Posted on 08/17/2003 10:16:25 PM PDT by Chad Fairbanks
Police officials say U.S. Rep. Bill Janklow, R-S.D., was driving a car that collided with a motorcycle in rural South Dakota yesterday, leaving the biker dead.
Rep. Bill Janklow, R-S.D.
The freshman congressman, 63, also had an unidentified staff member in his vehicle, according to the Sioux Falls Argus-Leader.
Janklow was driving a Cadillac near the small town of Trent, some 25 miles north of Sioux Falls, said Col. Dan Mosteller of the South Dakota Highway Patrol.
The Argus-Leader quotes Moody County Coroner Tad Jacobs as saying his dominant impression of the accident was that "the cyclist was not wearing a helmet. That's the major thing." Jacobs characterized the collision as "a motorcyclist headed eastbound. A car ran the intersection going southbound and struck the motorcyclist," who was pronounced dead at the scene "from extensive trauma from impact."
The Associated Press identified the victim of the crash as Randolph E. Scott, 53, of Hardwick, Minn.
Janklow's son Russ says his father feels "absolutely horrible'' about what happened, adding he's never seen his dad so distraught, according to AP.
Routine blood samples were taken to determine if alcohol or drugs factored into the cause of the crash, but results are still not in.
State Attorney Bill Ellingson offered no comment last night, so it's unclear if any charges are to be filed.
Janklow was just elected to the House of Representatives last November, after serving four terms as governor of South Dakota, as well as state attorney general in the 1970s.
He's also served in the Marine Corps from 1956-1959, and his father was a prosecutor at the Nuremberg war-criminal trials.
In November of 2002, South Dakotans elected William J. Janklow to represent them as their state’s only member of the United States House of Representatives. At the time of his election, Janklow was serving his fourth four-year term as South Dakota’s governor, and he was the nation’s senior governor.
Janklow was born in Chicago on September 13, 1939. His father Arthur was a prosecutor at the Nuremberg war criminal trials. After Arthur died, the family returned to Flandreau, South Dakota, the hometown of Bill’s mother LouElla.
At age 16, Janklow joined the United States Marine Corps. He served in the Marine Corps from 1956-1959, including service in Asia during the Quemoy-Matsu crisis.
Janklow returned home in 1960, married his high school sweetheart, Mary Dean Thom, and enrolled at the University of South Dakota. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration in 1964.
In 1966, Janklow earned his law degree from the University of South Dakota. He intended to become a tax attorney, but began working in the Legal Aid program on the Rosebud Indian Reservation. He eventually became director of the Legal Aid program for South Dakota. In 1973, he was hired as the chief prosecutor in the South Dakota Attorney General’s Office.
Republicans drafted Janklow as their Attorney General candidate in 1974. He won with 66.7 percent of the vote -- the highest percentage for any South Dakota Attorney General’s race.
As Attorney General, Janklow kept his promise to be a trial lawyer, not a politician. He won landmark decisions before the U.S. Supreme Court on Indian law and criminal law. He not only had the best criminal conviction rate of any previous Attorney General, he has argued and won more cases in the U.S. Supreme Court than any lawyer in South Dakota’s history.
Janklow’s accomplishments as Attorney General prompted Republicans to urge him to run for governor in 1978. He won with over 56 percent of the vote. In 1982, he was re-elected with 71 percent of the vote -- the highest margin of victory in the history of South Dakota gubernatorial campaigns.
During his first two terms as governor (1979-1987), Janklow managed state agencies so efficiently that over $50 million was returned to the state treasury. He also brought new plant expansions, new industries, and new capital investment at a time when federal policies were causing record-breaking years of high interest rates and inflation.
Janklow saved South Dakota’s farm-to-market railroad system so agricultural producers could have better access to national and world markets. He also won dramatic changes in state banking laws that caused a national revolution in financial services and created thousands of new higher paying jobs for South Dakotans.
In 1987, Janklow returned to the practice of law as a private attorney. After eight years in private life, Janklow returned to public service when he was reelected governor in 1994, with 55 percent of the vote. He was reelected in 1998 with 64 percent of the vote.
During his second two terms as governor (1995-2003), Janklow won legislative approval for the largest tax decrease in South Dakota history--reducing property taxes on agricultural land and owner-occupied homes by 30 percent. Janklow also continued to make state government more efficient. In 1994, voters demanded a state government that was smaller and more efficient. Janklow responded by cutting state government’s workforce under his control by 1,064 full time equivalent jobs over the next two years -- a decrease of more than 12 percent.
His state fiscal year 1997 state government budget contained a decrease of more than $10 million--the first time that overall state spending decreased since the state fiscal year 1983 budget, when Janklow had previously been in office.
South Dakota leads the nation in school technology as a result of Janklow’s efforts to wire school buildings with the use of inmate labor. He also connected the schools with a high-speed network, and he created statewide academies to immerse educators in 200-hour training sessions in the use of technology for teaching and learning.
Janklow created the first program in America where inmates build affordable homes for senior citizens and the disabled who want to stay independent. The program also builds day care centers for communities that need them.
Other far-reaching efforts by Janklow include his Bright Start early childhood development program and Spruce-Up South Dakota, a program to remove environmental and health hazards from South Dakota communities.
- Rep. Lantos ticketed following accident at Capitol
Crime/Corruption News Keywords: HIT AND RUN LANTOS BLAMES CHILD
Source: AP
Published: May 4, 2000 | 3:12 p.m.
Posted on 05/04/2000 13:55:22 PDT by HAL9000WASHINGTON (AP) -- California Rep. Tom Lantos was ticketed after his car struck and slightly injured a 10-year-old boy in front of the Capitol.
Lantos was driving on the East Front Plaza at about Wednesday morning as a large group walked across the pavement. As he inched through the crowd, Lantos' car hit the boy's ankle, police said.
``One of the kids, who was playing or fooling around or just didn't see, stepped in front of the car, stumbled and walked away,'' said Lantos, a 10-term Democrat who represents part of San Francisco and San Mateo County.
An officer from the Capitol Police waved Lantos through the area to clear the scene and the congressman drove to his office in the Rayburn House Office Building across the street.
Police later went to Lantos' office and gave him a $25 ticket for ``failure to pay full time and attention.''
The boy, whose name was not disclosed, was treated at the scene, police said.
Lantos said he would not dispute the ticket even though he does not believe he was at fault. He also said he called the boy's family and invited them to lunch.
It might have been an unmarked intersection. There were plenty of those in the rural Midwest when I grew up there. In the blinding prairie sunlight, and with crops growing tall along the roadside, it might have been very hard to see a motorcyclist.
But if it can been shown the congressman was drunk or negligent, he should suffer the consequences. I'm sure he's suffering plenty already.
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