A man was taken into custody after leading police on a multi-county chase Sunday afternoon.
Porter County officers stopped a blue Nissan in the area of 450 E and US Highway 30 because its license plate indicated it was stolen.
The Nissan, driven by 28-year-old Keon Starr, fled from the scene, continuing eastbound on US Highway 30 into Starke County.
Police say Starr was believed to have been traveling at speeds of up to 100 mph.
Starke County deputies deployed stop sticks at US 30 and State Road 23, successfully deflating the rear tires just before 3:30 PM.
The vehicle came to a stop in the area of 1100 East and US Highway 30.
Starr was taken into custody by Porter County Police on felony charges of Auto Theft and Resisting Law Enforcement.
This is a developing story. Stay with WSBT 22 News as we work to learn more.

(NEXSTAR) – The number of people living with Alzheimer’s disease is expected to double by 2060. New research is shedding light on warning signs and risk factors that could signal cognitive decline ahead.
One clear risk factor, the research shows, is hearing loss.
“We know from a lot of public health studies that hearing loss changes the brain, and we have also seen in studies that hearing loss is consistently linked to a higher risk of dementia over time,” said Jennifer Deal, an associate professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in a recent media briefing on Alzheimer’s.
It’s not just about volume, Deal said, but rather about hearing clarity.
“So you can hear someone speaking, but the words kind of blur together,” she explained. “So, the word sphere, S-P-H-E-R-E, for example, may sound like the word ear, E-A-R.”
It’s not clear exactly how hearing loss and Alzheimer’s are connected, Deal said. One possibility is that hearing issues could make it harder to connect socially, and social isolation could make cognitive decline worse.
Intervention – like using a hearing aid – could be helpful in fighting off dementia, but the research is mixed, Deal said.
Hearing loss isn’t the only risk factor that appears in the research.
“It is not one single factor that is contributing to that risk,” said Adam Spira, a professor in the Department of Mental Health at Johns Hopkins. “There are a whole range of factors that play a role.”
Another important risk factor, Spira pointed out, has to do with sleep. “We now believe that sleep disturbances, such as not getting enough sleep, having your sleep be of poor quality, more fragmented (sleep) over the course of the night – those sorts of disturbances are risk factors for cognitive decline and dementia, according to the developing research literature.”
Sleep apnea, a common condition that obstructs breathing while sleeping, may also increase people’s risk of developing dementia and Alzheimer’s, Spira said.
Other risk factors, according to Spira, include cardio-metabolic problems, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, depression, traumatic brain injury, and low physical activity.
As the research unfolds, it’s becoming clear there is no “magic bullet for dementia prevention,” Deal said.
“We really need to probably be tackling a number of different factors in order to move the needle.”

Dementia is poised to hit more Americans than ever, but the odds are quietly shifting in your favor. Vox’s Bryan Walsh reports that while a graying population means new dementia cases in the US could top 1 million a year by 2060, a person at any given age is now far less likely to develop the condition than someone that age a generation ago. Across rich countries, age-specific dementia rates have fallen roughly 13% per decade since the late 1980s, with similar drops for Alzheimer’s specifically.
What’s driving the improvement? Walsh points to better heart and blood vessel health—think blood pressure and cholesterol drugs, less smoking, and improved stroke care—as well as more years of schooling, which research has linked to lower dementia risk, though without pinpointing why. A 2024 Lancet commission estimated that tackling 14 midlife risk factors, from high LDL to hearing loss to inactivity, might prevent or delay up to 45% of cases, and Walsh flags the intriguing (but still early) evidence that the shingles vaccine may reduce dementia risk. His view? Some of us will undoubtedly develop dementia. “But that doesn’t mean we’re helpless.” Read his full piece here.
Read These Next
Sunken station on the WII ‘death railway’
Ground beef prices move past a
Olympian arrested after reaching
Summer jobs are hard to come by for latest

A Poe classic has turned out to be an accidental case study: For people with misophonia, “The Tell-Tale Heart” reads less like madness and more like a man exercising enormous restraint, until a sound finally breaks him. Writing for the New Yorker, Sloane Crosley, a self-described misophonia patient (though she says her case isn’t severe), digs into a condition defined by an intense fight-or-flight reaction to specific everyday noises—chewing, gulping, sniffing, tapping—that an estimated 4.6% of American adults may experience. It’s not about loudness, doctors say, but about how certain brains tag particular human-made sounds as threats. When those who have misophonia hear such noises, “they share a dysregulating visceral response, a cognitive and physiological—chest-tightening, heart-racing, sweating—spiral of alertness and exhaustion,” Crosley writes.
The author follows patients whose lives have been reshaped by misophonia—students eating alone in their rooms, a teacher hiding his condition at work, a family switching to plastic cutlery—and the clinicians and advocates pushing to get the disorder its own code in the World Health Organization’s disease manual. That recognition could unlock insurance coverage, as well as basic validation. Others warn it’s too soon, however, to codify something that still straddles both psychiatry and audiology. The piece also explores experimental “semantic hearing” headphones that might one day mute triggers selectively. Crosley wonders, however, “if people should be able to do this. … Should we be able to tailor our immediate environments more than we already do? So much of today’s technology is built for self-siloing.” More here on this under-recognized condition.
Read These Next
Sunken station on the WII ‘death railway’
Ground beef prices move past a
Olympian arrested after reaching
Summer jobs are hard to come by for latest

To­ba­go Cor­re­spon­dent
The Di­vi­sion of Health is ex­press­ing alarm over “high rates” of sex­u­al­ly trans­mit­ted in­fec­tions (STIs) in To­ba­go, par­tic­u­lar­ly HIV, among the 20-29 age group.
In an ex­clu­sive in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Oni­ka Hen­ry, se­nior pro­gramme co­or­di­na­tor for sex­u­al health and youth de­vel­op­ment at the De­part­ment of Well­ness, Pre­ven­tion and Health Pro­mo­tion, said HIV in­fec­tions are ris­ing on the is­land. Apart from un­ac­cept­able HIV lev­els, Hen­ry said gon­or­rhoea and syphilis are al­so soar­ing on the is­land and glob­al­ly.
“We are mon­i­tor­ing those close­ly in To­ba­go be­cause it seems to be an in­ter­na­tion­al trend,” she said, adding there is a new drug-re­sis­tant strain of gon­or­rhoea.
“HIV re­mains a pri­or­i­ty be­cause those rates seem to be in­creas­ing over a num­ber of years. I re­mem­ber com­ing back in 2016 af­ter study­ing abroad; there was an in­crease hap­pen­ing even then.”
Hen­ry said while the STI trans­mis­sions re­main a big con­cern, she said the di­vi­sion is still analysing the da­ta to get a clear­er pic­ture.
“We’re see­ing an in­ter­est­ing pat­tern in terms of a par­tic­u­lar age group. From 20-29, they seem to have con­sis­tent­ly high rates when it comes to STIs. What we can’t do is draw any firm con­clu­sions about whether that means we have STIs in­creas­ing or whether more peo­ple are com­ing for­ward to be test­ed.”
She said da­ta from pri­vate in­sti­tu­tions re­mains in­ac­ces­si­ble to the di­vi­sion, but it is work­ing to ad­dress this.
Hen­ry, a clin­i­cal sex­ol­o­gist, said the main hin­drance to com­bat­ing new in­fec­tions is shame. She said the Di­vi­sion of Health is for­mu­lat­ing a work­place pol­i­cy to re­move dis­crim­i­na­tion and stig­ma sur­round­ing HIV. It al­so in­tends to strength­en pub­lic trust in their in­for­ma­tion re­main­ing con­fi­den­tial at pub­lic fa­cil­i­ties.
While HIV is now con­sid­ered a chron­ic dis­ease ow­ing to ad­vances in treat­ment, Hen­ry ac­knowl­edged it re­mains a tremen­dous fi­nan­cial bur­den on the di­vi­sion.
“It is not about us just want­i­ng peo­ple to be well and hav­ing a healthy labour force, but there is al­so the chal­lenge of bud­getary al­lo­ca­tions; the chal­lenge of find­ing fund­ing if you find your rates are in­creas­ing every year and if you have to pro­vide free med­ica­tion for a grow­ing pop­u­la­tion of pos­i­tive folks.”
She said there are com­pli­ca­tions in­volved in liv­ing with HIV, adding that an age­ing pop­u­la­tion that is not well is prob­lem­at­ic.
The sex ed­u­ca­tor be­lieves ear­ly in­ter­ven­tion and ed­u­ca­tion are key, stress­ing the im­por­tance of in­cor­po­rat­ing sex­u­al ed­u­ca­tion in­to the school cur­ricu­lum.
“Giv­en the num­bers, the STI re­ports we are hear­ing, it would be a grave in­jus­tice to not give young peo­ple the skills and knowl­edge they need to pro­tect them­selves. Sex­u­al­i­ty is health; it is part of one’s whole­ness and well­ness.”
Hen­ry said the in­ten­tion is to col­lab­o­rate with the Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion to de­sign age-ap­pro­pri­ate mes­sages for chil­dren. While an­tic­i­pat­ing some re­sis­tance from re­li­gious groups, Hen­ry is ea­ger to get all stake­hold­ers in­volved, in­clud­ing var­i­ous par­ents’ and teach­ers ‘ as­so­ci­a­tions (PTAs).
“I am hope­ful that they would see, based on the fig­ures, num­bers and re­search, that what we have been do­ing is clear­ly not work­ing, and if we re­al­ly care about our young peo­ple’s health, that we would do some­thing about it in ways that are ev­i­dence-based.”
She be­lieves re­li­gious groups preach­ing ab­sti­nence should em­brace sex­u­al ed­u­ca­tion in schools from an ear­ly age.
“Ab­sti­nence is a skill, it is not a tal­ent we are born with. Ab­sti­nence and re­fusal skills are part of sex ed­u­ca­tion.”
She said, like all oth­er sub­jects in the cur­ricu­lum, there is a way for it to be taught in the class­room, even at the pri­ma­ry school lev­el.
She warned against judg­ing young peo­ple too harsh­ly and la­belling them reck­less when they are bom­bard­ed dig­i­tal­ly with sex­u­al con­tent.
“If your on­ly ac­cess to in­for­ma­tion about sex is porn, we are cre­at­ing a sit­u­a­tion where peo­ple are look­ing at ex­plic­it con­tent with­out know­ing how to eval­u­ate it, as­sess it and as­sum­ing this is the norm, copy­ing what they’re see­ing and caus­ing harm to them­selves and oth­ers.”
She said sex­u­al ac­tiv­i­ty among pri­ma­ry school stu­dents is al­so be­ing re­port­ed and in­ves­ti­gat­ed,
Hen­ry ar­gued that even chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties must not be ex­clud­ed from be­ing ed­u­cat­ed on the top­ic.
As the is­land pre­pares for its fifth an­nu­al car­ni­val in Oc­to­ber, the di­vi­sion will be rolling out an aware­ness pro­gramme tar­get­ing young peo­ple.
She said in­flu­encers will be in­clud­ed as they meet the pop­u­la­tion at the var­i­ous fetes and oth­er ac­tiv­i­ties to spread their mes­sage.
IDA head hits pub­lic-pri­vate sec­tor dis­con­nect
Mean­while, Dr Denise Tsoisafatt An­gus, med­ical doc­tor and po­lit­i­cal leader, In­no­v­a­tive De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Al­liance (IDA), said it was a trav­es­ty that the di­vi­sion was un­able to ac­cess da­ta from the pri­vate sec­tor.
“The pub­lic health sec­tor in To­ba­go should be con­nect­ed to the pri­vate doc­tors for them to re­port on what they are see­ing. They should be able to give the pub­lic sec­tor a re­port, month­ly or week­ly, on the cas­es they are see­ing. So if there is an uptick in the num­bers, the pub­lic health sec­tor should start in­creas­ing their ed­u­ca­tion.”
She said this dis­con­nect could eas­i­ly be bridged by a pol­i­cy from the THA.
“It is just a pol­i­cy de­ci­sion and them go­ing out and en­gag­ing the pri­vate per­sons and cre­at­ing a re­port­ing sys­tem. I am sure the doc­tors in the pri­vate sec­tor would be more than hap­py to give a re­port, even though they’re not giv­ing the names of their pa­tients.”
She said health is­sues of such mag­ni­tude should not be treat­ed in iso­la­tion.