AP PA Headlines, Oddities and Scores & Skeds

AP PA Headlines

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Lawyer Gloria Allred says she appreciates a court ruling Friday that lets one of her clients testify against Bill Cosby at his sex assault trial, though she wishes more of the accusers could join her.

The Allred client says Cosby drugged and molested her at a Los Angeles hotel in 1996 when she a 29-year-old assistant to the comedian’s late agent.

Allred says she supported the prosecution effort to have 13 other accusers testify. The judge Friday says he will allow just the one. But Allred says the others still played a key role in the prosecution effort.  The woman allowed to testify has spoken to the press but does not want her name used in public.  She says she took a white pill from Cosby only after he insisted several times.

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP) — Police say a 6-year-old Connecticut girl has been found in Pennsylvania after a high-speed chase and crash involving a car driven by her father, who’s suspected in her mother’s killing.

Pennsylvania state police say Aylin Sofia Hernandez suffered minor injuries in the crash at about 11 a.m. Friday on Interstate 99 in Benner Township.

Her father, Oscar Hernandez, was taken into custody and taken to a hospital for treatment of injuries. Two state troopers suffered minor injuries.  Police issued a public alert about the girl at about 2:45 a.m. Friday. Officers had gone to the girl’s Bridgeport, Connecticut, home and found her mother, Nadia Gonzalez, fatally stabbed. Another person in the home was also stabbed but is expected to survive.  Benner Township is about 300 miles from Bridgeport.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A Democratic candidate’s run for the Pennsylvania Legislature is down the drain — partly because he used too little water at the house he claimed as his residence.  A state judge Thursday threw Frederick Ramirez off the ballot in the race for an open House seat in Philadelphia.  The judge found that low water and electric use at the house Ramirez claimed as his residence showed he really didn’t live in the district.

According to testimony, for 11 months he was billed for a total of about 3,000 gallons of water, or the equivalent of less than two toilet flushes a day on average.  His attorney said the number is misleading because of how bills are calculated.  The decision means the overwhelmingly Democratic district could soon be represented by a Republican, the only candidate still on the ballot.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Pennsylvania State Police says it costs $600 million a year to provide full-time coverage to 2.5 million residents in nearly 1,300 municipalities that don’t pay for a local police force.

State Police Commissioner Tyree Blocker gave the figure at Thursday’s Senate Appropriations Committee hearing. The state police hadn’t divulged a cost figure in response to repeated requests by The Associated Press.

Senators’ questions about the cost came after Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf proposed charging those municipalities an annual $25-per-person fee for the coverage. The proposed fee would raise $63 million, but it’s unclear whether the Republican-controlled Legislature would approve it.  That $600 million is roughly half of the state police’s $1.2 billion budget, most of which is funded by money constitutionally restricted to highway construction, repair and safety.

NEW KENSINGTON, Pa. (AP) — A Ten Commandments monument will be moved from a western Pennsylvania high school to a Catholic grade school due to an atheist’s lawsuit.  The New Kensington-Arnold School District earlier this week agreed to pay $164,000 in legal fees to settle the suit by the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

The monument outside Valley High School must be moved within 30 days. It will be placed in front of Mary Queen of Apostles, a K-8 school, also in New Kensington. That school is housed in a former elementary school that closed in 2014 before the district sold it to the Diocese of Greensburg.  Superintendent John Pallone says the Ten Commandments will remain in the community for those who acknowledge their worth, while those who don’t “can turn the other cheek, as we learn in the Bible.”.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

Oddities

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ellen DeGeneres has handed out college scholarships to the entire senior class of a New York City charter school.  DeGeneres surprised the 41 students from Brooklyn’s Summit Academy this week at her California studio during the taping of Thursday’s episode of her chat show . The four-year scholarships paid for by Wal-Mart will cover tuition for any state university in New York. DeGeneres says the entire gift is worth $1.6 million.  The school’s first graduating class was last year. School officials tell DeGeneres that 93 percent of members of the class are enrolled in college.

UNDATED (AP) — It’s starting to get real when it comes to the running beef between the news media and President Donald Trump. A group of news organizations including the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, CNN and Politico were blocked from joining an informal, on the record White House press briefing today. And after White House press secretary Sean Spicer announced the briefing would be limited, The Associated Press declined to take part. In a statement, the news cooperative says: “The AP believes the public should have as much access to the president as possible.”

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

Scores & Skeds

The Shikellamy District 4/9 wrestling coverage continues on Newsradio 1070 WKOK and WKOK.com today. The matches start at 4pm. Also this weekend, the Phillies resume spring training games Sunday on WKOK at 1pm (CBS Sports will continue on WKOK.com during the Phillies broadcast).

The Shikellamy Braves boy’s basketball team lost to the Lewisburg Green Dragons last night 53-46. That game was on WKOK & WKOK.com. That wraps up the Braves season. Lewisburg plays Danville next week as high school basketball playoffs continue. Thanks to Kevin Herr and the Chief, Dave Ritchie for another exciting hear of Shikellamy basketball.