Green Bay News

GREEN BAY  – With so much of our information online, including credit card numbers and social security numbers, it could take a thief just a few clicks to capture it all.

“The amount of fraud that we see as the result of breaches is incredible these days,” said Karen Carew, chief financial officer for Capitol Credit Union in Ashwaubenon. And Carew added the problem is only going to get worse.

Capitol is in the business of helping people financially.

“It seems you’re always a half step behind the bad guys and the best approach is to make sure you’re monitoring your accounts,” said Carew.

Holly Krause of Green Bay first realized she was a victim of identity theft last summer.

Wisconsin’s Department of Workforce Development paid out an unemployment claim in Krause’s name, before discovering Krause was gainfully employed and never filed a claim.

“I had contacted my banks and at that time put the 90 day alert through the credit bureaus,” said Krause.

There are three credit bureaus that gather information from financial institutions, to monitor and establish your credit score. When an identity breach occurs, the IRS recommends you contact the credit bureaus. For a fee they can monitor activity on your accounts–even freeze your numbers to prevent unauthorized use.

“It’s a lot cheaper and faster than dealing with all the issues you need to deal with once your identity has been stolen,” said Jose Munoz, IRS spokesman.

Krause’s credit bureau protection ran out last Fall, only to have her identity stolen again.  This time someone filed a tax return in her name.

“The fact that I work hard and they get access to my information and can do whatever they want to mess up my life financially it was like devastating,” said Krause.

So through no fault of her own, Krause is now paying $17 a month for fraud protection through the credit bureaus.

Recently Anthem Blue Cross suffered a cyber attack, leaving customer data potentially vulnerable. Anthem offered to pay for credit monitoring and identity theft protection of potential victims for two years.

But Carew says for one’s protection long-term that’s not enough.

“They’re trying to cover for their breach,” said Carew. “However if you want to protect yourself from other breaches that occur that’s just an ongoing process.”

Capitol Credit Union has joined the many companies that offer credit and fraud protection at a cost.  The recommendation is to get it before you have a problem.

You can click here to see if your 2014 tax return was filed.

For more information on identity protection and victim assistance, click here.

Seymour clinched the Bay Conference title Tuesday night with a 57-55 win over West De Pere.

Junior Alex Schuh talked about his team’s big win.

West De Pere visited Seymour in a Bay Conference boys basketball game Tuesday.

Seymour won, 57-55.

TOWN OF VINLAND – The Upriver Lakes portion of the 2015 sturgeon spearing season is over.

It took five days this year, instead of three last year.

The season on Lake Poygan, Lake Winneconne and Lake Butte des Morts closed Wednesday afternoon with the spearing of 288 fish.

152 more fish were harvested from Lake Winnebago Wednesday, bringing the season total just on Winnebago to 1,447.

Spearing experts believe Friday or Saturday will be the final day on Winnebago.

They are 146 adult females from the harvest cap.

And it has been a cold five days.

So how have those working at the 11 registration stations throughout the Winnebago system been coping with the cold?

The windchill Wednesday morning was around -20 at registration station number 12 near Neenah.

“The weather has been challenging. It’s been very cold,” said Scott Bunde, D.N.R. Fisheries Technician.

Bunde and his D.N.R. crew at Payne’s Point have been outside for days, processing hundreds of sturgeon.

“It’s the wind, that really eats at you, and tends to freeze these fish very fast,” said Bunde.

“When they bring the fish in, we have to measure them, and if they’re shaped like a boomerang, it hard to get a good measurement on them,” he said.

Bunde says the weather is tough on the equipment too.

“It’s kind of like cutting into a four by four when they’re froze solid,” he said.

But there was a place to warm up. During down times, crews huddled inside the registration station.

“We kind of switch jobs between staying in the shack, and going inside,” said Dan Nelson, D.N.R. Fisheries Technician.

Nelson recorded data from inside the heated shack, but he still bundled up.

“Gloves, long underwear, under armor, whatever you got. Thick coats, hats, gloves,” said Nelson.

And it’s been windy since opening day on Saturday.

“Visibility, drifting, the snow, and the way the roads were plowed kind of made an ideal place for the snow to drift in, which caused more people to get stuck,” said Bunde.

“The wind was gusting pretty good. I thought I was going to lose some panels for a while, but we managed,” said Brad Beattie, Menasha.

Beattie managed to get his first sturgeon Wednesday.

So did Casey Kostechka.

“First one I’ve ever gotten in seven years. Saw one earlier this morning, didn’t throw. This one came through, so threw at this one and got lucky,” said Casey Kostechka, Winchester.

Bunde and his crew processed fish for six hours Wednesday. Depending on the season harvest, they expect to be back again, on Thursday.

Workers say they know working in the cold comes with the territory.

They say they will be relived when the season is over.

ASHWAUBENON – Temperatures in Ashwaubenon Wednesday struggled to get above zero, and wind chills remained close to 20 below zero– far from ideal outdoor work conditions.

While some people try to avoid being outside when it gets this cold, others don’t have a choice.

That’s the case for a crew of workers upgrading gas lines near the corner of Cormier Road and Holmgren Way for Wisconsin Public Service.

There’s work to be done, bitter cold or not.

Rob Harteau, a Gas Distribution Mechanic for WPS working on this project, says, “This time of the year we try to avoid some of this, it makes it a little more difficult. But we run ‘em year-round… It’s the kind of weather we need to work in once in a while and we just get ‘er done.”

Because this project shut down a lane on Holmgren way, they couldn’t wait for the extreme cold to ease before finishing it.

The ground was so hard they needed a jackhammer in place of a shovel.

But believe it or not, this isn’t the weather that bothers them most.

“During the summer we still need to be fully layered because of the commodity, so I can’t break down to shorts and a tank top, that’s not the way we can work. So there are times in the summer it’s too warm to work, where at least in the winter you can dress for it,” says Harteau.

Even with today’s cold, Harteau says this winter hasn’t been as bad as last winter.

And with even colder weather expected for Thursday, they’re plenty motivated to finish this project sooner rather than later.

According to Harteau, the cold today was close to the point where they won’t work on non-essential projects.

But in emergency situations, he says there’s no weather that would prevent that work getting done.

WASHINGTON (AP) – Muslims in the U.S. and around the world have a responsibility to fight a misconception that terrorist groups like the Islamic State speak for them, President Barack Obama said Wednesday in his most direct remarks about any link between Islam and terrorism.

For weeks, the White House has sidestepped the question of whether deadly terror attacks in Paris and other Western cities amount to “Islamic extremism,” wary of offending a major world religion or lending credence to the “war on terror” that his predecessor waged. But as he hosted a White House summit on countering violent extremism, Obama said some in Muslim communities have bought into the notion that Islam is incompatible with tolerance and modern life.

“We are not at war with Islam,” Obama said. “We are at war with people who have perverted Islam.”

While putting the blame on IS and similar groups – Obama said the militants masquerade as religious leaders but are really terrorists – the president also appealed directly on prominent Muslims to do more to distance themselves from brutal ideologies. He said all individuals have a duty to “speak up very clearly” in opposition to violence against innocent people.

“Just as leaders like myself reject the notion that terrorists like ISIL genuinely represent Islam, Muslim leaders need to do more than merely discredit the notion that our nations are determined to suppress Islam,” Obama said.

GREEN BAY – A Green Bay man is now charged in what investigators have called the most disturbing child porn case Brown County has ever seen.

62-year-old John Beauchamp is facing 20 counts of child porn possession.

Investigators say he had 7,446 child porn images. They say the images are primarily of children younger than 3 years old.

According to a criminal complaint, Beauchamp told sheriff’s deputies he refers to himself as “Baby Emily.”

Beauchamp told deputies he watches child porn in “his nursery,” which is a room decorated with dolls and baby clothes in his basement.

Deputies say they are still investigating whether Beauchamp had any inappropriate physical contact with children.

In court this afternoon, his bond was doubled to $10,000.

FOX 11’s Ben Krumholz will have more on this story on FOX 11 News at Nine.

Some Northeast Wisconsin tribes are among 11 in the state that in line to receive money for affordable housing.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced Wednesday that it is giving more than $651 million to 636 tribes across the country.

The funds primarily benefit low-income families living on Indian reservations or in other American Indian communities. The amount of each grant is based on a formula that considers local needs and housing units under management by the tribe or designated entity.

The money includes $3.6 million for the Oneida Tribe of Indians of Wisconsin, $2.6 million for the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin, $515,496 for the Stockbridge-Munsee Community of Wisconsin and $355,788 for the Forest County Potawatomi Community of Wisconsin.

• Click here for the complete list

As the Obama Administration focuses on the future in how to deal with the Islamic State, a former CIA officer said Wednesday it may help to start first by looking at the past.

“The U.S. invasion of Iraq simply destroyed the country and its infrastructure and its ruling elite,” said Graham Fuller, a former C.I.A. officer who served more than two decades in the Middle East.

“As a result the country has been in chaos ever since,” he added.

Fuller said that chaos has made for fertile ground for the growth of ISIS.  Many members of the group are Iraqi citizens who felt betrayed and shunned by former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a U.S. backed leader.  Many others hold personal grudges against the west because of the decade-long occupation in their country.

“When people at a very young age have their families, their lives demolished and nothing for them to go for then they fall prey to this kind of ideology,” said Faheem Younus, with the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.

And it’s not just Iraq.  An unstable Libya also now has pockets of the country overrun by those faithful to the Islamic State.

In 2011, U.S. forces are believed to have assisted in removing former leader, Col. Muammar Gaddafi, from power.

U.S. and allied forces also spent weeks in the country afterward entangled in war.

“I’m not saying that Gaddafi should have stayed but when we move in and really tear the country apart, we cannot be surprised that all kinds of forces come out of the wood work,” Fuller said.

The mass beheading of Egyptian Christians over the weekend took place on a Libyan beach.

MOSINEE, Wis. (AP) – Investigators believe smoke detectors were not working when a house fire in Mosinee killed a brother and sister last week.

It’s unclear why 68-year-old Neatha Carwile and her 75-year-old brother, Hershel “Fred” Bauman, were unable to escape the fire. But Mosinee Fire District Chief Josh Klug tells Daily Herald Media that Bauman had physical limitations that might have made it difficult for him to get out.

Klug says Carwile was at the duplex caring for Bauman when the fire broke out Thursday.

Investigators don’t know yet what caused the fire but believe it began in the kitchen.

Police say two adults and their grandchild who were in the lower apartment of the duplex were able to escape safely.

Watch live streaming video of President Obama talk at the White House Summit on battling violent extremism.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – Newly released reports show who spent the most money lobbying in the Wisconsin Legislature last session.

The Government Accountability Board reported Wednesday that Wisconsin Taxpayers Inc. spent the most at $1.5 million on lobbying over the two-year session. That is somewhat misleading, however, because most of the membership-based group’s spending went to pay for field workers who traveled the state to promote its lower-taxes agenda.

The statewide chamber of commerce, Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, spent the second-most at nearly $1.2 million with the Wisconsin Hospital Association not far behind at $1.1 million.

Overall, the $57.5 million spent on lobbying was down about 9 percent from the nearly $63 million spent in the previous two-year session.

The number of hours spent lobbying dropped nearly 13 percent.

See how the Redwood Inn in Green Bay prepares a perch plate for their Friday Night fish fry.

(CNN) – No one wants to face the idea of their own mortality, but last week Facebook made users do just that, giving the new option of choosing someone to maintain their profile after they die. The question of what happens to our virtual presence after death is becoming more of a real-life concern.

Some described it as creepy, but others had asked for it for a long time. Last week, Facebook started giving the option to select a friend or family member as a “legacy contact” who can post information to a page, respond to friend requests, and update a profile photo, in the event of a user’s death.

Professor Naomi Cahn of the George Washington University Law School says it’s a good prompt to get millions of users thinking about an increasingly important question: what happens to any of our digital assets after we’re gone?

“Such a large part of our lives is lived online and we think that we will be able to manage them forever. We can’t, and it does make sense for people to start being proactive,” Cahn said.

Cahn says a good starting point is to make a list of every account and every password, especially things like domain names that could have value, just like items in a will.

“Take an inventory. Keep track of precisely what you have stored and where it’s stored, and on which device you have actually stored it as well as whether it is all stored in the cloud,”

It’s all still an evolving space in the legal world. Each online service provider has a terms of service agreement, and many right now say accounts aren’t transferable and passwords shouldn’t be shared.

So when tech companies make it easy to navigate the process – like Facebook, or Google’s “Inactive Account Manager,” tool, take advantage. Cahn says the rest will likely have to follow suit.

SHEBOYGAN – A former alderman charged with repeated sexual assault of a child was ordered Wednesday to stand trial.

Kevin Matichek pleaded not guilty Wednesday, according to online court records.

A plea hearing is scheduled for May 4, with a May 20 trial date if the case is not resolved.

According to the criminal complaint, the boy told investigators the two had sex in Matichek’s car and Matichek’s bedroom at his mother’s Sheboygan home, where he lives, from June through September of 2014.

Matichek resigned from the city council after charges were filed.

GREEN BAY – Statements a man suspected of possessing ricin made before being read his Miranda rights will be allowed at trial, a federal judge ruled.

Kyle Smith, 21, faces two counts: knowingly developing and possessing ricin for use as a weapon, and having ricin not in its naturally occurring form and not for a reasonable purpose. The first count carries maximum penalty of life in prison, while the second count has a maximum penalty of ten years in prison.

According to a criminal complaint, Oshkosh police and the Wisconsin National Guard found 1 1/2 grams of ricin in Smith’s apartment on Halloween.

Smith’s attorney argued statements Smith gave police before being read his rights should not be allowed at trial. But at the hearing Tuesday, federal Judge William Griesbach disagreed.

“The Court finds that this case is one that does fit with in the public safety exception. The Court is satisfied that the officers acted in good faith, reasonably and with a real concern for public safety. The officers initial questioning of the defendant was perfectly lawful under the public safety exception, Mr. Smith was properly in custody. The Court finds no violation of Miranda and so the motion to suppress will be denied,” states the court minutes.

Trial is scheduled for March 16.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services says more than 200,000 people in Wisconsin selected health plans on the federal marketplace in the second year of open enrollment under the Affordable Care Act.

That is an increase of about 58 percent from the 130,000 Wisconsin residents who enrolled in the first year.

The department reported Wednesday that 205,839 Wisconsinites chose a plan or were automatically re-enrolled for existing plans. The open enrollment period came to a close Sunday.

The online marketplace is meant for people who aren’t covered by employer-offered insurance plans or government programs, such as Medicare or BadgerCare, the state’s Medicaid program. The marketplace offers subsidized private insurance for single people earning about $47,000 or less per year and families with incomes of up to $128,000.

CHICAGO (AP) – Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said Wednesday that “there were mistakes made in Iraq” during his brother’s administration, offering the critique during a wide-ranging speech on foreign policy that comes as part of his run-up to a likely presidential campaign.

Speaking to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, Bush said during a question-and-answer session after his speech that intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s possession of weapons of mass destruction was not accurate, and the U.S. initially failed to create an environment of security in the country after removing the Iraqi leader from power.

But Bush praised former President George W. Bush’s decision to “surge” troops into Iraq in 2007, which added roughly 20,000 troops to the American forces in the country in an effort to improve security. He called it “one of the most historic acts of courage politically” of any president.

The surge was “hugely successful,” Bush said, and it created a “a fragile but more stable situation” in Iraq that President Barack Obama could have built on during his term in office.

Bush offered harsh words for Obama’s foreign policy during the speech, calling his administration “inconsistent and indecisive” and one that has led the U.S. to lose “the trust and the confidence of our friends.”

“The great irony of the Obama presidency is this: Someone who came to office promising greater engagement with the world has left America less influential in the world,” Bush said.

Bush acknowledged during the speech that his views about America’s place in the world will often be compared with those of his brother and father, former President George H.W. Bush, adding he is “lucky” to have had family members who have “shaped America’s foreign policy from the Oval Office.”

“But I am my own man – and my views are shaped by my own thinking and own experiences,” he said. “Each president learns from those who came before – their principles, their adjustments.”

The older Bush brother finished his second term in 2009 amid an unpopular war in Iraq, an economy in freefall and with a majority of Americans disapproving of his job performance.

Among donors, Jeb Bush has noted a strong family and religious bond with his older brother, but has also said they are not clones and have differences common among siblings.

Ahead of the speech, Bush aides also released what they called a preliminary group of experts who will provide him with foreign policy advice. They included familiar names, such as James Baker III and George Shultz, both secretaries of State under President Ronald Reagan; former Homeland Security secretaries Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, all three of whom served under George W. Bush.

The list also included some lesser-known names, such as Meghan O’Sullivan, a former national security adviser to George W. Bush, who now teaches at Harvard and is seen as key to Jeb Bush’s idea of lessening U.S. dependence on Middle East energy.

Bush aides also confirmed late Tuesday that former Minnesota Rep. Vin Weber, a senior policy aide to 2012 GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, was advising Bush.

INDIANAPOLIS — Two of the NFC North’s top tackles came from the University of Iowa in Bryan Bulaga and Riley Reiff. Another hoping to join that lineage is former Hawkeye Andrew Donnal. The 6’7 lineman knows Bulaga, Green Bay’s free agent to be at right tackle. The Packers feature several Iowa products, including defensive lineman Mike Daniels and defensive back Micah Hyde.

Have you met with the Packers?
I had an informal interview with the Packers yesterday, I think it went well.

What did they ask about?
Just real general stuff, just kind of got to know who I am.

What are you like as a lineman?
I’m a versatile player, I think that’s one of my strengths. I can do both sides, left, right, guard, tackle, kind of whatever. I’ve tried to amke that pretty clear, I’m willing to do whatever.

Why have Iowa lineman been so successful in the NFL?
Coach Ferentz considers Iowa’s program a developmental program. A lot of the times, Iowa doesn’t get the big 4- or 5-star recruits. What they do a really good job of is developing players. Making sure that they’re fundamentally sound, solid technicians and students of the game. A lot of the guys that are at Iowa really don’t have the tangibles, height, weight or strength. A lot are really good, sound technicians and know the game inside and out.

UPPER ARLINGTON, Ohio (AP) — Too busy to stop in for an Ash Wednesday service? Some churches plan to offer drive-by ashes.

Clergy at Advent Evangelical Lutheran Church in Upper Arlington, Ohio, planned to apply ash to the foreheads of anyone who stopped in the parking lot of the church from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wednesday.

It’s the first time the church has offered the drive-by service, said the Rev. Aaron Layne. The congregation supports it, he told The Columbus Dispatch, although some comments on Facebook criticized him for cheapening the observance that marks the beginning of Lent for Christians.

Layne reasoned that it could be a first step back for some people who haven’t been to church in years.

Other churches have also taken more informal approaches to Ash Wednesday. The “Ashes to Go” movement began in 2007 with ashes given to some 100 passers-by outside a coffeehouse in Missouri, the Rev. Teresa K.M. Danieley of St. John’s Episcopal Church in St. Louis wrote on the “Ashes to Go” website.

The practice has since spread, and the website lists quick ash distribution services in more than 30 states and in several countries.

St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Ashtabula, Ohio, also planned to offer ashes at a downtown park Wednesday, The Star-Beacon in Ashtabula reported. Like Advent Evangelical Lutheran Church, the service would be a first for the northeast Ohio church.

Both churches also planned traditional evening services with ash distribution.