Category: kmiz-local-news

Jazsmin Halliburton

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Starting Tuesday night, a traffic shift will occur on Eastbound I-70 in Columbia, between Paris Road and Highway 63, as the Missouri Department of Transportation continues the Improve I-70 Project.

MoDOT has completed new lanes in the median between Eastbound and westbound I-70 and will begin reconstructing the existing Eastbound lanes. For the reconstruction to happen, Eastbound traffic will be shifted onto the newly constructed lanes starting Tuesday night. Two Eastbound lanes will be open for motorists to travel on, with speeds reduced to 55 mph.

A large part of this traffic shift will require the Eastbound I-70 ramp to Highway 63 to be closed until the morning of July 12.

Drivers will need to find an alternate route. MoDOT says drivers traveling West of Columbia will be directed to Stadium Blvd. to southbound Highway 63, while all other travelers will be directed to exit at Range Line Street.

This project could be delayed by the weather.

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Matthew Sanders

Flash flooding is big news this week after a massive storm inundated parts of Texas.

The system created flooding that has claimed more than 100 lives. The tragedy has touched Mid-Missouri, with Columbia-based Task Force 1 called up to help with the search operation.

Mid-Missouri is also prone to flooding, with flash floods a common occurrence here. Do you live in a flood-prone area?

Let us know by voting in the poll.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A man was arrested in Sedalia after he allegedly sexually assaulted a woman and pointed a gun at a police officer.

The City of Sedalia shared in a social media post on Monday afternoon that police arrested Sam Newl, 24, on suspicion of first-degree assault, attempted rape with a weapon, first-degree kidnapping, first-degree sexual assault, second-degree sodomy, second-degree assault, armed criminal action and unlawful use of a weapon.

Charges were not filed on Casenet on Monday evening and a mugshot was not immediately available. He was brought to the Pettis County Jail and put on a 24-hour hold, the post says.

The post says a woman flagged down police at 2:20 a.m. Sunday in the 200 block of West Broadway Boulevard. She allegedly told police that she was pinned and sexually assaulted by a man who may have had a knife, the post says. She was able to run away and find police, the post says.

The city wrote that police found Newl in the area, he ran away and a chase occurred. Police found him “behind an obstruction” while he was holding a gun and walked toward an officer, the post says. He eventually put down the gun after officers told him to, the post says.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A Columbia man was charged with two felonies after he allegedly set a backpack on fire and threw it on top of a home on Paris Road last month.

Brandon Butchkoski, 47, was charged on Monday with first-degree arson and drug possession. He is being held at the Boone County Jail without bond and had a hearing on Monday afternoon. Police announced Butchkoski’s arrest on Friday morning.

The probable cause statement says that someone knocked on the victim’s door on June 29 to say their roof was on fire and the victim was able to put it out with a hose. There was a cleaner bottle, drink container and latex gloves filled with gasoline inside the backpack, the statement says.

Butchkoski was found in the area but was initially let go because of a lack of evidence, court documents say.

He was later seen on RING video throwing the backpack on the roof of the house, the statement says.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Missouri Task Force 1 has been activated by FEMA to assist in rescue operations following catastrophic flooding in Texas’ Guadalupe River. The Boone County Fire Protection District announced the deployment Monday afternoon.

At least 95 people have died in the flooding, according to reporting from CNN. The task force will focus on water rescues and human remains detection efforts.

A 52-member team left BCFPD’s Columbia headquarters around 7:30 p.m. Monday and will head to Kerr County, Texas. Missouri Task Force 1 is expected to be on the ground for up to 14 days.

“While the final destination has not yet been confirmed, the team will support search and rescue operations in response to the historic flooding affecting the region,” the release says.

Assistant Fire Chief Gale Blomenkamp said the team is deploying in a Type 3 configuration with additional personnel.

“There’s several different configurations that we can be deployed as,” Blomenkamp said. “A Type 1, a Type 3, a Type 4 or just a mission ready package. So FEMA requested a Type 3 task force, which is 35 people plus 10 for ground support, makes 45 people deploying. However, on this mission we have added four HRT, human remains detection, K-9 and handlers, and one additional search team manager.”

Blomenkamp said this mission includes an enhanced water rescue component due to the scale of the flooding.

“We’re going down with an enhanced water rescue package. And most of the members that are being deployed are either swift-water and/or boat-operator certified,” he said. “So we have that enhanced capability for water rescue anticipating this being a flooding event. That’s going to be some water. There’s going to be some debris and a lot of wide area search going on.”

Blomenkamp also compared the devastation to what the team experienced during flooding in Kentucky in 2022.

“The extent of damage that we’ve seen on TV, the amount of water that went through that area is really kind of unbelievable,” Blomenkamp told ABC 17 News. “It’s a lot of what we saw in Kentucky last year during those floods, just sheer devastation. So we are we’re prepared for that. We’ve seen it before. But those families down there, they need some closure.”

Preparation for the deployment was fast and detailed. Blomenkamp said the team had just four hours to mobilize after receiving the call. The team packed approximately 100,000 pounds of equipment for the mission.

Missouri Task Force 1 will be joined by Colorado Task Force 1 on Tuesday as recovery efforts continue.

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Matthew Sanders

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KMIZ)

Missouri’s attorney general said Monday that he is appealing a Jackson County judge’s injunction, issued last week, that allowed abortion to proceed in the state.

Attorney General Andrew Bailey said in a news release that his office has filed an appeal of the injunction issued last week. Judge Jerri Zhang issued the ruling on Thursday. The Missouri Supreme Court had blocked one of Zhang’s similar rulings in May and told her to reconsider under a different legal standard.

Planned Parenthood clinics in Kansas City had said they would resume services Monday after last week’s ruling.

The lawsuit centers on state regulations that abortion choice advocates say make abortion de facto illegal. Planned Parenthood argued those regulations were at odds with Amendment 3, which was approved by voters in November and enshrined a right to abortion in the state constitution.

The injunction stops enforcement of those regulations while the lawsuit proceeds.

Bailey and other abortion opponents say the regulations are needed to protect women’s health.

Bailey claimed in a news release that the Jackson County injunction means the state can’t enforce laws against coerced abortion, require sterile equipment and clean facilities or require emergency complication plans. The injunction also means abortion providers can refuse to let pregnant women see an ultrasound of the fetus, Bailey claims.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

An “interested parties” meeting has been scheduled to discuss adding a sidewalk in a portion of West Broadway, according to a Monday press release from the city.

The meeting is scheduled for 5:30-6:30 p.m. Monday, July 14 at the Activity and Recreational Center at 1701 W. Ash St.

Organizers will discuss a concept for a sidewalk to be placed on the south side of West Broadway between Maplewood Drive and West Boulevard, the release says. The project is expected to include a 5-foot-wide sidewalk with a 3-foot-wide grass parkway and will include reconstructing driveway approaches, the release says.

west_broadway_sidewalk_preliminary_planDownload

If the project is approved, construction would start in the spring of 2027, the release says.

The public can leave comments on the project’s BeHeard site.

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Matthew Sanders

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A tractor-trailer lost control and folded in on itself on Interstate 70 near Kingdom City on Monday.

The truck and trailer have the Hogan logo on them. The crash happened Monday afternoon and ended with the trailer blocking both eastbound lanes, a photograph shows. It’s not clear how the crash started.

Both lanes remained closed and it was unclear how long it would take to open them, according to the Missouri Department of Transportation’s online traveler map. A 68 mph wind gust was recorded nearby in Auxvasse around the time of the crash.

Traffic appeared to be backed up for miles.

A Missouri State Highway Patrol spokesman wrote in an email that there were no injuries.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

A Vandalia, Missouri, man was charged with four felonies after he was accused of molesting two children younger than 14 years old.

Dylan Preston was charged with two counts of first-degree child molestation and two counts of statutory sodomy of a child younger than 14 years old. A warrant was served on Monday and a confined docket hearing was scheduled for 10 a.m. Tuesday.

A deputy wrote in the probable cause statement that law enforcement was called to a Vandalia residence on Sunday after someone reported Preston allegedly had been sexually assaulting two child victims for “several months.”

The victims described multiple assaults, according to the statement. Someone described as a witness allegedly wrote in a statement to law enforcement that Preston eventually admitted to doing the assaults after initially denying it.

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Ryan Shiner

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Fewer people were killed on Missouri roads during the Fourth of July weekend this year compared to last year, according to data provided by the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

Statistic provided by MSHP counted from a period of 6 p.m. Thursday, July 3-11:59 p.m. Sunday, July 6. This year, there were eight fatalities, 246 crashes with 115 injuries and 114 people arrested for driving while intoxicated.

A press release says that in the 2024 counting period, 14 people were killed and 560 were injured in 1,366 crashes, while 149 people were arrested for driving while intoxicated. Statistics for 2025 could change if deaths are reported late, according to the release.

On the water, there were nine boat crashes this year that led to four people being injured and 13 people arrested for boating while intoxicated. Last year, there were 10 boat crashes that led to seven people being injured, while 12 people were arrested for boating while intoxicated, the release says.

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