A Seymour grandmother shot her grandson, then killed herself last night, according to police.

The Seymour Tribune newspaper is reporting that 68-year-old Wanda Huber was pronounced dead at her South Walnut Street home last night. Police told the newspaper that she shot herself after shooting her 16-year-old grandson. The boy was flown to University of Louisville Hospital with critical injuries

Police were called to the 1700 block of South Walnut Street in Seymour shortly after 5 yesterday evening. That is near the Seymour Community School Corporation building.

Police told the newspaper that Huber’s gun was recovered at the scene.

Click for more information at tribtown.com

Three teenagers are facing charges related to a string of arson cases in the area of Paris Crossing and Montgomery Township.

On Friday, the Jennings County Sheriff’s Department and investigators from the Indiana State Fire Marshall’s Office served a search warrant at a home in Montgomery Township. During the course of the investigation, authorities say three suspects were identified as being involved with stealing property, then setting the fires.

Taylor S. Corya and Tristan McDonald, both age 18, are facing preliminary charges of Arson, Burglary and Theft. A 17-year-old boy was also arrested at a different location in Montgomery Township. He was transported to the Bartholomew County Youth Services Center and is also charged with Arson and Burglary.

A Columbus teen is fighting for his life after a Sunday night crash in Bartholomew County. At approximately 6:30 p.m., deputies responded to the two-vehicle crash at the intersection of E CR100 S and S CR650 E. The driver, 19-year-old Philip Artis, was flown to IU Health Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. Artis’s condition is unknown at this time. The driver of the second vehicle, 33-year-old Aaron Klene, of North Vernon, was not hurt.

A witness told deputies that Artis was driving southbound on 650 E when he failed to stop at the intersection of 650 E and 100 S. The witness also reported that Klene tried to avoid the collision, but was unable to do so.

Four Bartholomew County librarians have been selected to attend a public innovators lab in Indianapolis this spring.

The Harwood Public Innovators Lab is meant to help libraries turn their focus outward, to use the community, not the conference room, as the reference point for choices and actions. Fifteen libraries across the state were chosen to participate based on their intent to more deeply engage with the communities.

Sandy Allman, Angela Eck, Dakota Hall, and Kelly Kennedy are attending from the Bartholomew County Public Library. The March workshop is being held at Indiana Wesleyan University in Indianapolis and the Midwest Collaborative for Library Services will be covering the costs.

Columbus Regional Health is reevaluating its plans for the former Holiday Inn and Clarion hotel property on Jonathan Moore Pike.

The hospital bought the hotel property with the intention of developing medical facilities on the west side of Columbus, but now that it is purchasing a large tract of farm land on the same side of the city, the entire hotel property is not seen as a necessity for the hospital’s future operations, says Kelsey DeClue, spokeswoman for CRH.

The hospital is buying farmland stretching from Garden City almost to the Interstate, DeClue said. Hospital officials expect to use 90 to 150 acres for medical uses and to make the rest open for development.

DeClue said there is no timeline yet on what might happen with the former hotel property. All of the hospital’s plans on the west side of Columbus are looking five to 15 years into the future, she said.

The hotel property is now piled high with concrete rubble. DeClue explains that the rubble came from the Interstate 65 project and will be used to lift the property out of the flood plain, making it usable for future development.

The former hotel property floods easily with any significant rainfall in the area.

State Rep. Jim Lucas is asking his constituents to take a survey to help set legislative priorities.

he Seymour Republican’s district includes parts of Bartholomew, Jackson, Jennings and Jefferson counties in southeastern Indiana.

He said that constituents’ input would help help him to serve as their voice during the session which started this week. The survey asks constituents to weigh in on education, medical marijuana, punishment for repeat overdose victims revived with Narcan and other issues.

You can find the survey here.

An 18-year-old Columbus man died in an accident last night in rural Bartholomew County and a passenger in the vehicle was flown to an Indianapolis trauma center.

18-year-old Kyle N. Hall was driving northbound on County Road 250E, just north of County Road 275S at about 8 p.m. Thursday night according to Indiana State Police, when he lost control of the vehicle, it went off the road and rolled several times ejecting him from the vehicle according to firefighters.

He was taken to Columbus Regional Hospital where he died from his injuries. Hall’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the chest and pelvic area, according to Bartholomew County Coroner Clayton Nolting.

A passenger, 18-year-old Lilly E. Hall was also ejected from the vehicle and she suffered serious injuries. She was flown by Lifeline helicopter to IU Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis.

The accident remains under investigation.

Assisting troopers at the scene were Bartholomew County Sheriff’s Department, Columbus Regional Hospital paramedics, Columbus Township Fire and Rescue, Elizabethtown Fire Department, and Bartholomew County Coroner’s Office.

Two Bartholomew County deputies are being recognized for their life-saving actions to rescue a man from a burning home in Elizabethtown two months ago.

The Elizabethtown Volunteer Fire Department recognized deputies Andrew Dougan and Robert A. Cooper last night according to the sheriff’s department.

The deputies crawled along the floor through heavy smoke to pull the man from the burning home on November 6th. Sheriff Matt Myers said that the department and the community are fortunate to have both men working to protect and serve the residents. He said the two reflected the highest standards of excellence in public safety.

The Yellow Trail Museum in Hope will be holding its annual meeting on January 14th, featuring a special program by members of the Indiana Postal History Society.

They will talk about the history of rural mail carriers in the Hope area. Hope was one of two sites in the U.S. that pioneered the idea of rural mail delivery in 1896, and has had continuous rural mail delivery since then.

The town of Hope used to have a museum on the Town Square dedicated to rural mail carriers but that was torn down in 2014. There is some movement in the town to create a new museum dedicated to that history.

Dinner is $10 and the meeting will start at 6 p.m. on Jan. 14th at Willow Leaves of Hope on the north side of the Hope Town Square. Reservations are requested by Monday, Jan. 7th.

A Greencastle man is under arrest, accused of fleeing from Indiana State Police after an attempted traffic stop on Interstate 65 in Bartholomew County early Thursday morning.

State police report that they tried to stop a speeding vehicle heading southbound just south of the Columbus exit at about 12:25 a.m. Thursday morning, but the driver sped away.

Seymour police dropped a tire-deflating device in front of the vehicle at U.S. 50 and the vehicle came to a stop a few miles down the highway.

Troopers report that the vehicle was not properly registered and the driver, 39-year-old Richard Romandine III, had a suspended license. A search of the car also revealed marijuana and drug paraphernalia, police report.

Romandine was arrested on preliminary charges of resisting law enforcement in a vehicle, reckless driving, driving while suspended, possession of marijuana, and possession of drug paraphernalia. Additional charges are possible, police say.