$1 million worth of cocaine found; police arrest smugglers\nINDIANAPOLIS -- Police arrested two men after a drug-sniffing dog found about $1 million worth of cocaine in their sport utility vehicle.\nOfficers found 10 kilograms of unprocessed cocaine in the SUV after they stopped the driver for speeding Monday on Interstate 70 on Indianapolis far-east side.\nPolice said the cocaine would have had a street value of about $1 million after it was processed.\nThe men were turned over to the Drug Enforcement Administration for questioning, police said. Their names were not released.\nInvestigators suspected the men were smuggling the drugs from Chicago to central Ohio, said Indianapolis police Detective Mike Johnson.
Suspect in crack house murder enters not guilty plea\nCROWN POINT, Ind. -- A Gary man accused of killing a toddler and three adults while robbing what police described as a crack house had an innocent plea entered on his behalf Tuesday.\nJames Parks, 23, made his initial court appearance before Lake Superior Court Judge Thomas Stefaniak Jr. Two other men charged with Parks -- Lenzo Aaron III, 23, of Indianapolis, and Antonio D. Jones, 28, of Merrillville made initial court appearances on Friday.\nAll three have indicated they would hire private defense attorneys. They were being held Tuesday without bond.\nPolice say the three men committed the slayings during a robbery Jan. 16 at a Gary apartment. Anthony McClendon Sr., 24, was killed in the shootings along with his 23-month-old son, Anthony McClendon Jr., and Laurice Jones, 47, and Jimmy Jones, 45.
BMV employees receive legal rights\nINDIANAPOLIS -- License branch employees who report wrongdoing in the Bureau of Motor Vehicles would receive legal protection under a bill being considered by lawmakers.\nHouse Bill 1271 would allow workers who claim they were fired, demoted or denied a promotion because they reported crimes to sue the BMV Commission in state court. BMV employees currently have no such protection because they are considered "at-will" employees.\nOfficials at the agency said they support the legislation, which was scheduled for debate in the House on Wednesday.\n"We support anything that encourages employees to come forward," said BMV spokeswoman Media Wilson. "We can't be everywhere to see everything, so we need them."\nThe bill's sponsor, state Rep. Ron Liggett, D-Redkey, said he believed it likely would pass because of recent allegations of fraud. Similar bills were defeated in 2002 and 2003.\nMarion County prosecutors recently charged four BMV employees with accepting bribes to help foreign nationals obtain fraudulent Indiana driver's licenses.\nLiggett originally proposed classifying license branch workers as state employees and eliminating the BMV Commission, which oversees operation of the branches.\nBut members of the House Ways and Means Committee said that would have cost the state about $668,000 annually for disability insurance, and pulled that part of the bill.
4 killed in early morning electric fire\nLOWELL, Ind. -- A fire sparked by an electrical short-circuit in a television cord raced through a second-floor apartment Monday, killing a woman, her twin 4-year-old daughters and a family friend.\nWhen firefighters arrived about 4:15 a.m., the two-story building housing a ground-floor dance studio and apartments above was filled with flames, said Chief Jack Eskridge of the Lowell Volunteer Fire Department.\nBystanders told firefighters that at least two people had jumped from a window to escape the flames, and others were possibly trapped inside the building in the business district of the town about 25 miles south of Gary.\n"We basically were in a defensive mode until we got it knocked down enough, (then) we made entry in three different areas," Eskridge said.\nInside, firefighters found the bodies of Delores A. Szot, 34, and her 4-year-old twin daughters, Tia P. Parker and Talia J. Parker. Family friend Jack D. Umfleet, 47, was rescued from the building but died later at a Crown Point hospital, Eskridge said.\nHe said an investigator with the state fire marshal's office determined that the fire was accidental and was caused by an electrical failure in a television's power cord that smoldered "for some time" before touching off the fire.\nTwo people, including the twin girls' father, survived the fire, Eskridge said.
