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Larry Conners.

On Tuesday we reported on KMOV-TV (Channel 4) anchor Larry Conners' controversial comments on his Facebook page pondering whether the IRS was targeting him in response to a critical interview he did with President Obama. Later that night -- after getting national attention for his comments -- he issued a short on-air statement admitting that he had issues with the IRS for several years prior to the Obama interview and saying his views were his own.

Now he is temporarily off the air. KMOV officials and Conners' attorney say it's not a suspension.

"He's dying to talk to everybody," Conners' attorney Merle Silverstein tells Daily RFT, "but until he gets released from this order of the station, he is barred from making any comment."

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via blues.nhl.com

David Backes to the rescue.

As we reported yesterday, Phineas the Dog, who lives in Salem, could be put to sleep -- after a long, bizarre battle in the south-central Missouri city. In response to a biting incident a year ago, Salem officials ruled that the three-and-a-half-year-old labrador retriever must be euthanized, sparking outrage from the family and now supporters from around the globe.

The parents of a little girl who was bitten have even urged the city not to put dog to sleep. And now, the dog has a high-profile fan that is bringing even more attention to this small-town saga: David Backes, captain of the St. Louis Blues.

Backes and his wife, Kelly, have offered to fly down to Salem, rescue Phineas and bring him to a no-kill animal shelter in St. Charles.

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VinitaPark.org

Mayor James McGee.

Over the course of several months in 2011, eight police officers for the city of Vinita Park were fired, resigned or took jobs with other departments. This was an unprecedented amount of turnover in the small north-county town. More than half the department, including the chief, was suddenly gone.

According to a lawsuit filed by five of those officers, Vinita Park city officials terminated or forced the officers out because they are white. African American officers kept their jobs, and the majority of the replacement hires were black also.

The allegation might sound far-fetched, but attorneys for the officers believe they have a smoking gun -- a secretly recorded conversation of Vinita Park mayor James McGee, the subject of this week's cover story. On the tape, McGee speaks in blunt terms about racial tension in the city and his role in the termination of the white police officers.

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Mike Bizelli via

Missouri puppy mill.

Missouri has the worst puppy mills in the nation -- and lawmakers in the state are working hard to make sure it stays that way! So says the Humane Society, which announced this week that Missouri ranks No. 1 for terrible puppy farms in the United States and is now going after a piece of legislation that passed yesterday which critics say is designed to block all anti-cruelty efforts.

"It's a pro-puppy mill bill," Amanda Good, Missouri state director for the U.S. Humane Society, tells Daily RFT. "We're going to start an education campaign and make sure the public knows exactly what this resolution is."

She is referring to House Joint Resolution 11, a so-called "right-to-farm" bill, which, she says, is just a puppy mill industry effort to avoid all regulation.

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Governor Jay Nixon.

The debate around the privacy of gun owners has dominated the legislature this session, with Republican lawmakers' persistent outcry regarding record-keeping in the state. The worry is that the Missouri license bureau, under the direction of Democratic Governor Jay Nixon, could be collecting and storing documents for some sort of gun registry -- and collaborating with the feds in the process.

A bit lost in the discussion, however, are concerns from critics of this Republican agenda who argue that efforts to ensure the privacy of gun owners could have serious public safety consequences. That is, that these reforms could make Missouri more vulnerable to fraud, terrorism and other security risks.

"What they're attempting to do here is protect, at all costs, concealed-carry," Democratic Representative Stacey Newman tells Daily RFT. And some national security experts say these privacy initiatives of the Missouri GOP could create obstacles for law enforcement.

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After months of controversy regarding the smelly Bridgeton landfill -- with heated debates about the cause of the awful stench and the potential health hazards -- the Missouri attorney general's office and the company behind the site have hammered out an agreement.

Republic Services, parent company of the landfill, and Attorney General Chris Koster, who sued, unveiled a legal agreement yesterday, which includes details on relocation opportunities, a timeline on efforts to reduce the stench and funding plans for ongoing monitoring of air quality.

Environmental activists, however, say the plans don't go far enough to protect local residents in the coming weeks -- in part, because some in the surrounding areas may have to deal with an increasingly putrid odor.

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Scott Schnuck.

Here at Daily RFT, we've been following the Schnucks cyber attack controversy pretty closely, chronicling the various apologies and legal complaints the company is facing tied to a security breach that left millions of customers' credit card numbers vulnerable.

In our reporting, we've kept an eye on the hundreds of comments on Schnucks' Facebook page and while there are many angry customers who say they will never be coming back -- unless they are offered some serious coupon deals! -- we've noticed there are a handful of hardcore Schnuck devotees who will not abandon the local store. At any cost! The business is really a victim here, too, they argue.

So today, we bring you twenty reasons to continue shopping at Schnucks -- from its most vocal and loyal customers.

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via PETA

Undercover video.

Last month, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals released an "undercover video" inside one of Washington University's labs, which the group says reveals the school's mistreatment of live cats in one of its courses. Soon after, PETA made more of a splash with an announcement that The Price Is Right's Bob Barker supported the cause and would even donate tens of thousands to rescue the cats from these labs.

But Wash. U. has continued to defend the practice, saying it is not cruel and is an important training tool, prompting PETA to try a different approach: a complaint with the Missouri attorney general's office.

"The course is indefensible," Justin Goodman, director of laboratory investigations with PETA, tells Daily RFT. "This is an opportunity for the attorney general to evaluate these misleading claims."

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Missouri inmates have a right to get married behind bars -- and they also have a right to receive newspapers. So says the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri, which has a record of advocating for the incarcerated and has announced a settlement in a recent dispute regarding newspaper subscriptions in prison.

As we reported back in January, the ACLU alleged in a lawsuit that the Ste. Genevieve sheriff's office cut off newspaper delivery to inmates after one of them, Stanley Schell, wrote a letter to the editor to the Ste. Genevieve Herald. Schell was excited when the paper published his letter -- but was a lot less pleased when he reportedly stopped receiving the newspaper the following week.

That prompted the civil-rights group to intervene -- and now, months later, as part of a settlement, detainees will once again be able to receive newspapers, the ACLU says.

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via YouTube

Scott Schnuck apologizes.

If you shopped at Schnucks between December and March and are still using the same credit card, you may want to get a new one. Or at the very least, watch your statements and notify your bank of suspicious charges.

So says Scott Schnuck, in yet another video apology for the massive security breach that exposed roughly 2.4 million credit and debit cards at a majority of their stores in the St. Louis metro region and beyond. This latest apology released on Friday comes in the wake of new lawsuits alleging that the local supermarket chain was negligent in their handling of this cyber attack -- and waited too long to alert customers.

And while Schnucks says it blocked access at the end of March and increased security on its payment system, cards used before that date, the company warns, are still vulnerable.

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