, deciding, instead, to risk going to trial on a rare human trafficking charge that carries a top sentence of life in prison.
Travis Levar Johnson, 30, is one of three charged this summer with trafficking the girl as a prostitute to several men in Grand Forks in early 2011, including to a University of North Dakota professor and a high school counselor.
They are the first human trafficking charges brought in Grand Forks County, prosecutors said.
Johnson also is charged with felony corruption of a minor for allegedly having sex with the girl to initiate her into prostitution.
His alleged accomplices, Joshua Harry, 27, and Amanda Stewart, 22, faced a similar trafficking charge, but have taken deals with prosecutors, pleading guilty to lesser felonies.
Prosecutor Meredith Larson said she offered deals to the three largely to protect the victim from having to testify at trial.
Even with the deal, Stewart and Harry will serve substantial time behind bars, she said. Their deals also require them to testify against Johnson at his trial, she said.
(GFH)
NDSCS teams up with Case IH dealers for new educational partnership
WAHPETON, N.D. – A new educational partnership between North Dakota State College of Science and 11 Case IH dealerships across the state will be a “win-win” for customers, dealers and the future technicians that will be trained at the school, Brian Hanson said.
“They’re going to be more ready to step right into the job and do what they need to do to help take care of our customers out there,” said Hanson, general manager of Grafton-based Hansons Auto and Implement Inc.
During a Thursday news conference at the NDSCS Fargo campus, President John Richman announced the partnership for a two-year diesel technology program that will start up this fall.
During their education, 20 students accepted into the program each year will complete two internships, working directly with the dealers that sponsor them as well as getting extensive training at the school focusing on Case IH agricultural equipment and technology.
“This is one of those rare private-public partnerships that really benefit a number of sources,” Richman said.
The program on the school’s main campus in Wahpeton will be taught in Bisek Hall, which is undergoing a $10.5 million expansion expected to be completed this spring that will double the space for diesel technology instruction to about 125,000 square feet.
(FF)
Man accused of asking for nude pic from minor
FARGO – A 21-year-old Wheatland man is accused of asking a 15-year-old girl to send him nude pictures of her via text message last September.
Jacob Nichols Mogen, 21, was charged Wednesday in Cass County District Court with promoting a sexual performance by a minor.
The alleged victim told authorities Mogen asked her to touch herself in a photo and send it to him, which she did, according to a report by the Cass County Sheriff’s Office. Mogen was previously acquainted with the girl.
The sheriff’s office and North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation executed a search warrant at Mogen’s residence in Wheatland on Sept. 24, seizing his cell phone, three laptop computers and an Xbox 360.
If convicted of the Class C felony, Mogen faces up to five years in prison.
(FF)
Fargo man, woman face felonies in S. Dakota
PIERRE, S.D. – A Fargo man and woman each face felony charges in South Dakota after they allegedly sold metal buildings that were never constructed, according to a news release from the South Dakota Attorney General’s Office.
George Donald Nelson III, 45, and Karla Ann Nelson, 44, were charged with two counts each of grand theft by deception in December. The charges are punishable by up to 10 years in prison, a $20,000 fine, or both.
According to the release, the two formerly ran a business out of South Dakota under multiple names, including Baron Buildings, Baron Steel Buildings and Ag Pro Buildings.
Warrants have been issued for the two. George Nelson is currently incarcerated at the Minnesota State Penitentiary for theft by false representation, the release said.
(FF)
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