Small Town News

Top 10 stories on the web

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Top 10 of 2010 This year's good, bad and ugly

What were the biggest stories of 2010? We'll let you be the judge. In order of HaysFreePress.com page views, here are our top web stories of the year.

KYLE POLICE OFFICER LOSES BADGE IN PEDOPHILE CASE

When former Kyle Police Officer Karl Cranek failed to properly investigate a traffic stop in February and let alleged pedophile Dustin McFall escape with a 14-year-old runaway, the department fired him. Cranek appealed his termination in a neutral arbitration hearing but his termination was upheld.

McFall is currently in Hays County Jail

awaiting trial.

LEHMAN MOURNS DEATH OF FORMER HOMECOMING QUEEN

Audrey Gaytan, who wrapped up her senior year at Lehman High School as homecoming queen and captain of the girls soccer team before graduating in May 2009, died in February in the Rio Grande Valley. Gaytan, 19, died at Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen, near the Texas-Mexico border.

CITY MANAGER RESIGNS

Concerns involving the performance of former Kyle City Manager Tom Mattis sparked his resignation in early April. Mattis, who had been the city manager for eight years, pocketed up to $250,000 in termination pay in his surprise departure. In November, the Kyle City Council hired former Leon Valley City Manager, Lanny Lambert, as its next city manager.

BATTLE OF PEDDLERS PEDDLING IN KYLE

A trio of young entrepreneurs, who ran a snow cone stand named the Chilly Penguin, petitioned Kyle city officials in March to change an out-dated ordinance that made it difficult for local food vendors to operate. In August, the Kyle City Council unanimously approved a revised city ordinance allowing peddlers, such as mobile and temporary vendors who offer food services, to operate within city limits.

INFANT DIES AFTER KYLE DAYCARE INCIDENT

Christina Suzanne Lyons, 32, turned herself in to authorities late November after the Hays County District Attorney's Office increased her bail to $500,000 in connection with the death of a 10-week-old baby who suffered fatal head and chest injuries at her home daycare in Kyle. Lyons is charged with a first-degree felony of injury to a child.

1926 BAYL0R-A&M HALFTIME WAS A REAL RIOT

An excerpt from the paper's column This Week in Texas History t this story describes a halftime riot at the Baylor-Texas A&M football game in Waco on Oct. 30, 1926, in which an Aggie cadet was fatally injured on the playing field.

ONE DEAD, ONE INJURED IN BUDA WRECK

A wreck in front of Buda Elementary School on the morning of May 24 left one Buda man dead and another man injured. Joshua Keith Hertenstein, 32, died in the head-on collision at 590 RM 967. Hertenstein attempted to pass other vehicles in the no-passing zone at the hard curve just before Cole Springs Road. His vehicle collided head-on with a Suburban driven by Buda resident Ronnie Cruz, 22, a cafeteria worker at Dahlstrom Middle School.

TEEN STRUCK, KILLED BY TRAIN IN KYLE

A 16-year-old boy was killed when a Union Pacific train struck him as he walked along the railroad tracks about a quarter mile south of downtown Kyle around 9 a.m. on Dec. 1. The train engineer reported sounding the northbound train's horn repeatedly and that Ramon Eric Zapata initially stepped off the tracks, but then stepped back on and was hit. It's still unclear why Zapata was on the tracks; family members had said that he left that morning with a rifle to go hunting.

HAYS HIGH STUDENT DIES IN GOLF CART ACCIDENT

Alyssa Marie Bargsley, 17, a Hays High junior from Kyle, died May 1 in Kingsland, Texas, after falling out of a golf cart and striking her head on the pavement. Alcohol was believed to be a factor in the accident. No charges were filed on the golf cart's driver. Days later, hundreds of friends and family members gathered in a vigil ceremony to remember her.

HAYS GRADUATE DIES IN CAR CRASH

A 2009 Hays High School graduate was killed in a one-vehicle crash along RM 967 near Drift wood June 2. Adrian Nicholas Acosta, of Manchaca, was driving eastbound when his 2003 Nissan sedan left the roadway and struck a telephone pole. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Excessive speed was determined to be a factor in the crash, which occurred about a mile south of FM 1826.



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© 2011 The Free Press Buda, Texas. All Rights Reserved. This content, including derivations, may not be stored or distributed in any manner, disseminated, published, broadcast, rewritten or reproduced without express, written consent from DAS.

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