Across Virginia
Governor Youngkin traveled to Lynchburg this morning to sign a bill that immediately outlaws vehicles called “Carolina Squats” It is a bill introduced by a Lynchburg lawmaker and passed in unusually quick time. “Carolina Squats” are pickups and SUV’s modified so the front bumpers are noticeably higher than the rear ones, and they are given their nickname for first becoming popular in the Myrtle Beach area. Critics say they dangerously limit visibility, especially when coming over hills, and they point to a fatal Virginia accident last month as just such an unfortunate example. WFIR’s Evan Jones has more:
South Carolina and North Carolina have previously outlawed “Carolina Squat” vehicles.
CLICK HERE for the Myrtle Beach Cam website which, among many other things, has videos of Carolina Squat cruising.
CHESAPEAKE, Va. (AP) — A man was fatally shot outside a Virginia shopping center, police said, marking another serious crime during a weekend of violence in the Hampton Roads region.
The Chesapeake Police Department said its officers responded to a gunfire report Saturday afternoon at the Holly Point Shopping Center, where they found a man who had been shot.
The man, whose name was not immediately disclosed, died on the way to the hospital, according to news outlets. No arrests have been announced.
The Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk reported that at least 15 people had been shot — four of whom died — in shootings between Friday evening and Saturday afternoon in an area stretching from Newport News to Chesapeake and Suffolk.
The shooting victims included Virginian-Pilot reporter Sierra Jenkins, who died at a Norfolk hospital after being shot during a shooting early Saturday outside a restaurant and bar. Devon M. Harris, 25, of Portsmouth, also died, and three others were wounded, police said.
A manager at Chicho’s Pizza Backstage said Jenkins, who was 25 and joined her hometown newspaper in late 2020, was caught in the crossfire as she was leaving the bar. No arrests had been announced as of Sunday.
Norfolk police said a shooting Friday night sent Leonco S. Lamb, 31, to the hospital, where he later died.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A new, permanent leader for Virginia’s 23 community colleges has been named, after new Gov. Glenn Youngkin asked that the hiring process be restarted and an interim head be appointed.
The State Board for Community Colleges on Thursday picked Russell Kavalhuna, president of Henry Ford College in Michigan, as the system’s next chancellor. He’ll succeed the retiring Glenn Dubois.
His appointment came after Youngkin criticized the appointment process as lacking transparency and failing to address the system’s needs, in particular workforce development. But the board said no wait was needed because Youngkin’s concerns had been addressed, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
Youngkin initially wrote a letter earlier this month to board Chair Nathaniel Bishop, saying the board had failed to collaborate with the administration.
Youngkin and Bishop conferred twice, but the governor requested more involvement. He still felt excluded from the decision-making process, he wrote in a second letter obtained by the newspaper.
“Our exclusion from your search process for the next chancellor was disappointing, and I strongly recommend that the selection committee appoint an interim chancellor and restart the process,” Youngkin wrote on Wednesday.
The board spent at least three hours in closed session Thursday before picking Kavalhuna, who was also a former federal prosecutor and commercial airline captain.
The governor believes the system hasn’t done enough to support workforce development to address the number of unfilled jobs in the state and to grow enrollment, according to Macaulay Porter, a Youngkin spokesperson.
“While there are outstanding individual schools, Virginia needs an entire system that supports all Virginians in the pursuit of gaining skills, furthering their academic goals and equipping them with the tools they need to succeed in an ever-competitive world,” Porter said.
In a letter to Youngkin on Thursday, the board said it had contacted the education and commerce secretaries soon after their appointments, and the selection committee added Jason El Koubi, interim president of the Virginia Economic Development Partnership.
The transparency, administration input and business involvement that Youngkin sought was accomplished, the board said, so “therefore, there is no need to delay nor repeat the process.”
POTOMAC FALLS, Va. (AP) — A woman was fatally shot early Friday when authorities said she lunged at Virginia sheriff’s deputies with a knife.
Loudoun County Sheriff’s deputies responded to a report of an argument at an apartment in the Potomac Falls area around 4 a.m., the sheriff’s office said in a news release. Arriving deputies found Faubricia Virtaux Gainer, 36, near the entrance of the apartment armed with a knife that she refused to drop, officials said. When she lunged at the deputies, Gainer was shot, officials said. Gainer was taken to a hospital, where she died.
Inside the apartment, deputies found a 38-year-old woman and 15-year-old girl with stab wounds they siffered during an argument with Gainer. They were taken to a hospital for treatment of injuries that weren’t considered life-threatening. Two other children in the apartment were not injured.
No deputies were injured. Virginia State Police are investigating the shooting at the request of the sheriff’s office.
MARTINSVILLE, Va. (AP) – Police in Virginia say a man fleeing an attempted bank robbery was caught after he crashed a motorcycle into a police vehicle. Martinsville police said a man entered the Carter Bank and Trust in Martinsville on Thursday afternoon, opened a bag and ordered the teller to put money inside. He didn’t get any money and left. Police were immediately notified and officers found the man as he was taking off on a motorcycle. After a brief pursuit, police say the man was involved in a wreck with a police vehicle. The man was taken to a hospital with minor injuries. Police say he will face charges once he’s released from the hospital.
(From University of Richmond Athletics)
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) – Jacob Gilyard scored 24 points and 12th-seeded Richmond leaned on its experienced lineup to defeat Big Ten champion Iowa 67-63 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Tyler Burton scored 18 points and had 11 rebounds for the Atlantic 10-champion Spiders, who improved their tournament record against fifth-seeded teams to 4-0. Keegan Murray scored 21 points and Patrick McCaffery added 18 for the Hawkeyes. Richmond advances to face the Midwest Region’s No. 4 seed, Providence. Iowa came in with the nation’s fourth-best offense but had its worst scoring output since January.
MGN
NEWS RELEASE: RICHMOND, VA – Governor Glenn Youngkin today announced that he would send a bill to the General Assembly in the upcoming special session to suspend Virginia’s gas tax for 3 months. The Governor proposes using over $437 million in unanticipated transportation revenues to support the gas tax holiday. Data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this week showed a 38.8% surge, year over year, in the gasoline index, and inflation on all items is at a 40-year high.
Andrew Wheeler
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Andrew Wheeler, the former Trump administration Environmental Protection Agency administrator, will serve as a senior adviser to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s administration after Senate Democrats rejected his appointment to a Cabinet role.
Wheeler had been nominated to oversee environmental and other policy issues as secretary of natural and historic resources. Travis Voyles, previously the deputy secretary of natural and historic resources, will serve as acting secretary while Wheeler takes on the advisory role, Youngkin spokeswoman Macaulay Porter said.
She didn’t immediately respond to questions about the scope of Wheeler’s new position or how long he intends to stay on.
In Virginia, the governor’s cabinet nominees are subject to confirmation by the part-time and currently divided General Assembly, though lawmakers rarely reject nominees. This year, Democrats who narrowly control the state Senate united against Wheeler as he faced criticism from environmental groups and some ex-EPA employees for an EPA tenure criticized as overly deferential to corporate interests. In February, the Senate voted along party lines to reject his appointment.
Youngkin repeatedly said he hoped Democrats would reconsider. But earlier this month, legislators gave final approval to all Cabinet members but Wheeler.
Lawmakers adjourned their regular session Saturday but are expected to return to Richmond soon for a special session to deal with unfinished business, including the state budget.
While legislators were meeting, the partisan fight over Wheeler’s nomination spiraled into a broader back-and-forth over other appointments and confirmations. The GOP-controlled House effectively removed a nominee of former Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam from the power State Corporation Commission by letting her appointment expire and booted 11 other Northam nominees from other boards and commissions.
The Senate then retaliated by removing four Youngkin parole board members.
Lawmakers left town before any resolution was reached on those or other vacancies, including two spots on the Supreme Court of Virginia. It was not immediately clear how soon the governor would call lawmakers back for the special session or how the sparring over the appointments would end.
Voyles, the acting secretary, most recently served as oversight counsel for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works under Republican Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia.
“In this role, he served as the lead coordinator of the Committee’s efforts for environmental, energy, economic development, and infrastructure issues, including primary oversight over a wide range of federal agencies programs and funding,” according to a biography provided by the governor’s office.
Voyles, who holds a law degree, also served in multiple appointed roles at the EPA, the biography said.
The last time a governor’s cabinet appointee was rejected, in 2006, then-Gov. Tim Kaine, a Democrat, took the same approach as Youngkin. He appointed Daniel LeBlanc, a former president of the state AFL-CIO, to serve as a senior workforce adviser.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) – A police officer in Virginia has been sentenced to one year in prison for fatally shooting his then-fiance dog with a 12-gauge shotgun. WRIC reports that Richard Chinappi III was sentenced Friday in Powhatan County Circuit Court. The Richmond police officer had pleaded guilty to a felony charge of torturing or maiming a dog or cat and making a false report to police. Prosecutors said that Chinappi initially claimed a bear had attacked the dog. He then allegedly changed his story to say he had shot the bear and killed the dog in the process. Richmond police said in a statement that Chinappi remains on leave without pay. But the department also said that it’s very close to concluding an internal investigation.
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The Virginia General Assembly approved legislation Saturday to toughen the penalty for stealing catalytic converters.
The emission control devices have become popular targets for thieves to cut out of a vehicle’s exhaust system. Thefts have increased across the country over the last two years as prices for the precious metals they contain have skyrocketed.
Thieves can expect to get anywhere from $50 to $1,000 or more if they sell the converters to scrap yards, which then sell them to recycling facilities to reclaim the precious metals inside, including platinum, palladium and rhodium.
The legislation makes tampering with or stealing a catalytic converter a Class 6 felony, which is punishable by up to five years in prison. Stealing a converter is currently a misdemeanor. The legislation also requires people who sell catalytic converters to show identification, which the purchaser must record.
“We need to more seriously criminalize people who are damaging vehicles,” said Republican Sen. Frank Ruff Jr., the lead sponsor of the Senate bill.
Both the House and Senate approved the legislation on Saturday. It now goes to Gov. Glenn Youngkin for his consideration.