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Elderly man shoots

Elderly man shoots

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ARKADELPHIA — Authorities in southwest Arkansas say an 85-year-old man fatally shot his adult son after mistaking him for an intruder at his home.

The Clark County Sheriff’s Office says the shooting happened early Wednesday in Arkadelphia, about 60 miles (95 kilometers) southwest of Little Rock. The sheriff’s office says 45-year-old Scott Copeland had a single gunshot wound to the chest, and he was pronounced dead at a hospital.

The sheriff’s office says Copeland was trying to enter the home of his father, Curtis Copeland. Sheriff Jason Watson says the elder Copeland was holding a gun because he thought his home was being broken into, and the gun accidentally discharged.

According to Little Rock TV station KLRT, Watson says the shooting appears to be a “pure accident.”

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NORTH LITTLE ROCK — If you take on a residential project that will pay you over $2,000, you had better have a contractor’s license.

If not, you may find yourself in the hot seat before a state board.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse as we watched contractor after contractor lose their license or, if they were unlicensed, get his with hefty fines.

For more than a decade James Carvill was accused of taking thousands of dollars from customers in exchange for restoring their decks only to do little or no work.

Now a Sherwood woman is accusing him of the same thing.

Carvill failed to show for the hearing and the board voted to fine him $2,800 for doing work for seven days without a contractor’s license. Another rogue contractor, Greg Pectol, was also a noshow.

The board voted to fine him nearly $25,000 after six Arkansas citizens filed complaints against him.

Pectol has bigger problems in his future after agreeing to plead guilty to federal charges of mail fraud.

Complaints about Eric Holmes go back 20 years. But it is a complaint filed earlier this year that has him in hot water with the contractors licensing board.

Holmes called and asked that his appearance before the board be continued until January.

“We regularly offer continuances,” said Birkett Wootton with the Arkansas Contractors Licensing Board. “The first continuance, pretty much, if there’s a reason we’ll give you the continuance. Beyond that we need to know a reason and what is going on.”

Two other questionable contractors, Howard Gene Hickman and John Malone, have also drawn the ACB’s attention.

Three Jacksonville homeowners are accusing Hickman of taking money to repair their roofs and then doing no work or poor work. And Malone has complaints filed against him as well.

The board is currently focused on residential complaints, but plans to take a look at commercial contractors in the near future.

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LITTLE ROCK — Last Monday’s tornado count in Arkansas has risen to four.

The National Weather Service (NWS) Office in Tulsa confirmed there had been two tornadoes in the Siloam Springs area of Benton County (Northwest Arkansas) just after midnight Monday. One of the tornadoes has been upgraded to EF-2 intensity with winds greater than 110 MPH. The other tornado is rated EF-1 with winds 90 to 100 MPH A 3rd tornado, rated EF-1, touched down in Northeast Arkansas at Tyronza in Poinsett County in Eastern Arkansas.

A 4th tornado, rated EF-1, in Southwest Arkansas was confirmed by the National Weather Service in Shreveport

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