By DUANE SHERRILL / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard A 60-person docket was heard Thursday by General Sessions Judge Larry Ross in General Sessions Traffic Court.Included in court action: Kimberly Lowry was bound over to the grand jury on charges of possession of meth and drug paraphernalia. Jessica Crusinberry was issued a six-month probationary…

By DUANE SHERRILL / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard Accused of beating and choking his girlfriend, a man charged with domestic violence claimed Tuesday the marks on his girlfriend’s neck were not from an altercation but were instead hickeys.“They were hickeys,” Silverio T. Hernandez told General Sessions Judge Larry Ross in his own defense…

By DUANE SHERRILL / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard The father of a 6-week-old toddler who died under mysterious circumstances has been sentenced to 15 years in prison, joining the baby’s grandmother who is already serving 15 years for the child’s death.The defendant, Jesus T. Hernandez, 23, entered a no-contest plea before Circuit Court…

NASHVILLE, Tenn. Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. ? Members of a legislative committee say they want to see more initiatives addressing the behavior of students to prevent violence in Tennessee schools. The Select Committee on Children and Youth heard testimony Friday from…

TO THE EDITOR: I have a real problem with the new and so-called holiday trees. Christmas was always, and still is, a celebration of the birth of Christ.Where do we draw the line here? We no longer allow prayer in our schools and now we’re to teach our children and grandchildren it’s not a Christmas…

To the Editor: It must be a really slow news day when a political stunt performed by a looney left-wing political group such as Moveon.org commands front page, above-the-fold headlines in the Southern Standard newspaper.For those who are not familiar with this group, Moveon.org (more appropriately called can’t Moveon.org) is a Bush-hating, American-foreign-policy bashing, out-of-the-mainstream,…

By TOM RAUM / Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON ? In President Bush’s first term, the Republican congressional leadership stood solidly behind him at every turn, delivering on tax cuts, authorization for the Iraq war, homeland security and Medicare overhaul. That GOP discipline is clearly gone now. Neither House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., nor Senate Majority…

By RON FOURNIER / AP Political Writer WASHINGTON ? Given a free hand after the Sept. 11 attacks, President Bush followed the uncertain footsteps of Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, John Adams and other past presidents who made civil liberties the first casualty of war. Eavesdropping without warrants, redefining torture, building loopholes into the Geneva Conventions…

By Gene Lyons / Columnist The Associated Press recently administered a political I.Q. test, and 61 percent of the American public flunked. Needless to say, they didn’t call it that. “Poll Finds Broad Approval of Terrorist Torture,” the headline read. More than three out of five Americans surveyed “agreed (that) torture is justified at least…

By Thomas Vaughn / Columnist “Grief drives men to reflection, sharpens the understanding, and softens the heart.” These words from President John Adams comfort me now, as I grapple with the loss of my lovely wife, Nancy.Ours was not a perfect marriage, due more to my shortcomings than any of hers. Still, it was a…