Local News
UPDATE: Man faces Sept. sentencing for having sex with lamb
SANDY LAKE TOWNSHIP — A Sandy Lake Township man said he doesn’t remember the details of a drunken night that ended with him facing charges of trespassing and sex with a barnyard animal.
James Alan Stiver, 46, of 11 Booher Road, took an Alford plea for felony trespassing and sexual intercourse with an animal — a misdemeanor — on Monday before Common Pleas Judge Christopher J. St. John. He had charges of animal cruelty dropped.
An Alford plea works like a guilty plea in Pennsylvania for sentencing purposes but does not require the defendant to admit the details of their crime. Stiver said he doesn’t remember what happened.
“I awakened to someone shining a flash light on me and I was told to leave,” Stiver said. “I was walking down the road when I was picked up by (Sandy Lake police) Chief Oakes, and was taken back to the location.”
Stiver was awakened by the barn’s owner, a woman who had slipped a baby monitor into the barn because she thought someone might be staying there. She heard the lamb making noise at about 9 or 10 p.m. Jan. 11 and found Stiver and the animal, police said.
Stiver was covered in blood, some from his own hands, which had lacerations, and some on the front of his pants, underwear, and genitals. Police found him with his pants undone, they said.
Assistant District Attorney Keith Bell said a Greenville Veterinary Clinic expert examined the lamb and said it had been penetrated, but no blood tests were done to match the blood on the sheep and the blood on Stiver.
The lamb had to be euthanized due to its injuries.
Stiver said he came upon the barn while wandering home from a Stoneboro bar after polishing off most of a 30-pack of beer. He said he does not remember what led him to the barn. It is between his home and the bar he was drinking at, and he said he grew up in the area.
Stiver is scheduled to be sentenced on Sept. 11.
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Commissioners formally move to raise sewer fees
Hermitage commissioners introduced an ordinance Wednesday to increase sanitary user fees.
Residents tapped into the Hermitage Municipal Authority lines now pay $95 a quarter. That rate will bump up to $105 a quarter on Jan. 1, under the proposed rate hike.
Two more hikes on Jan. 1, 2012, and Jan. 1, 2013, will result in the rates increasing 50 percent from the current fee. -
Water is on at Forrest Brooke
Water service has been restored at Forrest Brooke Manufactured Home Community after well problems left the 165-unit complex dry Tuesday.
A boil and conserve water advisory has been issued by the DEP and will remain in place until tests confirm the water is safe to drink, Forrest Brooke’s manager Pete Havens said.
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Storm damages trees, wires
Thunderstorms ripped through parts of Mercer and neighboring counties Wednesday night, downing trees and wires and keeping rescue workers on their toes.
A Mercer County 911 dispatcher shortly after 8 p.m. said they were busy with calls across the northern part of the county. He said there had been a few reports of trees falling on homes.
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City leaders open to talks
Sharon officials aren’t opposed to sitting down with their counterparts in Farrell to revisit the idea of combining the two struggling cities.
“It never costs a penny to talk and there’s no (idea) that’s not worth looking at,” Sharon councilman Ed Palanski said. “I think it would be foolish to oppose looking at the idea.”
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Murphy’s Law doesn’t faze regional planners
A complicated, two-day public meeting blitz in 32 counties ran headlong into Murphy’s Law in Mercer County on Tuesday.
The group Power of 32 are looking to re-write the regional map and create a grand, 15-year strategic economic plan for the 32 counties in four states that make up the Ohio River basin and greater Pittsburgh area.
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Forrest Brooke copes with water outage
Residents of Forrest Brooke Mobile Home Community in Jefferson and Lackawannock Townships woke up Tuesday morning to find they didn’t have any water.
Managers of the park could not be reached for comment, but residents said they were told they won’t get water service back for at least another month.
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City facing bleak financial reality
LaVon Saternow has been Farrell’s city manager since 1992. Shortly after she took the job, Sharon Steel, the city’s economic engine, officially closed down.
Since, the city has struggled to remain solvent and Mrs. Saternow said it is facing its worst financial crisis in her tenure.
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Near-complete addition to let man come home
Although the weather delayed the start of Penny and Paul Strechansky’s construction project by about three weeks, the end of the sawing, hammering and stapling is in sight.
“It should be done by the middle of next week,” Strechansky said of the 15-by-20 foot addition being built onto the back of his garage in Hermitage, which will be the new home of his grandson, David Johnson.
Johnson was critically injured in a car crash June 19, 2009, on what is now Interstate 376 in Lawrence County. The crash rendered Johnson, who just turned 21, blind and brain damaged. He is unable to care for himself.
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Man prison-bound for role in drug buy shooting
It may never be known for certain who fired the two fatal shots that killed a Sharon teen on Nov. 6 on Wallis Avenue during a botched drug deal, prosecutors have said.
But Christopher Swogger, 24, Sharon, was fingered by at least one other suspect as the one whose bullets killed John B. Hosey III, 18, of 422 Meek St. Swogger was sentenced Monday.
Swogger was sent to prison for 1 1/2 to 3 years for having a firearm without a license, ending his role in the criminal prosecutions of the drug deal turned shooting.
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Farrell, Sharon to revisit merger
Times are tough.
In Farrell Monday night, city council heard a grim financial report from City Manager LaVon Saternow.
“It’s not a pretty picture,” Mrs. Saternow said. “We could conceivably run out of cash by the end of the year. I don’t know how to put it more bluntly.”
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Commissioners formally move to raise sewer fees
