Thursday 3.1
Celeste Ingold, 76, dies in a fire at her condominium on Golf Course Road on the city's north side. Fire officials later say they believe Ingold fell asleep in a living room chair with a lit cigarette.
The Dane County Board votes to officially halt plans for a controversial new $34 million work-release jail and substance abuse treatment center after a proposed south-side location is shot down. The board is now weighing whether to build a smaller facility or switch to electronic monitoring.
Kenosha businessman Dennis Troha is indicted on felony charges that he committed fraud and lied to the FBI regarding more than $100,000 in donations that he and members of his family made to Gov. Jim Doyle and others. Troha had been seeking state approval of a casino.
Friday 3.2
A Dane County jury finds Ramon Cruz del Valle, 30, of New York, guilty of the 2003 murder of Alex Ortiz. A drug dealer hired Cruz del Valle to shoot and kill the 20-year-old, who was suspected of stealing drugs. Cruz del Valle now faces a mandatory life sentence.
Saturday 3.3
A 21-year-old UW-Madison student is sexually assaulted by two men while walking on the 1000 block of Spring Street shortly before 2 a.m. Police are looking for the suspects, described as white males in their mid-20s.
Monday 3.5
Leonard Kaplan, a UW law professor, issues a written statement denying he ever made 'hateful' comments about the Hmong in one of his classes last month. Some students charged that Kaplan said Hmong men had no skills other than to kill and other derogatory comments. Kaplan says he was simply trying to explain how U.S. laws and a clash of cultures aggravated the difficulties faced by Hmong immigrants here.
Robert Marsland, 18, of Madison, wins first place in the National Vocabulary Championship in New York City. Marsland is awarded a $40,000 scholarship. He won by correctly defining the word solipsism, which is the theory that only the self exists.
Tuesday 3.6
President Bush taps former UW-Madison chancellor and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala to lead, together with former Sen. Bob Dole, an investigation into problems at U.S. military and veterans hospitals.
Ald. Austin King introduces a proposal to require Madison landlords to replace inefficient incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs in all common areas. Doing so, he says, could save enough energy to power 4,100 homes and would reduce global warming pollution by an amount comparable to taking 6,000 cars off the road.
Madison Comptroller Dean Brasser releases figures showing that the Overture Center's endowment fund dropped another $1.5 million in February. The fund is now valued at $104.9 million. If the fund drops below $104 million, the arts center will have trouble paying its maintenance and operation costs.
Compiled from local media
