Category: Boston, Massachusetts Local News

It was already painful enough for some Bruins fans to watch former captain Brad Marchand lift the Stanley Cup with the Florida Panthers in June. 

But, the Bruins legend revealed on Tuesday that he also considered joining another rival of Boston’s this past offseason before eventually re-upping with Florida. 

“It was between Florida and Toronto of where I was going to go,” Marchand told reporters, including The Athletic’s Chris Johnston, on Tuesday before a matchup with the Panthers. “I mean, ultimately, I never even thought it was even possible to re-sign in Florida. I really didn’t. Just with the guys that we had up and stuff like that. 

“Toronto, I was serious about what I said, with where they’re at. As a group, the way that they’re competing now — they compete the right way, which is what they kind of had to get over that hurdle.” 

The 37-year-old Marchand eventually re-upped with the Panthers on a six-year contract with Florida before hitting free agency. 

While Marchand’s comments could be interpreted as another signature trolling opportunity for the long-time Leafs antagonist, Johnston noted that there was “ legitimate smoke around the possibility of him jumping to the Leafs on July 1.”

“League sources familiar with the situation say that Toronto even passed on the possibility of acquiring another player in a June trade in order to protect the cap space that would have been needed to bring in Marchand,” Johnston wrote.

“They were ready to be aggressive if the 37-year-old winger hit the open market coming off a playoffs in which he finished second in Conn Smythe Trophy voting and was part of a team that knocked the Leafs out of the playoffs for the fifth time in his career.”

Even though Marchand reportedly had interest in joining Toronto, he did manage to twist the knife against the Leafs amid their up-and-down season. 

“It’s unfortunate the fans ran [Mitch] Marner out of town,” Marchand said, referring to Marner’s exit this offseason before joining the Vegas Golden Knights. “That’s a huge impact on their group. He’s a point-a-game player. Like, that hurts.”

 

Conor Ryan is a staff writer covering the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, and Red Sox for Boston.com, a role he has held since 2023.

BOSTON (AP) — Pamela Smart, who is serving life in prison for orchestrating the murder of her husband by her teenage student in 1990, is seeking to overturn her conviction over what her lawyers claim were several constitutional violations.

The petition for habeas corpus relief was filed Monday in New York, where she is being held at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women, and, in New Hampshire, where the murder happened.

“Ms. Smart’s trial unfolded in an environment that no court had previously confronted — wall-to-wall media coverage that blurred the line between allegation and evidence,” Jason Ott, who is part of Smart’s legal team, said in a statement. “This petition challenges whether a fair adversarial process took place.”

The move comes about seven months after New Hampshire Gov. Kelly Ayotte rejected a request for a sentence reduction hearing. Ayotte said she reviewed the case and decided it was not deserving of a hearing.

A spokesman for the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision said it would have no comment about the petition.

A spokeman for New Hampshire’s attorney general said it would not comment on pending litigation “other than to note that the State maintains Ms. Smart received a fair trial and that her convictions were lawfully obtained and upheld on appeal.”

In their petition, lawyers for the 57-year-old Smart argue that prosecutors misled the jury by providing them with inaccurate transcripts of surreptitiously recorded conversations of Ms. Smart that included words that were not audible on the recordings. Among the words they claim weren’t audible but in the transcript were the word killed in the sentence “you had your husband killed,” the word busted in the sentence “I’m gonna be busted” and the word murder in the sentence “this would have been the perfect murder.”

“Modern science confirms what common sense has always told us: when people are handed a script, they inevitably hear the words they are shown,” Smart’s attorney, Matthew Zernhelt, said in a statement. “Jurors were not evaluating the recordings independently — they were being directed toward a conclusion, and that direction decided the verdict.”

Lawyers also argued the conviction should be overturned because the verdict was tainted by the media attention and due to faulty instructions to the jury. They argued jurors were told they must find that Smart acted with premeditation, not told they must consider only evidence presented at trial.

They also argued the trial court gave her a mandatory life sentence without parole for being an accomplice to first-degree murder, despite New Hampshire not mandating that sentence for the charge.

Smart was a 22-year-old high school media coordinator when she began an affair with a 15-year-old boy who later fatally shot her husband, Gregory Smart, in Derry. The shooter was freed in 2015 after serving a 25-year sentence. Although Smart denied knowledge of the plot, she was convicted of being an accomplice to first-degree murder and other crimes and sentenced to life without parole.

It took until 2024 for Smart to take full responsibility for her husband’s death. In a video released in June, she said she spent years deflecting blame “almost as if it was a coping mechanism.”

Smart’s trial was a media circus and one of America’s first high-profile cases about a sexual affair between a school employee and a student. The student, William Flynn, testified that Smart told him she needed her husband killed because she feared she would lose everything if they divorced and that she threatened to break up with him if he didn’t kill her husband. Flynn and three other teens cooperated with prosecutors and all have since been released.

Flynn and 17-year-old Patrick Randall entered the Smarts’ Derry condominium and forced Gregory Smart to his knees in the foyer. As Randall held a knife to the man’s throat, Flynn fired a hollow-point bullet into his head. Both pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and were sentenced to 28 years to life. They were granted parole in 2015. Two other teenagers served prison sentences and have been released.

The case inspired Joyce Maynard’s 1992 book “To Die For” and the 1995 film of the same name, starring Nicole Kidman and Joaquin Phoenix.

CHATHAM, MASS. (WHDH) – A dog was rescued from a pond in Chatham after he fell through the ice Tuesday afternoon, according to Chatham fire officials.

The dog, named Goose, fell into the frigid water at Goose Pond.

Chatham firefighters said when they arrived, Goose had his head and front paws above the water and was clinging to a shelf of ice. They quickly put on their survival suits and pulled Goose out in less than two minutes.

The first responders said they train for this type of situation yearly.

“It’s the kind of thing that we can think about when we’re coming on shift, you know, what are some possible calls that we might get due to weather,” said Peter Hennigan, one of Goose’s rescuers.

Hennigan said Goose’s owner made the right decision by calling 911 instead of trying to rescue the dog himself. The owner told firefighters he was grateful for their swift action in saving his beloved pet.

“They were very thankful and grateful,” said Nick Ruggiere, who also helped rescue Goose. “They invited us inside the house after to see Goose. He is a very sweet dog. We got to love him up by the fire place, it was nice. He was very thankful, too.”

Hennigan is now warning people to be aware of the dangers of icy ponds like this one, since hypothermia can set in quickly.

“It’s really important that people understand that no ice is safe ice, and your actions of trying to help will probably make it worse and dangerous for others,” he said.

Firefighters said Goose was cold and tired, but showed no signs of severe distress or other issues. Goose’s owner was advised to notify the veteranarian so he can be checked out.

(Copyright (c) 2025 Sunbeam Television. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) — A school police officer in Uvalde, Texas, stood by during one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history and made no attempt to distract or stop the gunman before he opened fire inside the classrooms, a prosecutor told a jury Tuesday.

Adrian Gonzales, who was among the first to respond to the attack in 2022, arrived while the teenage assailant was still outside the building and did not make a move, even when a teacher pointed out the direction of the shooter, special prosecutor Bill Turner said during opening statements of a criminal trial.

The officer only went inside Robb Elementary minutes later “after the damage had been done,” Turner said.

Prosecutors focused sharply on Gonzales’ steps in the minutes after the shooting began and as the first officers arrived. They did not address the hundreds of other local, state and federal officers who arrived and waited more than an hour to confront the gunman.

Gonzales has pleaded not guilty in the case, which is a rare example of charges being brought against an officer who is accused of not doing more to save lives. His attorneys disputed accusations that he did nothing at what they called a chaotic scene, saying that Gonzales helped evacuate children as other police arrived.

“The government makes it want to seem like he just sat there,” said defense attorney Nico LaHood. “He did what he could, with what he knew at the time.”

Gonzales, who is no longer a Uvalde schools officer, faces 29 counts of child abandonment or endangerment and could be sentenced to a maximum of two years in prison if convicted.

“He could have stopped him, but he didn’t want to be the target,” said Velma Lisa Duran, sister of teacher Irma Garcia, who was among the 19 students and two teachers who were killed.

Duran, who arrived at the courthouse to watch the beginning of the trial, said authorities stood by more than three years ago while her sister “died protecting children.”

Students grabbed scissors to confront attacker

Defense attorneys described an officer who tried to assess where the gunman was while thinking he was being fired on without protection against a high-powered rifle.

Gonzales was among the first group to go into the building before they took fire from Ramos, the officer’s attorneys said.

“This isn’t a man waiting around. This isn’t a man failing to act,” defense attorney Jason Goss said.

Gonzales and former Uvalde schools police chief Pete Arredondo are the only two officers to face criminal charges over the response. Arredondo’s trial has not been scheduled.

Gonzales, a 10-year veteran of the police force, had extensive active shooter training, the special prosecutor said. “When you hear gunshots, you go to the gunfire,” Turner said.

“When a child calls 911, we have a right to expect a response,” Turner said, his voice trembling with emotion.

As Gonzales waited outside, children and teachers hid inside darkened classrooms and grabbed scissors “to confront a gunman,” Turner said. “They did as they had been trained.”

Families expected to testify

Some families of the victims were upset that more officers were not charged given that nearly 400 federal, state and local officers converged on the school soon after the attack.

Terrified students inside the classrooms called 911 and parents outside begged for intervention by officers, some of whom could hear shots being fired while they stood in a hallway. A tactical team of officers eventually went into the classroom and killed the shooter.

An investigation found 77 minutes passed from the time authorities arrived until the tactical team breached the classroom and killed Salvador Ramos, who was obsessed with violence and notoriety in the months leading up to the shooting.

The trial for Gonzales was expected to last about two weeks, Judge Sid Harle said.

Among the potential witnesses are FBI agents, Texas Rangers, emergency dispatchers, school employees and family members of the victims.

At the request of Gonzales’ attorneys, the trial was moved to Corpus Christi after they argued Gonzales could not receive a fair trial in Uvalde.

Reviews found many failures with police response

State and federal reviews of the shooting cited cascading problems in law enforcement training, communication, leadership and technology, and questioned why officers waited so long.

The officer’s attorneys told jurors that there was plenty of blame to go around — from the lack of security at the school to police policy — and that prosecutors will try to play on their emotions by showing photos from the scene.

“What the prosecution wants you to do is get mad at Adrian. They are going to try to play on your emotions,” Goss said.

“The monster who hurt these children is dead,” he said. “He did not get this justice.”

Prosecutors likely will face a high bar to win a conviction. Juries are often reluctant to convict law enforcement officers for inaction, as seen after the Parkland, Florida, school massacre in 2018.

Sheriff’s deputy Scot Peterson was charged with failing to confront the shooter in that attack. It was the first such prosecution in the U.S. for an on-campus shooting, and Peterson was acquitted by a jury in 2023.

(Copyright (c) 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

Democrats hoping to regain control of the Senate in this year’s midterm elections face a tough task: They must flip four seats controlled by Republicans, on a map that offers few obvious opportunities.

Midterm elections are traditionally an uphill battle for the party in the White House, and some of President Donald Trump’s unpopular policies could hinder his party’s efforts to maintain a majority in the Senate and continue advancing his agenda. But Democrats control only 47 seats, compared with 53 for Republicans, and they also have to defend vulnerable seats of their own.

Still, Democrats in recent months have had a streak of good luck, recruiting top-tier candidates in some of the most important races.

Here’s a look at the top Senate races to watch in 2026.

Key open seats and vulnerable incumbents

Maine: Sen. Susan Collins, the fifth-term lawmaker from Maine, is a top target of Democrats. She is the only Republican senator who represents a state won by former Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024, but she has cultivated a reputation as a moderate pragmatist and has proved extremely tough to oust.

Gov. Janet Mills, the popular and term-limited Democratic governor, jumped into the race in October and appears to be the pick of much of the party establishment. Mills would be a formidable challenger to Collins, but she has a primary to get through first.

And Mills, who would be 79 by the time she was sworn into the Senate, is facing a much younger primary opponent, 41-year-old Graham Platner, who has become a progressive favorite. But Platner, an oyster farmer and Marine veteran, also faces nagging questions about past controversies, including a tattoo he got years ago that resembles Nazi imagery.

Georgia: Sen. Jon Ossoff, a Democrat, will likely have to attract some Trump supporters to earn reelection in Georgia, a battleground that Trump carried in 2024.

Ossoff, a strong fundraiser who won a runoff election in early 2021, will face tough sledding this year. But he caught a break when Gov. Brian Kemp, a popular Republican viewed as Ossoff’s toughest challenger, said in May that he would not run against him.

Instead, three Republicans have jumped into the primary: Derek Dooley, a former college football coach with close ties to Kemp, and Reps. Mike Collins and Buddy Carter.

North Carolina: The open seat in North Carolina, a perennial battleground that Trump has won three times, may be Democrats’ best pickup opportunity. Sen. Thom Tillis, a Republican, said in June that he would not run for reelection, after Trump assailed him for opposing his signature domestic policy bill and threatened to back a primary challenge.

Two high-profile politicians seeking the seat could make the general election an expensive, marquee clash: Popular former Gov. Roy Cooper is running on the Democratic side, and Republicans have Michael Whatley, a favorite of Trump’s who stepped down from his role as chair of the Republican National Committee to run for the seat.

Michigan: Sen. Gary Peters, a Democrat, said at the beginning of last year that he would not run for reelection, setting off a race among Michigan Democrats to replace him and offering Republicans a chance to go on offense in a swing state.

The Democratic primary is a three-way contest. State Sen. Mallory McMorrow, 39, who is one of the party’s leading advocates for generational change, faces Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, 41, a progressive former public health official, and Rep. Haley Stevens, 42, a suburban Detroit moderate.

Republicans have coalesced around one candidate: Rep. Mike Rogers, 62, who narrowly lost in the general election for Michigan’s other Senate seat in 2024.

Where parties need to defend friendly turf

Ohio: Sen. Jon Husted, a Republican, was Ohio’s lieutenant governor until January, when he was appointed to fill the Senate seat vacated by Vice President JD Vance. Running in a special election this year to serve out the remainder of Vance’s term, which would have ended in 2028, Husted should have had an easy path in a former battleground that has become a safely Republican state.

But Democrats scored a big win in August, when former Sen. Sherrod Brown said he would attempt a comeback. Brown, a mainstay of Ohio politics who lost his reelection bid in 2024, could win over a sizable portion of working-class voters and make the race competitive — though he starts at a disadvantage given the state’s red lean.

Minnesota: Democrats were forced to defend another open seat when Sen. Tina Smith of Minnesota said in February that she would retire. Minnesota is a blue state, so the race should tilt Democrats’ way, but both sides have competitive primaries.

Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, who served under Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ running mate, will face Rep. Angie Craig in the Democratic primary. Republicans have not yet recruited a candidate who appears particularly formidable: Their options so far are former NBA player Royce White, who was the party’s nominee for Senate in 2024, and Adam Schwarze, a former Navy SEAL. Another former NBA player, Willie Burton, has also considered joining the Republican primary.

Iowa: Facing flagging approval ratings and a primary challenger, Sen. Joni Ernst, a Republican, said she would not run for reelection in Iowa in August.

Some Democratic challengers had already jumped into the race to defeat her, as the party attempts a comeback in a Republican state that was once a battleground. They include Zach Wahls, a state senator; Josh Turek, a state representative; and Nathan Sage, a Marine veteran and former Chamber of Commerce president.

Rep. Ashley Hinson, a Republican, is the likely favorite to win the seat, given Iowa voters’ conservative bent. Former state Sen. Jim Carlin is also in the Republican primary.

New Hampshire: Republicans have spied an opportunity in New Hampshire, a former swing state that has trended Democrats’ way at the federal level but has a Republican governor and legislature. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat who has held her seat since 2009 and was previously governor of the state, said in March she would not run for reelection.

Rep. Chris Pappas, a Democrat, is running to succeed Shaheen, as is Karishma Manzur, a scientist and progressive. On the Republican side, former Sen. John Sununu launched a comeback bid in October after representing the state in the early 2000s. And Scott Brown, another former senator who represented neighboring Massachusetts, is also in the Republican primary.

The seats Democrats would like to flip

Alaska: Alaska has not had a Democratic senator since 2014, and with Sen. Dan Sullivan, a Republican, running for reelection, that trend is likely to continue. But the solidly red state has an independent streak, and Democrats are hoping they can recruit a candidate who has an outside shot at toppling Sullivan: former Rep. Mary Peltola.

Peltola is a Democratic star in the state who in 2022 flipped Alaska’s sole House district blue for the first time in decades. She has not said yet whether she will run to reclaim that seat — she lost reelection in 2024 — or for governor or Senate. If she chose to face Sullivan, she would start the race as an underdog.

Texas: Democrats have long salivated at the possibility of flipping Texas blue, but they have repeatedly fallen short, and Sen. John Cornyn, a Republican, would enter a general election as a strong favorite.

Former Rep. Colin Allred, a Democrat who lost to Sen. Ted Cruz in 2024, bowed out in December, making way for Rep. Jasmine Crockett, a high-profile liberal firebrand, to jump in. Crockett faces James Talarico, a progressive seminarian and rising star in the state Legislature, in her primary.

But there is a twist: Cornyn faces a serious primary challenge from Ken Paxton, the state attorney general who has tied himself closely to Trump’s base. Paxton faces several scandals, a weakness that has Democrats hoping he defeats Cornyn in the Republican primary. Rep. Wesley Hunt also entered the primary in October, adding another wrinkle.

Nebraska: Democrats do not usually stand much of a chance in this solidly conservative state. But they would surely prefer independent candidate Dan Osborn, a former union leader and populist, to Sen. Pete Ricketts, a Republican.

Osborn’s long-shot campaign in 2024 against Sen. Deb Fischer, the state’s other Republican incumbent, caught her flat-footed and was far more competitive than expected. But Republicans are better prepared for his challenge this time. Democrats are not running a candidate in the race, and the state party’s chair endorsed Osborn, who remains an underdog to Ricketts.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.