Gov. Bevin requests disaster declaration for flooding

FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin is requesting a presidential disaster declaration for 22 eastern Kentucky counties where damage occurred during severe flooding last month.

Bevin’s office said in a news release Monday that the flooding caused over $18 million in damages to highways, bridges and local infrastructure. Bevin said the declaration will provide federal assistance for repairs.

The release said the counties are located in eastern Kentucky. Kentucky Emergency Management Director Michael Dossett said the state is helping western Kentucky counties with damage assessments from flooding that occurred within days of the initial damage.

Ky. county to install metal detectors in more schools

LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) — A Kentucky county board of education superintendent says his district will move toward offering metal detectors in more area middle and high schools.

News outlets report the Fayette County school district announced Frederick Douglass High School would be the first school with fixed metal detectors after a student accidentally shot himself in the hand Friday. These efforts reverse the district’s earlier decision that having all secondary students use metal detectors would be too time consuming and costly.

County Superintendent Manny Caulk says he’s unsure how many of the district’s 31 secondary schools will get fixed metal detectors, but “we have to have a starting point.” He says potential changes by the school board may enable middle and high schools to use handheld metal detector wands in the meantime.

At least 44 kid-on-kid sex assault cases on Ky. bases

FORT CAMPBELL, Ky. (AP) — A decade after the Pentagon began confronting rape in the ranks, the U.S. military frequently fails to provide justice to the children of service members when they are sexually assaulted by other kids on base.

An Associated Press investigation finds that sex assault cases occurring where military kids live and learn often die on the desks of prosecutors. Criminal investigators shelve an unknown number of reports.

Instead of punishment or rehabilitation, offenders may be shuffled into the civilian world.

The Pentagon doesn’t know the extent of the problem. On two bases in Kentucky, records the Army acknowledges are incomplete document at least 44 sex assault cases among children or teens since 2007. Fort Campbell accounted for 30; Fort Knox the other 14.

Pentagon officials promised to take “appropriate actions.”

School bus crash injures 18 students

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Officials say a crash involving a Kentucky school bus sent 18 students to a hospital to get evaluated.

News outlets report the crash happened Tuesday in Louisville as students were on their way to school. Jefferson County Public Schools spokeswoman Allison Martin said the bus had 41 students on board and they were heading to Fairdale Elementary and Coral Ridge Elementary.

Jefferson County School spokesman Daniel Kemp said 18 students were taken to the hospital for “minor injuries” and the rest were taken to school.

The cause of the crash is under investigation.

Beam fills 15 millionth barrel of bourbon since Prohibition

CLERMONT, Ky. (AP) — Bourbon barrel No. 15 million has taken its place in a Jim Beam warehouse in Kentucky.

Beam on Monday filled its 15 millionth barrel of bourbon since the end of Prohibition. The company says it’s a first for a Kentucky distillery. It was filled and sealed by seventh-generation Master Distiller Fred Noe and his son, Freddie, at Beam’s flagship distillery in Clermont.

Employees at the company’s Clermont, Boston and Frankfort plants signed the barrel, which will be stored in a nine-story warehouse rebuilt by Jim Beam after Prohibition on the Clermont distillery grounds.

The company says it will be among nearly 2.3 million barrels of bourbon currently aging in Jim Beam’s rackhouses across the state.

The milestone was reached less than two years after the brand’s14 millionth barrel was filled.

Investigation puts 2 police officers on leave

HORSE CAVE, Ky. (AP) — A Kentucky police chief and and officer have been placed on paid leave while a federal investigation in to the department continues.

Horse Cave Mayor Randall Curry says city police Chief Sean Henry and Officer Chris Trulock are on leave indefinitely pending the investigation’s outcome. Curry says he doesn’t know why the department is being investigated.

Curry says electronics, including Trulock’s and Henry’s personal cellphones, were seized March 5 by the FBI and state police during search. News outlets report the search shuttered the department until Wednesday and seized electronics were returned Friday.

The mayor says the department is down to four officers, with one assigned to a local high school “because of all the school shootings.”

State police and the Hart County Sheriff’s Office are providing law enforcement assistance.

Former University of Kentucky trustees chairman dead at 78

OWENSBORO, Ky. (AP) — Former University of Kentucky board of trustees Chairman Billy Joe Miles has died. He was 78.

Rep. Regina Huff, R-Williamsburg, announced Miles’ death at the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee meeting on Tuesday. The Lexington Herald-Leader reports Miles’ daughter, Suzanne, an Owensboro Republican lawmaker, left the meeting soon after it started.

Miles, of Owensboro, had been suffering from dementia in recent years, according to testimony in a case in which he was charged with sexually assaulting a home health worker and offering $1 million for her silence. The charges were dismissed after credibility issues were raised about statements the worker made.

After graduating from Western Kentucky University in 1962, Miles began working at his father’s seed corn company. He expanded the company into one of western Kentucky’s largest enterprises.