Kansas City, Mo.

Food distributor admits offering tainted meats

The owner of a now-closed food processing and distribution company pleaded guilty Monday to trying to sell thousands of pounds of meat that had been contaminated by rodents.

Lihn Vi Lam, 47, owner of Big Bird Poultry, waived her right to a federal indictment and pleaded guilty to a charge of offering adulterated food for sale.

Big Bird Poultry sold cuts of chicken and other meat to restaurants and hotels in the Kansas City area.

U.S. Atty. Todd Graves said Lam admitted storing 6,935 pounds of beef, pork and lamb in such unsanitary conditions that it became infested. She said a plant manager would sweep away evidence before routine visits by agricultural inspectors.

Officials discovered the contamination in April 2001 and ordered the meat and 22,780 pounds of chicken destroyed.

Lam faces up to three years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Boscawen, N.H.

Fugitive from Kansas arrested after 9 years

A man wanted for more than nine years in Kansas on drug-related charges has been arrested in Boscawen, the U.S. Marshals Service said.

Federal officials say Kevin Mclaughlin, of Franklin, 44, failed to appear at a sentencing in Kansas in 1995. They say he had pleaded guilty to charges involving the manufacturing and distribution of methamphetamine.

He was arrested Thursday. He is expected to be returned to Kansas for sentencing.

Kansas City, Mo.

Romantic defrauder sentenced to five years

A man who admitted romancing 22 women in a scheme to steal money from banks was sentenced Monday to five years in federal prison without parole.

Ryan S. Blevins, 29, of suburban Raytown, pleaded guilty in December to wire fraud and bank fraud. In addition to the prison time, U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan Jr. ordered him to make restitution totaling $90,680.

U.S. Atty. Sam Graves said Blevins used the personal relationships he developed to either steal checks, pass forged checks or receive wire transfers of stolen money.

Graves said Blevins told the women he needed to deposit a check but did not have an account. He said Blevins claimed the checks were paychecks, payments from selling cars, or money from friends or family members, but that they were actually either stolen, forged or insufficiently funded.

Blevins got the women to deposit the checks into their own bank accounts, then asked them to give him cash, wire him money or write a check, Graves said.

Benedictine College looking for new leader

Atchison — A former president of Donnelly College in Kansas City, Kan., has been named interim president of Benedictine College.

John P. Murry will take over the position July 1. He will replace Daniel J. Carey, who announced last week he would become president of Edgewood College in Madison, Wis. Carey had been at Benedictine for nine years.

Murry retired from Donnelly College in 1997.

The Benedictine College board of directors will form a search committee to find a permanent president.

The Catholic liberal arts college has about 1,000 students.