In brief: Abortion provider commits to Kansas

Omaha, Neb. – A Nebraska doctor said Wednesday that he will perform third-term abortions in Kansas after the slaying of abortion provider George Tiller, but would not say whether he will open a new facility or offer the procedure at an existing practice.

Dr. LeRoy Carhart declined to discuss his plans in detail, but insisted “there will be a place in Kansas for the later second- and the medically indicated third-trimester patients very soon.”

“I just think that until everything is in place, it’s something that doesn’t need to be talked about” in detail, Carhart said a day after Tiller’s family announced his Wichita clinic was permanently shutting its doors.

Tiller’s clinic was one of the only facilities in the country that performed third-trimester abortions. Carhart has run his own clinic in Bellevue, Neb., since 1985, but he had performed late-term abortions at Tiller’s clinic because of Nebraska’s more restrictive abortion laws.

Great-grandmother gets Tasered

Austin, Texas – Cursing and belligerent, a great-grandmother refused to sign her speeding ticket, got out of her truck and dared a deputy to shock her with a Taser.

So he did.

Video released by a Travis County constable’s office shows 72-year-old Kathryn Winkfein hitting the ground and moaning while the shocks jolted through her body after the May 11 confrontation.

Winkfein was stopped for driving 60 mph in a 45-mph zone just west of Austin. A dashboard camera in the deputy’s car shows the 4-foot-11 Winkfein refusing to sign her speeding ticket, getting out of her white pickup truck and cursing at the deputy constable.

Winkfein was charged with resisting arrest, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and fines up to $4,000.