MINNESOTA CITY, Minn. – A man reported a pistol stolen from his parked car at the Verchota boat landing on Prairie  Island. It was a SCCU brand 9-millmeter, he said. The theft was reported about 4:30 p.m. The man said that he had left the car unlocked 2-1/2 hours earlier and that the gun was gone when he came back.

NEW HARTFORD, Minn — Two children, age 9 and 6, were injured when a dirt bike driven by their dad crashed into a tree. The impact ejected all three off the bike – the father at the handlebars, one boy on his lap, the other hanging on to his waist. None was helmeted. The 9-year-old boy had a possible head injury and was taken 16 miles to a LaCrosse hospital. Both boys also had minor cuts and scrapes. The father, Dylan James Fairey, age 37, suffered a possible concussion and also was taken to the hospital. Winona County deputies decided against any legal action, noting that the law doesn’t  require helmets on private property. This was in the 31000 block of County Road 5.

MANKATO, Minn. – More jurors were accepted for duty for the Favel murder trial on the third day of jury selection.

Juror Number 11: A middle-age man  who is  a  credit analyst at a bank.

Juror Number 10: A middle-age man who works as a metal fabricator and who had no knowledge of the ase..

Juror Number 9: A middle-age woman, s a nurse, whoi had heard about the case.

Juror Number 8: A middle-age woman, the owner of a small business with her husband.

Earlier: Fravel jury selection, now seven, on slow track

WINONA, Minn. — A man flagged down a police squad car and told the officer he had been assaulted. This was a block from City Hall at Third and Walnut streets about 1150 a.m. The man said the attack was two blocks away. He also said he didn’t want to pursue the case legally. Police began a neighborhood search for surveillance video for clues.

SPARTA, Wis. — A Sparta man was charged with attempted homicide for injuries to a woman who suffered serious injuries in a domestic incident two days earlier. Bail for Andrew Nauman, age 39, was set at $1 million – plus $1,000  for bail-jumping in a previous case.

Earlier: Badly injured Sparta woman air-lifted to LaCrosse

Nauman. Now a second domestic abuse charge.

LACRESCENT, Minn. – A Brownsville driver was injured when his vehicle crashed into trees at a difficult junction south of LaCrescent. Joseph Mark Schneider, 76, was taken 12 miles to a LaCrosse hospital. His injuries appeared non-life threatening. The accident was about 10:20 p.m. This was at the junction of State Highway 16 and State Highway 26. Schneider was beading north toward LaCrescent. He was alone in his 2021 Jeep Cherokee

AUGUSTA, Ga. – An Xcel Energy convoy of linemen that headed from Wisconsin to Georgia to help with the Hurricane Helene disaster on October 2 now has an expandedmission – move to Florida for the even more disastrous Hurricane Milton aftermath. The crew headed for Tampa. The Wisconsin Xcel crew, which assembled in Eau Claire, comprised 40 linemen with a support staff of 50 employees. They debarked with  39 trucks.

Earlier: Rushford crew on way for Hurricane Helene relief

Mutual aid. Xcel convoy crews assemble from Eau Claire, LaCrosse, Menomonie, Rice Lake and Sparta. Utilities have agreements to help each other through crises. Minneapolis-based Xcel, with 5.8 million customers, is one of the major contributors to the mutual assistance pact.

BIXBY, Minn. – A Spring Valley driver was injured in a two-vehicle collision and taken 12 miles to an Owatonna hospital with non-life threatening injuries. Molly Therese Mitchell, 52, was heading north toward Owatona from the direction of Blooming Prairie. On a straight stretch of U.S. Highway 218 her 2015 GMC Terrain collided with a 2012 Jeep Wrangler, which also was northbound. Unhurt in the Jeep:

> Miranda Adriana Grieger, 42, of Owatonna, the driver.

 > Matthew Richard Grieger, 37, also of Owatonna,

The accident was about 9:30 p.m. at Bixby Lane.

MANKATO, Minn. – Jury selection continued slowly and laboriously in the Mankato courtroom where Adam Fravel will be tried for the 2023 Winona murder of Maddi Kingsbury. The jury is now at seven:

Juror Number 7: A young man, a mortgage banker, who has read a few articles about the Kingsbury case but doesn’t feel too knowledge about it.

Juror Number 6: A young Hispanic man who works as a courier and said he would be fair and impartial.

The latest selectoons brought the jury nearer to gender bakance – now four women and three men. Judge Nancy Buytendorp expressed concern about the pace of jury selection. Originally she had hoped to have a full panel of 12 jurors and five alternates by Friday. With that target unlikely to be met, Buytendorp changed opening arguments to October18 – another nine out.The questioning of potential jurors, most whom have been dismissed or excused, has run as long as an hour each.

Earlier: More jurors seated for Fravel murder trial

MADISON, Wis. – The Wisconsin Supreme Court has no sympathy for moral turpitude by judicial officers. The Court refused to reinstate the law license of James Ritland, a former county attorney in Black River Falls, who was convicted of attempted adultery and disorderly conduct in 2021.  He had been accused of telling female prisoners that he would post their bond or give them drug money in exchange for sexual favors. In denying to renew Ritland’s license, the Supreme Court said Ritland’s sexual misconduct demonstrated an “inability to recognize right from wrong and good from bad.”

Verbatim

Court: “Ritland’s continued failure to recognize the connection between his sexual misconduct and his status as an attorney reflects his general inability to recognize right from wrong and good from bad as it relates to the victims of his misconduct. His view that the victims of his exploitive sexual misconduct were somehow pleasured by his conduct or enjoyed it signals either distorted thinking or a general lack of empathy, either of which would prevent him from appreciating the full degree of harm he caused by his actions. This shows a stunning lack of moral character.”

Ritland. Age 70. His career as attorney has dead-ended.

WINONA, Minn. – A Winona pleaded guilty to a bar stabbing in which another man was critically wounded. The plea from Larry Tramone Hudson, 41, was to a negotiated-down charge of third-degree rioting. Originally he was charged also with assault and carrying a dangerous weapon. Hudson was arrested in March after a fight outside the Cornerstone Bar on West Fourth Street. The criminal complaint said that Hudson had been picking fights and being disruptive in the bar. Outside, the complaint said, he pulled a seven-inch pocket knife and stabbed two 23-year-old men — one of whom was hospitalized in critical condition.

Earlier: Two men stabbed in West Side bar fight

BLACK RVER FALLS, Wis. – A man accused of harboring an attempted homicide suspect pleaded not guilty. James Sylvester, 45, was arrested in October 2023 after an investigation found he was “harboring and intentionally interfering” with police efforts to locate and apprehend Anthony Sylvester IV. Sylvester IV was accused of attempted first-degree intentional homicide and home invasion.

Earlier: Bail at $750,000 in Hixton break-in, stabbing

Earlier: Hixton stabbing suspect taken without resistance

Earlier: Arrest warrant goes out for Hixton stabbing

Earlier: Hixton stabbing suspect spotted but fled

Earlier: Stabbing reported in Hixton home invasion

Sylvester. Mugshot from Jackson County jail in Black River Falls.

OSTRANDER, Minn. – A restaurant in Ostrander, population 230 near the Iowa border, has collected hundreds of pounds of relief items for hurricane victims in the Southeast. And it’s not over. Lynne Dempewolf, owner of Wolf’s Den, said said her project will culminate Sunday with a drive-through collection from 12 to 3 p.m. Among what’s most desperately needed: Cleaning and hygiene supplies, baby formula, diapers, bug spray, rubber gloves, can-openers, garbage bags, toilet paper, and non-perishable food. Among early contributors: Ziebell’s Hiawatha Foods of Winona, , Carr’s Bar & Grill of Racine, and Sweet Stop and Sandwich Shoppe of  Preston.

LUANDA, Angola – A Minnesota missionary was murdered in a remote area of this former in Portuguese colony. Authorities called it “a volent criminal attack.” Beau Shroyer, 44, and his family had moved from Detroit Lakes in Minnesota to this west Africa country three years ago. They were with the SIM Christian missionary project out of North Carolin. Shroyer, his wife and five children lived in a remote Nyneka village and proselytized and farmed. Few details were available in Luanda, the Angola capital, where the U.S. Embassy is located. Friends in Detroit Lakes said Shroyer had visited home last summer and described working with the Nyneka people, whom he described as among the most marginalized groups in Angola. He talked about a child, Mauricio, who walked half of each  day to school and back. Shroyer showed a picture of himself spreading manure by hand over a 130-foot by 50-foot agricultural plot.

Shroyer. In third year as Christian missionary in Angola.