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US Marine from Massachusetts accused of stolen valor: Feds say he applied for Purple Heart he hadn’t earned

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

A former U.S. Marine from western Massachusetts was arrested following an indictment in federal court alleging he had lied about his service experiences to receive disability benefits and even tried for a Purple Heart he hadn’t earned.Paul John Herbert, 52, of Shelburne Falls, was arrested Friday following an indictment handed down by a federal grand jury sitting in Springfield the day before. The indictment charges him with theft of government property and making false statements. He was released from custody following an initial appearance in court.“Individuals who steal veterans disability benefits and falsely represent themselves as decorated veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces degrade the service of the men and women who selflessly serve our country,” said Patrick Hegarty, the special agent in charge of the U.S. Department of Defense, investigative service for the northeast, in a statement.The false statement charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison, while the the...

School Committee gives Superintendent Skipper’s first year mixed reviews

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

Following her first year on the job, the Boston School Committee gave Superintendent Mary Skipper generally tepidly positive feedback on her first steps in the position.“The Committee recognizes that the timing of the Superintendent’s arrival, with hiring season and budget season having already been completed, limited her ability to make significant changes or new investments in year one,” the committee’s summative evaluation read. “With this in mind, the Committee expressed broad agreement that the Superintendent was proficient in her performance and is supportive of her work.”The evaluations, completed by each committee member and compiled into a group evaluation by members Stephen Alkins and Michael O’Neill, follow Skipper’s self-evaluation presented to the committee in late July.The evaluations rank the new superintendent on the categories Instructional Leadership, Management and Operations, Family and Community Engagement and Professional Cul...

EEE detected in mosquitoes in Massachusetts for the first time this year: ‘A late season emergence’

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

EEE has been detected in mosquitoes in the Bay State for the first time this year, as the risk level for EEE was raised in communities ahead of Labor Day weekend.After zero EEE activity in Massachusetts over the last two years, the state Department of Public Health announced the season’s first Eastern equine encephalitis positive mosquito samples.The presence of EEE was confirmed on Friday by the Massachusetts State Public Health Laboratory in mosquito samples collected in Douglas and Southbridge in Worcester County. No human or animal cases of the rare but serious and potentially fatal disease have been detected so far this year.This EEE detection comes after the Department of Public Health earlier this week reported the first two human cases of West Nile virus in state residents this year. A man in his 40s was exposed to the virus in Middlesex County, which is an area already known to be at moderate risk for West Nile virus. The other case is a woman in her 70s, who was expo...

Brockton School Committee votes for audit, investigation of $14.4 million budget deficit

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

An unexpected $14.4 million deficit in this past fiscal year’s budget, which the Brockton School Committee learned about at the time its superintendent announced he’d be taking an extended medical leave, has prompted an independent, third-party audit and investigation.The committee authorized the audit and investigation of the budget during a rare Friday emergency meeting at Brockton High School.Fiscal year ’23 ended June 30, but Mayor Robert Sullivan said the deficit wasn’t learned about until this week, prompting an emergency executive session meeting that lasted four hours Thursday night.“I support this wholeheartedly,” Sullivan said of the audit and investigation during Friday’s meeting. “I want to do a deep dive. I want to work with a firm that specializes in this type of thing, not connected to the city of Brockton. I think that’s extremely important.”Superintendent Mike Thomas, who has been in the district for 30 years, informed the committee this week he’d be out on ex...

Ticker: Ahead of big sports weekend, dispute with Disney leaves millions of cable subscribers in the dark; Wall Street edges higher

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

A company representing nearly 15 million cable subscribers and The Walt Disney Co. blamed each other Friday for a dispute that has cut off Disney-owned stations to viewers on the eve of a big sports weekend for U.S. Open tennis and college football fans.The dispute between Disney and Charter Communications Inc. resulted in ESPN, ABC, FX, National Geographic and Disney-branded stations going abruptly dark on Thursday night for Charter’s Spectrum TV subscribers. ABC-TV was also cut in seven markets, including New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.Both the cable company and Disney said the other side rejected short-term extensions that would have kept Spectrum subscribers’ access to the networks.Wall Street edges higherA choppy day of trading on Wall Street ended Friday with slight gains for stocks, as the market notched its second straight winning week.The market got a boost early on from a closely watched government report that showed U.S. job growth increased at a healthy, b...

Man who escaped Oregon mental health hospital while shackled found stuck in muddy pond

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A man charged with attempted murder who escaped from a psychiatric hospital in Oregon while fully shackled was arrested Friday after he was found floundering in a muddy pond.Christopher Pray was found buried up to the armpits in the pond in Portland, the Oregon State Police said. Portland Fire & Rescue personnel extricated the man using ropes and he was taken to the hospital. Police said he gave a false name, but a hospital employee recognized Pray and police were called.The Oregon State Police are investigating how Pray managed to escape on Wednesday as he was being taken to the Oregon State Hospital in Salem. Restrained with leg shackles, a belly chain and handcuffs, Pray slid into the driver’s seat of a van he was being transported in when the driver was outside the vehicle and drove away. Pray faces charges including attempted murder, robbery, assault and felon in possession of a firearm in Multnomah County Circuit Court, where Portland is located...

‘We had given up hope’: A family reunion decades in the making

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

Retired Toronto news anchor Jack Roe relentlessly searched for his brother for nearly 25 years, but that quest has finally ended. He has found him on the other side of the world.The 70-year-old Roe says he and his sister, 81-year-old Maureen Scott, had no idea they had a brother until their father died in 1999. That’s when family members told them that their mother had another child.His name was Paul Wavish, and he was born in a small village in Scotland in 1944. The search for Paul spanned over two decades and at first did not turn up anything.“It had been 23 years. We never thought it was going to happen. In fact, we had given up hope,” said Roe.Last August, Scott says they received a message from a young woman in New Zealand who saw their billboard on Ancestry.ca, which changed everything.“The message read ‘the particulars you listed about the person you are looking for closely matched my grandfather, whose name is also Paul,'” said Scott.Roe s...

DeSantis won’t meet with Biden during president’s trip to survey Idalia damage

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ‘ office said Friday that he’s not going to meet with President Joe Biden when the Democrat flies to Florida this weekend to survey damage from Hurricane Idalia, suggesting that doing so could hinder disaster response. “In these rural communities, and so soon after impact, the security preparations alone that would go into setting up such a meeting would shut down ongoing recovery efforts,” DeSantis spokesman Jeremy Redfern said in a statement. Idalia made landfall Wednesday morning along Florida’s Big Bend region as a Category 3 storm, causing widespread flooding and damage before moving north to drench Georgia and North Carolina. Biden is set to fly to Florida on Saturday to tour the damage personally. But DeSantis preemptively heading off a meeting contradicts Biden himself, who, when asked after an event at the White House earlier Friday whether he would meet with DeSantis during his trip to Florida, replied, “Ye...

Attorney: Myon Burrell, locked up for life as teen in killing but later freed, denies new charges

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A Minnesota man who was a teenager when he was sent to prison for life in a high-profile murder case — then released 18 years later when his sentence was commuted — was charged Friday with gun and drug felonies after police said they found a handgun and drugs in his SUV during a traffic stop.Myon Burrell, now 37, made his first court appearance Friday, where bail was set at $50,000. His attorney said Burrell denies the allegations. “As in so many criminal prosecutions, things may not be as they first appear,” said his attorney, Paul Applebaum. “I am particularly interested in the circumstances surrounding the initial traffic stop of Mr. Burrell.”Burrell was previously convicted in the 2008 death of 11-year-old Tyesha Edwards, a Minneapolis girl who was doing her homework when she was hit by a stray bullet. Burrell was 16 at the time of the slaying and was sentenced to life. He always maintained his innocence, and his prosecution and punishment raised questio...

Officials can’t interfere with local Tennessee Pride festival under anti-drag law, judge rules

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:17:31 GMT

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A federal judge ruled Friday that law enforcement officials can’t use a Tennessee law that strictly limits drag shows to interfere with a local Pride festival this weekend, favoring event organizers who sued after a district attorney warned he intends to enforce the new statute even after another federal judge ruled it unconstitutional.U.S. District Judge Ronnie Greer in Knoxville granted a temporary restraining order that prevents District Attorney Ryan Desmond and other local law enforcement officials from enforcing the state law or interfering with the Blount County Pride festival scheduled for Saturday. That includes no discouraging of third parties from hosting or modifying the event, including the venue of Maryville College, the judge wrote.Earlier this year, a federal judge across the state in Memphis ruled Tennessee’s anti-drag show law was “unconstitutionally vague and substantially overbroad,” and encouraged “discriminatory enforcement.” The r...