Kentucky News Now

TEEN ASSAULTED

Police: Ky. teen sodomized in recorded assault

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Authorities say a group of young men and teenagers sodomized a 15-year-old boy, critically injuring him in an attack that was recorded on video and shared among cellphones.

Christian County sheriff's Capt. Chris Miller said Thursday that the assault occurred at a home in Hopkinsville in western Kentucky. Authorities say three men and two juveniles have been taken into custody.

The victim was in intensive care Thursday at a hospital. Miller says the boy's condition has improved since the attack early Sunday left him with life-threatening injuries.

Police have not released a possible motive or many details about what happened. Miller says four people are accused of sodomy and another person had a video of the attack. The victim knew his attackers, and all are from the Hopkinsville area.

CORVETTE MUSEUM-SINKHOLE

Corvette Museum sinkhole repair starts next month

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. (AP) — The National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green says work will start in about three weeks to fill a massive sinkhole that opened up in February and allowed eight prized sports cars to topple inside.

The project's schedule calls for completion by July.

The museum says six of the eight cars that fell into the hole last February are on display in the museum's Skydome. The museum will move as many as possible into other public viewing areas after Nov. 9 until the Skydome reopens next summer.

Video of the hole became an Internet hit, with cars toppling like toys. Museum officials considered keeping part of the hole open and putting a crumpled sports car back inside but said that idea lost favor because of safety feature and maintenance costs.

JOBLESS RATE

Kentucky jobless rate falls to 6.7 percent

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky officials say the state's unemployment rate in September dropped to its lowest rate in more than six years.

The Kentucky Office of Employment and Training said Thursday the seasonally adjusted jobless rate fell to 6.7 percent last month, down from 7.1 percent in August. It's the lowest statewide jobless rate since July 2008, when the rate was 6.6 percent.

Officials say last month's decline was the biggest one-month drop in unemployment rates since 1976.

The preliminary rate for September was 1.6 percentage points below the 8.3 percent jobless rate in September 2013.

Officials say job gains occurred in a number of sectors last month, including leisure and hospitality, educational and health services, professional and business services and construction. They say employment in the government and mining sectors remained flat.

PRISON SLAYING-APPEAL

Appeals court upholds conviction in inmate slaying

INEZ, Ky. (AP) — A federal appeals court has upheld the conviction of a federal inmate in the death of a fellow prisoner at a prison in eastern Kentucky.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday concluded there was no basis for overturning 37-year-old Dwaune "Deuce" Gravely's conviction. Gravely and 31-year-old Darryl "Beast" Milburne were sentenced to life in prison for the Nov. 12, 2006, assault and slaying of fellow inmate Shamoni Peterson at USP Big Sandy in Inez.

Prosecutors say the two men beat and choked Peterson to death and covered his nose and mouth until he quit breathing.

Both were transferred to ADX Florence, the supermax prison in Colorado, which holds the most dangerous inmates in the federal prison system.

Milburne's case is not part of the appeal.

COURT RECORDS CLEANED

Jefferson Co. deletes sensitive info from records

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Jefferson County has erased Social Security numbers from some public records in an effort to protect against identity theft.

For years, hundreds of thousands of Social Security numbers in the state's largest county have been available for public viewing on some land records.

WDRB-TV reports that up until Wednesday, anyone using a simple web search could type in a name or address and find that person's Social Security number.

The county clerk's office says mortgages, tax liens and deeds are all published online, and up until this week, many had Social Security numbers attached.

The county spent about $400,000 to address the issue.

Officials believe they have erased 300,000 Social Security numbers from documents since the project started in 2010.

KENTUCKY EXECUTIONS-WILSON

Kentucky high court hears condemned inmate's case

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — A skeptical group of justices from the Kentucky Supreme Court is weighing whether DNA testing results would impact the death sentence of a man convicted of kidnapping, raping and killing a woman from northern Kentucky 27 years ago.

Justices quizzed the attorney for 57-year-old Gregory L. Wilson on Thursday about what, if any, effect DNA testing on evidence would have on the conviction.

Wilson was convicted on Oct. 31, 1988, of kidnapping and killing Deborah "Debbie" Pooley of Kenton County 19 months earlier. Biological samples recovered from Pooley's car have not been tested before.

Prosecutors say Wilson raped and later strangled Pooley while an accomplice drove. Her body was found in Indiana two weeks later.

Kentucky is under a judge's order halting all executions in the state.

TODDLER DEATH

Man sentenced in death of toddler seeks parole

(Information in the following story is from: The Paducah Sun, http://www.paducahsun.com)

PADUCAH, Ky. (AP) — A western Kentucky man sentenced in 2012 to 10 years in prison in the death of a toddler has a parole hearing.

The Paducah Sun reports Ronald Saunders II will go before the parole board on Oct. 28 in the death of 2-year-old Conner Bachuss.

Prosecutors say they believe Saunders suffocated the child, who died in 2010 five days after being taken to the hospital. Officials say he suffered puncture wounds and severe brain damage before his death.

After a jury deadlocked on a murder charge, Saunders entered an Alford plea to manslaughter, which means he did not admit guilt but believed there was enough evidence for conviction.

The boy's mother, Mashanna Bachuss, said she has collected about 5,000 signatures so far to oppose parole.