News: Folks Acting (Very) Badly

Plea Deal Reached In Heather Ellis Case

A woman who faced up to 15 years in jail for an altercation which began after she cut the line at a Missouri Walmart has pled guilty to misdemeanor charges (hat tip: Character Corner). Heather Ellis went on trial for two felony charges of assault on November 18 in Kennett, Mo. But just a few hours after the case went to the jury on November 20, Ellis accepted a plea deal. The deal dropped the two felony charges of assault against police officers in exchange for Ellis pleading guilty to two misdemeanor charges, disturbing the peace and resisting arrest.

As part of her plea, Ellis will spend four days in jail before the end of the year, be under unsupervised probation for a year, and have to attend two hours of anger management class. She is also required to pay the costs of her prosecution in the case. If she complies with the terms of the deal, the incident will be sealed and her record expunged. The deal is similar to one which Ellis was offered by prosecutors shortly after her arrest, a deal that she refused several times. Ellis said it had been worth it to go to trial, saying, “I still think it's important my story got out.”

Computer Scam Hits Black Churches

Dozens of black churches in California have allegedly fallen victim to a scam involving computer kiosks. The scheme cost the churches hundreds of thousands of dollars. Up to 30 churches in California may have fallen victim to the computer kiosk scam. The churches thought they were providing a free service to parishioners, but instead got stuck for thousands of dollars in lease fees. The investigation targets four individuals and three national leasing companies. They are believed to be part of a nationwide scam involving churches in at least 10 states. “Mine never worked. I didn’t even have the loop, didn’t have any advertisements, I didn’t have anything,” said Reverend Gayle Davis-Culp. Like other ministers, Rev. Davis-Culp got stuck with the lease costs of as high as $45,000 when the companies skipped town.

8-Year-Old Rape Victim’s Parents Charged With Child Abuse

Regular Booker Rising readers surely remember this case, which created an international outcry after the girl's father blamed her for the rape and disowned her. Well, the parents of an 8-year-old Liberian-born girl who was allegedly sexually assaulted by four boys in Arizona in July were arrested Friday on child abuse charges. The father, 59, and mother, 47, were arrested in Phoenix on seven counts of child abuse, said police spokesman Sgt. Andy Hill. The names of the parents have been withheld to avoid identifying the underage daughter. The child abuse investigation was based on documented incidents from the Phoenix Police Department and numerous referrals to Arizona Child Protective Services dating to 2005.