Gazette Daily News Podcast, August 30

It's going to be sunny all week, but Tuesday will be a little cooler than days to come. According to the National Weather Service it will be sunny with a high near 80 degrees in the Cedar Rapids area on Tuesday. It will also be breezy, with a wind of 10 to 20 mph gusting as high as 30 mph. On Tuesday night it will be clear, with a low of around 57 degrees and a calmer wind.

In an unexpected turn, a Cedar Rapids man told a judge he wanted to plead guilty Monday to robbing a cabdriver who was fatally stabbed during the crime in 2011. The plea came before trial testimony was to begin.

Johnathan Mitchell, 44, started talking to his lawyer, Chad Frese, near the end of the jury instructions on Monday. Frese requested a sidebar — a private discussion with lawyers and U.S. District Chief Judge Leonard Strand.

Strand excused the jury for a break, and Frese said Mitchell wanted to plead guilty to robbery affecting commerce, as charged. He said Mitchell, who has been found incompetent off and on since 2016, was competent and he had actively helped in his defense during preparation for this trial.

This case has been pending for six years, mostly due to Mitchell being found incompetent when he refused to take antipsychotic medications prescribed by prison doctors.

On Monday, Mitchell admitted he robbed Catherine Ann Boyle Stickley, 54, of Cedar Rapids, on April 29, 2011. He also admitted to taking cash, a purse and money bag from her during the robbery.

Mitchell didn’t admit to stabbing Stickley 18 times, as a medical examiner determined. The fact that Stickley died as a result of the robbery will be a sentencing issue and could impact the sentencing guideline for Mitchell, who faces up to 20 years in federal prison, Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Reinert said after the plea hearing.

Iowa organizations encouraging alternatives to abortion may see increased demand for their services if abortion laws change. However, the $500,000 in state funding the Legislature allocated to expand these services is not yet available and new abortion restrictions may come first.

The Legislature passed the “More Options for Maternal Support” (MOMS) program into law earlier this year, appropriating $500,000 toward funding nonprofit organizations that encourage alternatives to abortion. These organizations, often called pregnancy centers, provide services such as pregnancy and adoption counseling for expecting and new parents.

Program funds have not been distributed yet. Alex Carfrae, a public information officer with the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services, said the goal was to have services in place before the start of the next fiscal year. The next fiscal year starts July 1, 2023.

Abortion still is legal in Iowa, but the U.S. and state supreme courts decided this summer that the medical procedure is not protected under the federal or state constitution. These decisions opened the doors for legislation and court challenges seeking to restrict abortion in the state.

As it stands, abortions are banned in Iowa after 20 weeks of pregnancy, except in cases where the mother’s life is at risk. Gov. Kim Reynolds is hoping to bring that timeframe down to six weeks. Earlier this month, the governor’s attorneys filed a court brief asking an Iowa judge to lift an injunction blocking enforcement of the so-called fetal heartbeat law. The decision could come within weeks.

According to the Associated Press, a fuel leak and then an engine problem during final liftoff preparations led NASA to call off the launch of its mighty new moon rocket Monday on a shakedown flight with three test dummies aboard.

The next launch attempt will not take place until Friday at the earliest and could be off until next month.

The rocket was set to lift off on a mission to propel a crew capsule into orbit around the moon, bringing the U.S. a big step closer to putting astronauts back on the lunar surface for the first time since the Apollo program ended 50 years ago.

The 322-foot spaceship is the most powerful rocket ever built by NASA, more powerful even than the Saturn V that the Apollo astronauts rode.

The launch, when it happens, will be the first flight in NASA’s 21st-century moon-exploration program, named Artemis after Apollo’s mythological twin sister.