KTRS News
Mo. texting while driving law nabs few violators
Monday, 25 February 2013 08:47 Published in Local NewsCOLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) - A 2009 Missouri law that bans young drivers from using their cell phones to send text messages has led to few citations and remains difficult to enforce, a Columbia newspaper reports.
The Columbia Missourian reports that an average of fewer than four people a month have received texting-while-driving tickets since the law was passed. Court records reviewed by the Missourian show that no one has been punished for violating the law in nearly half the state's 114 counties.
In Boone County, six of the seven people punished for breaking the law were fined $20.50. A seventh violator received the maximum $200 fine after also hitting a utility pole while texting.
Missouri's distracted driving laws are among the nation's most lenient. Ten states ban all hand-held cellphone use.
That major winter storm is threatening to bring blizzard conditions to the north and central portion of Missouri--hitting Kansas City hard and in other parts of the central Plains today.
Kansas City leaders are telling people to move their cars off the street or they'll be towed. This snow plow driver says cars parked haphazardly have made it been difficult to clear the streets. "It's not that we haven't tried or haven't been there. Just a lot of times we get there and we can't get through."
Kansas City - which got a foot of snow last week - could get another 15 inches staring Monday afternoon Jesse Bustamonte was out with a shovel clearing a storm drain in front of his house Sunday. "I had to dig out a friend of mine. Every time he tried to move he was spinning his wheels because of the ice. So it was dig out and move, dig out and move."
The National Weather Service in Dodge City, Kan. says there could be "upward of a foot across south-central Kansas with lesser amounts across west-central and central Kansas." The storm also could bring tornadoes to the South.
BLOOMFIELD, Mo. (AP) - Two Southeast Missouri men are charged with first-degree murder in the death of a man whose body was found in a truck in a fast-food restaurant parking lot.
Stoddard County prosecuting attorney Russ Oliver says 29-year-old Matt Cook and 45-year-old Glen Scott Evans, both of Dexter, were charged Sunday in the death of 34-year-old Sean Crow of Bernie. Crow's body was found in a truck in Advance last Wednesday.
The Southeast Missourian reports the men were also charged with robbery and armed criminal action. They are being held in Stoddard County Jail.
Online court records do not show that either man has a lawyer.
Further details about the crime and cause of death have not been released.
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