Boise Police via AP, file

Michael J. Watkins was sentenced to seven years in prison after the death of a monkey at the Boise zoo. The patas monkey was found dead of blunt force trauma to the head and neck.

An Idaho man who admitted to breaking into a Boise zoo last year and killing a monkey was sentenced to seven years in prison on Thursday, court records show.

Michael Watkins, 22, of Weiser, Idaho, in March pleaded guilty to attempted grand theft, a felony, and misdemeanor animal cruelty stemming from the break-in and beating death of the monkey at Zoo Boise in November.

The primate was one of the zoo's two Patas monkeys, ground-dwelling animals from Africa that stand more than 2 feet tall and weigh about 35 pounds. They are rare in zoos but not endangered in the wild.

The case shook officials at the zoo and triggered an outpouring of sympathy and donations from animal lovers worldwide.

Watkins scaled the security fence at Zoo Boise in the pre-dawn hours of November 17 and attempted to steal the monkey, which bit him, police said. Watkins then kicked and hit the animal, severely wounding it, according to police. The monkey later died of blunt force trauma, zoo officials said.

Zoo Boise Director Steve Burns said on Thursday the sentencing of Watkins closed a particularly devastating chapter for the facility.

"We're moving on," he said. "The court has done its job and we're continuing to do our job."

In the days after the death, zoo staff sought to boost the spirits of the companion-less Patas monkey and considered shipping it to another zoo with primates since they are exceedingly social, Burns said.

Instead, Zoo Boise in December gained two female Patas monkeys donated by the Rosamund Gifford Zoo in Syracuse, New York.

News about the monkey's death brought donations from across the United States and overseas, allowing the zoo to begin construction on Monday of a $250,000 exhibit for the three Patas monkeys, Burns said.

SALMON, Idaho -- A transgender woman whose use of a women's restroom in an Idaho grocery store reportedly upset other customers has been cited for trespassing and banned from the store for a year, police said on Friday.

A Rosauers supermarket in Lewiston asked police to charge 25-year-old Ally Robledo, who was born male but identifies as female, with the misdemeanor trespass charge on Monday, Lewiston Police Captain Roger Lanier said.

"The store security officer said he had been dealing with a problem over a couple days with the person going into the women's restroom and urinating while standing up," Lanier said.

He added that the store had reported that Robledo's use of the restroom made other female customers "very uncomfortable."

Robledo said she was being discriminated against.

"I'm a female trapped in a man's body. It's natural for me to go to the ladies' room. Getting the no trespassing order for a public restroom was really painful," she said.

The incident follows several cases that have stoked public debate about the boundaries of gender identity and the rights of transgender people to use accommodations such as restrooms in government buildings and businesses open to the public.

In February the parents of a 6-year-old transgender girl in Colorado filed a complaint with the state's civil rights agency challenging a decision by education officials to deny their child access to the girls' restrooms in her school. The case is being closely watched by civil libertarians.

Then last month in Arizona, a judge declined to grant a divorce to a transgender man, ruling he could not prove he was a male when he wed his wife in Hawaii. Same-sex marriages are not recognized in Arizona. The man has said he would appeal.

Colorado and a dozen other states have laws explicitly barring discrimination against transgender people in employment, housing and public accommodations, but Idaho does not, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Robledo said she was being unfairly treated by the store and by authorities in a rural area where questions about gender identity and the rights of transgender people rarely arise.

"I'm struggling here in this rural community as a transgender. Now I feel even more vulnerable," she said.

Ilona Turner, legal director of Transgender Law Center in San Francisco, said it was discriminatory to prevent transgender people from using the same facilities as everyone else.

"Transgender people have the same needs and deserve the same access to public stores and facilities as others without discrimination based on who they are. They just need to go to the bathroom like everyone else," she told Reuters by email.

An executive with Rosauers, a regional supermarket chain based in Spokane, Washington, did not respond to a request for comment.

Under Idaho law, anyone who owns or controls a property can deny access to it. Lanier said police responded to a trespassing matter involving Robledo and were not in a position to address the transgender issue.

"Society has yet to define exactly what makes a transgender. Far be it from a police department in Idaho to try to define that," he said.

AP file

This image provided by the National Park Service shows a gray wolf in the wild. The Obama administration on Wednesday May 4, 2011 announced it was lifting endangered species act protections for gray wolves in eight states in the Northern Rockies and Great Lakes.

Long an endangered predator, the northern Rocky Mountain gray wolf is once again the prey.

More than 550 gray wolves have been killed by hunters and trappers in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming this season, the second period in which hunting has been allowed in order to manage the population. For over 30 years the animals were considered endangered.

Add in the number of wolves killed by federal Wildlife Service agents because they are a threat to livestock, as well as those killed by poachers, diseases, collisions with vehicles and other means, and it's not clear that these levels are sustainable, according to conservationists.

Sitting at the top of the food chain in many wild areas, wolves often conjure up frightful images in people's minds, primarily due to fairy tales going back to "Little Red Riding Hood," "Peter and the Wolf" and even horror-film depictions of werewolves.

But in reality, experts say, while wolves are known to sometimes attack livestock such as sheep and cattle, attacks on humans are extremely rare.

Still, wolves were hunted to the point where they were listed as endangered under federal law in 1974. After years of recovery efforts -- and countless lawsuits -- gray wolves were completely taken off the endangered species list in 2012 when Wyoming became the last of the Rocky Mountain states to manage its gray wolf population. Hunting started last season in Idaho and Montana,  and in Wyoming in October 2012.

As the hunting season winds down, Montana reported that hunters have killed 225 wolves and Idaho 259. In Wyoming, which hosted its first gray wolf hunt this year, 42 wolves were killed in a controlled trophy hunting area near Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks in the northwest part of the state. Another 32 were killed in the rest of the state where gray wolves can legally be shot on sight, Eric Kezler of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department told NBC News.

"Hunters were very cooperative with us in reporting the animals they killed and provide the samples we need to track genetics," Kezler said. "It went extremely well. Based on whatever else is happening in Wyoming, we're confident we can maintain a health population."

Meanwhile the federal government reported that 216 wolves were killed by federal Wildlife Service agents because they were attacking livestock, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Related: Wolves, no longer endangered in Wyoming, now labeled 'predators'

According to the latest federal wolf counts “by every biological measure” the wolf population in the Northern Rockies region, excluding Wyoming, is fully recovered, according to federal experts. As of Dec. 31, 2011, the Rockies contained at least 1,774 wolves in at least 287 packs.

Derek Goldman, with the Endangered Species Coalition, points to gray wolves as an endangered animals success story, though he says his organization, based in Washington, D.C., is still awaiting word on the final population figures of wolf packs for this year.

“We recognize that hunting of wolves while we may not be enthusiastic about it that once a species is no long endangered that oftentimes hunting is going to be a reality,” Goldman told NBC News. “But we definitely want it managed by the best available science and not by politics.”

Marc Cooke of the Wolves of the Rockies conservation group, however, said some legislators in Montana want to make it open season on wolves. One bill, Senate Bill 200, would make it legal to kill a wolf on site on private property. "How is this managing wolves?" he asked.

“These animals can’t take this much more persecution,” Cooke told NBC News. “When you go and kill these wolves, a lot of times you’re killing the teachers, and when you kill the teachers of the pack you get the youngsters who haven’t absorbed the skills that would’ve been passed down over time to them from the elders in the pack. Now you have youngsters who don’t know how to kill things going after the easiest thing to kill, lambs and cattle, which leaves them open to being killed by in control hunts by the federal government.”

Kootenai County Sheriff, file

Joe Hundley was charged with assault after allegedly hitting a 19-month-old boy who had started to cry aboard a Delta flight.

A man accused of uttering a racial slur and slapping another passenger's crying toddler during a flight has been fired in the wake of the alleged incident.

Joe Hundley, 60, from Hayden, Idaho, was charged with assault after he allegedly hit the 19-month-old boy who had started to cry during the airplane’s descent, NBC station KARE reported.

According to court documents, the child’s mother Jessica Bennett alleges Hundley leaned over and said, "Shut that [N-word] baby up!" before slapping the child. This caused him to bleed and cry even harder, his mother told KARE.

'Offensive and disturbing'
The Boise Weekly reported that Bennett's story was supported by another passenger who was aboard the Delta Air Lines flight from Minneapolis to Atlanta on Feb. 8. That could not be independently confirmed by NBC News.

Hundley is no longer working for Idaho-based aircraft component manufacturer, Unitech, its parent company AGC Aerospace and Defense said in a statement on its website Sunday:

“Reports of the recent behavior of one of our business unit executives while on personal travel are offensive and disturbing. We have taken this matter very seriously and worked diligently to examine it since learning of the matter on Friday afternoon. As of Sunday, the executive is no longer employed with the company.

“We wish to emphasize that the behavior that has been described is contradictory to our values, embarrassing and does not in any way reflect the patriotic character of the men and women of diverse backgrounds who work tirelessly in our business.”

In an interview with KARE, Bennett said Hundley appeared intoxicated, accusing him of becoming increasingly obnoxious during the flight.

"He reeked of alcohol," Bennett said.  "He was belligerent and I was uncomfortable."

Hundley's attorney, Marcia Shein of Atlanta, has said that her client will plead not guilty to the charge.

Shein told Reuters that she has received hate mail over her defense of Hundley, but added that she believes her client has been misunderstood.

"He is not a racist," Shein said. "I'm going to make that real clear because that's what people are suggesting."

"There's background information people don't know about, and in time it will come out," she said.

The Spokesman-Review newspaper of Spokane, Wash., reported that Hundley had denied the allegations.

“I can only say it’s an absolute falsehood,” the Spokesman-Review quoted Hundley as saying. 

Police have arrested one of two men who they believe broke into an Idaho zoo the night a monkey there died from blunt-force trauma, but questions remain about how and why the animal was killed.

Michael J. Watkins, 22, of Weiser, Idaho was arrested Monday in Washington County on felony burglary and grand theft charges.

A tip led police to Watkins after they identified a hat found in the monkey's enclosure as similar to one Watkins was wearing the night two intruders were spotted at Zoo Boise. A security guard frightened away the intruders, then discovered the gravely injured patas monkey, which died a short time later.

Masterson said at a news conference Monday evening that Watkins sought care at a hospital for injuries to his upper torso sometime after the early Saturday incident. The story he gave to hospital staff "did not seem to mesh up with the injuries," Masterson said.

The monkey's death has left zoo workers shocked and devastated, zoo director Steve Burns said. The Crime Stoppers organization offered an award of up to $1,000 for information leading to the culprits' arrest.

Investigators had not had a chance to question Watkins extensively and have not revealed whether they think the zoo break-in was a prank that turned violent or something done with more sinister intent. But the police department and community are "angered and outraged over this senseless crime," Masterson said.

"The loss of this patas monkey has touched many lives, including our officers and investigators," he said.

The zoo doesn't have surveillance video. Instead, security guards patrol the grounds when the zoo is closed.

Burns said the guard who discovered the crime spotted one intruder inside the zoo and one outside the perimeter fence near the primate exhibit. Both men fled, with one running into the interior of the zoo.

Previous record
Investigators believe Watkins is the man who was seen inside the fence.

Burns and police were searching the grounds when Burns heard a groan and found the injured monkey outside its exhibit, near the fence surrounding the zoo. They were able to get the animal into a crate and to the zoo's animal hospital, but the monkey died of blunt-force trauma to its head and neck just a few minutes later.

An inventory showed none of the other animals were missing or harmed.

Monkey dies from blow to head after break-in at Idaho zoo; police find ballcap

Police say Watkins was visiting Boise with friends over the weekend from his home in Weiser, an agricultural town about 60 miles away near the Oregon-Idaho border.

Court records show Watkins has been in trouble with the law before, including drug arrests. Police said they do not know whether Watkins may have been under the influence of alcohol or drugs at the time of the break-in.

Officers have spoken with the other man spotted outside the zoo but do not expect charges to be filed against him, Masterson said.

Crimes at the zoo are rare, Burns said.

"I've been here for 15 years, and I don't remember any cases where we've had a visitor intentionally or even accidentally injure an animal," Burns said. "People in Boise are usually pretty respectful. We were just saying the other day that we can't even remember the last time that someone was found inside the zoo after hours. The security guards do a really good job."

Burns said it will take a few weeks before he can decide if the remaining patas monkey will be sent to another zoo or if another patas monkey will be brought in as a companion.

“Because monkeys are social animals we are concerned about the welfare of the remaining animal,” Burns said.

'We're going to move on'
The crime may have raised interest in the patas monkeys. A donation for the one remaining male patas monkey under the zoo's adopt-an-animal program came in over the weekend, Burns said.

Patas monkeys, found in Africa, are around 2.5 feet tall and typically weigh around 35 pounds.

The monkey exhibit remains open to the public, although zoo workers were keeping some of the larger garage-sized doors to the exhibit closed to keep down noise, and keepers were giving the remaining patas monkey a little more attention, Burns said. The zoo kicked off a fundraiser to build a new exhibit house for the primates in September.

"That primate house was built back in the 1960s and it's just time to update it and provide the animals with more space and things like that," he said.

For now, he said, zoo workers are just focusing on caring for the remaining 300 animals at the zoo.

"We're going to grieve for the animal and make sure the community's OK. But we're going to move on with the plans that we have and continue to take care of the animals. Boise's a really nice place to live, and usually this kind of stuff doesn't happen in Boise," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Two children found sitting by the side of Interstate 90 in western Idaho Tuesday told sheriff’s deputies that their mother had left them there after running out of gas, officials said.

Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that the boys, aged three and six, said their mother had walked them to the spot on I- 90 where they were found. The kids said they had been taken there when it was still dark and raining.

She then took a ride to a gas station between 6:30 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. local time (8:30 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. ET), the statement said. A construction supervisor working nearby found the children at about 9:10 a.m. local time (11:10 a.m. ET). 

'Argument with her boyfriend'
The woman was arrested on a negligent driving warrant at a house in Spokane Valley, Wash., on Tuesday night after deputies received a tip-off that she was there, NBC station KHQ reported. Kootenai and Spokane counties are on either side of the state line.

KHQ said the mother would most likely face more charges in Kootenai.

The sheriff’s office statement said the woman told the person who gave her the ride that “she had been in an argument with her boyfriend and just needed to get to a phone to call for a ride.”

The children – after being cleared by emergency medical providers – were placed in foster care.

KHQ reported that the woman was seen with her children at a Walmart near the state line Monday night. Someone called police saying she was acting strangely and she was checked out by medics.

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