Sheriff’s officials in Union County say the driver of a pickup truck was injured when the vehicle went out of control Thursday night and rolled into a ditch. 49-year old Paul Burdett Pals, of Orient, was transported to the Greater Regional Hospital in Creston following the accident, which occurred at around 9:15-p.m. on Highway 25.
Authorities say Pals’ 2006 northbound Chevy Silverado pickup went off the road onto the shoulder and the veered across the southbound lane of Highway 25 before entering the west ditch, hitting a fence and ending up in a soybean field.

Officials with the State of Nebraska and the University of Nebraska say treating a doctor who contracted Ebola in Africa at an Omaha hospital poses no health risk to the public. Dr. Joseph Acierno  is director of the Nebraska Department of Health.  “Considering the way the facility has been designed, considering the expertise we have with that facility, considering our partners, we believe any risk is minimal and we think there shouldn’t be fear, but we understand there will be fear,” Acierno says. “We stand ready to answer those questions.”

Dr. Rick Sacra, the patient, went on a mission trip to Liberia in August to work in a hospital there. He got a fever last Friday and was diagnosed with Ebola early this week. Sacra was driven by ambulance to the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha after landing a little after 6 a.m. today (Friday) at Offutt Air Force Base, just south of Omaha.

Dr. Phil Smith is director of the “biocontainment” unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center where Sacra is being treated. “It’s likely that we’re going to continue to see people like this,” Smith  says. “They want to test the capacity of different places and have more than one facility on call.” Jeffery Gold, chancellor of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, says staff at the hospital have been preparing for this type of situation for “a very long time.”   “Not only will this patient receive world-class care,” Gold says, ” but all of our patients, students, faculty and staff will be completely protected during this entire episode of care.”

During this Ebola outbreak in west Africa, 36-hundred people have fallen ill and more than half of them have died. Sacra is a family practice doctor who was volunteering in the obstetrics unit of a hospital in Liberia. Two other American medical missionaries were flown back to the U.S. and treated at an Atlanta hospital’s isolation unit. They have both been released. The unit at Emory University in Atlanta, the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland and the Rocky Mountain Laboratory in Montana operate containment units that are similar to the one in Omaha.

(Radio Iowa)

Police in Lenox arrested a man Thursday night who was wanted on a warrant for Failure to Appear in Court. Officers took 21-year old German Phillip Rodriguez, of Lenox, into custody at around 11-p.m. at his place of employment.

German P. Rodriguez.

Rodriguez was wanted for failure to appear on an original charge of assault causing injury. He was transported to the Taylor County Jail where he was being held without bond, pending an appearance before the magistrate.

A Creston man was arrested Thursday evening on drug charges, following a traffic stop. According to Creston Police, 21-year old Ely Will was taken into custody at around 5:30-p.m. in the 900 block of N. Lincoln Street.

Will faces charges that include Driving While Revoked, Possession of Paraphernalia, and Possession of Methamphetamine. He was released from the Union County Jail after posting $1,000 bond.

(8-a.m. News)

With KJAN News Director Ric Hanson.

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Voters in Pottawattamie, Harrison and Mills Counties will head to the polls Tuesday to participate in special school elections. The Daily NonPareil reports the Lewis Central Community School District is asking voters to renew an existing instructional support levy, while the Missouri Valley and East Mills school districts will hold votes on voter-approved physical plant and equipment levies.

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Discarded smoking materials are being blamed for a small deck fire Thursday evening, in Atlantic. Firefighter Gene Schmeling told KJAN News the damage to the deck at 806 Locust was minimal. The incident, which was originally dispatched as an overturned grill that landed on a deck and caught it on fire, was reported at around 6:28-p.m.

No other details are currently available.

STORM LAKE, Iowa (AP) – Storm Lake police have arrested a woman who they say played a game with her children that deprived them of oxygen. The Storm Lake Pilot Tribune reports 31-year-old Jennifer Cordova was charged with two counts of child endangerment on Thursday. Police say she played a “pass out game” with her 13- and 7-year-old sons. They say she pushed on the 13-year-old’s chest until he passed out. The 7-year-old wasn’t injured.

It’s unclear if the older child was hospitalized.  Cordova was released from the Buena Vista County Jail on $2,000 bond.

The latest report of a major retailer being hacked has prompted warnings for customers to keep an eye on their credit and debit card accounts. The spokesman for Iowa’s Attorney General, Geoff Greenwood, says the Home Depot announcement shows why you should make it a habit to track you accounts. “We urge consumers, regardless if there has been a report of data breach, to monitor their bills,” Greenwood says. “That is sometimes not just your best, but your only defense in detecting when someone has compromised your card.”

Greenwood says you can take all the right steps and still have your data stolen. “These are likely eastern European, perhaps Russian hackers who have infiltrated a system according to media reports, and have sold credit cards on the black market, in what they call the Dark Web. And so, you may’ve done everything right and you may’ve been compromised, and the best way to figure that out is to look at your bills, look at your account statements. Keep on top of your accounts,” Greenwood says.

Another way to keep up with your accounts is through a credit report. “Credit reports are available for free. There are three credit reporting agencies, and you are entitled to one free credit report every year and you can get many more if you want to pay for them,” Greenwood says. “What some consumers do, is they will spread it out over several months. They will get a report from one agency and then three or four months later get one from another agency.”

He says there are some specific instructions for Home Depot customers. “Any customer who used a credit card or debit card at Home Depot in the last six months should act accordingly and look at their account activity,” according to Greenwood. You can go to the Attorney General’s website to find out more. He says there is information on the website about what you can do. Right now you can call Home Depot directly if you have more questions, as Greenwood says Home Depot has not released specific information yet on the time frame involved in the hacking.

The latest retailer hack comes after Target reported having its data stolen near the end of last year.

(Radio Iowa)