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A corrections officer with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department has been suspended from the job and is now facing charges in connection with a prison contraband case. Twenty seven year old Janice O'Dell was arrested Thursday and charged after a grand jury heard the case. O'Dell is is charged with two counts of promoting prison contraband in the first degree, one count of second degree promoting prison contraband, one count official misconduct. Sheriff John Burns says O'Dell has been suspended from her position since May 17.

10:45 AM

One person is dead and one other person was injured following a one vehicle accident involving a pickup truck Thursday afternoon in the Town of Theresa. Police say the two were riding in the bed of the truck just after 3pm on County Route 21 when the truck overturned, throwing the two out of the vehicle. The fatality is that of male who died at Samaritan Medical Center. The other individual, a female, was flown to Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse. Their names have not been released.

10:44 AM

Watertown City Police are investigating a hit and run accident that occurred last evening. The incident happened at around 9:30 pm at the intersection of Washington and Clinton Streets. A motorcycle being ridden by a male and female was struck by blue Eclipse convertible, which drove off. Two men were reportedly in the vehicle. The two victims were taken to Samaritan Medical Center for treatment of unspecified injuries.

10:43 AM

A Chaumont man has been sentenced for seriously injuring an infant in Three Mile Bay in March of last year. Thirty three year old Kelly Keegan was sentenced to 25 years in state prison during his sentencing Thursday in Jefferson County Court, followed by five years of post release supervision. He was convicted in March of this year by a jury of first, second, and third degree assault, as well as endangering the welfare of a child and reckless assault against a child. Keegan was accused of assaulting 11 month old Kate Cawvey, causing serious brain injuries leaving the little girl blind. She is the daughter of Keegan's ex-girlfriend.

10:42 AM

The majority of people here in Jefferson County feel the overall quality of life here is good, but there are concerns in some areas. Specifically education and housing. That according to the 13th annual Survey of the Community, released Thursday night by the Center for Community Studies at JCC. Overall, people find the quality of life here pretty good, with 84% of respondents rating it as getting better or staying the same. One concern is housing. Two out of five residents say the housing situation is getting worse. When it comes to education, the number of people who felt the quality of K-12 education as getting worse was at it's highest rate ever in the history of the study at 20%. Residents also indicated by a 30-1 ratio that state cuts were more likely to make things worse. The complete survey is available online through JCC's website.

10:42 AM

The state legislative session wrapping up on Thursday yielded good news for a handful of employees of the Jefferson County Industrial Development Agency who had their pensions removed by Comptroller Tom DiNinapoli earlier this year. Both the Senate and Assembly have passed a bill that would restore the benefits to the 12 employees who had them stripped away. The controversy is over whether or not the 12 are eligible for the benefits. The bill initially faces some opposition in the Assembly at the urging of the CSEA. The union backed off on that opposition when the bill was modified to restore the benefits through August of this year. The bill now needs Governor Cuomo's signature.

10:41 AM

Lawmakers in Albany have passed Governor Cuomo's bill that limits disclosure of teacher evaluations. The state Senate and Assembly have both approved the bill, which will allow only parents to see evaluations by name and only for their own kids' teachers. Under the bill, any evaluations released to the general public will have teacher names redacted. The state teachers' union had been fighting any release of teacher names and evaluations to the general public.

10:40 AM

From the "how was this ever allowed in the first place?" file, New York inmates are no longer allowed to receive mail that contains maps that could help them escape from prison. State corrections officials have updated rules that now prohibit maps "that could aid in an inmate's escape from a correctional facility" from being allowed to get to inmates behind bars. Incredibly, escape maps had not been barred from prisoners until this week.

10:39 AM

Police in Greece say a school bus monitor who was verbally abused by four middle school students does not want to press charges. A cell phone video that has gone viral shows the students verbally abusing 68-year-old Karen Klein for ten minutes earlier this week. Police Captain Steve Chatterton said at a news conference Thursday that Klein has told police she is confident the Greece Central School District will discipline the students involved appropriately. He said the police investigation of the bullying incident will continue as the harassment included threats to physically harm Klein.

10:39 AM

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