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Complaint: Man used ax, gun in slaying of 5, Bentley to send troops to Mexico border

Governor Robert Bentley is sending assistance to protect the U.S. Border. APR Student reporter Parker Branton reports…

Governor Robert Bentley approved a notion that will send Alabama National Guard helicopter and pilot to Marana, Arizona to assist with protecting the U.S. border with Mexico.

This is the second time this year that Alabama National Guard has sent assistance to the Southwest Border Team.

Governor Bentley says he is honored to once again support the Southwest Border Mission by sending Alabama’s finest to protect the great people of the United State of America.

The requested National Guard personnel is needed through September. 

The Southwest Border Team will perform all maintenance of the aircraft at no cost to the state while deployed. 

Criminal complaints allege that a man used both a gun and an ax to slaughter five adults as they slept in an Alabama home.

The complaints filed today in Mobile County District Court do not allege in which order Derrick Dearman used the weapons, or elaborate further on the nature of the killing.

Dearman of Leakesville, Mississippi, is charged with six counts of capital murder and two counts of kidnapping.

The bodies of all five people were found Saturday inside the home in Citronelle, Alabama. A sheriff's captain says Dearman attacked them as they slept, then abducted his estranged girlfriend and an infant from the home. Both of them were found alive.

A prosecutor says it is likely she will seek the death penalty.

Alabama is looking to educate over fourteen thousand four-year-olds in over eight-hundred schools.

This is only one out of four children within the state.  The state is giving out sixteen million dollars to the education program this year.  The program is called First Class Pre-K.

Allison Muhlendorf is the Executive Director of Alabama School Readiness Alliance. She says the program isn’t just for state funded schools…

“It is definitely a private-public partnership that just provides additional funding so that more families can have access to high quality pre-k programs and so that existing preschool programs that want to improve their quality, will be able to do so.”

The program is looking to increase funding in years to come, as preschool programs show increased test scores and learning capabilities in older children.

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