A defendant accused of viciously attacking a homeless man in downtown Lawrence has been ordered to stand trial, although plea negotiations are underway.
The 49-year-old man testified that the defendant, Shaun Donovan Bernie, 33, attacked him from behind last fall, causing significant injuries to his head and disfiguring his hand.
The man testified that Bernie, who was also homeless at the time, would regularly ...
A Douglas County judge will soon decide whether to order a man to stand trial for child abuse after a store's video camera captured him striking a young boy repeatedly with a belt.
The state at Tuesday's preliminary hearing for the man portrayed the incident as a violent felony, while the man's appointed attorney sought to characterize it as parental discipline of a child with extremely difficult behavioral ...
A Minnesota man who was shot and killed earlier this month by a City of Lawrence employee suffered from schizophrenia and was traveling to see his grandmother in Mexico at the time of his death, according to his family, who are calling his death a heartbreaking tragedy and urging a greater understanding of people suffering from mental illness.
Omar Dominguez Gavilan, of Buffalo, Minnesota, died Jan. 5 after he ...
Attorneys with the Douglas County Public Defender’s Office are seeking a new trial for a man who was convicted of rape last fall. In their supporting motion, they are asking a judge to find that some of Kansas’ rape and sodomy statutes are unconstitutional because they allow for conviction without proof of criminal intent and also fail to define “consent.”
The case involves 33-year-old defendant Miquel ...
A drug dealer's attorney told a judge Friday that his client was "very happy" with the plea deal she had made with the Douglas County District Attorney's Office — a deal that reduced one count of distribution of heroin causing death to two much lower-level offenses of unlawful distribution of less than one gram of heroin.
"It started as a level one and is now two level 4s," the attorney, Hatem Chahine, told ...
A judge had little to say to a violent sex offender Friday after she sentenced him to nearly a quarter of a century in prison for abusing a Lawrence girl.
"I acknowledge that you have taken responsibility via a plea (deal)," Judge Amy Hanley told Kyle Elder, 36, of New York. "That is the only thing I can say here, looking at you.”
Hanley had just heard the victim's mother talk about how traumatic the ...
