Lewiston Tribune

CLARKSTON, Wash. --The red light on the phone next to Mica Craig's hospital bed blinked with a new call, but this time it wasn't a concerned relative or another reporter asking how a rattlesnake bit him at the Clarkston Walmart.

"I'm about to do a TV interview in five minutes," the 47-year-old Clarkston man said to the caller shortly before 2 p.m. He asked the caller to call back about 3 p.m.

After Craig hung up, he said it was a Walmart claims adjuster.

Craig said he was looking at gardening supplies in the Clarkston Walmart parking lot Friday when he grabbed what he thought was a stick lying on the ground, but was really a 1-foot to 1 1/2-foot long, solid brown rattlesnake that struck him in the hand. He eventually flung the reptile to the ground and stomped it to death.

RIGGINS, Idaho -- Idaho Fish and Game commissioners debated Thursday the extent to which they should protest a new law that establishes as many as a dozen big-game auction tags.

The law was passed in the 2012 legislative session over the objections of the commission. It gives commissioners the authority to issue as many as a dozen auction tags -- up to three each for elk, deer and antelope, and a maximum of one each for moose, mountain goat and bighorn sheep.

LEWISTON, Idaho --The owner of a pair of Lewiston smoke shops is facing multiple narcotics and racketeering charges relating to the alleged sale of the synthetic marijuana known as Spice.

LEWISTON, Idaho -- Benjamin Howard had been ailing for some time when he and his wife, Ellen, decided a sea voyage to America would benefit his health.

Two of their sons had settled in Idaho, and the couple planned to visit them in the spring of 1912. They left their home in Swindon, England, and took a train to Southampton, setting sail on the Titanic the next day.

The Howards were among the 1,514 victims when the ill-fated vessel collided with an iceberg and sank in the freezing North Atlantic Ocean 100 years ago this month. Several of their descendants live in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley, including Mary Pell, Richard Smith and Megan Ah Hi.

BOISE, Idaho -- The Idaho Fish and Game Commission raised the bag limit on wolves and set spring chinook fishing seasons at its meeting in Boise Thursday.

BOISE, Idaho -- After discussing the problem for years, House lawmakers sent "a strong message" Tuesday and banned texting while driving on a 53-17 vote.

BOISE, Idaho  -- Prompting references to Jesus and George Orwell, a bill requiring women to have an ultrasound exam before getting an abortion was approved on a 23-12 vote Monday.