News 01.12.17
12 January 2017 News
The first assistant chief of the Eldorado Fire Department is found dead at the fire station apparently from natural causes. The Sheriff’s Office says the death of Rod Menne is not suspicious. A volunteer firefighter and plow driver found Menne in the station early Tuesday morning. Menne was a past chief of the department and was a volunteer firefighter for the department for 30 years.
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Visitors are once again allowed to see inmates at the state prison in Oshkosh. The Wisconsin Department of Corrections says visitations at the Oshkosh Correctional Institution were halted in late December because so many inmates were sick. Inmates, themselves, were also kept apart from each other as much as possible to stop the spread of the illnesses. But now visitations have resumed.
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The Oshkosh Fire Department is investigating a house fire which they’ve ruled “suspicious.” At about 6 p.m. Tuesday, crews were called to a home in the 300 block of W. 6th Avenue. Firefighters arrived to find heavy smoke and flames coming from the back of the home. There were eight people in the home when the fire broke out, and they all made it out safely. Crews quickly extinguished the fire, but not before it caused extensive smoke and heat damage to the home, according to the Oshkosh Fire Department. One person was treated on scene for a hand injury. No firefighters were injured. The residents are receiving assistance from the American Red Cross.
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A group of former Department of Natural Resources secretaries are urging Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and legislators to reject a proposal to divide the agency and spread its responsibilities across state government. Republican Rep. Adam Jarchow has proposed splitting the DNR into a new Department of Fish and Wildlife and a new Department of Environmental Protection. Three existing agencies would assume forestry, park and land acquisition duties. The former secretaries sent a letter Tuesday to Walker and legislators warning the move would confuse the public, create a coordination nightmare and a number of new supervisors that would need compensation, force environmental groups and outdoor clubs to deal with five agencies rather than one. Jarchow and Walker’s offices have not yet commented.
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Some members of Congress are making another run at taking gray wolves in the upper Midwest and Wyoming off the endangered list. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service had tried to take wolves in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Wyoming off the list, saying those populations had recovered sufficiently to allow resumed hunting under state management plans. But courts in 2014 re-imposed federal protections for the wolves. A bill introduced Tuesday by U.S. Reps. Collin Peterson of Minnesota, Sean Duffy of Wisconsin and Liz Cheney of Wyoming would block the courts from intervening. Similar proposals failed to advance last year, partly due to White House opposition, but farmers and ranchers who say they have no way to protect their livestock from problem wolves are hoping that changes under the Trump administration.
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A Wisconsin man who became an instant millionaire with a winning lottery ticket has been sentenced for stalking and other charges related to his obsession with a woman who rejected his advances. 50-year-old Douglas P. Miron was sentenced on Tuesday to a year in jail with work-release privileges, starting in April. He’ll also have to pay $55,000 in fines and serve four years of probation. Miron won a $31.4 million Powerball jackpot in 2009. The charges against him grew out of his alleged obsession with a teenage girl he hired to clean the house he bought with his prize money. Assistant Attorney General Christopher Liegel says he believes the defendant’s wealth motivated him to engage in out-of-control behavior. Miron’s attorney, Gregory Petit, says the lottery win didn’t influence Miron’s actions.
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