KTBB News, Weather, Talk

TYLER — The official kickoff of the 2011 Texas Rose Festival was held Friday night at Willow Brook Country Club. “The Grand Illusion,” the theme of the 78th annual festival, is inspired by the works of artist Maxfield Parrish. 2011 Rose Festival Queen Morgan Elizabeth Rippy, Festival Duchess Virginia Winston Anderson, and Festival President Thomas Boyd Ramey III addressed media and others during a brief news conference. Ramey stressed the importance of the numerous volunteers who work with paid staff to put the festival together. He also reminded attendees of “Investing in Our Legacy of Roses.” That’s a campaign announced this past spring, designed to provide proceeds from the Texas Rose Festival Association back to the City of Tyler to enhance the Tyler Rose Garden.

Festival events are scheduled for October 13-15. Advance tickets for the Ladies’ and Men’s Luncheons, Parade, and Coronation will go on sale September 1. According to organizers, “This fall’s annual parade is shaping up to be like none other and will feature more floats, bands, and special guests than in previous years.” You can go to http://www.texasrosefestival.com/festival/index.htm to get a parade application and more information about the festival.

TYLER — Police in Tyler are continuing to seek leads in a weekend convenience store robbery. On Friday night shortly before 11:30, officers responded to the Exxon Speed Track at 2615 E. Commerce, where the incident had just occurred. The clerk told officers that a black male wearing a stocking over his head entered the store and pointed a handgun at him while demanding money. The suspect then left the store with an undisclosed amount of cash. The suspect is described as a black male, 23 to 28 years of age, 5’ 06” to 5’ 8”, 180 to 220 pounds wearing a black shirt and dark colored pants. Anyone with information is urged to contact the Tyler Police Department at 903-531-1000 or Smith County Crime Stoppers at 903-597-2833.

TYLER — One of Tyler’s largest employers is offering more details after announcing big job cuts. They happen every year, but these may be different. Trane is laying off workers, over 500 of them. It’s a pattern they’ve come to expect, but they didn’t expect what came next. “This action eliminates 528 positions,” Patrick O’Connell of parent company Ingersoll Rand said Friday. “The workers were notified on July 8th, and their last day with the company is today, July 15th.”

Trane typically has around 1600 employees, but that number can be a bit flexible. If you are an hourly, union worker at Trane, you’re used to the pattern. You are laid off toward the end of the summer when demand for air conditioning slacks off, and then rehired early the next year as it picks up again. This time it’s different for two reasons: it’s not the end of the summer — and this time the layoff includes salaried workers. O’Connell says it’s normal. “I don’t know the exact time frames, but I would say that this is about when we usually announce them,” he told our news partner KETK.

Tom Mullins of the Tyler Economic Development Council says that no matter what the company says, this is early. “Typically we don’t lose them until 30 or 45 days from now,” Mullins says. “You know, August-September.” And the white collar layoffs are troubling. “Losing the management jobs is a surprise — 40-45 jobs that are not going to return,” Mullins says. O’Connell would not give an exact figure. “We’re not disclosing the number of those salaried positions eliminated,” he told us. “It was not a material number.” Mullins replied, “That’s hard for those individuals and those families. “In this economy, they’re not going to be able to walk down the street and find something else.”

LONGVIEW — Leah Danielle Bryson, 24, of Longview remained jailed Friday on $10,000 bond, charged with felony theft and drug possession. That’s according to KETK and the Longview News-Journal. A Texas Department of Public Safety trooper arrested Bryson shortly after 12:15 p.m. Thursday.

According to court records, Trooper Brant Smith was traveling west on Marshall Avenue behind a silver Toyota passenger car that was approaching Eastman Road. The trooper checked the license plate and found the vehicle was listed as stolen out of Dallas. Smith initiated a stop, made contact with the driver, Bryson, and took her into custody. Bryson was the vehicle’s only occupant. During a search, Smith located a syringe loaded with methamphetamine on the passenger side of the vehicle, records showed. Bryson admitted to possession of the syringe and the stolen car, records showed.

QUITMAN — Wood County authorities say an arrest has been made following a high-speed chase. According to KETK, deputies responded to a disturbance on CR 3876 in the Hainesville area Friday at approximately 2:00 a.m. While deputies were taking an assault report from the victims, the officers reported that shots had been fired in their direction. The officers say they gave chase after a man in a vehicle that fled the area at a high rate of speed. According to the sheriff’s department, the man fled the vehicle on foot, other officers were called — and at approximately 6:07 a.m., the man was taken into custody without further incident. 31-year-old David Clifton was booked into the Wood County Jail for assault. The sheriff’s office is looking into possible other charges that may be filed.

TYLER — Get the charcoal and brisket ready to grill out this weekend! KETK reports that the Smith County burn ban has been amended. Officials are now allowing wood or charcoal to be used, as long as the flame is contained and the grill is being watched. The ban is still in place for fireworks and other types of burning. You can use this link — http://www.smith-county.com/NewCountyIntranet/NewsEventsImages/Amended%20Burn%20Ban%20Order%20071511.pdf — to read the full amended official burn ban order.

JACKSONVILLE — One person has died in a Jacksonville accident that tied up traffic for a time Friday morning. According to KETK, 28-year-old Stephen Mathew Duecker of Flint reportedly crossed over Highway 79, hitting a tanker truck. Duecker was killed; the tanker driver suffered only minor injures. Authorities say the wreck happened just after 3:45 a.m.

TYLER — Police in Tyler say an alert resident helped them round up some burglary suspects. On Friday at 12:17 p.m. the Tyler Police Department was notified by a concerned neighbor who observed several males running from her neighbor’s carport in the 700 block of Hudson Street with assorted lawn equipment in their hands. The witness gave a detailed description of the suspect vehicle as it left the area. Officer Larry Christian spotted the suspect vehicle minutes later in the parking lot of K’s Food Mart at Vine and Glenwood. Officers say they located the stolen lawn equipment in the trunk of the vehicle and placed two suspects under arrest for Burglary of a Habitation.

The suspects arrested were identified as Ronald Joseph Williams and Demarkus Dewayne Osborn, both 21. Both suspects were transported to the Smith County Jail and booked in on a 2nd degree Felony. According to police, the suspect vehicle has been described by witnesses in similar types of thefts of lawn equipment in South Tyler recently, and investigators will be interviewing the suspects. A police department news release says, “This is a fine example of Community Policing in which neighbors were watching out for one another and reported information that allowed police to catch the criminals with the stolen property.”

TYLER — Some might call the phrase controversial, but Smith County commissioners could be the first to have the nation’s motto hanging in their courtroom. According to KETK, commissioners approved displaying the phrase “In God We Trust” in the room in the courthouse annex. East Texan Rosalie Howerton heard about a national campaign to that effect on conservative talk radio and decided to start the campaign in Smith County. Howerton hopes to get the saying in government buildings around East Texas, including Lindale, Whitehouse, and Troup as well.

MANGUM, Okla. (AP/Staff) – An FBI agent says a convicted killer who escaped an Oklahoma prison — allegedly with the help of the wife of the prison’s deputy warden — told him that she did not assist his escape. Agent Terry Lane testified Friday in the trial of Bobbi Parker on a charge that she helped Randolph Dial escape the Oklahoma State Reformatory in Granite in 1994. Parker’s husband was the prison’s deputy warden. Dial and Parker were found living at a chicken farm in Campti, Texas — in Shelby County — in April 2005. He said Parker had to be repeatedly reassured that Dial would not escape and that Dial said Parker had been his hostage. Defense attorneys say Parker was kidnapped and stayed with Dial after he threatened to harm her family if she left him.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01) sounds off regarding the announcement by the United States Postal Service (USPS) of plans to close the Easton Post Office. In a statement released Friday, Gohmert said, “In another example of mid to upper-level mismanagement of the Postal Service, it has been announced that the Easton Post Office will be closing. As I have acknowledged, the USPS is obviously experiencing serious financial shortfalls. However, to close a location that facilitates the constitutionally permitted task of delivering mail ahead of cutting bureaucratic expenditures is the very backwards-thinking mismanagement that has led the USPS to its current status.

“The closure of the Easton Post Office is inappropriate and unnecessary, and I am making that known to both the regional and national mismanagers. In addition to the inconvenience this will be on our community, especially seniors and disabled, the City of Easton may experience financial backlash given that having a postal station available locally is a vital aspect to the success of businesses and individuals.

“As the USPS attempts to attain solvency, USPS officials must learn to cut bureaucratic costs first before cutting the local facilities where postal consumers are so faithful and the delivery of mail is actually advanced. Far too often, hard-working postal workers must do their jobs under unnecessarily adverse circumstances created by the atrociously ill-advised decisions by higher level Postal management. The people of East Texas deserve better – so does the rest of the country.”

LONGVIEW — Longview police have arrested a third suspect in connection with the May robbery of a couple in a local park. Marqunis O’Neal Howard, 20, of Longview, was among three people who police say beat, pistol-whipped, and robbed a man and woman who were at Willow Park on May 5. KETK and the Longview News-Journal report that Howard was arrested Tuesday in the 300 block of West Cotton Street. He remained jailed at last report on $75,000 bond, charged with aggravated robbery. Also arrested in the case were 17-year-old Eunice Zavalla and 18-year-old Erica Pena, both charged with aggravated robbery. They have been released from jail on $50,000 bond.

According to court documents, Michael and Karen Gonzalez were sitting outside their car at Willow Park in the 300 block of East Birdsong Street when two women got out of a Chevy Impala and attacked Karen Gonzalez. When Michael Gonzalez tried to separate the women, a man at the park attacked him and hit him several times, reports show.

HENDERSON — One of Rusk County Crime Stoppers’ most-wanted fugitives surrendered Wednesday night after a resident reported knowing where she lived, officials said. Rusk County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Viki Penny said 33-year-old Amanda Gayle Jimerson of Hallsville turned herself in about 9 p.m. after authorities went to her home to arrest her on charges of tampering with physical evidence. According to KETK, Penny said deputies were tipped off to her whereabouts and had police check her home in the 500 block of Coleman Road in Hallsville. She said Jimerson didn’t answer the door when deputies arrived. Jimerson later turned herself in to Rusk County authorities and was released on $20,000 within an hour of being booked into the jail, Penny said.

BULLARD — Fire destroys a large workshop near Bullard, off Cherokee County Road 3408. Almost six acres were scorched by flames. Bullard’s fire chief tells KETK no one was inside at the time of the fire. A witness says he was working in the shop earlier and left for awhile — and when he came back it was in flames. He says the fire spread quickly to a nearby wooded area. No word on the cause of that fire.

SMITH COUNTY — Investigators are trying to figure out what caused a northwestern Smith County mobile home to go up in flames. It happened on the 9000 block of County Road 411. Officials tell KETK the home is a loss, but fortunately, no one was inside the home at the time of the fire.