DELIVER TO: Postal Patron Mechanicsville, VA 23111
PRSRT. STANDARD U.S. POSTAGE PAID Mechanicsville, VA Permit No.141
Vol. 29, No. 43 | Richmond Suburban Newspapers | February 27, 2013
STOPS AT EVERY HOME IN TOWN
Mom held in ax attack and arson
Threepeat: 8th HCSB saves 8 grader wins bee teaching jobs
F
or the third year in a row, Yashna Nainani, an eighth grade student at Chickahominy Middle School, was declared the 2012-2013 division spelling champion for Hanover County Public Schools.
After 12 challenging rounds, the winning word was “matriarch.” Nainani also was the runner-up in the 2009-2010 competition. Jenny Droujinsky, a seventh grade student at Oak Knoll Middle School, was the runsee BEE, pg. 4 Photo submitted by Linda M. Scarborough
Yashna Nainani, left, captured the Hanover County Public Schools Spelling Bee for the third consecutive year. Jenny Droujinsky, right, is the runner-up.
By Jim Ridolphi for The Mechanicsville Local Following weeks of discussion and public comment, the Hanover County School Board approved a $188.7 million budget for 2013-2014 at a meeting on Thursday, Feb. 21. The board initialed a budget that was almost identical to the one proposed by Jamelle Wilson, superintendent of Hanover
County Public Schools, earlier this year. But, there were some revisions. Originally, 24 teaching positions were on the chopping block as school officials attempted to rectify a more than $5 million budget shortfall. Eight of those positions are restored in the final budget, funded by a transfer of funds from the schools’ Capital
tion that Wells had arranged had turned into an armed robbery. Drayton, Byars and Highsmith were convicted in October of first-degree murder in the commission of a robbery, two firearms charges, conspiracy to rob and a charge of aggra-
A 30-year-old mother accused of intentionally setting a fire to kill her 11yearold son, who she had attacked SHEPPERSON with an axe, her other two children, ages 7 and 10 months, and herself, faces an April 11 preliminary hearing. Sgt. Chris R. Whitley of the Hanover County Sheriff ’s Office said a joint investigation with the Hanover Fire Marshal’s Office led to the arrest of Kimberly K. Shepperson of the 8200 block of Bultaco Trail. She is charged
see WELLS’, pg. 18
see MOM, pg. 7
Jim Ridolphi for The Local
Hanover County School Board chair Ann F. Hagan Gladstone said the final document has put the system in the best place it could be, considering the revenue restraints surrounding this year’s process.
Improvement budget. see HCSB, pg. 13
3 get 27 years in Wells’ shooting death By Bill McKelway Richmond Times-Dispatch Three young men will each serve 27 years in prison for their roles in the shooting death of Atlee High School student Brett Wells. Kevin M. Drayton Jr., 19, a former standout basketball player at Atlee; Da’Von T. Byars,
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19, and Xavia S. Highsmith, 20, both of Richmond, were sentenced after a hearing Monday in Hanover Circuit Court. They faced possible sentences of life in prison. The 16-year-old was shot through the heart on Jan. 21, 2012, in his Mechanicsville home. The Hanover County Sheriff ’s Office had determined a drug transac-
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