Two standout athletes from the Wichita area and a prized basketball recruit from Topeka have been charged with felony sexual exploitation of a minor.

Dylan Vincent, a former Eisenhower High basketball player, Dalyn Johnson, a former Maize football player, and Topeka-Hayden basketball player Zach Harvey were initially charged on Oct. 16, according to Sedgwick County juvenile court documents. The incident happened about March 23, 2017, in Sedgwick County, according to the documents.

Vincent, Johnson and Harvey are accused of having sexually explicit images or videos of a 15-year-old girl.

Calls to Vincent’s family and Vincent and Johnson’s attorneys’ offices were not immediately returned. Shara Horton, Johnson’s mother, had no comment on the charges.

Vincent was 17 at the time of the incident. Johnson was 16. Harvey, a high school junior who has received scholarship offers from numerous Division I basketball programs, including Kansas, Kansas State and UCLA, according to Rivals.com, was 16.

Pretrial hearings in the case have been pushed back several times. The next scheduled hearing in the matter is May 29.

Vincent and Harvey played the entire basketball season at their respective schools. Johnson did not play on Maize’s basketball team.

Eisenhower principal Christie Meyer said in February that she had no comment on whether she or the district was aware of the charges but said each player’s eligibility would depend on the specific situation.

“We look into it, talk to the appropriate people and go from there,” Meyer said. “In general, if a student is not convicted, we do not step in.

“… If there is evidence that we know about or that is impacting an educational environment, we could step in and address that.”

Meyer said the school does not get involved with incidents involving Eisenhower students that happen off school grounds.

“If a student is officially charged — arrested is different from being charged — found guilty or innocent, we receive documents from the court,” Maize principal Chris Botts said. “Just because a student is arrested does not mean he or she is guilty.”

Botts said, like at Eisenhower, Johnson’s penalty from athletics would depend on the specific situation. As of Oct. 16, when the charges were filed, the Maize football team still had two games to play. Johnson played in each of the school’s final two games.

Botts said he would not comment on who decided to allow Johnson to finish the season. He cited a Kansas statute stating such incidents could trigger a 180-day expulsion.

Vincent has signed to continue playing basketball at Hutchinson Junior College. He led the Wichita area in scoring-average per game with 25.8 points and helped lead Eisenhower to the No. 1 seed in the Class 5A state tournament.

Johnson has signed with Ottawa University as a running back. He helped Maize to an 11-2 record in football.

Harvey was recently named to the Eagle’s All-State basketball team.

Two standout athletes from the Wichita area and a prized basketball recruit from Topeka have been charged with felony sexual exploitation of a minor.

Dylan Vincent, a former Eisenhower High basketball player, Dalyn Johnson, a former Maize football player, and Topeka-Hayden basketball player Zach Harvey were initially charged on Oct. 16, according to Sedgwick County juvenile court documents. The incident happened about March 23, 2017, in Sedgwick County, according to the documents.

Vincent, Johnson and Harvey are accused of having sexually explicit images or videos of a 15-year-old girl.

Calls to Vincent’s family and Vincent and Johnson’s attorneys’ offices were not immediately returned. Shara Horton, Johnson’s mother, had no comment on the charges.

Vincent was 17 at the time of the incident. Johnson was 16. Harvey, a high school junior who has received scholarship offers from numerous Division I basketball programs, including Kansas, Kansas State and UCLA, according to Rivals.com, was 16.

Pretrial hearings in the case have been pushed back several times. The next scheduled hearing in the matter is May 29.

Vincent and Harvey played the entire basketball season at their respective schools. Johnson did not play on Maize’s basketball team.

Eisenhower principal Christie Meyer said in February that she had no comment on whether she or the district was aware of the charges but said each player’s eligibility would depend on the specific situation.

“We look into it, talk to the appropriate people and go from there,” Meyer said. “In general, if a student is not convicted, we do not step in.

“… If there is evidence that we know about or that is impacting an educational environment, we could step in and address that.”

Meyer said the school does not get involved with incidents involving Eisenhower students that happen off school grounds.

“If a student is officially charged — arrested is different from being charged — found guilty or innocent, we receive documents from the court,” Maize principal Chris Botts said. “Just because a student is arrested does not mean he or she is guilty.”

Botts said, like at Eisenhower, Johnson’s penalty from athletics would depend on the specific situation. As of Oct. 16, when the charges were filed, the Maize football team still had two games to play. Johnson played in each of the school’s final two games.

Botts said he would not comment on who decided to allow Johnson to finish the season. He cited a Kansas statute stating such incidents could trigger a 180-day expulsion.

Vincent has signed to continue playing basketball at Hutchinson Junior College. He led the Wichita area in scoring-average per game with 25.8 points and helped lead Eisenhower to the No. 1 seed in the Class 5A state tournament.

Johnson has signed with Ottawa University as a running back. He helped Maize to an 11-2 record in football.

Harvey was recently named to the Eagle’s All-State basketball team.

By Tribune News Service

WICHITA, Kan. — The California man arrested in connection with a fatal swatting incident in Wichita has also been charged for a similar hoax in Canada earlier in December.

Tyler Barriss, 25, who is awaiting extradition to Kansas, is accused of calling 911 in Calgary, Alberta, on Dec. 22, claiming that he had shot his father and was holding his mother and younger brother hostage, the CBC reported.

As officers on the scene attempted to confirm the reported information, 911 received a call from a woman at the address who said she suspected she was the victim of a swatting call, according to a statement released by Calgary police. The woman walked out of her house and police were able to confirm the call was false. No one was hurt.

Barriss has been charged with public mischief, fraud and mischief in connection with the incident. But he will face charges in Kansas first.

Barriss was charged in Wichita on Dec. 29 with the felony of making a false alarm.

Barriss is accused of reporting a fake homicide and hostage situation to the Wichita Police Department just after 6:15 p.m. on Dec. 28. The “crime” he reported in Wichita mirrored what was reported in Calgary.

Reports say Barriss was called by someone after a feud between two Call of Duty players broke out over a virtual “friendly kill” during a game earlier that day. There was a $1.50 wager over the game.

One of the players allegedly called Barriss and requested he “swat” another player. A man claiming he was responsible for the swatting said he was given an address on McCormick Street by another player, he said during an interview with the DramaAlert channel on YouTube.

Swatting is the term when someone calls police with a fake story of a serious ongoing crime — like a killing, hostage situation or bomb threat — in an effort to draw a large police presence to an address. It has gained traction in recent years among online gamers.

Police went to the address, expecting to find a homicide victim and two hostages. Instead, Andrew Finch, 28, opened his front door when he saw police lights outside and didn’t know why. Wichita police say he was given commands to keep his hands raised, but he reached toward his waistline multiple times.

When he reached his hands up suddenly, police say an officer who was standing in a driveway across the street from Finch shot him.

—The Wichita Eagle

———

Scalise to undergo planned surgery related to baseball shooting

WASHINGTON — House Majority Whip Steve Scalise will undergo a planned surgery Wednesday as part of his recovery from injuries sustained last June from a shooting at a GOP congressional baseball team practice.

The Louisiana congressman missed more than three months last year after a gunman opened fire on Republican lawmakers in Alexandria, Va., on the eve of the annual Congressional Baseball game.

Scalise suffered severe internal organ damage when a bullet tore through his hip as he fled to right field.

He returned to Congress in a wheelchair in September but has recently been seen walking around the Capitol on crutches.

“I have been fortunate to make tremendous progress in my healing from last June’s shooting, and tomorrow I will undergo a planned surgery as part of my ongoing recovery process,” Scalise said in a statement Tuesday. “I am incredibly humbled by the outpouring of support and prayers I have received from friends and neighbors in southeast Louisiana, my colleagues in Congress, and wonderful people from all across the country.”

He also thanked his medical team for its care.

It is unclear when Scalise will return to the Capitol after Wednesday’s operation.

—CQ-Roll Call

———

ACLU wants Kansas secretary of state held in contempt, says he disregarded court order

The American Civil Liberties Union wants Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach held in contempt of court, arguing he disregarded a court order to register voters.

The ACLU filed court documents late Monday seeking a contempt order, or asking a judge to order Kobach to update election procedures to make clear that those seeking to register to vote in federal elections at Department of Motor Vehicle locations are exempt from a Kansas law that requires proof of citizenship to register.

The ACLU says Kobach, who is running for governor, is refusing to correct errors in his manual for local election officials and is not ensuring that voters who register at DMV sites in accordance with an earlier court order are receiving certificates of registration saying they can vote.

“These violations could be cured easily. … Yet, despite numerous efforts by Plaintiffs over the past six months to obtain Defendant’s compliance, Defendant has refused, and has stated that he will not take corrective action even if final judgment is rendered against him after trial,” an ACLU court filing says.

A Kobach spokeswoman didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. The Eagle first saw the documents just before 10 p.m.

“My objective … is to make it easy to vote but hard to cheat,” Kobach said in September. “Those are completely compatible goals.”

The filings came in a lawsuit challenging a Kansas law that requires voters to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote. A federal judge has already effectively suspended the requirement for individuals who want to vote in federal elections.

—The Wichita Eagle

———

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Online gamers have said in multiple Twitter posts that the shooting of a man Thursday night by Wichita police was the result of a “swatting” hoax involving two gamers.

RELATED STORIES: Family says son killed by police in ‘swatting’ was unarmed, didn’t play video games | Pivot Point: If shooter games lead to real-life death, it’s time to hit pause

Swatting happened when someone makes a call to a police department with a false story of an ongoing crime – often with killing or hostages involved – in an attempt to draw a large number of police officers to a particular address.

Swatting has gained traction across the country with online gamers. Those who try to cause the swatting incident will use caller ID spoofing or other techniques to disguise their number as being local. Or they call local non-emergency numbers instead of 911, according to 911.gov.

Deputy Wichita Police Chief Troy Livingston said Thursday night that police were looking into whether the call that led to the shooting was a case of swatting.

Livingston said the department received a call that someone had an argument with their mother, that the father had been shot in the head and the shooter was holding his mother, brother and sister hostage.

“That was the information we were working off of,” he said.

Officers went to the 1000 block of McCormick, preparing for a hostage situation and they “got into position,” he said.

“A male came to the front door,” Livingston said. “As he came to the front door, one of our officers discharged his weapon.”

Livingston didn’t say if the man, who was 28, had a weapon when he came to the door, or what caused the officer to shoot the man. Police don’t think the man fired at officers, but the incident is still under investigation, he said. The man, who has not been identified by police, died at a local hospital.

A family member identified that man who was shot by police as Andrew Finch. One of Finch’s cousins said Finch didn’t play video games.

“This call was little peculiar for us,” Livingston said. “(The call) went to a substation first, then it was relayed to dispatch, then dispatch gave it to us. We have a lot of information to go through.”

On Twitter, more than a dozen people who identified themselves as being in the gaming community told The Eagle that a feud between two Call of Duty players sparked one to initiate a “swatting” call.

After news began to spread about what happened Thursday night, the people in the gaming community, through Twitter posts, pointed at two gamers.

“I DIDNT GET ANYONE KILLED BECAUSE I DIDNT DISCHARGE A WEAPON AND BEING A SWAT MEMBER ISNT MY PROFESSION,” said one gamer, who others said made the swatting call. His account was suspended overnight.

According to posts on Twitter, two gamers were arguing when one threatened to target the other with a swatting call. The person who was the target of the swatting gave the other gamer a false address, which sent police to a nearby home instead of his own, according to Twitter posts.

The person who was to be the target of the swatting sent a Tweet saying, “Someone tried to swat me and got an innocent man killed.”

Livingston, the deputy police chief, would only provide the block number of the home where the shooting occurred, not the specific address. Police were seen in the front yards of two houses across from each other at the corner of Seneca and McCormick.

Dexerto, a online news service focused on gaming and the Call of Duty game, reported the argument began over a $1 or $2 wager over the game.

“Normally this is a prank, but due to the high stress situation, sometimes it is closer to a death threat from a user trying to get cops to kill them,” one man told The Eagle in an email.

The officer who fired the shot — a seven-year veteran of the police department — will be placed on administrative paid leave, which is department policy.

Police expect to release more information later Friday.