IN SPORTS: It’s football season — Sumter Sertoma Jamboree kicks off Aug. 12 B1 PANORAMA
Perseid meteors light up the skies Thursday, Friday WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 3, 2016
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Sizzling summer stresses stripers
City to host dialogue with public, police Discussion of law enforcement in the community meant to head off problems seen elsewhere BY JIM HILLEY jim@theitem.com In response to concerns about recent tragedies affecting the relationship between law enforcement and the public,
Sumter Police Department, Sumter County Sheriff’s Office and Sumter County Concerned Clergy will hold an event at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Sumter Opera House, 21 MCELVEEN N. Main St., Mayor Joe McElveen said at Tuesday evening’s City Council meeting. “We will have a dialogue between the
community and the police,” he said. “We have good dialogue, but it needs to get better." According to a notice for the event, it will include members of the faith community, public officials and city and county law enforcement representatives including Sumter Police Chief Russell Roark and Sumter County
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Tooting their own horns
BY JIM HILLEY jim@theitem.com
thankful for the opportunity. Two of the students, Harglerode and McClain, also received band scholarship offers to South Carolina State University and are participating in the band program there. Haley will
Summer can be a tough time for fish. One reason is the lack of oxygen in the water, said South Carolina Department of Natural Resources Fisheries Biologist Carl Bussells. “Lack of oxygen can really be tough on the fish,” he said. “Especially in small streams and ponds the fish are kind of struggling.” There is plenty of sunlight in the daytime, and the phytoplankton are producing plenty of oxygen, but at night the dissolved oxygen levels start to drop because there is no photosynthesis going on, Bussells said. “You end up having the occasional die-offs,” he said. Among the most vulnerable to that kind of stress are striped bass, he said. According to veteran fishing guide Inky Davis, the striped bass season is closed from June through October to protect the fish, because over about 85 degrees the striped bass can’t tolerate being caught and released. “When you DAVIS caught one and it was still frisky and you took the hook out, about 80 percent of them still die after you let it go,” he said. Bussells said the problem with high temperatures occurs across the Southeast. In the bigger lakes, the water tends to form layers, Bussells said. “The top layer holds more oxygen, but it is also the warmest layer, so the fish try to go down a little deeper,” he said. “That water is a little cooler but holds less oxygen. A lot of fish are going to succumb to those warm temperatures and lack of oxygen.” Bussells said they have observed some striped bass and blue catfish dying off, but that is normal for this time of year. Davis said he thinks spraying of chemicals to kill invasive plant species also causes a drop in oxygen levels.
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PHOTOS BY RICK CARPENTER / THE SUMTER ITEM
Above, baritone horn player Anthony Degrazio stands at attention while preparing to play during Lakewood High School’s Band Camp on Tuesday. Right, four Lakewood seniors who received college scholarship offers from their participation in band are, left to right, Lakeisha Pringle, Lakiera Pringle, Michaela Stukes and Alexis Haley.
All Lakewood High School band’s seniors receive scholarship offers BY KONSTANTIN VENGEROWSKY konstantin@theitem.com All seven of Lakewood High School's graduating seniors from last year's marching band received scholarship offers to participate in a college marching band. The seven members received scholarship offers for band to Benedict College in Columbia, and two of the seniors also received scholar-
ship offers to South Carolina State University in Orangeburg. Alexis Haley, a flutist; Austin Harglerode, a trumpet player; and Jordan McClain, a trumpet player, each received a $20,000 scholarship offer to Benedict College; Michaela Stukes, a clarinet player, received an $18,000 scholarship offer; Lakeisha Pringle and Lakiera Pringle, color guard dancers, each re-
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ceived a $3,000 scholarship offer; and Iesha Genrette, a color guard flag line dancer, received a $3,000 scholarship. Although none of the students who received the scholarships will be attending Benedict College, the students said they were
Roof attorneys want death penalty ruled unconstitutional BY BRUCE SMITH The Associated Press CHARLESTON — Attorneys for Dylann Roof, the white man charged with killing nine black parishioners at a South Carolina church, want a federal judge to rule the death penalty unconstitutional and allow their client to plead guilty and serve life in prison. Lawyers for 22-year-old Roof filed the motion on Monday saying a flawed process of sitting juries willing to recommend the death penalty violates the
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rights of both potential jurors and defendants. The government is seeking the death penalty against Roof, who is charged with hate crimes and other counts in the June 2015 shootings at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston. Prosecutors allege Roof posed with the Confederate battle flag before the killings and talked of starting a race war. His federal trial is set for November. He also faces the death penalty in state court, where he is charged with murder in a trial set to begin early next year.
In the filing, Assistant Federal Public Defender Sarah Gannett said while some aspects of jury selection in death penalty cases have been considered by the courts, other issues she puts forward are being raised for the first time. While the law provides that all citizens have an opportunity to sit on juries, juries willing to impose a death penalty don't represent a cross-section of the community, the filing said. Gannett said such juries are more likely to be white, older, predominantly Protestant and less educated than the
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rest of society, while women and minorities tend to be excluded. She also noted that excluding jurors who oppose the death penalty for religious reasons violates constitutional protections against requiring religious tests for holding office or having positions of public trust. "If a proposed juror is Catholic, Quaker or any sect of any other religion and adamantly opposed to the death penalty, death qualification discriminates against that juror's religion," she said.
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INSIDE
COOLER BUT STORMY
3 SECTIONS, 24 PAGES VOL. 121, NO. 244
Cooler again today but with good chance of strong thunderstorms continuing into the evening. HIGH 90, LOW 72
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