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Tag: justice

  • Trahan calls for fed probe of Steward finances

    Trahan calls for fed probe of Steward finances

    BOSTON — U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan is urging federal authorities to investigate Stewart Health Care System’s plans to sell its Massachusetts hospitals after the bankrupt company announced plans to close two of the facilities.

    In a letter to the heads of U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Trade Commission and Department of Health and Human Services, Trahan said Steward’s decision to sell two hospitals — Carney Hospital in Dorchester and Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer, will “have a long-lasting impact on accessible healthcare” in those communities.

    The Westford Democrat, whose district includes Ayer, called on the agencies to probe the closures and “closely monitor” the sale of Steward’s six other hospitals in Massachusetts, including Holy Family’s locations in Methuen and Haverhill.

    “It is crucial to ensure that healthcare services remain accessible and affordable for patients as these hospitals transition to new ownership,” Trahan wrote.

    The Department of Justice and other agencies recently launched an investigation into the impact of “greed” at Steward and other health care systems. As part of the investigation, the agencies plan to review the impact of private equity firms on patient health, worker safety and the quality of care for patients.

    The Texas-based company is also the target of an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston, which is probing allegations that include fraud and violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The federal law prohibits U.S. companies or citizens from engaging in bribery and corruption overseas.

    Trahan’s request would expand the scope of that investigation to include “domestic crimes” as well as “the consumer harms patients have faced because of the company’s actions.”

    Trahan cited the role of the private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management in Steward’s finances in Massachusetts and other states. She said acquisitions and sale-leaseback deals enriched Cerberus and Steward’s executives, including CEO Ralph de la Torre.

    Last week, the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions voted to initiate the investigation and issue a rare congressional subpoena for Steward’s CEO Ralph de la Torre to testify on Capitol Hill before the panel at a September hearing.

    Steward plans to put its 31 U.S. hospitals up for sale to pay down $9 billion in outstanding liabilities owed to creditors as part of the company’s bankruptcy proceedings. The company filed for federal bankruptcy protections in May.

    Bids on Steward’s Massachusetts hospitals and other states were due last week= but the company hasn’t disclosed prospective buyers. The company’s attorneys have asked a federal bankruptcy judge on Monday to postpone a court hearing on the hospital sales until Aug. 13 as it finalizes lease terms and other details.

    Meanwhile, the Healey administration’s plans to provide about $30 million in repurposed state-Medicaid funding to keep the hospitals running as they transition to new ownership is facing opposition from a committee representing creditors during the company’s bankruptcy proceedings.

    In a court filing late Monday, the committee said it has “significant concerns” that the $30 million pledged by the state may provide near-term (and important) assistance in transitioning the hospital to new owners, “it will do so at the expense of the rest of debtors, their estates and their creditors.”

    Gov. Maura Healey has pledged that “not a dime” of the $30 million will go to Steward and will instead help ensure a smooth transition to new hospital ownership. But she noted that her administration has little or no authority to block the hospital closures.

    “It’s Steward’s decision to close these hospitals, there’s nothing that the state can do, that I can do, that I have the power to do, to keep that from happening,” Healey told reporters on Monday. “We are in this situation … because of the greed of one individual, Ralph de la Torre, and the management team at Steward.”

    Christian M. Wade covers the Massachusetts Statehouse for North of Boston Media Group’s newspapers and websites. Email him at cwade@cnhinews.com

    By Christian M. Wade | Statehouse Reporter

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  • Trahan calls for federal probe of Steward finances

    Trahan calls for federal probe of Steward finances

    BOSTON — U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan is urging federal authorities to investigate Stewart Health Care System’s plans to sell its Massachusetts hospitals after the bankrupt company announced plans to close two of the facilities.

    In a letter to the heads of U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Trade Commission and Department of Health and Human Services, Trahan said Steward’s decision to sell two hospitals – Carney Hospital in Dorchester and Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer – will “have a long-lasting impact on accessible health care” in those communities.

    The Westford Democrat, whose district includes Ayer, called on the agencies to probe the closures and “closely monitor” the sale of Steward’s six other hospitals in Massachusetts, including Holy Family’s locations in Methuen and Haverhill.

    “It is crucial to ensure that healthcare services remain accessible and affordable for patients as these hospitals transition to new ownership,” Trahan wrote.

    The Department of Justice and other agencies recently launched an investigation into the impact of “greed” at Steward and other health care systems. As part of the investigation, the agencies plan to review the impact of private equity firms on patient health, worker safety and the quality of care for patients.

    The Texas-based company is also the target of an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Boston, which is probing allegations that include fraud and violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The federal law prohibits U.S. companies or citizens from engaging in bribery and corruption overseas.

    Trahan’s request would expand the scope of that investigation to include “domestic crimes” as well as “the consumer harms patients have faced because of the company’s actions.”

    Trahan cited the role of the private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management in Steward’s finances in Massachusetts and other states. She said acquisitions and sale-leaseback deals enriched Cerberus and Steward’s executives, including CEO Ralph de la Torre.

    Last week, the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions voted to initiate the investigation and issue a rare congressional subpoena for Steward’s CEO Ralph de la Torre to testify on Capitol Hill before the panel at a September hearing.

    Steward plans to put its 31 U.S. hospitals up for sale to pay down $9 billion in outstanding liabilities owed to creditors as part of the company’s bankruptcy proceedings. The company filed for federal bankruptcy protections in May.

    Bids on Steward’s Massachusetts hospitals and other states were due last week= but the company hasn’t disclosed prospective buyers. The company’s attorneys have asked a federal bankruptcy judge on Monday to postpone a court hearing on the hospital sales until Aug. 13 as it finalizes lease terms and other details.

    Meanwhile, the Healey administration’s plans to provide about $30 million in repurposed state Medicaid funding to keep the hospitals running as they transition to new ownership is facing opposition from a committee representing creditors during the company’s bankruptcy proceedings.

    In a court filing late Monday, the committee said it has “significant concerns” that the $30 million pledged by the state may provide near-term (and important) assistance in transitioning the hospital to new owners, “it will do so at the expense of the rest of debtors, their estates and their creditors.”

    Gov. Maura Healey has pledged that “not a dime” of the $30 million will go to Steward and will instead help ensure a smooth transition to new hospital ownership. But she noted that her administration has little or no authority to block the hospital closures.

    “It’s Steward’s decision to close these hospitals, there’s nothing that the state can do, that I can do, that I have the power to do, to keep that from happening,” Healey told reporters on Monday. “We are in this situation … because of the greed of one individual, Ralph de la Torre, and the management team at Steward.”

    Christian M. Wade covers the Massachusetts Statehouse for North of Boston Media Group’s newspapers and websites. Email him at cwade@cnhinews.com.

    By Christian M. Wade | Statehouse Reporter

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  • As he was about to go free, Missouri Supreme Court halts release of man with overturned conviction

    As he was about to go free, Missouri Supreme Court halts release of man with overturned conviction

    The Missouri Supreme Court halted the immediate release Wednesday of a man whose murder conviction was overturned — just as the man was about to walk free.A St. Louis Circuit Court judge had ordered Christopher Dunn, now 52, to be released by 6 p.m. CDT Wednesday and threatened the prison warden with contempt if Dunn remained imprisoned. But Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey has been fighting Dunn’s release.The situation was chaotic as the deadline set by the judge approached. Corrections Department spokesperson Karen Pojmann told The Associated Press that Dunn was out of the prison facility and waiting for a ride. His wife told the AP she was on his way to pick him up. Minutes later, Pojmann corrected herself and said that while Dunn was signing paperwork to be released, the Missouri Supreme Court issued a ruling that put his freedom on hold.St. Louis Circuit Judge Jason Sengheiser overturned Dunn’s murder conviction Monday, citing evidence of “actual innocence” in the 1990 killing. He ordered Dunn’s immediate release then, but Bailey appealed, and the state Department of Corrections declined to release Dunn.St. Louis Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore had filed a motion Wednesday urging the judge to immediately order Dunn’s freedom.“The Attorney General cannot unilaterally decide to ignore this Court’s Order,” Gore wrote.An attorney for the Department of Corrections told a lawyer in Gore’s office that Bailey advised the agency not to release Dunn until the appeal plays out, according to a court filing. When told it was improper to ignore a court order, the Department of Corrections attorney “responded that the Attorney General’s Office is legal counsel to the DOC and the DOC would be following the advice of counsel.”Dunn’s attorney, Tricia Rojo Bushnell, the executive director of the Midwest Innocence Project, expressed her frustration.“What is this bringing to taxpayers in Missouri? What is this use of our resources and our state’s time getting us?” she said. “All it’s doing is keeping innocent people in prison.”Dunn’s wife said while driving to the prison that they were numb when he didn’t get out earlier this week.“If you know a little about the story, you know we’ve had a lot of disappointments where we thought we’d finally get his freedom and it was snatched away,” Kira Dunn said. “So we were just bracing ourselves.”Dunn’s situation is similar to what happened to Sandra Hemme.The 64-year-old woman spent 43 years in prison for the fatal stabbing of a woman in St. Joseph in 1980. A judge on June 14 cited evidence of “actual innocence” and overturned her conviction. She had been the longest held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., according to the National Innocence Project, which worked to free Hemme.Appeals by Bailey — all the way up to the Missouri Supreme Court — kept Hemme imprisoned at the Chillicothe Correctional Center. During a court hearing Friday, Judge Ryan Horsman said that if Hemme wasn’t released within hours, Bailey himself would have to appear in court with contempt of court on the table. Hemme was released later that day.The judge also scolded Bailey’s office for calling the warden and telling prison officials not to release Hemme after he ordered her to be freed on her own recognizance.Dunn, who is Black, was 18 in 1990 when 15-year-old Ricco Rogers was killed. Among the key evidence used to convict him of first-degree murder was testimony from two boys who were at the scene of the shooting. Both later recanted their testimony, saying they had been coerced by police and prosecutors.At an evidentiary hearing in 2020, another judge agreed that a jury would likely find Dunn not guilty based on new evidence. But that judge, William Hickle, declined to exonerate Dunn, citing a 2016 Missouri Supreme Court ruling that only death row inmates — not those like Dunn sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole — could make a “freestanding” claim of actual innocence.A 2021 law now allows prosecutors to seek court hearings in cases with new evidence of a wrongful conviction.Although Bailey’s office is not required to oppose such efforts, lawyers for his office said at the hearing that initial testimony from two boys at the scene who identified Dunn as the shooter was correct, even though they recanted as adults.He also raised opposition at a hearing for Lamar Johnson, who spent 28 years in prison for murder. Another St. Louis judge ruled in February 2023 that Johnson was wrongfully convicted, and he was freed.Another hearing begins Aug. 21 for death row inmate Marcellus Williams. Bailey’s office is opposing the challenge to Williams’ conviction, too. Timing is of the essence: Williams is scheduled to be executed Sept. 24.Steven Puro, professor emeritus of political science at St. Louis University, said Bailey is in a highly competitive race for the attorney general position with the primary quickly approaching on Aug. 6.“Bailey is trying to show that he is, quote, ‘tough on crime,’ which is a very important Republican conservative position,” he said. “Clearly, he’s angering members of the judicial system that he will have to argue before in the future. But he’s making the strategic notion that he needs to get his name before the voters and try to use that to win the primary election.”Michael Wolff, a former Missouri Supreme Court judge and chief justice, agreed, saying it seems this has become political for Bailey.“But one of the things is that no matter what your beliefs are, if a court orders something to happen, it’s not your purview to say no,” he said. “The court has to be obeyed.”___Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas; Associated Press writer Summer Ballentine contributed from Columbia, Missouri.

    ST. LOUIS, Mo. (Video from: KSDK, KIRA DUNN, CNN via CNN Newsource) —

    The Missouri Supreme Court halted the immediate release Wednesday of a man whose murder conviction was overturned — just as the man was about to walk free.

    A St. Louis Circuit Court judge had ordered Christopher Dunn, now 52, to be released by 6 p.m. CDT Wednesday and threatened the prison warden with contempt if Dunn remained imprisoned. But Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey has been fighting Dunn’s release.

    The situation was chaotic as the deadline set by the judge approached. Corrections Department spokesperson Karen Pojmann told The Associated Press that Dunn was out of the prison facility and waiting for a ride. His wife told the AP she was on his way to pick him up. Minutes later, Pojmann corrected herself and said that while Dunn was signing paperwork to be released, the Missouri Supreme Court issued a ruling that put his freedom on hold.

    St. Louis Circuit Judge Jason Sengheiser overturned Dunn’s murder conviction Monday, citing evidence of “actual innocence” in the 1990 killing. He ordered Dunn’s immediate release then, but Bailey appealed, and the state Department of Corrections declined to release Dunn.

    St. Louis Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore had filed a motion Wednesday urging the judge to immediately order Dunn’s freedom.

    “The Attorney General cannot unilaterally decide to ignore this Court’s Order,” Gore wrote.

    An attorney for the Department of Corrections told a lawyer in Gore’s office that Bailey advised the agency not to release Dunn until the appeal plays out, according to a court filing. When told it was improper to ignore a court order, the Department of Corrections attorney “responded that the Attorney General’s Office is legal counsel to the DOC and the DOC would be following the advice of counsel.”

    Dunn’s attorney, Tricia Rojo Bushnell, the executive director of the Midwest Innocence Project, expressed her frustration.

    “What is this bringing to taxpayers in Missouri? What is this use of our resources and our state’s time getting us?” she said. “All it’s doing is keeping innocent people in prison.”

    Dunn’s wife said while driving to the prison that they were numb when he didn’t get out earlier this week.

    “If you know a little about the story, you know we’ve had a lot of disappointments where we thought we’d finally get his freedom and it was snatched away,” Kira Dunn said. “So we were just bracing ourselves.”

    Dunn’s situation is similar to what happened to Sandra Hemme.

    The 64-year-old woman spent 43 years in prison for the fatal stabbing of a woman in St. Joseph in 1980. A judge on June 14 cited evidence of “actual innocence” and overturned her conviction. She had been the longest held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., according to the National Innocence Project, which worked to free Hemme.

    Appeals by Bailey — all the way up to the Missouri Supreme Court — kept Hemme imprisoned at the Chillicothe Correctional Center. During a court hearing Friday, Judge Ryan Horsman said that if Hemme wasn’t released within hours, Bailey himself would have to appear in court with contempt of court on the table. Hemme was released later that day.

    The judge also scolded Bailey’s office for calling the warden and telling prison officials not to release Hemme after he ordered her to be freed on her own recognizance.

    Dunn, who is Black, was 18 in 1990 when 15-year-old Ricco Rogers was killed. Among the key evidence used to convict him of first-degree murder was testimony from two boys who were at the scene of the shooting. Both later recanted their testimony, saying they had been coerced by police and prosecutors.

    At an evidentiary hearing in 2020, another judge agreed that a jury would likely find Dunn not guilty based on new evidence. But that judge, William Hickle, declined to exonerate Dunn, citing a 2016 Missouri Supreme Court ruling that only death row inmates — not those like Dunn sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole — could make a “freestanding” claim of actual innocence.

    A 2021 law now allows prosecutors to seek court hearings in cases with new evidence of a wrongful conviction.

    Although Bailey’s office is not required to oppose such efforts, lawyers for his office said at the hearing that initial testimony from two boys at the scene who identified Dunn as the shooter was correct, even though they recanted as adults.

    He also raised opposition at a hearing for Lamar Johnson, who spent 28 years in prison for murder. Another St. Louis judge ruled in February 2023 that Johnson was wrongfully convicted, and he was freed.

    Another hearing begins Aug. 21 for death row inmate Marcellus Williams. Bailey’s office is opposing the challenge to Williams’ conviction, too. Timing is of the essence: Williams is scheduled to be executed Sept. 24.

    Steven Puro, professor emeritus of political science at St. Louis University, said Bailey is in a highly competitive race for the attorney general position with the primary quickly approaching on Aug. 6.

    “Bailey is trying to show that he is, quote, ‘tough on crime,’ which is a very important Republican conservative position,” he said. “Clearly, he’s angering members of the judicial system that he will have to argue before in the future. But he’s making the strategic notion that he needs to get his name before the voters and try to use that to win the primary election.”

    Michael Wolff, a former Missouri Supreme Court judge and chief justice, agreed, saying it seems this has become political for Bailey.

    “But one of the things is that no matter what your beliefs are, if a court orders something to happen, it’s not your purview to say no,” he said. “The court has to be obeyed.”

    ___

    Hollingsworth reported from Mission, Kansas; Associated Press writer Summer Ballentine contributed from Columbia, Missouri.

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  • Beverly man charged with trafficking cocaine

    Beverly man charged with trafficking cocaine

    BEVERLY — The execution of a search warrant Wednesday has resulted in the arrest of a 58-year-old Beverly man on charges of drug trafficking.

    On Wednesday evening, members of the Beverly Police Drug Control Unit, with assistance from Salem police and detectives, executed a search warrant at the Beverly home of David Davis, 58, and charged him with trafficking over 100 grams of cocaine.

    A search of Davis’ home and vehicle located approximately 119 grams of cocaine in baggies of various sizes, a digital scale, and $1,033 in cash.

    A Beverly police detective was bitten by a dog while serving the search warrant. He was taken to Beverly hospital for treatment of injuries to his arm.

    Davis was taken into custody at the scene and pleaded not guilty at his arraignment Thursday in Salem District Court. He is being held on $10,000 bond, and a probable cause hearing has been set for July 24 in Salem District Court.

    The search was a result of an ongoing investigation.

    By Buck Anderson | Staff Writer

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  • House approves plan to end ‘equity theft’ in foreclosure sales

    House approves plan to end ‘equity theft’ in foreclosure sales

    BOSTON — The state House of Representatives has approved a proposal to stop “equity theft” from property owners who fall behind on their local taxes, which comes in response to federal and state court rulings that deemed the practice unconstitutional.

    The bill, which passed Wednesday by a vote of 154-0, would establish a process allowing delinquent property owners to claim “excess equity” within 60 days of a foreclosure sale or seizure by local governments.

    The excess equity would be determined by deducting the tax title account balance owed to a local government on date of a foreclosure judgment, the cost of appraisal, and other related expenses, according to the proposal. Property owners would need to file a claim to recoup the excess equity.

    The changes are a matter of fairness to property owners who shouldn’t lose equity in their home that they’ve built up over years because of an unpaid tax bill, lawmakers said.

    “No one, and no entity, should gain a windfall profit in a split second by stealing every bit of equity someone else has built over decades or a lifetime,” state Rep. Tram Nguyen, D-Andover, said in remarks ahead of the bill’s passage. “Not here. Not anywhere.”

    Another architect of the bill, state Rep. Mark Cusack, D-Braintree, said the changes are aimed at “protecting property owners and making towns whole” and ensuring that excess equity is “returned to the rightful owners.”

    To help prevent property owners from slipping into foreclosure, the proposal would require local governments to provide advanced notice to people who have fallen behind on their taxes and at risk of having a lien placed on their property.

    Movement on the legislation comes amid pressure on lawmakers to act following a series of court rulings over the past year holding that government can’t take value of someone’s property beyond taxes owed without reimbursement.

    A 2023 U.S. Supreme Court issued a ruling in a Minnesota tax foreclosure case that effectively deemed the practice unconstitutional by siding with a 94-year-old woman over her claim that a county government violated the Constitution by keeping a $25,000 profit when it sold her home in a tax foreclosure sale.

    Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the ruling that taxpayers are only required to pay the government what it is owed and anything beyond that is an unconstitutional taking of property.

    “The taxpayer must render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s but no more,” Roberts wrote, in a reference to biblical scripture.

    In April, a Massachusetts judge added to the pressure on lawmakers to take steps to comply with the high court’s ruling. Superior Court Judge Michael Callan’s ruling in a Hamden County lawsuit deemed the law “unconstitutional,” saying “the statutory scheme, in its present form, is untenable and requires Legislative correction.”

    Massachusetts is among a dozen states, plus Washington, D.C., with tax foreclosure laws allowing local governments or investors to take dramatically more than what is owed from homeowners who slip into default.

    Under the state’s foreclosure law, cities and towns can sell or keep tax liens on delinquent properties. The lienholder — whether it’s a local government or investor — can file for foreclosure once the debt is six months old.

    Once a property is foreclosed on, the lienholder gets a deed and can keep or sell it. A lienholder can keep profits from the sale, under the law.

    Critics of the practice, including the Boston-based New England Legal Foundation, argue that if the government seizes a home to collect overdue taxes the homeowner should be allowed to collect the surplus revenue from the sale once the taxes are paid.

    Dan Winslow, the foundation’s president, said the House’s plan to fix the law “strikes a fair balance between the need for cities and towns to collect taxes for local services while protecting homeowners from being cheated out of their hard-earned equity.”

    A 2022 report by Pacific Legal Foundation found homeowners in Massachusetts and other states collectively lost more than $777 million in savings on more than 5,600 homes based on their market value, above what they owed in taxes. On average, homeowners lost 86% of their equity, the group said.

    Local governments, which often sell properties for a fraction of market value, collected about $26 million more than they were owed on 1,300 homes, the report said.

    Meanwhile, private investors collected an estimated $250 million more than they were owed on about 2,600 homes, the report’s authors said.

    In Massachusetts, the report identifies about 315 homes in the state — including several in Lawrence — that have been affected by home “equity theft” totaling more than $48 million.

    The House’s excess equity proposal must be approved by the state Senate before heading to Gov. Maura Healey’s desk for consideration.

    Christian M. Wade covers the Massachusetts Statehouse for North of Boston Media Group’s newspapers and websites. Email him at cwade@cnhinews.com

    By Christian M. Wade | Statehouse Reporter

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  • Killer in 1987 Salem murder granted parole

    Killer in 1987 Salem murder granted parole

    BEVERLY — A man who was serving a life sentence for a 1987 execution-style murder in Salem has been granted parole, despite the objections of the victim’s family and the Essex District Attorney’s office.

    Charles “Chucky” Doucette, who pleaded guilty to the second-degree murder of Raymond Bufalino, was granted parole by the state parole board on May 13.

    Doucette, who is now 64, shot Bufalino twice in the head as they were sitting in Bufalino’s car near Harmony Grove Cemetery on the Salem-Peabody line in 1987. He was also convicted of two violent home invasions while on bail awaiting trial, and was arrested when he was out on parole on two previous occasions.

    In its unanimous decision, the parole board said Doucette “has demonstrated a level of rehabilitation that would make his release compatible with the welfare of society.”

    In testimony before the parole board in March, Bufalino’s wife, Shauna O’Sullivan, pleaded with the board not to release Doucette.

    “With his tendency for violence I fear that he will reoffend,” she said in a video of the hearing. “I would hate to hear of another person having to live through the anguish and emotional turmoil that I went through. I believe he made his choice all those years ago and that he should be held accountable for his crimes.”

    O’Sullivan said her son was 9½ months old at the time his father was murdered.

    “I’m not angry or bitter,” she told the board. “I’m past that now, some 38 years later.

    “I feel I owe it to my husband’s memory to say something.”

    Bufalino’s sister and brother also spoke against giving Doucette parole. In a statement read by a victim service advocate at the parole hearing, Suzanne Maynard and Anthony Bufalino called Doucette a “menace to society and a true threat to society.

    “Look at what happened the first time he got paroled,” they said. “Nothing but trouble. So tell me, since being back in prison has he changed? I doubt it.”

    Essex County Assistant District Attorney Kayla Burns also spoke against parole, saying Doucette has continued to minimize his culpability and deflect blame.

    “He puts the blame on other people being in his life,” Burns said.

    During the hearing, Doucette, who has lived in Beverly and Peabody, said he has changed in his years in prison thanks to counseling and programs on subjects such as domestic violence and anger management.

    “I’ve always been bigger and stronger than most people. I always got my way through intimidation and being a total ass,” he told the parole board. “I’m not that person today. I have children. I have grandchildren. I have great-grandchildren. I don’t want them to make the mistakes I made. I want them to learn from the mistakes I made.”

    Doucette’s mother and sister spoke in favor of his release. His sister, Kim Malick, said Doucette has remained close to her children, who are now in their 20s.

    “He met my oldest daughter when she fit into the palm of his hand in prison,” Malik said. “I would love for him to have the opportunity to come home and see her.”

    Doucette had been granted parole twice previously and was arrested both times — once on a rape charge that was later dropped, and another on a domestic assault charge of which he was acquitted — and sent back to prison.

    In total, Doucette was serving seven life sentences for the murder, two counts of home invasion, two counts of armed robbery, and two counts of stealing by confining or putting a person in fear.

    He was denied parole in his last three attempts before the board granted parole in May.

    According to the board’s decision, Doucette has invested in his rehabilitation, including participating in domestic violence programs and counseling, and working and volunteering in the prison law library. “He has strong vocational skills and work ethic,” the board said.

    Doucette has maintained stable relationships with his family and has been sober since 1990, according to the board.

    He told the board he wanted to get his commercial driving license and move to Texas to be near his family.

    Bufalino, of Salem, worked for Doucette’s father at a Salem gas station and was considering a lawsuit after getting injured while working. Doucette was also angry that Bufalino owed him money, according to the parole board’s statement of the case.

    While seated together in Bufalino’s car, Doucette shot him once behind the right ear and once in the mouth. Bufalino’s body was found by his wife, who had gone to search for him. He was 30 years old.

    At the hearing, Doucette apologized to Bufalino’s family. At one point he broke down crying when he said that his own daughter no longer talks to him.

    “I know how bad it hurt me with my own daughter not being part of my life,” Doucette said. “I can’t put into words what I must have cost Ray’s family and his son especially.”

    After gaining parole, Doucette was scheduled to be released to a long-term residential program. Conditions included a 10 p.m. curfew, electronic monitoring at the parole officer’s discretion, a substance abuse treatment plan, domestic violence counseling, counseling for intimate partner/co-dependence relations, and no contact with the victim’s family.

    Staff Writer Paul Leighton can be reached at 978-338-2535, by email at pleighton@salemnews.com, or on Twitter at @heardinbeverly.

    By Paul Leighton | Staff Writer

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  • Cal State L.A. encampment is shut down days after takeover of building with administrators inside

    Cal State L.A. encampment is shut down days after takeover of building with administrators inside

    Dozens of officers in riot gear from multiple agencies descended Monday afternoon on a pro-Palestinian encampment at Cal State L.A. to dismantle the camp and force protesters to leave after tensions escalated last week.

    About 1:20 p.m., police issued a dispersal order in English and Spanish, and the remaining protesters in the encampment, a group of about 10, left voluntarily, said university spokesperson Erik Frost Hollins.

    It was the last major pro-Palestinian protest encampment at a Los Angeles college.

    Officers, who included those from the LAPD, California Highway Patrol and multiple Cal State campus police departments, did not use any weapons to remove protesters and made no arrests, Hollins said. Campus security and police blocked all road entrances to campus, although exits were open, and the campus was accessible by foot.

    Using forklifts and large dumpsters, crews took down the painted and graffitied wooden boards that encircled the encampment and hauled them away. Many were painted in the red, green, white and black colors of the Palestinian flag and bore phrases including “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” and “Google LASD gangs.”

    Students launched the camp on May 1 to demand that Cal State L.A. and the California State University system disclose its investments, “divest from companies that financially and materially support genocide, defend the Palestinian people’s rights of resistance and return, and declare that the genocide in Gaza and occupation of Palestine is illegal under international law,” according to a statement from the Students for Justice in Palestine at Cal State L.A.

    Hollins said that, since the encampment launched, Cal State L.A. President Berenecea Johnson Eanes had visited it twice and held several conversations with protesters.

    While other universities, including USC and UCLA, moved in relatively quickly to shut down pro-Palestinian encampments over the spring, the one at Cal State L.A. was tolerated for many weeks. For the most part, it hasn’t been a site of heated controversy or clashes involving students, campus officials or police.

    But the nature of the relationship between the university and protesters changed Wednesday, Hollins said, when several dozen protesters barricaded themselves inside the student services building, with some administrators inside, for more than nine hours. The Students for Justice in Palestine group said that administrators were free to leave, with escorts, whenever they desired. The group said it communicated that message directly and via Instagram. About 60 staffers were in the building for roughly two hours before exiting. Around a dozen, including Eanes and Hollins, voluntarily remained behind.

    Hollins said there was no specific event on Monday that spurred the university to call in police but said officials had been talking about taking the encampment down since the building occupation.

    On Monday afternoon, Eanes said in a campus-wide email that “those associated with the encampment engaged in unlawful acts that put staff and students” at risk during the building occupation, “including assault, vandalism, destruction of property, and looting.”

    “The only acceptable option for the safety of the entire campus community was for the encampment to disband and disperse. We will not negotiate with those who would use destruction and intimidation to meet their goals,” she wrote. “It does not escape me that public employees serving a public mission at a public university in one of the region’s most under-resourced communities have been victimized by those claiming to protest injustice.”

    Eanes said the campus, where classes have been virtual since the middle of last week, would continue virtually on Tuesday. The university is in its summer session, which ends Aug. 10.

    On Monday, the Cal State L.A. chapter of Faculty for Justice in Palestine said it had remained concerned for weeks that the peaceful encampment might be compromised as negotiations stalled and frustrations mounted.

    “While the protest of June 12th produced a turning point for the encampment, we propose that timely, good faith negotiations with the students over their divestment demands is the best route to a resolution,” the group said in a letter posted on Instagram. “We also recommend that you communicate more clearly with the encampment students about a timeline and process for decampment, rather than resort to an unannounced possible sweep that is likely to produce trauma, harm, and violence as it has at other universities.”

    An Instagram post by Students for Justice in Palestine at Cal State L.A. showed a video of what appeared to be activists talking to police in riot gear who were gathered outside the camp’s barricades. “We have to do whatever they say,” a voice from the camp says in the background. “Can we leave?” an activist says to police as the activist looks out at law enforcement. “Yes!” several officers say in unison. “I want you to go,” an officer says. “I want less of you in there.”

    The encampment was nearly dismantled by 5:30 p.m. Its removal revealed graffiti covering the wall below the “Olympic Fantasy” tile mural near the heart of campus, with slogans such as “Gaza lives” and “Stop funding genocide.”

    The student services building, the site of last week’s occupation, remained closed off with police tape. Tables and chairs were turned over on its patio, and graffiti remained across its ground-level windows.

    A campus security worker not authorized to speak to media said officials would clean up the building area after the camp materials were fully removed. They said they weren’t sure whether that would happen Monday.

    Onlookers, including students and neighborhood residents, expressed surprise at the encampment’s removal and the police presence Monday.

    “I did not agree with what the camp stood for, but I walked by it many times,” said James Wheeler, who walked over to the encampment area — cordoned off with yellow police tape — while a helicopter flew above.

    “These were mostly peaceful students,” Wheeler said, “and their protest was nothing like the conflict or controversy you have seen at other colleges, aside from the one time they went to occupy the building.”

    A student who said she knew members of the encampment said the police response was “way overblown” considering it was about 10 activists who voluntarily left the scene. “They sent in all these police cars, these riot police, blocked off the streets, all for nothing. It’s out of control,” said the student, who declined to share her name.

    In her letter Monday, Eanes said the university would “need to confront the aftermath of sheltering inside [the student services building], the anger at the destruction of student spaces they worked so hard to create, and the grief of feeling less safe on a campus we all cherish.”

    Hollins said, during the sit-in, one employee had “something thrown at their head,” while another was pushed into the door and then out of the way as protesters forced their way into the building.

    Protesters vandalized the building heavily, Hollins said, and the university is still investigating to determine whether there should be arrests. Protesters covered their faces and took other steps to hide their identities, which complicates the investigation, they said.

    Activists defended their actions.

    “The defense of the sit-in and the Solidarity Encampment will continue despite heavy police pressure from the University Police Department, the Los Angeles Police Department, and the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department until CSULA ends its financial and material support for genocide,” the group said in a statement last week.

    Times staff writer Angie Orellana Hernandez contributed to this report.

    Jaweed Kaleem, Jaclyn Cosgrove

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  • Timeline of the case

    Timeline of the case

    1990

    Newlywed Pam Smart, then a 22-year-old media coordinator at Winnacunnet High School in Hampton, New Hampshire, plots with her teenage students to have her husband, Gregg Smart, murdered. She has an affair with a student, William “Billy” Flynn of Seabrook, then 15, who shoots Gregg Smart in their Derry condominium.

    1991

    Pam Smart is convicted as an accomplice to first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole after a trial in Exeter, New Hampshire. The case gained international attention and was one of America’s first major cases involving a sexual affair between a school staff member and student. Flynn is later convicted of second-degree murder.

    1992

    Notable author Joyce Maynard writes the novel “To Die For” drawing from the Smart case.

    1994

    Pam Smart is transferred to Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in New York to serve her life sentence.

    1995

    “To Die For” inspires a film of the same name, starring Nicole Kidman and Joaquin Phoenix.

    2005

    Pam Smart is denied her first request at a commutation hearing that year.

    2010

    In interviews, Smart says she never wanted Gregg killed and never asked anyone to do it.

    2015

    Flynn is freed after serving a 25-year prison sentence.

    2019

    N.H. Governor’s Council votes 4-0 against Smart’s request for a commutation hearing.

    2022

    Smart appeals to N.H. Supreme Court, which dismisses her petition a year later.

    2024

    In a video sent to WMUR TV, for the first time at age 56, Smart says she accepts responsibility for Gregg’s murder and asks to have an “honest conversation” with Gov. Chris Sununu and the Executive Council.

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  • Former Danvers DPW director pays $17K civil penalty for ethics violation

    Former Danvers DPW director pays $17K civil penalty for ethics violation

    DANVERS — Former DPW Director David Lane has paid a $17,000 civil penalty after admitting that he violated the state’s conflict of interest law by accepting multiple gifts from a water meter manufacturer and its distributor.

    An Alabama-based water meter maker, sourced through the manufacturer’s sole authorized New England distributor, hosted golf outings, three-day ski trips, and other events to which they invited employees of several municipal water districts and departments of public works, including Lane, according to state ethics officials.

    Lane took part in three separate ski trips courtesy of the vendors. These included trips to Sugarloaf, Maine, in 2018; Okemo, Vermont, in 2020; and Jay Peak, Vermont, in 2022 — all with the understanding that when he accepted the vendor’s invitation they would pay for his lodging, all or most of his meals, and his ski lift tickets in Sugarloaf and Jay Peak.

    Each of the trips were Wednesday through Friday and were at least $425 per person for lodging and $133 for a two-day ski lift ticket.

    In October 2020, the distributor hosted Lane at a golf event in which they paid for his green fees, meals and drinks. In November of the same year, a sales representative of the manufacturer treated Lane and two other municipal public works employees to dinner at Pellana Prime Steakhouse in Peabody. Both of the payments are valued to be $50 or more. The conflict of interest law prohibits public employees from accepting anything worth $50 or more that is given to them for or because of their official positions.

    Danvers officials issued a news release on Tuesday stating that “The town became aware of an inquiry by the Massachusetts Ethics Commission last summer and immediately engaged an independent investigator to determine whether any town policies were violated. The town has fully cooperated with the Ethics Commission’s inquiry.

    “The town was unable to obtain information and documents from the vendor in question and the Ethics Commission due to confidentiality restrictions related to the Commission’s inquiry. Ultimately, Mr. Lane retired prior to the conclusion of the investigation. The town will not provide any further comments relating to personnel matters.”

    Danvers’ water meters were purchased in 2009 through an Invitation For Bid (IFB) process, which means the low bidder was selected after sealed, written proposals were opened by the purchasing department. The town’s centralized purchasing function operates independently from individual departments, and all purchasing is done in accordance with MGL Chapter 30B (Uniform Procurement Act).

    Earlier this year, Danvers Department of Public Works Water and Sewer Supervisor Aaron Cilluffo and other municipal water employees from Salem, Southampton, and Sudbury admitted to violating the conflict of interest law multiple times by accepting valuable gifts from the water meter manufacturer and its distributor. They each paid civil penalties ranging from $6,000 to $18,000.

    “When public employees accept valuable gifts from vendors, they create the appearance that they may be improperly influenced by the vendors or are likely to unduly favor them in their actions on the job,” State Ethics Commission Executive Director David A. Wilson said. “Accepting such gifts undermines the public’s confidence in the integrity of the employees’ governmental service and is prohibited by the conflict of interest law.”

    “The town of Danvers fully supports the work of the Massachusetts Ethics Commission,” Town Manager Steve Bartha said. “We understand that public trust is the currency of local government, and that situations like this erode that trust.”

    Michael McHugh can be contacted at mmchugh@northofboston.com or at 781-799-5202

    By Michael McHugh | Staff Writer

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  • Agreement reached in Rousselot smell lawsuit

    Agreement reached in Rousselot smell lawsuit

    PEABODY — Neighbors of the former Rousselot Peabody Inc. site on Washington Street have come to an agreement with the gelatin company in a class-action lawsuit over noxious odors they said have permeated the area for years.

    Rousselot is expected to pay nearly $3.1 million in the matter after a preliminary settlement was ordered by a Suffolk Superior Court judge last week.

    Although Rousselot didn’t object to the amount, it claims no liability as part of the agreement and is settling now “to eliminate the time, expense and uncertainties of continuing to litigate,” according to court records.

    The company also agreed to not use the 227 Washington St. facility to manufacture gelatin “now or in the future.”

    The plant shut down on Dec. 31 as part of its parent company’s plan to consolidate manufacturing locations. It produced pharmaceutical-grade gelatin used by different industries.

    The class-action complaint was filed in December 2019 by Michael Baranofsky, of 32 Lynn St., Kimberley Gale, of the same address, and Lawrence Essember, of 8 James St., on behalf of the neighborhood. They are being represented by Lynnfield attorney William P. Doyle III.

    They claimed noxious odors emitted by the plant traveled onto their properties for years and made them unable to fully enjoy their homes, especially in the warmer months.

    One resident who was cited in the suit said the odor “stinks like decaying flesh.” Residents couldn’t use their outdoor spaces because of the smell, had to keep windows shut and could still at times smell the odor inside, they said in the suit.

    Both renters and homeowners who have lived within a half-mile of the plant at some point since Jan. 2, 2017, are eligible to join the class and receive part of the settlement, barring that no complaints are filed at a final settlement hearing in Suffolk Superior Court on Sept. 17, court filings indicate.

    The settlement could affect more than 3,000 households in the area, the preliminary agreement said.

    Such households will be mailed claim forms to join the class and potentially receive part of the settlement. A class notice will also be published in The Salem News and a class settlement website will be created by the class’ attorney.

    It’s still unclear what will happen with the now-empty site at 227 Washington St. or other parcels still owned by Rousselot in the city. In all, the company owned 300 acres in Peabody while in operation.

    Last year, the city bought 135 of the acres off Granite Street for $9 million. The city plans to preserve the land as open space.

    Contact Caroline Enos at CEnos@northofboston.com.

    By Caroline Enos | Staff Writer

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  • Rollback of reforms? Advocates express concerns with new NC juvenile justice proposal

    Rollback of reforms? Advocates express concerns with new NC juvenile justice proposal

    A proposal that would require some 16- and 17-year-olds to be tried initially as adults in North Carolina’s courts took a step forward on Tuesday, despite concerns by some that it would roll back protections for youths.

    Currently, juveniles under 18 are tried in the state’s juvenile court after a petition is filed.

    If a 16- or 17-year-old juvenile commits a Class A through G felony, then the case must be transferred from juvenile court — after probable cause is found or the teen is indicted — to the state’s superior courts to be tried as an adult. A prosecutor may also decline to transfer certain felonies to superior court.

    Class A-G felonies range from high-level offenses such as murder to mid-level felonies such as committing a robbery using threats or force.

    But a new bill that has bipartisan backing would change this transfer process.

    Changes under the proposal

    House Bill 834, among other provisions, would modify the state’s definition of a delinquent juvenile to exclude 16 to 18-year-olds who commit Class A-E felonies.

    This means these cases will now start in superior court.

    The bill would make sure “that the proper cases, if they do exist, can be sent to juvenile court,” said Chuck Spahos, a lobbyist for the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys, a state-funded association that lobbies the legislature.

    Critics said these changes would reverse criminal justice reforms, including provisions passed into law in 2017 and implemented in 2019 known as Raise the Age.

    Proponents, however, called it a procedural change that would streamline processes.

    ‘Raise the age’ concerns

    The Raise the Age law pulled 16- and 17-year-olds accused of misdemeanors and low-level felonies like larcenies, break-ins and other nonviolent crimes, from the adult system into the juvenile justice system.

    Under the law, all criminal cases for juveniles up to age 18 begin in juvenile court, with a requirement that higher-level felonies be transferred to adult court following a hearing or indictment..

    “We are kind of reversing the order of operation we have now,” Sen. Lisa Grafstein, a Raleigh Democrat said Tuesday during a committee hearing at the General Assembly.

    “This seems to be a fairly significant rollback of ‘Raise the Age,’ which I think we made a broad commitment to. I just wanted to highlight this because it’s concerning,” Grafstein said.

    Spahos said there are “less than 500 cases a year that are transferred now to superior court. This is not a mass undoing of Raise the Age.”

    “These are the cases that end up in superior court anyways, and it’s agreed by everyone that’s been involved in this,” including the state Division of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, “that this is just cutting some of the procedural parts of that out while making sure that the proper cases, if they do exist, can be sent to juvenile court,” Spahos said.

    Sen. Danny Britt, a Robeson County Republican, echoed this, saying “the majority of these violent crimes are actually being processed in superior court anyways.”

    “When you have a district like Robeson County, for example, what you have is an extreme backlog of juvenile court cases in the juvenile court that are there unnecessarily longer than what they should, bogging down the docket,” he said.

    Kerwin Pittman with social justice advocacy group Emancipate NC echoed Grafstein’s concerns on the rollback of Raise the Age and said ”this isn’t just a procedural change.”

    This will put “juveniles essentially in a position where they will no longer be able to regain a sense or restorative justice for them because it’s gonna take them to an adult setting.”

    Tara Muller with Disability Rights North Carolina said this bill will affect children with disabilities who make up the vast majority of the youth in the criminal justice system.

    The bill — which has already passed the House — was approved by a Senate judiciary committee following amendments and now moves to the rules committee, where bills often go prior to moving to the floor for a vote, if approved.

    Related stories from Raleigh News & Observer

    Luciana Perez Uribe Guinassi is a politics reporter for the News & Observer. She reports on health care, including mental health and Medicaid expansion; higher education; hurricane recovery efforts and lobbying.Luciana previously worked as a Roy W. Howard Fellow at Searchlight New Mexico, an investigative news organization.

    Luciana Perez Uribe Guinassi

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  • He spent 27 years in prison. Five witnesses say someone else committed the murder

    He spent 27 years in prison. Five witnesses say someone else committed the murder

    The Office of the Brooklyn District Attorney has overturned 37 felony convictions in the last 10 years, the most in New York State. Anthony Green says his murder conviction should be next.

    And in an unusual twist, Charles Linehan — a former investigator who uncovered key evidence in Green’s case — now leads the unit that will decide on his bid for exoneration.

    “I got arrested and charged for crimes that I didn’t do,” said Green.

    In 1990, Anthony Green was found guilty of fatally shooting Demetrius “Mimi” Ware on Saratoga Avenue in Brooklyn’s Ocean Hill section. After Green went to prison, he enlisted Linehan for help in proving his innocence. Linehan came through. In his re-investigation of the killing, Linehan obtained a sworn statement from a man who lives near the murder scene, suggesting his own son was most likely the killer.

    In an affidavit signed in March of 2020, Kevin Fields said his son, Rick Morrison, disappeared from the neighborhood after Mimi Ware was shot. In a phone call a few weeks after the sidewalk murder, Fields said his son admitted that “he had a beef with Mimi.” In the same affidavit, Fields added he “believed that Rick had killed Mimi, so I told him to lay low.” Rick Morrison, known then in the neighborhood as “Little Rick,” was, himself, shot and killed about a year after that phone call.

    On top of the affidavit from Kevin Fields, Anthony Green has also obtained sworn statements from four other witnesses who say they saw “Little Rick” Morrison shot Mimi Ware – with their own eyes. Those eyewitnesses include:

    • Alvida Woods, a former teenage girlfriend of Rick Morrison, who swore “I saw Rick pull a gun out of his pants and fire at Mimi.”
    • Shemene Minter, a former Ocean Hill neighbor, who swore “I saw Little Rick pull out a gun and shoot the other guy several times.”
    • Agnes Foster, a woman who said she and her friends were sitting on lawn chairs on Saratoga Avenue at the time of the murder and swore, “I saw ‘Ricky’ point a large square-like gun and start shooting at ‘Mimi.’”
    • Linda Foster, Agnes Foster’s sister, who swore “we were picking up our chairs when Ricky started shooting” and “I heard Ricky shooting many times.”

    In their sworn statements, Minter and the Foster sisters said NYPD investigators interviewed them about their eyewitness accounts but seemed to be focused only on Anthony Green as a suspect.

    Nicholas Liakas, Green’s civil attorney, says the investigative record suggests police wanted to pin the crime on Green and ignored other evidence that didn’t fit their narrative.

    “This was an orchestrated effort to lock somebody up who they pre-judged as guilty,” Liakas said.

    Two years after obtaining key evidence suggesting Anthony Green may be innocent, Charles Linehan was appointed to lead the Brooklyn Conviction Review Unit (CRU), which is currently considering whether the DA should now move to vacate Anthony Green’s conviction. But the DA’s official re-investigation has now gone on for more than two years and Green is becoming impatient.

    “With all the evidence he has, what are we continuing to wait for?” Green said. “It’s been 40 years.”

    Oren Yaniv, a spokesman for Brooklyn DA Eric Gonzalez, said the office is methodically considering all the new evidence, but stressed Green is the one who asked the CRU to re-examine his case after a judge granted him a hearing to consider the merits of his wrongful conviction claim in court.

    “[The CRU] is working diligently and collaboratively on this complex reinvestigation which pertains to events from nearly four decades ago,” Yaniv wrote in an email to the I-Team. “Given its track record, it is not surprising that Mr. Green asked the CRU to review his case even after a post-conviction court hearing had been granted to him, but he’s free to pursue that remedy at any time.”

    The case against Anthony Green was based primarily on the testimony of two women – Vicky Colon, the teenage mother of Green’s unborn child, who said she saw him pull the trigger, and Cindy Pressley, a surprise witness at trial who testified she was in the car with Green as he drove to the murder scene.

    After Green was convicted, Colon recanted her story – claiming she lied on the stand because detectives and prosecutors threatened to take her unborn child if she didn’t testify against Green.

    Colon has since died of breast cancer. None of the women who swore they saw Rick Morrison shoot Mimi Ware would agree to do an interview with the I-Team. The I-Team was unable to reach family of Demetrius “Mimi” Ware, the murder victim, for comment.

    After taking over the CRU, Linehan re-interviewed Pressley who said Little Rick Morrison could have been the shooter but she wasn’t sure. In an audio recording of the re-interview, Pressley told Linehan police kept her in a hotel for weeks before the trial while she was coached on what to say on the stand..

    “How long were you in the hotel?” asked Linehan.

    “Maybe a couple weeks,” Pressley responded. “They just prepped me for the court.”

    The NYPD did not respond to the I-Team’s email seeking comment on the allegation a key witness was held in a hotel for weeks, but in the audio recording, Linehan expressed concern about the practice.

    “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. “Them behaving like that is not something we would have had them do.”

    Liakas said he believes the CRU is taking Anthony Green’s wrongful conviction claim seriously – but he also expressed concern that his client has already spent decades in prison – and cannot move on with his life without shedding the label “murderer.”

    “You have the Conviction Review Unit, which I think has great intention,” Liakas said. “But there’s a proverb that says the road to hell is paved with good intentions and even if there are good intentions here, he’s still going through hell.”

    Chris Glorioso and Kristina Sola

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  • Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter agrees to plead guilty to stealing $17 million

    Shohei Ohtani’s former interpreter agrees to plead guilty to stealing $17 million

    Ippei Mizuhara, the former interpreter for Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani, has agreed to plead guilty in federal court to stealing millions of dollars from Ohtani to cover gambling debts, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

    The 39-year-old Japanese-language interpreter has reached a plea deal for one count each of bank fraud and subscribing to a federal tax return, the Justice Department said. Mizuhara faces up to 33 years in federal prison for the two crimes, which authorities allege he committed as part of a scheme to surreptitiously steal more than $17 million from Ohtani to pay off an Orange County bookmaker.

    The blockbuster March revelation that the Dodgers had fired Mizuhara amid an investigation into claims he had stolen Ohtani’s money and gambled on sports shocked the baseball world. Last month, federal authorities cleared Ohtani of wrongdoing in connection with the scheme, quieting widespread speculation about the potential fallout of the scandal for his baseball career and potential criminal charges.

    Mizuhara has not yet formally entered a plea, according to Ciaran McEvoy, a spokesman for the DOJ. McEvoy said Wednesday he expects Mizuhara to “plead guilty in the coming weeks.”

    “The extent of this defendant’s deception and theft is massive,” U.S. Atty. Martin Estrada said in a news release. “He took advantage of his position of trust to take advantage of Mr. Ohtani and fuel a dangerous gambling habit. My office is committed to vindicating victims throughout our community and ensuring that wrongdoers face justice.”

    Connor Sheets

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  • K.Dot’s “Euphoria,” Acho’s Book, and Reproductive Justice With Nourbese Flint

    K.Dot’s “Euphoria,” Acho’s Book, and Reproductive Justice With Nourbese Flint

    Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay discuss the drop of Kendrick Lamar’s “Euphoria” and the evolution of Drake throughout the years (15:03), before reacting to Emmanuel Acho’s latest project, Uncomfortable Conversations With a Jew (49:17). Nourbese Flint then joins them to talk about how the political landscape is impacting Black women in America (1:09:15).

    Hosts: Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay
    Guest: Nourbese Flint
    Producer: Ashleigh Smith

    Subscribe: Spotify / Apple Podcasts / Stitcher

    Van Lathan

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  • Your Weekend Playlist: New Music To Listen To This Friday

    Your Weekend Playlist: New Music To Listen To This Friday

    Now that we’re in the wake of Taylor Swift’s epic release of The Tortured Poets Department anthology, other artists have gathered the courage to release music yet again…I mean, the album literally broke every Spotify record in the book- already surpassing 1 billion streams in five days, she has the most streamed song and album in a single day. You get the point.

    But now, you’ve replayed the album sufficiently and you’re ready for new music. I know, we’re all insatiable when it comes to streaming new tracks. It’s why fans of other artists are lamenting that their faves don’t release as often as Swift. If, say, Billie Eilish or Harry Styles started releasing more frequently alongside Swift, we’d have a lot of work to do…my playlists would grow endless.

    Every Friday, I like to compile a list of the hottest new hits released that day so you know which songs to listen to. Whether you’re heading into the weekend ready to party, or need to get some spring cleaning done and need a soundtrack…there’s a song on my Weekend Playlist for everyone.

    And yes…our playlists are now available on Spotify! So all you need to do is press play and let the music take you away from your laptops and into your weekend.

    So, without further ado, let’s get listening!

    Chris Lake, Sammy Virji, Nathan Nicholson- “Summertime Blues”  

    We are no strangers to the technical genius of Chris Lake here at Popdust. He has the power to hop on collaboration tracks and make a hit…which is exactly what happens in “Summertime Blues.” An instant house classic that will smoothly transition you from spring to summer.

    Every warm weather season needs its essential techno house track, and it looks like we already have it. “Summertime Blues” transcends the listener to a club somewhere far away, maybe in Ibiza. It’s an instant classic- bouncy, sunny, heavy on the bass. A perfect blend of Virji, Lake, and Nicholson. Chef’s kiss.

    R3HAB, Jason Derulo- “Animal” 

    Jason Derulo and R3HAB team up for the ultimate collaboration: “Animal.” With Derulo’s smooth vocals and R3HAB’s production talent, you’ll be playing this song over and over. If you want a song with sexy lyrics, Jason Derulo’s famed voice, and R3HAB’s ability to meld any track into gold, this one is for you.

    This is the fourth collaboration for the now iconic duo, and it shows. “Animal” is a product of two powerhouses in their respective genres who know how to make a hit. Combining sounds isn’t always easy, but R3HAB and Derulo make you think it is.

    Mabel- “Vitamins” 

    Mabel delivers a hard-hitting R&B track with “Vitamins.” Perhaps my favorite song on the playlist this week, Mabel reminds you that she’ll be good for you. It’s reminiscent of R&B greats like Mary J. Blige and Ashanti, with all the soulful vocals and heartfelt passion that only Mabel can convey in her music. It’s easy listening, a slow burn that keeps shining from start to finish. About the track she says,

    “This is my family and friends’ favorite song out of all the music I’ve made over the past couple of years. It’s a reminder to the man I love to take care of himself but also that in difficult times I’ll always be there in his corner. I dedicate the record to my uncle David Cherry who passed during the making of this song. He was a musician and I felt him guiding me musically during the session, to be braver and bolder with my songwriting.”

    The Scarlet Opera- “Catch Me If You Can” 

    The Scarlet Opera delivers an empowering symphony of guitar and keys with “Catch Me If You Can.” It’s your dose of rock-and-roll combined with a mixture of badass lyricism, an intoxicating chorus, and a whole lot of infectious melodies. The Scarlet Opera’s message is that they have their stuff figured out, and they’re not letting anyone stop them.

    “We don’t really believe in revenge, but we do believe in epic destiny. We’re fortunate that those who have and continue to doubt us, hold little space in our hearts– this record will act as a constant reminder that we’re in control. Catch us if you can!”

    Justice, Tame Impala- “Neverender” 

    A Tame Impala track is essential for warm weather. Teaming up with the all-encompassing French touch DJ, Justice, the duo delivers a solid track in “Neverender.” Upbeat, well-paced, and catchy, this song will get you through the weekend seamlessly.

    If you want to check out our playlists, listen on our Spotify below!

    Listen To The Playlist On Spotify!

    Jai Phillips

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  • B.C. puts online harms bill on hold after agreement with social media companies | Globalnews.ca

    B.C. puts online harms bill on hold after agreement with social media companies | Globalnews.ca

    The B.C. government is putting its proposed online harms legislation on hold after reaching an agreement with some of the largest social media platforms to make people safer online.

    Premier David Eby says in a joint statement with representatives of the firms Meta, TikTok, X and Snap that they will form an online safety action table, where they’ll discuss “tangible steps” towards protecting people from online harms.

    Eby says the social media companies have “agreed to work collaboratively” with the province on preventing harm, while Meta will also commit to working with B.C’s emergency management officials to help amplify official information during natural disasters and other events.

    “We have had assurance from Facebook on a couple of things. First, that they will work with us to deliver emergency information to British Columbia in this wildfire season that (people) can rely on, they can find easily, and that will link into official government channels to distribute information quickly and effectively,” Eby said at a Tuesday press conference.

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    “This is a major step and I’m very appreciative that we are in this place now.”


    Click to play video: 'B.C. takes steps to protect people from online harms'


    B.C. takes steps to protect people from online harms


    The announcement to put the bill on hold is a sharp turn for the government, after Eby announced in March that social media companies were among the “wrongdoers” that would pay for health-related costs linked to their platforms.


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    At the time, Eby compared social media harms to those caused by tobacco and opioids, saying the legislation was similar to previous laws that allowed the province to sue companies selling those products.


    Click to play video: 'Carol Todd on taking action against online harms'


    Carol Todd on taking action against online harms


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    Last August, Eby criticized Meta over its continued blackout of Canadian news outlets as wildfires forced thousands from their homes.  Eby said it was “unacceptable” for the tech giant to cut off access to news on its platforms at a time when people needed timely, potentially life-saving information.

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    “I think it’s fair to say that I was very skeptical, following the initial contact (with Meta),” Eby said Tuesday.

    Eby said one of the key drivers for legislation targetting online harm was the death of Carson Cleland, the 12-year-old Prince George, B.C., boy who died by suicide last October after falling victim to online sextortion.

    The premier says in announcing the pause that bringing social media companies to the table for discussion achieves the same purpose of protecting youth from online harm.

    “Our commitment to every parent is that we will do everything we can to keep their families safe online and in our communities,” the premier said in his statement.


    Click to play video: 'Premier Eby on Meta ban during B.C. wildfire season'


    Premier Eby on Meta ban during B.C. wildfire season


    &copy 2024 The Canadian Press

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  • Biden’s Shifts on the WikiLeaks Extradition Case 

    Biden’s Shifts on the WikiLeaks Extradition Case 

    President Joe Biden told reporters on Wednesday that he was considering a request made by the government of Australia to drop the extradition case against Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks who is currently imprisoned in the U.K. 

    “We’re considering it,” Biden said after a reporter asked him where he stands in regards to Australia’s request. 

    “Mr. Assange has already paid a significant price and enough is enough. There is nothing to be gained by Mr. Assange’s continued incarceration,” Anthony Albanese, the current Prime Minister of Australia, told Sky News on Thursday. Assange is an Australian citizen, and in February, the Australian parliament passed a motion calling for his release.  

    Assange was arrested in London on April 11, 2019—exactly five years ago on Thursday—for failing to appear in court after his Ecuadorian asylum status was revoked. Since then, the U.S. government has requested that the British government extradite him to the U.S., where he would face charges under the Espionage Act. Assange helped obtain and publish thousands of confidential U.S. military documents related to the Iraq war, which the U.S. says endangered its national defense. Assange’s defense argues that publishing the documents helped serve the public interest because they exposed war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan that were previously unknown to the American public.

    In 2021, a Justice Department spokesman under the Biden Administration had said that it would continue to pursue extradition, according to Reuters.

    If Biden goes through with Australia’s request, it would indicate a dramatic reversal of policy, says Professor Charlie Beckett, a professor of media studies at the London School of Economics and the author of the book WikiLeaks: News in the Networked Era. 

    “Him even considering it is an absolutely fascinating change of tone,” says Beckett. When Assange was arrested, many prominent Democrats initially pressed for his extradition. Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Assange should “answer for what he has done” while Chuck Schumer, the current Senate Majority leader tweeted that he hoped Assange would “soon be held to account for his meddling in our elections on behalf of Putin and the Russian government.”

    However, increasingly, progressive groups have pushed for Assange’s release, saying that to prosecute the man would be a violation of his freedom of speech as a journalist. “The indictment of Mr. Assange threatens press freedom because much of the conduct described in the indictment is conduct that journalists engage in routinely—and that they must engage in in order to do the work the public needs them to do,” Human Rights Watch wrote in its coalition letter to the Department of Justice. 

    Read More: ‘Historic for All the Wrong Reasons.’ Press Freedom Advocates Condemn Julian Assange Extradition Ruling

    So far, Assange has yet to be extradited because he has appealed his case numerous times to British courts. Last month, a British court ruled that the U.S. cannot extradite Assange unless it can guarantee that Assange will be provided with First Amendment rights, will not be prejudiced due to his nationality, and will not receive the death penalty. If the U.S. is able to prove that it can meet these three criteria then Assange may be extradited within this year. 

    Read More: Here’s What’s Next if the U.K. Approves Julian Assange’s Extradition to the U.S.

    Assange has spent approximately 12 years in some form of confinement, seven in the Ecuadorian embassy in London where he was granted asylum, and another five in a London prison trying to avoid extradition via appeals cases. His co-conspirator, former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, spent seven years in an American prison but was released in May 2017 after her sentence was commuted by President Barack Obama. 

    “​​The irony is that it’s possible.. that had he come to the U.S. and had he been convicted he may have already served a sentence and he may already be freed,” says Gary Ross, the director of intelligence studies at Texas A&M University. “But because of his self-isolation and his fighting the extradition now he is still at the point where he has to come back and face the charges.”

    Anna Gordon

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  • 20 Pomona College protesters arrested after storming, occupying president’s office

    20 Pomona College protesters arrested after storming, occupying president’s office

    What began as a peaceful pro-Palestinian demonstration on Friday afternoon at Pomona College, quickly devolved after protesters stormed and then occupied the college president’s office. By the end of the evening, 20 students had been arrested and booked by riot-gear-wearing local police forces.

    Nineteen students were charged with misdemeanor trespassing, and one with obstruction of justice, according to the Claremont Police Department. Police from Claremont, Pomona, Azusa, and La Verne responded to the scene.

    The protest started over the college’s dismantling of a piece of student-erected pro-Palestinian protest art on the Claremont campus, which had been standing since March 28.

    The 32-foot-long, eight-paneled “apartheid wall” outside the Smith Campus Center was a physical and artistic protest designed to highlight “the unequal treatment of the Palestinian people living under the brutal conditions of the illegal Israeli Occupation,” and underscore the administration’s refusal to heed the will of students, who voted in February for the college to divest from companies seen as aiding Israel.

    “Civil disobedience and peaceful protests by students were met with tactical gear and assault rifles,” wrote members of the Claremont Consortium Faculty for Justice in Palestine in a statement about the event. “Students who are scheduled to graduate in less than a month are being threatened with suspension for non-violent protest. This response is shameful.”

    A letter sent out Friday by Gabrielle Starr, the Pomona College president, described the situation as “an escalating series of incidents on our campus, which has included persistent harassment of visitors for admission tours.”

    She said protesters had refused to identify themselves to campus authorities, and had verbally harassed staff, “even using a sickening, anti-black racial slur in addressing an administrator.”

    On Friday morning, students were told the campus would be taking down the wall. Many students had been camping there since the wall was erected in late March, but according to Eve Oishi, a professor of cultural studies at Claremont Graduate University, had packed up and disassembled their encampment.

    Oishi said she stopped by the wall late Friday morning in order to drop off books and snacks for the few students sitting at a table nearby. They requested “unhealthy snacks,” she said, because they’d been living off donated and shared granola bars for days.

    The wall consisted of eight wooden panels including maps of Palestinian territory since 1946, and large lettering with phrases such as “Disrupt the Death Machine,” “Apartheid College; We are all Complicit,” and “Smash Imperialism, Long Live Int’l Solidarity.”

    Oishi said the wall “was not highly unusual at all” in terms of the kinds of art, installations and protests often seen around campus. “I don’t understand why it was seen as such a threat.”

    At around 1:15 p.m., college staff began to take apart the wall “in preparation for events scheduled on Sunday, and in line with our policy,” wrote Starr in a statement, describing the “occupiers” as masked — which is against college policy.

    It was at this point, alleged Starr, that the students “proceeded to verbally harass campus staff” and used a racial slur.

    According to a statement from the Claremont Consortium Faculty for Justice in Palestine, college staff removed half of the installation’s panels, while students “protected the other panels from removal.”

    At 4 p.m., 18 of the demonstrators entered Alexander Hall, “under false pretenses,” according to Starr, and made their way up a staircase and into Starr’s office.

    According to a news release from Pomona Divest Apartheid, “the 18+ students sitting in Starr’s office were barricaded in by Campus Safety Officers, who positioned themselves in front of the exits.”

    Fifty more protesters spilled into the building in a second wave, after a protester unlocked a door to let them in. They occupied the hallway outside Starr’s office.

    According to the Claremont Courier, local police arrived roughly an hour later in riot gear, and then exited with 19 arrested students.

    Social media photos and videos of the events show police physically pushing student reporters out of the room, and closing window blinds to prevent them from documenting the situation.

    The arrested students were taken to the Claremont Police Department, where a demonstration quickly grew.

    At 12:20 a.m., the 20 students were released.

    According to Oishi, the students were from Pomona, Scripps and Pitzer colleges. She said the students have been expelled from campus and “not allowed back into their dorm rooms. Some of them are a month away from graduation. They have no place to to stay. No way to eat, no way to get to finish their classes.”

    In Starr’s statement, she wrote that any Pomona students involved in the protest would be subject to immediate suspension, whiles students from the other Claremont Colleges would be banned from Pomona’s campus and “subject to discipline on their own campuses.”

    Oishi said faculty would be looking into the “due process policies that the President used extraordinary emergency powers that were not merited, given the lack of community threat.”

    She said campus security had sent out an announcement saying there was no threat to the community.

    “So why were heavily armed and militarized police necessary?” she said.

    Susanne Rust

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  • State senators respond to fentanyl and retail theft crises with new legislation

    State senators respond to fentanyl and retail theft crises with new legislation

    SACRAMENTO — 

    A bipartisan group of lawmakers in the California senate on Monday announced a package of legislation to address the growing fentanyl crisis and untamed outbreak of organized retail thefts.

    Sen. Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg), who was sworn in as president pro tempore last month, recited sobering statistics to reporters as he introduced proposals he said will remedy the issues through a more rehabilitative approach.

    “There are more than 12,000 drug overdose deaths a year in California. More than half of those deaths are fentanyl-related,” McGuire said. “Black and Latino communities have seen a 200% increase in overdose deaths since 2017. Native Americans had a 150% increase in overdose deaths in the same period. The Hoopa Valley tribe faces a fentanyl death rate eight times greater than the state average.”

    The senate’s action comes after Assembly leaders this month presented their plans to remedy the issues, an indication that the drug and theft crises will be priorities this legislative session — and in California’s 2024 election.

    The set of 14 bills announced by McGuire and other Democrat and Republican Senate leaders takes a sweeping approach. The legislation, if passed and signed by the governor, would increase access to treatment, enhance addiction services for those in the criminal justice system and penalize criminal trafficking of xylazine, or “tranq,” a horse tranquilizer laced in fentanyl.

    Among those bills is SB 1144, authored by Sen. Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), which will tighten regulations to help prevent stolen goods from being sold online.

    Tinisch Hollins, executive director of the nonprofit Californians for Safety and Justice, called the package a “thoughtful approach to nuanced challenges.”

    Hollins said the package is needed “in an environment where special interests are gaslighting Californians with destructive and ineffective rollbacks.”

    She was referring to law enforcement agencies that have lobbied for changes to Proposition 47, a contentious ballot measure that reduced certain retail theft and drug offense charges to misdemeanors.

    Contra Costa County Dist. Atty. Diana Becton called for a strategic approach that strays from a one-size-fits-all approach to public safety.

    “I have seen firsthand the need to reimagine our approach to criminal justice,” she said. “To reexamine and reproach it through a lens of racial and socioeconomic disparity, with an eye to restorative justice programs and rehabilitation programs for nonviolent offenses.”

    Anabel Sosa

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  • Parents of boys killed by Grossman take solace in her murder conviction: ‘We finally can move on’

    Parents of boys killed by Grossman take solace in her murder conviction: ‘We finally can move on’

    Nancy Iskander arrived at the graves of her two young sons a few hours after a jury on Friday convicted Rebecca Grossman of murdering them.

    It was the end of a wrenching day. Three years after Grossman sped through a Westlake Village crosswalk in her Mercedes-Benz, hitting Iskander’s sons as she watched in horror, she had finally found some level of closure.

    “Someone was held accountable for your murder sons. Sleep tight. Rest in peace,” she wrote on X along with a dusk photo of the marble headstone.

    It took jurors a little over one day to convict Grossman on all charges.

    In doing so, the jurors appeared to embrace the prosecution’s case that Grossman — the scion of a prominent medical family — was reckless and impaired by margaritas and Valium when she plowed through the residential intersection and hit the children in a marked crosswalk.

    The jury convicted Grossman on two counts of murder, two counts of gross vehicular manslaughter and one count of hit-and-run resulting in death. Those were the maximum charges sought by prosecutors. The jury could have opted for lesser charges, such as vehicular manslaughter with ordinary negligence.

    Mark Iskander, left, and his brother Jacob in a family photo.

    (Courtesy of the Iskander family)

    For Iskander, it was a moment of satisfaction and grief. She had been bearing witness for her boys, testifying in court and demanding authorities take the case seriously.

    “My family has been waiting for this for 3½ years now. I’ve been waiting for the trust of the justice system. So today we’re just giving glory to God; the God of Mark and Jacob has been with us through that time and helped us through, carried us,” she said outside court.

    She said sitting through the high-profile trial “felt like I am attending the funeral of the boys again, day after day. That’s how it felt, seeing the defendant and defense attorneys.”

    But with the conviction, she felt, it was all worth it.

    “We were trusting the justice system,” she said. “We have a justice system you can trust from our experience. It’s not a justice system where people get away with things just under the color of their skin or their wealth or anything. You commit a crime, you will be held accountable.”

    1

    Mark Iskander.

    2

    The Iskander family, including Nancy Iskander and her husband

    1. Mark Iskander 2. Jacob Iskander. (Courtesy of the Iskander family)

    On Sept. 29, 2020, when Iskander and her three sons approached the crosswalk, wearing inline skates, she began to cross Triunfo Canyon Road at Saddle Mountain Drive. Her youngest son, Zachary, was next to her on his scooter. Mark, on a skateboard, and Jacob, also wearing inline skates, followed a little over arm’s length behind.

    Prosecutors accused Grossman of reaching 81 mph before lightly braking and hitting the brothers at 73 mph, based on the car’s data recorder and the distance Mark was found from the crosswalk.

    Prosecutors allege Grossman, 60, had cocktails with her then-boyfriend Scott Erickson, a former Dodgers pitcher, and then raced with him — he in his black Mercedes sport utility vehicle and she in her white Mercedes SUV — along Triunfo Canyon Road until they reached a crosswalk.

    Iskander boys

    (Courtesy of the Iskander family)

    Prosecutors also alleged that Grossman traveled a third of a mile after hitting the children before safety features in her car automatically shut it down.

    Iskander’s witness testimony was a highly charged moment in the trial, as she described watching Grossman’s SUV plowing into her sons.

    “I heard the loud noise, and I heard the driver of that car kept going,” Iskander told jurors. “I started screaming, ‘I can’t find them.’”

    “Nobody came back to help,” Iskander said. “She did not come back to the scene.”

    “She killed my kids,” Iskander said of Grossman. “They aren’t at school. They are not playing sports. They are at the cemetery.”

    Grossman was taken into custody after the verdict. She faces a sentence of 34 years to life in prison based on the conviction. Grossman’s lead attorney, Tony Buzbee, called the verdict unexpected and vowed to appeal.

    A woman, a man and three boys

    Nancy and Karim Iskander with their children, Mark, Jacob and Zachary.

    (Courtesy of the Iskander family)

    Nancy Iskander said it didn’t bring her any joy to see Grossman in handcuffs. Grossman’s daughter was overcome with emotion and yelled, “Oh, my God,” as the first word “guilty” echoed across the courtroom.

    “No one wishes that on anyone,” Iskander said. “I promise I do not have any hate for her. My heart broke for her children. … It wasn’t easy, but it will bring me closure.”

    Iskander also took time to talk about her sons.

    “Well, they were golden-age children. They loved God. They were raised at the church. They were hardworking. They were honest. They cared about the truth,” she said. “And they were spoken for by a prosecution who’s also just that hardworking, honest, who cared about the truth.

    “Mark and Jacob didn’t die. Mark and Jacob were murdered,” she added.

    She said her family was able to cope with the tragedy because of a large support group. “We’re thankful for our community. We’re thankful to everyone here.” Her son Zachary, who was 5 on the day of the crash, continues to deal with the trauma of losing his brothers.

    Iskander’s husband, Karim, said he hoped the verdict would be a turning point.

    Two boys wearing matching clothes hold each other

    Jacob, left, and Mark Iskander.

    (Courtesy of the Iskander family)

    “We finally can move on. Finally. We have been waiting for the closure,” he said.

    He also thanked the jury, saying they saw past “the imaginary conspiracy theories and tricks…. and focused on the evidence and they took it seriously.”

    Richard Winton

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