It’s Friday, and there’s plenty of news…

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

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Day care cleared in hot-foot baby case
WLOSer Russ “Beefcake” Bowen told us at 11 last night that St. John’s Day Care in Waynesville has been cleared of any liability in the case of a toddler burning her feet on the day care playground earlier this year.

Little Sarah suffered second degree burns on her tootsies when she walk barefoot on a 140-degree black mat in the middle of a hot summer morning. Russ never clearly explained the investigation, but it went something like this – Haywood County handed over the investigation to Buncombe County DSS. Russ was never clear about why.

Anyway, Sarah’s dad called bullsh*t on the investigation, saying its just an internal whitewash. Russ said the state is reviewing the case.

In a warm-up for sweeps, Russ warned us that there were going to be some graphic images of burned baby feet. Indeed, there were.

Teen dies on ballfield
Andrew Lewis, a 15-year-old Ashvegas High School sophomore playing baseball Wednesday night in the city’s Wooden Bat League, died on Oakley Park’s ballfield after hitting a ball and running to second base.

A number of Lewis’ classmates who played ball with him watched him die, according to WLOS, who interviewed Lewis’ brother and principal. Counselors at the high school talked to some 50 students, WLOSers said.

A preliminary autopsy shows the student may have died from heart complications, WLOSers reported at 11. How in the hell did WLOS get the preliminary autopsy results so quickly? Earlier in the afternoon, Kassandra “Special K” Pride reported that the preliminary autopsy showed he died of a “heart virus.”

The debate is on
U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor and challenger Heath Shuler have agreed to a televised debate on WLOS, the news readers reported. Details are still being worked out.

This is big news, because its been 12 years since Taylor debated an opponent. Despite a splash earlier in the week about poll numbers, this race remains too close to call right now.

Taylor last debated Maggie Lauterer, who, incidently, was a WLOS television personality-turned political candidate. After the debate, which nobody watched because it was a beautiful October day and the leaves were pretty, Maggie angrily confronted Taylor in the WLOS studio. The two camps had to be separated. That was one vicious political race with all manner of vile personal attacks from the Taylor camp. We don’t think Maggie’s ever forgiven him, and she went on to be a Methodist minister or something.

Remember that hazing incident?
Terrie Foster told us that some parents of children out at Franklin High School are pissed that punishment wasn’t more severe for six students involved in a hazing incident.

The students, members of the junior varsity football team, were kicked off the team but were not suspended from school. Terrie talked to students who called that a slap on the wrist. Police are investigating whether there could be criminal charges.

The hazing incident has been described thusly: four boys would hold down a kid, then another boy would touch the restrained one with his genitals. In past football hazing incidents, Ashvegas has heard of “tea-bagging,” and we think this might be that. Go here for a definition.

Bittersweet battle
Sheraldo took us into the woods to show us the battle against bittersweet. Bittersweet is a pretty vine that produces bright red berries that attract the mountain redneck, who plucks it, weaves it and hangs it on the front door.

But bittersweet is also a non-native plant that can throttle our lovely trees. So the park service hires people to go deep into the woods to cut it, stomp it and spray it with chemicals to kill it.

In other news…
A bunch of UNCA students from the Socialists of America club or something walked out of class and down to Pritchard Park to protest the war in Iraq. Ashvegas has pictures of the National Day of Resistance… The Woodfin Apartments has 30-some homeless people signed up for places to live. Cherub Charu did a story on Ashvegas’ 10-year-plan to end homelessness, and the story was hooked on a visit by Philip Mangano, a Bush administration official. There are about 2,000 homeless people in Ashvegas, Charu said… An area in Rutherford County called Gilbert Town is on the National Registery of Historic Places as a Revolutionary War site of significance… They’re still scared of John “Woody” Woodring out in Jackson County… A McDowell County man was sentenced to life in prison without parole for viciously stabbing to death his co-worker at Pizza Hut to get some money. He was 17 at the time of the murder, in March 2005.

In still other news…
An Ashvegas man is charged with kidnapping after police chased him to a Livingston Street apartment and wouldn’t let some children there out… Tim Hennis, a former soldier at Fort Bragg was eventually acquitted of charges that he killed three people way back in 1985, is headed back to court after some new DNA evidence turned up… Honor Air, that community group in Henderson County that took a bunch of old World War II veterans up to Washington to see the WWII Monument, will fly another 110 vets up to DC to see the memorial on Nov. 4… Tryon’s first paid fire chief, Michael Coggins, is coming back to work for the Ashvegas Fire Department, where he worked before he went down to Polk County…