CRIME

During a City Commission meeting on Tuesday, Mayor Scott Decker argued in favor of increasing the sales tax as part of a plan to provide property tax relief while boosting funding to various municipal projects.

In a better sort of world, where politicians and activists and social media rubberneckers were capable of a modicum of empathy and rational thought, we might have waited for facts that might support the conclusion before turning Ellingson's death into a political talking point. Sadly, we don't live in that world.

This is a situation that deserves better than the hot takes we're getting from Twitter demagogues and cable news creeps.

Kevin A. Dvorak, 35, of Dickinson faces 26 felony charges and is being held on $100,000 bond for allegedly possessing child pornography. He is also accused of peering into a bedroom window to watch and record a child undress.

Court papers say 41-year-old Shannon Brandt confessed to a 911 dispatcher and police that he killed 18-year-old Cayler Ellingson due to a political dispute.

Dean Hatzenbuehler and Daniel Grainger were arrested Monday by state parole and probation officers.

Joseph Bullins, 23, appeared in Southwest District Court on Monday for a preliminary hearing on charges of attempted murder for his alleged admission to shooting his roommate in July.

North Dakota's rate of violent crime — a category that includes murder, manslaughter, rape and assault — rose by 10.1% from 2020 to 2021, despite the number of murders falling by almost half to 17, according to an annual report.

Austin Edward Johnson Green was arrested Tuesday and charged with promoting obscenities to a minor.