Monday morning, December 16, 2019
Northern Utah
Polygamous Group Fraud
A Utah polygamous sect skimmed from federal student aid programs by telling teenagers to leaving off their fathers' and other sources of income when applying for benefits. The Salt Lake Tribune reports a leader in the Davis County Cooperative Society, also known as the Kingston Group, is accused in the scheme, according to a lawsuit filed in May in Salt Lake City’s federal court by Mary and Bryan Nelson. The couple has been profiled on the CBS program "Whistleblower." Read the full story — Salt Lake Tribune
Marine Killed In WWII Returned Home
A U.S. Marine killed on a Pacific island during World War II has been reburied in Northern Utah. Decades after Pfc. Robert James Hatch of Woods Cross was killed in 1943, searchers found his remains and others in a previously unrecorded burial trench on Betio in the Gilbert Islands. They were later identified by the Defense Department's POW/MIA Accounting Agency. On Saturday, fellow Marines in dress blues carried the coffin containing Hatch's remains from a hearse to the burial site in the Bountiful City Cemetery. — Bob Nelson
Timpview High Building Study
Excavation began at Provo’s Timpview High this weekend, as cracks continued to appear in the walls. This could be a sign that the foundation is unstable. In November, Provo residents voted against a bond that would pay to rebuild Timpview at a new location. Principal Fidel Montero wrote in a letter to parents that the district wants to gather information on the building’s structural integrity by evaluating the soil and foundation. — Jenny Goldsberry
State
Delayed 911 Calls
A new audit from the state of Utah found that 911 call transfers are creating dangerous delays. Across the state, there were more than 110,000 911 call transfers last year. Those mostly happen after a call is routed from a cellphone tower to the wrong jurisdiction. The audit found the median delay per transfer is 60 seconds. National standards say calls should be answered within 20 seconds. Read the full story — Sonja Hutson
Region
Controversy Over Swastika Removal
Students and faculty leaders at the University of Montana are calling for the removal of swastika-like symbols from a historic building there. The symbol predates Nazism and can be found all across the West — including a post office in Reno and a granite fountain in Provo. Both swastikas and aristikas were used during a revivalist form of architecture that swept across the West more than a century ago. But the symbols were co-opted by Adolf Hitler in 1920. Read the full story— Nate Hegyi, Mountain West News Bureau