In brief: Error delayed response to fire

BOZEMAN – State utility regulators say NorthWestern Energy crews misread a map of the company’s pipelines in downtown Bozeman, causing a delay in shutting off natural gas that fueled a fire after an explosion.

It took more than 16 hours to stem the flow of natural gas that fed a fire that leveled half a city block last March 5.

NorthWestern Energy spokeswoman Claudia Rapkoch says the stressful situation apparently fueled confusion in reading the maps, leading crews to install a fitting to stop the leak on the wrong pipe. A second fitting was installed nearby and was effective.

Rapkoch says the mistake only delayed gas shutoff for three or four hours.

Plea deal possible in doctor threat

DENVER – A Spokane man who asked for a trial on allegations he threatened a Colorado abortion doctor is asking for a hearing to enter a plea.

The attorney for 70-year-old Donald Hertz said in a federal court filing Tuesday that a plea agreement is in the works. Hertz refused to plead guilty under a proposed deal last month, saying there were false things in the plea agreement.

Hertz is accused of calling the Boulder Abortion Clinic in Boulder on June 23 and threatening to kill members of Dr. Warren Hern’s family.

A hearing date has not been set.

State winnows execution drugs

OLYMPIA – Washington state has changed its method of execution from a three-drug cocktail to a one-drug system.

State Attorney General Rob McKenna filed paperwork with the state Supreme Court on Tuesday asking it to dismiss portions of an appeal by death row inmate Darold Stenson. In the filings, the state argues that the part of the appeal challenging the constitutionality of the drug protocol is moot, since the state made the decision last Thursday to change the state policy on execution.

The state Department of Corrections is in the process of rewriting the execution policy that will make Washington state the second in the nation to use the one-drug method.

Ohio became the first state to use the system in January following a botched execution in September.