LOCAL DIGEST

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Case bound over for woman accused of assault

WARREN — A 19-year-old city woman waived a preliminary hearing and had her case bound over to a Trumbull County grand jury on allegations of hitting a teenage girl in the head with a baseball bat and hitting another girl with her car.

Judge Terry Ivanchak of Warren Municipal Court reduced bond for Demetria Anderson, of Parkman Road, to $2,000 Thursday but ordered that she have no contact with any of the alleged victims, and he set an 8 p.m. curfew for her.

Anderson is charged with two counts of felonious assault. If convicted on the charges, she could get up to 16 years in prison.

Police were called to Northwest Boulevard near Landsdowne Avenue Northwest about 2:40 p.m. May 6 for a fight involving Anderson and other females. A 16-year-old said Anderson hit her in the back of the head with a baseball bat. Another 16-year-old girl told police Anderson drove her car into her.

Both 16-year-olds were treated at a local hospital.

Warren man pleads innocent to burglary

WARREN — A 22-year-old city man pleaded innocent to one count of aggravated burglary after being accused of breaking into an ex-girlfriend’s house and assaulting her and another woman Wednesday evening.

Richard Ware, of Stiles Street Northwest, is being held in the Trumbull County Jail without bond. His next hearing will be at 1:30 p.m. May 21. If convicted, he could spend 10 years in prison.

A 50-year-old Jefferson Street Southwest woman told police she locked her front door when she saw Ware approaching the house about 8 p.m. Ware kicked open the door and grabbed a baseball bat she was holding, she said.

The break-in and fight injured her forehead and arm, she said. Ware then struck the other woman living there, 32, with a fist and hit her in her side and back with the baseball bat, police said.

The younger woman and Ware formerly dated, the older woman said.

Police arrested Ware a short time later after finding him in a nearby garage.

Women accused of assault

WARREN — A 36-year-old man and 22-year-old woman living on Irene Street Northeast told police that two women assaulted them as they were getting out of their car at their house about 5 p.m. Wednesday.

The two women first punched the 22-year-old in her head, face and body and then punched the man in the head, face and ribs and kicked him in his lower body when he attempted to help the woman.

The two unidentified women then got into a green Chevrolet Impala and fled, police said.

Neither victim received medical attention, but the 22-year-old had a visible bruise under one eye and the man had scratches on the top of his nose and left eye, police said.

Armed robbery probed

YOUNGSTOWN — City police are investigating the armed robbery of an East Side man.

The 31-year-old Sunshine Avenue man was talking to a woman in the 900 block of Martin Luther King Boulevard on May 5 when the woman’s boyfriend put a gun to his face and demanded his money. The man told police he gave the pair $100 and they ran off.

There is no explanation given on police reports for the time lapse in reporting the incident.

Open house at TCTC

CHAMPION — The Trumbull Career & Technical Center’s adult education department is having an open house from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday.

Individuals and employers can meet with instructors, tour the campus to see labs and equipment and learn about funding for training.

Automotive, business, computer, medical and industrial programs are offered.

Call (330) 847-0603, ext. 1600, for details.

OHIO

Lawmaker, war veteran eyeing treasurer bid

COLUMBUS — State lawmaker and Iraqi war veteran Josh Mandel says he is nearing a final decision on whether to run for state treasurer in 2010.

At 31, the two-term state representative from northeast Ohio is the youngest Republican in the Ohio House.

Mandel said Thursday he has been traveling the state talking with business, community and party leaders about a possible statewide run and plans to decide soon. He says he has been strongly encouraged.

State Treasurer Kevin Boyce, a Democrat, was appointed to the office in December by Gov. Ted Strickland. He has indicated he plans to run for the job in 2010.

Mandel has done two tours of duty in Iraq with the U.S. Marines.

State bar encouraging more minority attorneys

CLEVELAND — The Ohio State Bar Association will expand a program that encourages minority teens to consider law careers.

The Law & Leadership Institute began last year with 45 teens in Cleveland and Columbus and will expand this year to ninth-graders in Cincinnati, Dayton, Akron and Toledo. The program includes classes on legal issues taught by law students, presentations by prominent attorneys and field trips.

The bar association says the institute is meant as a “pipeline into the legal profession” for minority youngsters including blacks, who represent 12.6 percent of Ohio’s population but only 3.7 percent of its lawyers.

The program expansion, which begins in June, was announced Thursday at the bar association convention in Cleveland.

Cleveland Fed examines regional foreclosure trend

CLEVELAND — The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland says research shows foreclosures in its region were elevated well before the nation’s housing bust.

The bank said Thursday in its annual report that parts of Ohio, eastern Kentucky, western Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia had an abundance of lending but did not have extremely inflated housing prices like those in other states.

Researchers found home prices in that district were relatively flat from 1998 to 2008, but foreclosures increased as early as 2000. The underlying problem was too much lending to people in an economically stressed region.

PENNSYLVANIA

Man guilty in death of girlfriend’s son

BUTLER, Pa. — A man who testified that the death of his girlfriend’s 14-month-old son was an accident has been convicted of third-degree murder.

Butler County prosecutors had sought a first-degree murder conviction and the death penalty for 24-year-old Jarred Burton Knight. Because the jury convicted the Harrisville man of third-degree murder Thursday, the maximum sentence is 20 to 40 years in prison.

Tyler Davis suffered a fatal injury June 23, 2007, at his grandparents’ home in Merion, about 125 miles east-southeast of Pittsburgh. Prosecutors said Davis smashed the boy’s head into a wall. Davis testified Wednesday that the boy slipped and hit his head on a bathtub, then hit the floor.

Partners of state workers get health benefits

HARRISBURG — Many state government employees and retirees in Pennsylvania will soon be able to extend health benefits to either gay or straight domestic partners.

Officials at the private trust fund that manages the health benefits said Thursday that Pennsylvania will become the 16th state to offer such a benefit when it takes effect July 1.

The board of the Pennsylvania Employees Benefit Trust Fund approved the new benefit last September.

Staff and wire reports