Lottery winner

Lottery winner
YOUNGSTOWN -- A city woman has won $500,000 in the Ohio Lottery's instant $35 Million Spectacular game.
Loretta R. Presswood, who filed her claim Tuesday morning in the lottery office here, will get $357,500 after taxes.
Presswood said she plans to travel and buy a new car with her winnings.
She bought her winning ticket at the Mahoning Wine Shoppe, 1681 Mahoning Ave.
6th District candidate
LISBON -- A Boardman man has filed to run in the November general election as a write-in candidate for the 6th District U.S. Congressional seat now held by Democrat Ted Strickland of Lucasville.
John Luchansky, 1976 Wendy Lane, filed write-in documents Tuesday at the Columbiana County elections board.
Strickland handily won the Democratic nomination in the March 2 primary, defeating challenger Diane DiCarlo Murphy. No Republican has entered the race.
The district includes Columbiana County and portions of Mahoning County.
Child-rape charges
YOUNGSTOWN -- Arraignment will be March 30 in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court for Joseph Baker of North Lima, who faces 17 counts of rape and four counts of gross sexual imposition.
A grand jury indicted the 49-year-old East Calla Road man last week. Assistant Prosecutor Dawn Krueger said Baker molested a 7-year-old male relative from September 2002 through January 2004.
Baker could face life in prison if he is convicted.
Fire in Hubbard Township
HUBBARD -- Fire officials are trying to determine the cause of a blaze Tuesday night that destroyed a house at 7548 Mack Drive in the township.
The fire broke out shortly after 10:30 p.m., and those inside the two-story frame structure escaped unharmed.
Assistant Fire Chief John Bulmer said the flames started in the living room. There was no damage estimate.
Guns, suspected cocaine
YOUNGSTOWN -- Police confiscated a Chinese-built carbine rifle with 26 rounds in the magazine, a loaded 9mm semiautomatic handgun and suspected crack cocaine during a raid Wednesday at 315 E. Dewey Ave.
Police arrested the resident, Valar Blair, 25, on charges of drug abuse crack cocaine and illegal possession of a weapon, based on prior convictions.
Guilty in manslaughter
YOUNGSTOWN -- John P. Griffin, 50, has pleaded guilty in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court to one count of voluntary manslaughter. He was accused of killing 51-year-old Matthew Saunders of Elberon Avenue, Salem, during a fight in December 2003.
Griffin faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
Police said Griffin stabbed Saunders on Dec. 17 after the two got into a fight while drinking on South Avenue. Saunders died a day later from the stab wounds.
Saunders was involved in a one-car crash on Interstate 680 near the Belle Vista and Connecticut avenues exit.
While he was being treated at St. Elizabeth Health Center for injuries from the crash, doctors discovered he had been stabbed twice in the abdomen and twice in the back.
Train to spot weather
YOUNGSTOWN -- Mahoning Valley Skywarn, a volunteer organization of weather spotters, will be conducting training on how to recognize approaching storms and tornadoes.
The session will be at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Mahoning County EMA /Haz-Mat Building, 700 Industrial Blvd. (off South Meridian Road). Parking is across the street at the Mahoning County engineers office.
Gary Garnet, a forecaster for the National Weather Service in Cleveland, will conduct the training, which is free and open to the public.