PLOVER, Wis. (AP) - Authorities are investigating a shooting at the home of a Portage County Sheriff’s Office employee.
Wisconsin Department of Justice spokeswoman Dana Brueck tells Stevens Point Journal Media (https://spjour.nl/1gToMrWhttps://spjour.nl/1gToMrW ) the state Division of Criminal Investigation responded to the scene of the shooting in the village of Plover. She says more information will be released later.
The incident was reported just after 1 a.m. Saturday. Units from the Plover Police Department, Wisconsin State Patrol and Portage County Coroner’s Office went to the scene in central Wisconsin, and roads around the home were blocked off.
The Plover Police Department confirms that the DCI has taken over the investigation.
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Information from: Stevens Point Journal Media, https://www.stevenspointjournal.comhttps://www.stevenspointjournal.com
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MILWAUKEE (AP) - The University of Wisconsin ranks among the top 10 U.S. medical schools in producing graduates who go into family practice, an encouraging trend that could help stem an expected shortfall of doctors, especially in rural areas.
Over the past three years, one in six UW medical school graduates - or 16.5 percent - entered family practice, good for a ninth-place ranking overall, the American Academy of Family Physicians said this week. The University of North Dakota was first with 23.3 percent.
UW’s ranking suggests that efforts to expand the state’s pipeline for family-practice doctors are working, especially for those willing to practice in traditionally underserved rural areas. But it’s not always easy to convince students to do either. Last year, medical school students graduated with an average of $170,000 in debt, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges, leading many to specialize or move to higher-paying urban areas to get out of debt faster.
Federal and state programs, in conjunction with medical schools, are aiming to reverse the trend through solutions that include encouraging medical students to study family practice and giving graduates the opportunity to do their residencies - three to seven extra years after graduating - in rural areas. Statistics show that more than half of graduates who work outside of an urban setting stay rooted in the rural.
UW began receiving state funds in 2008 to create a program specifically for students who want to work in smaller, rural communities. Students spend two of their four academic years in rural areas, where they get hands-on clinical experience in a region they’re likely to end up serving.
“We have 26 students matriculating this fall,” said Byron Crouse, the director of the Wisconsin Academy for Rural Medicine. “I think it’d be good to see that number rise to 30 or 32, if we can find additional funding.”
Wisconsin’s longest-running rural family practice residency program is through St. Clare Hospital in Baraboo. The program began in 1996, well before the warnings of an impending doctor shortage started in 2004.
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MILWAUKEE (AP) - Four congressmen are demanding answers from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives about whether anyone has been held accountable for a botched, undercover guns and drugs operation in Milwaukee.
The congressmen, including Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, wrote Friday to ATF director B. Todd Jones asking why a supervisor in charge of the Milwaukee operation was not disciplined, but instead got a plum assignment, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Saturday (https://bit.ly/TeUdIhhttps://bit.ly/TeUdIh ). Bernard Zapor had been in charge of the ATF’s St. Paul, Minnesota, field division, which included the Milwaukee office. Jones later put Zapor in charge of the Phoenix Field Division.
The storefront sting was called Operation Fearless. A Journal Sentinel investigation in January 2013 found that an agent’s guns were stolen during the operation, including a machine gun that remains missing. Agents used a mentally disabled man to promote the operation and then arrested him. Four of the wrong people were arrested, felons were allowed to leave the store armed, and the operation was burglarized.
Jones and Zapor had worked together in Minnesota, where Jones did double duty as the U.S. attorney while serving as interim ATF director from 2011 until the Senate confirmed Jones to lead the federal agency last summer.
Zapor was put in charge late last summer of the Phoenix Field Division, which ran “Operation Fast and Furious,” during which thousands of assault rifles passed into the hands of criminals. Some ended up at murder scenes, including one where a U.S. border guard was killed.
“We were dismayed to hear that he was being reassigned to … arguably the ATF’s most important field division given the high volume of weapons trafficking there as well as its geographic proximity to Mexican drug cartel activity,” the letter said.
Zapor has roots in Arizona. He started his career as an agent in Phoenix in the late 1980s and has family in the area, the letter said.
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MADISON, Wis. (AP) - A Chicago-area man is charged with possessing child pornography after police found questionable photos on a phone he left behind in a Madison hotel room.
According to the complaint, 50-year-old Cesar G. Munive, of North Riverside, Ill., told police he downloaded images from the Internet onto a phone that was found last September by a hotel maid after he checked out.
The Wisconsin State Journal reports (https://bit.ly/1lwYyxXhttps://bit.ly/1lwYyxX ) police first found pictures of girls between 7 and 12, in underwear or swimsuits, in suggestive poses. A detective later turned up nude photos of girls as young as 3. A detective concluded the phone was used almost solely for browsing pornographic websites.
Possession of child pornography carries a mandatory minimum of three years in Wisconsin.
Online court records don’t list an attorney.
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Information from: Wisconsin State Journal, https://www.madison.com/wsjhttps://www.madison.com/wsj
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