DAVENPORT, Iowa – Part of a six-story apartment building broke off and collapsed in the street, trapping, it was feared three men from upper units in the rubble. Still-standing parts of the building remained constantly in motion, creaking and breakig off. Rescuers held off digging for the missing men for fear that disturbing the rubble would bring down more of the building. Arriving at the scene, rescuers had pulled seven people from the building. Twelve others walked out on their own. Later two more people were rescued, including a woman who was removed from the fourth floor as authorities were beginning to set up for demolition. The collapse occurred shortly before 5 p.m. Missing were Brandon Colvin, Ryan Hitchcock and Daniel Prien There was “high probability” the men were home at the time. All three have since been listed in the national missing persons database.

Rubble too unstable. Rescuers were worried that rubble was supporting remaining walls. Digging for other survivirs could bring everything down, Too dangerous, disturb, they said.

WINONA, Minn. – A dive team was called to Prairie Island afer a kayak flipped in a Mississippi River backchannel. The good news: The kayaker managed to swim to shore. No one was hurt. This was about 3:40 p.m.

TWIN LAKES, Minn. – A Lakeville motorcyclist was killed, apparently instantly, when his bike went out of control on Interstate 35 three miles from the Iowa border.  Michael Gerard Kerns, 63,  was heading south on a 2007 Harley Davidson Touring machine. The accident was about 11:30 a.m.

WINONA, Minn. – You never what you’ll find at the bluff-top Garvin Heights lookout the morning after. The usual dregs of partying: Empty beer cans, cheap wine bottles, marijuana stubs, drippy condoms. This time was different. Police were called about 9:26 a.m. about a sweatshirt that the caller believed was covered in blood. Not so, it turned out. Officers took one whiff. It wasn’t blood but vomit. They took it to he station house for destruction per protocol.

MADISON, Wis. – This is the season for turtles to be on the move looking for a safe place to lay their eggs. Sometimes a nesting place across the road looks better to a turtle. Who knows why. Whatever, Andrew Badje, state conservation biologist, urged people to help turtles cross the road safely. Don’t run them down. If possible, he said, lead them in the right direction. “The turtle is trying to get to an area,” he said. “Move it to the side of the road that it’s facing. So, if it’s facing east then move it to the east side of the road.” Badje said if a turtle is trying to nest in your yard, leave it alone. He said it likely will be there be there only a day or two.

Turtle query: Why did chicken cross the road? Err, why did the turtle cross the road? To lay eggs.

Badje. With the Wisconsin state Bureau of Natural Heritage Conservation.

WINONA, Minn. – Officers smelled burned marijuana inside a car during a traffic stop. The driver smelled too, police said. Arrested for impaired driving was Bryant Hameed Trussell, 27, of Goodview.  In their report quoted Trussel that he had just finished smoking five minutes or so earlier. He was specific, said police: He’d been smoking pre-rolled strawberry flavored joints called “flowers.” Police made the arrest after Trussel Failed several field sobriety tests.  His movements were slow and he had bloodshot, watery eyes and dilated pupils, police said. At jail he was tested for drugs. The tests will take a few days to analyze.

WINONA, Minn. – An Iowa driver was stopped for speeding on Riverview Drive, 52 mph in a 40 zone, and then arrested for being drunk. Dalton Lee Weigel, 23, of Mason City, had bloodshot, watery eyes and smelled of alcohol, the arresting deputy said. A field sobriety test found his blood-alcohol almost 0.10%, a fifth higher than the state threshold for impairment, He was taken to jail. This was a little before midnight.

AUSTIN, Min. – A couple was pulling into a Culver’s ice cream shop about 4 the afternoon when a car with flashing red lights pulled up behind them. “In Minnesota, we drive 30 miles per hour,” the officer told the couple, whose car had out-of-state plates. The driver admitted to 35 mph. But things didn’t seem right to the couple. Why was the officer in a red Mustang, not a black-and-white squad car. He said it was his “detective vehicle.” But why was a detective making a traffic stop? And why on a Saturday afternoon of a holiday weekend? And why did the cop keep smirking through the whole encounter? And what about the logo “NAPD” on his cap and white shirt: This was Austin. What jurisdiction was “NA”? No ticket was issued. And the guy had flashed his badge too quickly to make out. After the officer in the Mustang departed, the out-of-state couple was sure they had been played the fool. But why? They called the real police to report they suspected someone was impersonating a peace officer. Police looked at a Culver’s surveillance video and identified the red Mustang as belonging to a local man, Wade Joseph Novak, 58. Police — the real police — located the Mustang and found a look-alike police badge, a dash camera, two strobe lights, and emergency flashing lights on the front and back of the vehicle. What about “NAPD”? Police said Novak once had created an organization he called “Never Alone Public Defenders” and bought related paraphernalia. Novak will have an opportunity to explain all this to a judge next week.

Slow-speed derailment.  On a sidetrack of the transcontinental mainline that carries 70-some trains a day.

Loads of gravel lost when train tips

Preparedness

Although the derailment posed no environmental danger, Stearns County is prepared for the worst. St. Cloud has 60 certified hazmat technicians on staff, one of only four such emergency response teams in the state. Erin Tufte, the county emergency manager, said protocols are in place to evacuate everyone within a half mile. Nearly two dozen rescue locations have been pre-arranged, he said. each with backup generators, kitchens, restrooms and showers for overnight use or longer if needed.

WINONA, Minn. – Police made a couple discoveries in an afternoon traffic stop. First, a passenger in the car, Lonnie Edward Johnson, 42, of Rollingstone, was wanted on a felony drug warrant. Second, police said, Johnson was fidgeting on the backseat to conceal cocaine, albeit only a trace amount. This was at Second and Olmstead streets about 2:10 p.m.

ELBA, Minn. – A woman on an all-terrain four-wheeler was injured when the driver’s hat flew off and he braked and lost control. The passenger, Christina Onsy, 29, of Rochester, was taken to a hospital with a substantial injury to her right leg. This was about 9:20 p.m. on a gravel road at Wilderness Campground west of Elba on Highway 26. Both Onsy and the driver, Mai Kongkeo, 33, of Rochester, were thrown from the vehicle. Kongkeo showed signs of intoxication, deputies said.  His blood-alcohol level measured 0.13%. He was booked at the Winona County jail for criminal vehicular operation and drunken driving.

Kongkeo. Blood-alcohol level measured 0.13%.

Unrecognizable heap. Only blackened shambles remain of he 5,500-square foot full-service Toad’s Cove convenience store. Where now will Centerville’s coffee klatchers klatch? Image: Steve Lunde

Nothing left except fuel pumps, side buildings

CENTERVILLE, Wis. – Both lanes of U.S. Highway 35 through Centerville were were re-opened the morning after fire destroyed the Toad’s Cove convenience store and gas station. Gawkers slowed to see the devastation, some stopping, getting out and taking pictures of  what had been a thriving landmark stop for fuel, on-site cooking, and raspberry turnovers near the crossroads south to Trempealeau and north to Arcadia. Traffic had been rerouted on side streets most of the night. Firefighters from eight other communities had needed all the immediate area for their trucks and equipment. A truck-mounted ladder crew aimed hoses down into the interior while other firefighters shit water into the inferno from the ground. There were no injuries.

Earlier: Fire levels Toad’s Cove near Centerville crossroads

RIDGEWAY, Minn. – A report that a 82-year-old man pulled a gun during a long-running property dispute has been handed over to the county attorney. The incident, between Ridgeway and Witoka, was in March but was not reported until now. Sheriff’s officers said that the property owner was alleged to have pulled the gun on a 54-year-old man and that details were confirmed by a third party. No arrests were made, and the county attorney will need to sort out the facts. The incident was in the 40000 block of County Road 12.

Under Interstate Bridge. And around the pilings. Will dropping water levels yield new clues?

58 days later: Still no definitive answers

WINONA, Minn. – Friends and family spent the day combing the Mississippi River shore on both the Minnesota and Wisconsin sides for any trace of Madeline Kingsbury, who disappeared from her Winona home eight weeks ago. The river has been searched before but police suggested going out again now that flood  levels have gone down, said Petra Eastling of Minnesota United volunteers. Police suspect foul play in the disappearance of Kingsbury, 26, the mother of children 5 and 2.

Earlier: Maddi update: Police reticent on probe’s new wrinkle

Earlier: Probe restructured in Maddi Kingsbury disappearance

Earlier: Special prosecutor named in Kingsbury case

LACRESCENT, Minn. – A LaCrosse woman was injured in a two-car collision at the south end of LaCrescent. Donna Jean Kately, 73, was taken across the river to a LaCrosse hospital with non-life threatening injuries. She was on South 14th Street in a 2016 Crysler 300 about 9:05 a.m., turning onto four-lane U.S. Highway 16. The other car, a 2007 Pontiac Sunbird, heading south out of town on Highway 16, was driven by Garrett James Thornton-Paulson, 25, of La Crescent. He was unhurt Also unhurt was a14-year-ld girl in Kately’s car.

Night-time spectacle. Underground gasoline and diesel tanks cut off in time.  Image: Kayla Servant

Flames broke out after Friday closing time

CENTERVILLE, Wis. – The fueling stop Toad’s Cove was destroyed in a huge fire that lit the night sky and took firefighters from eight departments all night to quell. Then smoking embers broke oit in the rubble afire again at dawn. Not until 14 hours after the original f fire broke out was it it out again for sure. The fire was discovered after the Toad’s 10 p.m. closing time Friday. No one was in the structure. Spared were Toad’s car wash and BMX racing arena, and Toad’s Frog and Toad storage sheds a half block away. The owner said he hoped to have the car wash and its puppy wash re-opened soon. The devastated main building included a restaurant and ice cream parlor. The station was only fuel stop un a 30-mile stretch of U.S. Highway 35 between Galesville and Fountain City.

WINONA, Minn. – A Houston man failed field sobriety tests in a traffic stop at U.S. Highway 61 and Huff and tested at 0.10% blood-alcohol. That’s one-fifth above the allowable limit. Police said John Pozanc, 25, admitted to three or four drinks.  He had run a red light and was going 40 mph in the Huff Street 30 zone, police said. The stop was about 1:40 a.m.

NISSWA, Minn. — A black bear mauled a 65-year-old woman at a vacation home on Gull Lake, leaving deep claw wounds on a shoulder and arm.  She was treated at a Brainerd hospital emergency room and was determined not to be in a life-threatening medical situation. A doctor told her the pain and bruising would be with her a few days and the scarring much longer. The woman, who asked sheriff’s deputies not to release her name, said she had let dog Zeus out around midnight and shouted at what she first thought was a raccoon to scoot. It was no raccoon. Suddenly in defensive mode, the bear attacked. She described the animal as medium size and cinnamon. “My shirt had blood on it, but nothing gushing,” she told a KSTP interviewer. “I did not get bitten. It was just a what? A scratch.” She has no ill will towards the bear. The response, she said, was natural for a bear when a dog suddenly appears on its territory. The woman, who has vacationed for years on Gull Lake, said she never had a bear encounter before. Since the state Natural Resources Department began tracking encounters in 1987, there have been only 10 attacks leading to serious injuries. Statewide that averages one every 2-1/2 years.

Bear claw marks. Victim needed stitches. .Image: Cass County Sheriff

Sad duty. A Chisago County first-responder tracks colleagues in a recovery boat on the sgill high-running river.

Climber slipped on a weekend adventure at Taylor

TAYLORS FALLS, Minn. – Canoers spotted the body of a Wisconsin climber who fell into flood-swollen Croix River rapids seven weeks ago. An autopsy confirmed the identity of 18-year-old D’Andrea Sanvig of Luck. He fell from an overlook at Interstate Park.

Earlier: River a danger search zone for missing hiker

LA CROSSE, Wis. — A La Crosse physician accused of sexual liberties with a 10-year-old girl changed his plea to guilty. Joseph Poterucha, 41, a pediatric cardiologist, had been accused of separate incidents with three girls but pleaded guilty to reduced charges in plea deal. Judge Todd Bjerke acepted the deal, which hd been negotiated with prosecutors. The judge set ,and set sentencing for July on amended charges on second-degree and fourth-degree sexual assault. The case began w in October 2021 after the 10-year-old girl  old her mother that that Poterucha had touched her under her clothes. At the time Poterucha worked at Mayo Clinic in La Crosse. although the complaint was in a separate practice. Mayo fired Poterucha. In November 2021 he surrendered his medical license in Wisconsin and in January 2022 his Minnesota license.

Earlier: Now doctor facing three molestation charges

Earlier: Doctor denies sexual misconduct with minors

Earlier: Now doctor facing three molestation charges

Earlier: Pediatrician accused of molesting girl child

ST. PAUL, Minn. — A man who shot and killed four people outside a St. Paul bar and dumped the bodies in Wisconsin was sentenced to 160 years in prison. Antoine Darnique Suggs is now 39. Judge JaPaul Harris issued the sentence, following a jury conviction in March on four counts of second-degree intentional murder. Meanwhile Suggs faces charges of corpse-hiding in Menomonie, Wisconsin. The bodies had been driven 60 miles and left in a vehicle in a cornfield, where they were discovered the next day. The shootings were outside the White Squirrel bar in St. Paul.  The victims all were shot in the head. Suggs’ father Darren Osborn, was sentenced earlier to five years in prison for complicity. The father had driven Suggs back to Minnesota.

Earlier: Verdict guilty in quadruple slaying

Earlier: Balloons released at sunset at vigil

Earlier: Police name suspects in quadruple slaying

Earlier: Four people found in cornfield shot to death

Suggs. Victims’ families all asked the judge not to make the sentences concurrent.