(Harlan, Iowa) – Sheriff’s officials in Shelby County have identified the individuals whose bodies were found in a residence that was on-fire Tuesday, in Harlan. Authorities say a female, 52-year-old Dominique Pontzius and a male, 24-year-old Sebastian Pontzius, died as the result of the fire, which was determined to have been intentionally set as an act of suicide for both individuals.

Their relationship was mother and son. No foul play is suspected, and no other persons are being sought. An investigation into the incident is ongoing.

The Sheriff’s Office says if you or someone you know is struggling, help is available by texting 988 (The Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) to connect with support.

WASHINGTON, D.C. [Press Release]— During National Suicide Awareness Month, Representatives Zach Nunn (IA-03) and Chris Pappas (NH-01) introduced the Prevent Youth Suicide Act, bipartisan legislation to equip educators with tools to identify students at risk of suicide and provide life-saving interventions.

“One life lost to suicide is one too many, and far too many families in Iowa know this pain firsthand,” said Rep. Nunn. “The Prevent Youth Suicide Act gives high school teachers and staff the tools to act before a crisis, protect our kids, and help them thrive.”

Suicide is now the second leading cause of death for young people ages 10–24. In Iowa, the suicide rate for this age group is 18.5 per 100,000 — roughly 30% higher than the national average. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 40% of high school students nationwide reported persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness in 2023, and 1 in 10 attempted suicide.

Despite the urgent need, most school districts lack consistent training and resources to help teachers spot the warning signs when a student is struggling. Without clear guidance, those signs can be missed and students are left without support.

“Every child should know they have someone in their corner when they need it. Our educators do incredible work to teach and support students, and this legislation would ensure they have the training, resources, and processes to help children and connect them with mental health professionals,” said Rep. Pappas. “As we work to tackle the mental health crisis, we must listen to the needs of our children and teachers and take action to strengthen resources and support. No one should ever feel alone in this fight.”

The Prevent Youth Suicide Act would require the U.S. Department of Education to implement a new national standard for suicide prevention across middle and high schools. Specifically, the bill would:

• Provide biennial, evidence-based suicide prevention training for all licensed school personnel working with students in grades 6–12.
• Establish clear protocols to recognize and respond to students showing signs of distress, including guidance on reporting concerns to parents and school counselors.
• Create referral systems connecting students with mental health professionals both in and outside of school.
• Ensure trauma-informed care by training educators to understand and respond appropriately to the impact of trauma in student lives.

Text of the bill can be found here.

(Radio Iowa) – A member of the eastern Iowa immigrant rights group Escucha Mi Voz will go to Italy next month where he plans to meet with Pope Leo the 14th. Reverend Guillermo Trevino of West Liberty will attend the World Meeting of Popular Movements in Rome with Escucha Mi Voz’ parent organization Gamaliel. In the past, the meeting has provided a framework for the language used in the pope’s letters.

Trevino told supporters during a protest this week outside an immigration enforcement office in Cedar Rapids. “It’s a training for six days through the Vatican, sponsored by the Vatican so, approved by the Vatican. It includes an audience with Pope Leo himself,” Travino says, as people applaud. “So we were talking about national attention, but we might get some world attention.”

Trevino is advocating for his godson, Pascual Pedro, to be returned to the United States. Pedro was deported from Iowa to Guatemala this summer despite having no criminal background. “This started, as we know, July 1st, when Pascual was here by himself, but we know he’s not by himself, and it’s a fight still to bring him home,” Trevino says. “So we keep fighting. Don’t give up.”

Trevino recently returned from Washington D.C., where he met with members of Iowa’s congressional delegation to advocate for Pedro’s return.

Escucha Mi Voz is Spanish for “hear my voice.”

(Radio Iowa) – State Senator Claire Celsi’s family has announced Celsi has entered hospice care. Celsi, a Democrat from West Des Moines, has served in the state legislature since 2019. Celsi, who is 59, announced earlier this year she was dealing with a medical issue and was awaiting surgery.

State Senator Claire Celsi (D-West Des Moines) (official photo)

Celsi missed two months of the 2025 legislative session, but returned for the final few weeks. Celsi is a Drake University graduate who founded her own a public relations firm in 2009.

(Radio Iowa) – Attorneys for three environmental groups are urging Iowa officials to adopt tougher water quality standards. The federal Clean Water Act requires states to hold a public hearing about water quality regulations every three years and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources hosted one this (Thursday) morning. Iowa Environmental Council legal counsel Mike Schmidt says a decade ago federal officials recommended that states monitor water for 94 toxins that could impact human health and it’s shocking Iowa standards still call for monitoring just 50. “Iowa has the second highest cancer rate in the country — one of the only states with a rising cancer rate,” Schmidt said, “and we are concerned that water quality plays a role in that.”

An Iowa DNR environmental engineer says the agency is “potentially looking” at adopting the EPA’s expanded list of toxins to monitor, but is looking into using Iowa data rather than national parameters. Dani Replogle is a staff attorney for Food and Water Watch, a national group that has about 24-thousand Iowa members. She says more stringent standards are needed so Iowa taxpayers don’t have to keep paying to clean up drinking water supplies or get rid of algae from public lakes. “DNR’s under-inclusive and vague water quality standards contribute to the water quality crisis by impeding enforcement against polluters,” Replogle said, “and communication about the true magnitude of the problem in Iowa’s waterways,” Replogle said.

Wally Taylor, legal counsel for the Sierra Club’s Iowa chapter, says the state’s voluntary Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy isn’t working and it’s time to set limits on how much nitrogen, phosphorus and manure can used on Iowa farmland. “It’s a no brainer to have numeric criteria for nutrients,” Taylor said, “and to really get a handle on the major problem in Iowa’s waters.” The D-N-R’s water quality resource coordinator says when the Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy was adopted in 2013, officials projected it would take many, many years to make progress given the scale of changes required in farming practices and upgrades needed in municipal wastewater plants.

(Radio Iowa) – Iowa Workforce Development director Beth Townsend says the labor landscape in August remained pretty similar to what we’ve been seeing. “We have a slight uptick in our unemployment rate from three-point-seven to three-point-eight, but we did see an increase of labor force participation to 67-point-five. We added 19-hundred workers in August, so that’s a good sign,” she says. “Iowa employers added 36-hundred jobs in August as well.” Townsend says the addition of jobs was offset by continued layoffs in manufacturing. She says getting more people back into the workforce is important. “The group that we saw gains for the month of August was in the 20 to 24 age group, which is a key demographic because that group has, you know, been on the decline in terms of work,” Townsend says.

Townsend says Iowa’s economy continues to hold steady as we wait for more improvement on the national level. “I would not be the one to predict when we’re going to turn this all around, but I would say these are good trends and we hope that they continue. Obviously we want to bring the unemployment rate down, ” she says. Townsend says the amount of unemployment claims is another number that shows things are holding steady. “We paid out less money in August of 2025 than August of 2024 and benefits obviously went up in July of 2025. So you know you watching the unemployment insurance claim numbers are is also a good indicator of where we’re at,” Townsend says.

Townsend says the average duration for unemployment payouts remains below ten weeks, indicating they’re still able to help people find really good jobs.

(Radio Iowa) – Sixty-eight cases of Legionnaires’ disease are now confirmed in Marshall County, including one death, and the exact cause has yet to be pinpointed, even after two weeks. Marshall County Public Health director Sydney Grewell says they’ve tested a dozen cooling towers in Marshalltown and they’ve all been remediated. Grewell says the test they’re running is called an environmental sample. “The environmental samples do take a long time to grow and Legionella itself is just a hard bacteria to grow in general, so we haven’t found our smoking gun yet,” Grewell says, “but all of those remediated towers, everybody’s been working well with us and helping stop the spread of Legionella.”

When Grewell became the county’s public health director, she didn’t know she’d be learning so much about cooling towers, and she explains what they are. “Cooling towers are basically a large air conditioning system. These cooling towers are for large entities, just places that might need more air, and they’re used with a water-based system and it circulates and then it blows water into the air, which is how we get that legionella,” Grewell says, “and then it spreads around.” Grewell says they’re almost certain a cooling tower on the north side of Marshalltown is the culprit.

“We are focusing on the cooling towers and the CDC is in line with that,” Grewell says. “People like to go down those rabbit holes of like, ‘Well, what if it’s not that?’ Most of the time it is that cooling tower and that’s what we’re really focused on because of what we’re seeing.” As people begin to break out their humidifiers for the winter season ahead, she suggests they give the devices a good cleaning before use. Grewell says it takes between two and 14 days for people to start showing symptoms of Legionnaires’ disease, a lung infection that’s a form of pneumonia.”The most common ones, the dry cough, a high fever like 102, 103, 104, nothing to mess around with,” Grewell says. “It’s not just like, ‘Oh, we’re at 99,’ it’s high, sometimes weakness, fatigue.”

Other symptoms might include chills, muscle aches, headaches, and diarrhea. Grewell says if you are showing any of these symptoms, contact your primary healthcare provider and get tested.

COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa – The U-S Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Iowa says four Georgia men were recently sentenced in Council Bluffs U-S District Court, for their role in a nationwide fraud conspiracy.

According to public court documents, between March 2022 and April 2024, 26-year-old Russell Tafron Weatherspoon, 23-year-old Karl Andre Dieudonne, 32-year-old Demonte Tequis Brazil, and 25-year-old Gregory Lamar Scorza, ran a multi-state fraud scam. The scammers led victims in several states across the United States, including Iowa, to believe that an arrest warrant had been issued for them for failing to appear in court. The scammers used names of local law enforcement officers and used an application that spoofed law enforcement phone numbers. The victims were told they would be arrested if a cash bond was not posted. The victims were directed to a bond company or other location to meet and pay a bond for failing to appear as an expert witness pursuant to a subpoena. The scam involved the use of legal terminology, purported court proceedings, and threats of arrest to authenticate the scam.

Weatherspoon led and organized these activities from a Georgia state prison. A drone was used to fly over the prison and drop cell phones into the yard that were then utilized by inmates to make the scam calls. Weatherspoon was in prison following his 2020 convictions for aggravated assault and violation of the Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act.

Weatherspoon was sentenced on April 9, 2025, to 130 months in federal prison. Dieudonne was sentenced on May 13, 2025, to 36 months in federal prison. Brazil was sentenced on May 13, 2025, to 51 months in federal prison. Scorza was sentenced September 9, 2025, to 72 months in federal prison. One additional man has been charged in the conspiracy but has not yet been arrested.

After completing their terms of imprisonment, each defendant will be required to serve a three-year term of supervised release. There is no parole in the federal system. Victim restitution was also ordered.

Thes case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, Council Bluffs Police Department, Iowa City Police Department, Iowa Division of Criminal Investigations, Iowa State Patrol, Omaha Police Department, and Eppley Airport Police.