News Around the State of Indiana

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INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Indiana Rep. Luke Messer is formally announcing that he will challenge Democratic Sen. Joe Donnelly in 2018. The Republican congressman previously formed a finance committee and was widely anticipated to run. But he waited until Wednesday morning to announce the bid on Twitter. Donnelly is considered one of the most vulnerable Senate Democrats in 2018. Republicans have signaled they will spend considerable sums to retake the seat previously held by former Sen. Dick Lugar. But already the GOP primary is looking like it could be brutal. Messer and fellow Republican Rep. Todd Rokita have traded insults for weeks. Rokita has yet to formally announce his candidacy but has hired key campaign staffers for an expected Senate bid.

MIDDLETOWN, Ind. (AP) — The body of a Navy sailor who was among 16 service members killed in a plane crash is returning to Indiana for funeral services. Thirty-year-old Navy Hospital Corpsman 2nd Class Ryan Lohrey died July 10 along with 15 Marines when their military refueling plane crashed in Mississippi. His body is scheduled to arrive Thursday at Indianapolis International Airport. A military funeral procession will then will travel through Middletown en route to a New Castle funeral home. Funeral services are set for Monday at the Middletown Church of the Nazarene. Lohrey’s grandmother says she and her family remain stunned by the 30-year-old sailor’s death, which came just over a month after the father of two got married. Barbara Lohrey tells The Indianapolis Star that “Ryan was my hero.”

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (AP) — The founder of the C-SPAN public affairs TV network will be the main speaker at Purdue University’s summer graduation ceremony. The university says 1963 Purdue graduate Brian Lamb will take part in the Aug. 5 ceremony in Elliott Hall of Music on the West Lafayette campus. Lamb grew up in Lafayette and founded C-SPAN in 1979. He continues doing interview programs for the network since stepping down as its CEO in 2012. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, in 2007, and Purdue put his name on the Brian Lamb School of Communication in 2011. Purdue says about 1,350 students are set to receive bachelor’s or graduate degrees during the commencement ceremony.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett says the city will use $1.2 million in tax incentives recovered from Carrier Corp. to help about 630 workers losing their jobs find new employment. Hogsett said Wednesday the affected workers will receive up to $1,000 each to pay for transportation, child care, utility bills and other costs associated with finding new jobs. The city also will provide up to $1,000 in incentives to employers hiring displaced Carrier workers for at least one year and paying at least $16 per hour. Nearly 340 workers lost their jobs July 20 at Carrier’s Indianapolis gas furnace factory, and 290 more will be let go by Dec. 22 as the company moves some production to Mexico in a move criticized by then-presidential candidate Donald Trump last year.

AUBURN, Ind. (AP) — An Indiana sheriff’s deputy has been suspended following the death of a police dog that he left for hours inside a hot patrol car. The DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department says Deputy Courtney Fuller is suspended without pay for 30 days. The department says an investigation determined Fuller didn’t commit a crime but that he violated employee standards of conduct. Sheriff Don Lauer says Fuller left Mojo in his patrol car outside his home at 3 p.m. July 6. He was distracted by a situation involving his newborn child and forgot Mojo, finding him dead four hours later. A Purdue University necropsy found the dog’s death was consistent with heat stroke. The department says Fuller will no longer be a canine handler. DeKalb County is 150 miles (240 kilometers) northeast of Indianapolis.