Spartan Echo

  RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Fewer Virginians are expected to travel at least 50 miles from home during the Memorial Day weekend. AAA Mid-Atlantic said Wednesday, May 22, that it expects slightly more than 1 million Virginians to travel during the holiday weekend. That’s down 1.6 percent from 2012. AAA Mid-Atlantic spokeswoman Martha Mitchell Meade says [...]

  RICHMOND, Va. (AP) – State lawmakers are calling for more financial accountability at Norfolk State University, which has not been able to complete a financial audit for two years. Norfolk State does not have adequate administrative staff or documentation to complete the audits for fiscal years 2011 and 2012, state Auditor Of Public Accounts [...]

  WAKEFIELD, Va. (AP) — Before a nearly all-Republican crowd among the smallest in the Shad Planking’s 65 years, Republican Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli dismissed his absent Democratic foe in this year’s governor’s race as a Virginia outsider and Washington insider. Former Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe chose not to attend the event, the [...]

CHRISTIANSBURG, Va. (AP) — The 18-year-old man suspected of shooting and wounding two women at a community college in Virginia is scheduled to make his first court appearance. Neil Allan MacInnis is due in Montgomery County General District Court on Monday. He is being arraigned on four felony charges related to the shooting incident Friday [...]

  CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP) — The University of Virginia has stopped using live cats to train medical students to insert breathing tubes in newborns. U.Va. spokesman McGregor McCance told The Daily Progress (http://bit.ly/14gFqit ) that the university’s three USDA Category A felines — Alley, Kiki and Fiddle— have been adopted out to local residents. “We’ve [...]

  RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Virginia has rejected unsolicited bids by two companies to operate a state facility that detains violent sex offenders for treatment after their sentences are completed. Documents obtained by The Associated Press show that state officials who evaluated the proposals concluded that GEO Group, a private prisons operator based in Boca [...]

by Renon Weatherford Norfolk, Va., is home to many historical monuments and memories made in honor of and by African Americans. One accomplishment is Brown Savings & Banking, which was organized by African-American entrepreneur E.C. Brown. Brown started a real estate business around 1901 in Newport News, Va., and by 1908, he was renting more [...]

  RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A former basketball standout and two other young men will serve nearly three decades behind bars for killing a high school drug dealer. Media outlets report that 19-year-old former Atlee High School star Kevin Drayton, 19-year-old Da’Von Byars and 20-year-old Xavia Highsmith were sentenced Monday, Feb. 18, in Hanover Circuit Court. [...]

  Norfolk State University associate professor of engineering, Frances R. Williams, is a recipient of the 2013 Outstanding Faculty Award. The Outstanding Faculty Award is the Commonwealth’s highest honor for faculty at Virginia’s public and private universities. In order for a faculty member to receive this award, they have to make an outstanding contribution in [...]