Police charge teen for trucker murder\nINDIANAPOLIS -- An 18-year-old told detectives that personal problems led him to drop a broken piece of concrete from a highway overpass that fatally injured a truck driver.\nRobert K. Roberts faces preliminary felony charges of overpass mischief, reckless homicide and criminal recklessness following his arrest early Wednesday, state police said. He was being held in the Marion County Jail.\nInvestigators got a break when two teenagers said they saw Roberts drop the chunk of broken sidewalk onto the highway last week.\nThe concrete struck Richard Rodriguez, 44, in the chest about 11 p.m. April 5 as he was driving about 55 mph on Interstate 70 on the city's west side, police said. Rodriguez, of Crucible, Pa., managed to pull the semitrailer over and call for help, but died two days later from his injuries.\n"He showed remorse," said state police Detective Sgt. Jeff Hearon. "He cried. He even wrote an apology letter to the wife of the victim."\nHearon said Roberts was unemployed and had been kicked out of his home about a mile from the I-70 overpass.\n"He was homeless, frustrated and he lashed out," Hearon said.\nTammy Rodriguez said she was fortunate that she and two of her sons, ages 13 and 16, were able to be with her husband before he died.\n"I couldn't even begin to imagine what kind of person would do this," she said.
Daniels makes ethics, criminal justice appointments\nINDIANAPOLIS -- Gov. Mitch Daniels appointed veteran judge Mary Lee Comer Wednesday to lead his administration's efforts in training, advising and enforcing ethics laws for state employees.\nHe also appointed Heather Bolejack, an attorney from Indianapolis, as the new executive director of the Indiana Criminal Justice Institute. The agency oversees state planning for criminal justice, juvenile justice, traffic safety and victim services, and administers federal and state money to carry out long-range strategies.\nComer, the new executive director of the State Ethics Commission, served 18 years as a Hendricks Superior Court judge and since 2001 has been a senior state judge assigned to eight courts in central Indiana. She also has taught ethics courses to judicial officials in Indiana and Tennessee.\nDaniels said Comer will report to the state's new inspector general, who is responsible for pursuing fraud, waste and abuse in state government. Daniels said they would help create "a culture that encourages state employees to seek advice and report wrongdoing, as well as an understanding that rules will be enforced and unethical behavior is unacceptable."\nBolejack has worked as a litigation associate for the Indianapolis law firms of Ice Miller and Bingham McHale. Daniels said he wanted her to focus much of the Criminal Justice Institute's efforts on initiatives to stop the spread of methamphetamine use.
