Stories from Saturday, December 23, 2006

Communism was the terror of my youth. But it was with more amusement than fear that I watched Nikita Khrushchev on television pound his shoe on the dais and threaten to bury us all. As I reached my teenage years, TV news opened up the horrors suffered by African Americans seeking nothing more than equality...

BAXTER -- The quickest way to quiet a rowdy crowd is by jumping on their team in a hurry in dominant fashion. Shelbyville Central did just that to one of the top teams in Class AA in the championship game of the Mid-South Classic. Upperman carried a 15-0 record into Friday night and took a slim 7-6 lead four minutes in on a bucket by Chelsey Taylor...

Just east of the Bedford County Courthouse where I heard a man barely contain his continued rage over the loss of a daughter to a head-on crash last year, there's a woman whose eyes glow with excitement. Debra Weaver's been taking refresher courses on how to be a foster parent because a teenage girl is coming back to her after having been "in the system" since Debra was her "mother" several years ago in a similar arrangement...

Page Smith of Bell Buckle is finally going public in her search for her missing 8-year-old reindeer and told the Times-Gazette she is worried over his safe return. Referring to her planner, Smith says it was Nov. 26 when the family decorated their yard with the usual Santa Claus, lit up Christmas packages and two white wooden reindeer her brother-in-law Chuck Craig made for her about eight years ago...

POINTS NORTH -- "What's that, right there?" Santa asks, pointing a plump finger at what looks like a tiny little crack. An elf rushes over with a bright light. Santa's sleigh is suspended 6 feet off the ground as part of its yearly inspection. Santa must crouch to be able to look up at the bottom of the wooden chassis, but the elf must bring a stepladder in order to get close enough to scrutinize the would-be flaw...

A Tennessee Bureau of Investigation summary into a fatal shooting by a Shelbyville police officer last March "raises more questions ... than it answers," say survivors who've sued the city for $50 million and alleged wrongful death. That's according to a prepared response issued Thursday afternoon by lawyers on behalf of the children of Fermin Estrada, 47, who died of a gunshot wound to the head on March 18 during a party on his 15 acres in western Shelbyville...

Robert Earl Werner Sr., 76, of Shelbyville died Friday at Bedford County Medical Center. No services are planned. Doak-Howell Funeral Home handled arrangements.