(Harlan, Iowa) – The Shelby County Sheriff’s Office has issued a report on numerous arrests spanning the time frame of December 16th through the 31st, 2022.

• On Dec. 31st, 28-year-old Aaron Dale Kobes, of Missouri Valley, was arrested following a traffic stop at Station St and East St in Shelby, IA. Kobes was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with OWI 1st and Turning at Intersection Violation.
• On the 29th of December, 21-year-old Jonathan Gary Shimerdla, of Harlan, was arrested after a call for service in the 500 block of 12th St., Harlan, IA. Shimerdla was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Possession of a Controlled Substance, Keeping Premises or Vehicle for Controlled Substance, and Possession of Drug Paraphernalia.
• On the 28th, 26-year-old Victoria Anne Griffen, of Shelby, was arrested following a traffic stop on Plateau St., Shelby, IA. Griffen was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Interference with Official Acts and Driving while Barred; and, 22-year-old Nathaniel Lee Gangwer, of Atlantic, was arrested on a Shelby County Warrant. Ganger was transported to the Shelby County Jail for Failure to Appear.
• Christmas Day, 45-year-old Joshua Howard Finken, of Irwin, was arrested following a traffic stop on Chatburn Avenue, in Harlan. Finken was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Unlawful Possession of Prescription Drug, Keeping Premises or Vehicle for Controlled Substance, Possession of Drug Paraphernalia, Possession of Controlled Substance 2 counts, and No Valid Driver’s License.
• On Christmas Eve, 22-year-old Scott Alexander Selix, of Harlan, was arrested after a traffic stop on 12th Street. Selix was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Driving while Suspended, Failure to Provide Proof of Financial Liability, and Improper Rear Lamps.
• Shelby County Sheriff’s Deputies arrested 25-year-old Spencer Lee Miller, of Manilla, on December 22nd. Miller was arrested on a Shelby County Warrant. He was transported to the Shelby County Jail for Failure to Appear.
• On the 17th of December, 35-year-old Matthew David Andersen, of Harlan, was arrested after a traffic stop in the 1100 block of Linden Rd. Andersen was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with OWI 1st.
• There were two arrests December 16th, in Shelby County: 24-year-old Anton Jason Ahlhem, of Harlan, was arrested after a traffic stop in the 100 block of East St, Shelby. Ahlhem was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Possession of Drug Paraphernalia and Failure to Maintain or use Safety Belt; and, 30-year-old Drew Ashton Gagnon, of Harlan, was arrested after a traffic stop in the 100 block of East St, Shelby. Gagnon was transported to the Shelby County Jail and charged with Possession of Controlled Substance, Keeping Premises or Vehicle for Controlled Substance, Possession of Drug Paraphernalia, No Valid Driver’s License, Failure to Provide Proof of Financial Liability, and Operating Non-Registered Vehicle.

Note: Criminal charges are merely accusations and defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty in a court of law.

(Radio Iowa) – Human remains found on the Cedar River have been identified as a missing Cedar Rapids city employee. The State Medical Examiner has identified the remains found by hunters December 30th as those of 54-year-old Erik Spaw.

Spaw went missing on May 7th after the city-owned pickup truck he had been driving between work sites was found submerged in the Cedar River. An extensive search of the river had failed to locate his body. Spaw’s mother told K-C-R-G T-V that complications from his diabetes could have contributed to his accident.

(Radio Iowa) – A man was killed and another man was seriously injured in an early morning shooting in Davenport. According to a news release from Davenport Police, officers responding to a report of gunshots being fired near a pawn shop found two men with gunshot wounds at about 2:20 this (Thursday) morning. Police say a 40-year-old man found at the scene died and the other man, who is 33 years old, was seriously injured.

According to a statement from Davenport Police, the incident does not appear to be a random act of violence. There was a shooting in the same area in May. The Quad City Times reported witnesses told police two men had been shooting at one another and a building was damaged, but no shooting victims were found.

(Radio Iowa) – An arrest has been made in connection to an armed robbery at a northwest Iowa liquor store on New Year’s Day. Storm Lake Police were called to Al’s Liquor in Storm Lake late Sunday evening. An employee informed officers that a man had entered the business and brandished a firearm, which he held to the employee’s head. The man allegedly moved the employee to the cash register and took an undisclosed amount of cash. The suspect then fled the business on foot. No injuries were reported. On Tuesday, police executed search warrants at two Storm Lake residences, and found several items of interest.

The suspect, 24-year-old Eh Lwe of Storm Lake, was located at one of the residences, and arrested on multiple charges. The incident remains under investigation.

(Audubon, Iowa) – The Audubon County Sheriff’s Office reports Deputies on Monday arrested 61-year-old Harlin Weaver, of Kingsford, Michigan.  Weaver was arrested on an outstanding Violation of Probation, and an Unserved Mittimus warrant. He appeared before the District Judge and was held on his charges.

(Radio Iowa) – January is human trafficking awareness month and more than 600 Iowa businesses and industry groups are now part of an initiative aimed at identifying and responding to human trafficking in the state. Iowa Businesses Against Trafficking was launched a year ago. Secretary of State Paul Pate says businesses that join the program are asked to help raise public awareness of trafficking or train workers to spot people who may be trafficking victims. “Some of them are aggressive about putting out 800-numbers in their businesses’ restrooms so people can get help if they need to,” Pate says. “They’re reaching out to their own employees and to their customers with information. So, it’s building an army to combat this situation.”

Pate says the number of reported trafficking incidents has risen in Iowa. The most recent data from the National Human Trafficking Hotline shows there were nearly 300 contacts from Iowa in 2021. Those tips led to dozens of cases reaching law enforcement. Child sex trafficking sometimes starts with connections made online through social media, according to Teresa Davidson of Chains Interrupted, an eastern Iowa nonprofit that works to prevent human trafficking. Davidson says parents and caregivers should talk to kids about online relationships, but she says state lawmakers could also push device and tech companies to do more. For instance, she says safe browser settings should be turned on automatically, instead of being an option buried in user settings.

“Children do not have the developmental capability to handle what will be thrown at them online,” Davidson says, “so as adults, as a community, as lawmakers, we need to help protect our children.” Davidson says Iowa lawmakers should also pass a Safe Harbor law so victims of sex trafficking are safe from criminal liability and put more funding into survivor services. Secretary of State Pate says anyone with information about possible human trafficking should call local police or the Iowa Victim Service Call Center at 1-800-770-1650.

On the web at ibat.iowa.gov

(reporting by Grant Gerlock, Iowa Public Radio)

(Creston, Iowa) – A man residing in Creston told Police late Wednesday morning, that someone damaged his vehicle. A person unknown threw a brick at his car window, while the vehicle was parked in the 200 block of N. Maple Street. The incident resulted in an estimated $100 in damage. No other information is available.

(Radio Iowa) – Despite several rounds of heavy snow in recent weeks, it will take significantly more precipitation to break Iowa’s long-running drought. State climatologist Justin Glisan says much of the state is far behind on moisture levels. “We’re going to need several months, if not more than a year, of above-average precipitation in those drier parts of the central region and western Iowa,” Glisan says. “You look at Sioux City, around there, 47% of normal precipitation for the year, going back three years, 25 inches below-average-plus in certain parts of the state.”

Large portions of Iowa are in moderate to severe drought, and multiple northwest Iowa counties are in the D-3 category of extreme drought, but parts of Woodbury and Monona counties are in the worst category, D-4, for exceptional drought. Glisan says the soil needs to recharge in order to rebound.

“You really have to get a lot of water into the soil profile to replenish those stocks, but also wetter soils will get more runoff into the stream, so you’ll see a rebound in those stream flows as well,” Glisan says. “So we’re going to need, in those D-3 and D-4 regions, a lot of precipitation to put a dent in those longer-term deficits.” Glisan says it takes a lot of snow to melt down to usable precipitation. He says it’s anywhere from eight to 12 inches of snow that equate to one inch of rainfall.

“So you’re not getting a lot of water out of that snowpack, number one,” Glisan says, “but if the drier soils are frozen deeper, it’s going to take a while for those profiles to thaw late winter/early spring, so even if you’re melting that snowpack, a lot of that’s not infiltrating, it’s running off.”

Much of Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota has been in a significant drought for most of the last two years.

(Radio Iowa) – The growing of industrial hemp has not taken off as some envisioned when it returned to Iowa fields in 2020. Lane Kozel with the Iowa Department of Agriculture says the number of growers fell again this season. “Believe last year, we dropped to 45. And this year, we had 33, licensed growers. Of those 33, 26 growers actually planted a hemp crop. So we’re down to about 26 growers this year,” he says. “So it’s been cut in half every year since the program was started.” Kozel says one of the factors is the cost of the inputs and the amount of manual labor needed to properly cultivate and grow a crop .

“I don’t think there’s a market for it as well, I don’t think that’s been established is to help out or growers either,” Kozel says. The processing needed to extract the C-D-B or to create seeds, for grain or fiber has not taken off in Iowa. “Once it grows and there’s no place to go with it — that’s kind of leads to people not being interested either,” he says. Many other states also approved industrial hemp programs, and he says that created a lot of product. “You know, there’s been talked as long as it’s programs and going people have been, sitting on previous crops. C-B-D, that seemed to be the big boom, in previous years. And I think the market is saturated with that,” Kozel says. “And so until we can find some uses for some fiber and some grain, I think it’s going to stay where its at.” Kozel says there needs to be development of processing to use the hemp to make it worthwhile for growers to invest in.

“When we first started the program, I mean, everyone’s got, you know, great ideas with hemp concrete and housing, building material and clothing and what have you, but there’s just none of that going on right now, to my knowledge,” according to Kozel. “I’m sure there’s some small businesses in the country that are making him closing blue jeans out of hemp and things like that. But far as an Iowa, there’s nothing.”

The industrial hemp is required to pass a test that shows it has a T-H-C level below three-point-nine percent. The crop has to be destroyed if it can’t meet that standard. Kozel says everyone passed the test this year.