Drop in traffic

deaths celebrated

LUMBERTON — Vision Zero Task Force members celebrated on Thursday a decline, for the second year in a row, in the number of traffic deaths in Robeson County.

“The culture is changing. The number is improving,” said Shelton Hill, assistant county manager. “We’re saving lives, all of us working together. That’s what we’re accomplishing.”

In 2019, 43 people died in crashes across the county, five fewer than recorded in 2018, according to a statement by the N.C. Department of Transportation. In 2017, 53 people died in traffic accidents — so the decline over two years is about 19%.

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Second forum to

be held at UNCP

PEMBROKE — The Robeson County Sheriff’s Office is working with The University of North Carolina at Pembroke to offer a second Prevention and Response to an Active Shooter in a House of Worship forum on Feb. 20.

The forum will be at the Givens Performing Arts Center, located at 1 University Drive, and will take place from 6 to 8 p.m.

There was a standing-room-only crowd at the Jan. 23 forum in the A.D. Lewis Auditorium at Robeson Community College. More than 100 people were turned away because of fire codes related to crowd size. The auditorium accommodates about 800 people.

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Accident kills a

Fairmont teenager

LUMBERTON — A Fairmont teenager was killed Wednesday night in a single-vehicle accident that the Highway Patrol believes might have been the result of excessive speed.

Ameya D. Oliver, 19, was killed in the accident that occurred about 9:55 p.m. on Lovette Road, about four miles from Lumberton, according to a report by Trooper M.J. Miles.

Oliver, who was not wearing a seat belt, was thrown from the vehicle and died from her injuries. She was alone in the vehicle.

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NC man gets 20 years

for child pornography

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A North Carolina man convicted of making and receiving child pornography was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Justice announced.

Ezekial Sandoval, 49, of Raleigh, pleaded guilty to one count of child exploitation and manufacturing in November, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of North Carolina.

Sandoval was initially charged with one count of child exploitation and manufacturing child pornography, 10 counts of receipt of child pornography and one count of possession of child pornography in a May 2019 indictment, the office said.

Investigators found that Sandoval had been posing online and on messaging apps as a teenage girl, prosecutors said.

From regional Champion Media newspapers.