Idaho Briefs December 20, 2012

Judge dumps Hart's second bankruptcy

BOISE (AP) - Federal authorities are closer to seizing a tax-protesting former North Idaho lawmaker's home after a judge dismissed his second bankruptcy filing.

Ex-state Rep. Phil Hart has been ordered by courts to pay the federal government and state more than $600,000 in delinquent income taxes, interest and penalties.

He has tried to protect assets including his log home in Athol by filing a pair of bankruptcies.

Both have now been dismissed, the latest Monday by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Terry L. Myers, who ordered Hart to submit to a Jan. 7 deposition.

Hart's bankruptcies were rejected as inappropriate.

In the first, he proposed repaying about $12,000 of the total owed.

The second one that Myers dismissed this week proposed paying $106 monthly for three years - about $3,800 total.

Otter: Moment

of silence for shooting victims

BOISE (AP) - Gov. Butch Otter is asking Idahoans to observe a moment of silence Friday for the victims of the school massacre in Newtown, Conn.

Otter and governors across the country are calling for people to pause and reflect at 9:30 a.m. in local time zones. That's the hour of the shooting last Friday at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

The gunman killed 20 first-graders and six adults before committing suicide. He also killed his mother at their home.

Otter says Idahoans should take a "moment to remember that many families in Connecticut are dealing with unspeakable tragedy" and that "they are not alone in their grief."