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Attorneys: 2 Arrested By Immigration Officials At Courthouse

Defense attorneys say immigration agents detained two men at a North Carolina courthouse.

The Charlotte Observer reports the arrests Wednesday appear to be the first since new Mecklenburg County Sheriff Garry McFadden stopped participating in a program assisting immigration authorities. 

Defense attorney Bob Trobich told the newspaper his client, Leonardo Hernandez, was arrested Wednesday by ICE agents after arriving for a hearing on charges including kidnapping.

Trobich and Assistant Public Defender Rex Marvel say they saw ICE agents arrest a second man walking into a courtroom.

Shutdown Delays Disaster Relief For Some North Carolina Farmers

The federal government shutdown is delaying disaster relief for some North Carolina farmers.

The Fayetteville Observer reports the shutdown has mostly closed the federal Farm Service Agency responsible for a document required in farmer applications for state disaster relief. North Carolina set aside $240 million to assist farmers who sustained losses during Hurricane Florence and Michael last year.

State Department of Agriculture Chief Deputy Commissioner David Smith says about 900 farmers are waiting on certification and more than 7,000 farmers say they need the program's help.

The Farm Service Agency says it won't be working on relief programs when some offices open Friday and Tuesday.

2 Deputies Out Amid Probe Of Evidence In Missing Girl Case

One investigator has been fired and another resigned from a North Carolina sheriff's office following an internal investigation into evidence linking the suspect in a teen girl's slaying to another attack.

Former Robeson County District Attorney Johnson Britt has said evidence linked the suspect in last year's death of 13-year-old Hania Aguilar to a 2016 rape. Britt said a DNA match from that rape was given to the sheriff's office, but deputies apparently didn't follow up before Aguilar's disappearance.

The county's sheriff's office announced Thursday it had terminated Investigator Darryl McPhatter and accepted the resignation of Maj. Anthony Thompson. They had been suspended following a probe of information from the prosecutor.

Probe: Miscommunication Over Barriers Preceded Statue's Fall

An investigative report says the University of North Carolina declined to put up portable barricades around a Confederate statue the night it was toppled because of concerns they would be unsightly.

WBTV obtained a draft of the investigative report. The television station reports that the campus police chief believed the concerns from Chancellor Carol Folt's office amounted to a directive not to use the barriers. Folt said she hadn't meant for her concerns to be perceived as an order, according to the report.

The report cites miscommunication between police and administrators, as well as insufficient staffing and training for officers as contributing factors that allowed the statue to be torn down in August 2018.

Authorities ID 7-Year-Old Boy After Body Found In Water

School officials in North Carolina have identified a boy whose body was found in some water.

A Guilford County elementary school principal identified the boy as 7-year-old Logan Spruill.

Sgt. N.E. Triche said Guilford County sheriff's deputies responded to a call from a home after a family member called about a missing child. After two hours of searching the area on Wednesday, deputies found the boy in the water. He was taken to a Greensboro hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Colfax Elementary School Principal Julie Kimsey said Logan was autistic and had spoken his first sentence this week.

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