The Mexican government, which has failed to stop an unceasing supply of illegal, high-powered weaponry from entering the country, is trying another tack: Suing American gun makers and a Billerica-based gun wholesale in Boston federal court. Read more.
The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that blackjack players who won at the cheap tables at the Encore and MGM Springfield casinos, then sued to get the higher winnings they would have gotten at higher-stakes tables, should have quit while they were ahead. Read more.
Western Mass News reports the Commonwealth's Flagship Campus has decided that after nearly 60 years, it no longer has space for a permanent home for the Science Fiction Society, which has a library of some 10,000 science-fiction books - second in size in the country only to MIT. Read more.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court ruled today that a judge improperly dismissed an inmate's disciplinary appeal because she decided the statute of limitations started when an official denied the inmate's appeal, not when the inmate received notice of that, several days later. Read more.
Forget for a moment the question of why you'd want to do that, on a slow trip that would involve changing trains several times. The New London Day reports Connecticut legislators are considering a plan that would extend that state's commuter-rail system, which now ends at New London, to either TF Green Airport in Rhode Island or Worcester's Union Station - both of which are now also served by MBTA commuter rail. Read more.
The Daily Collegian reports on the annual Blarney Blowout festivities this past weekend, featuring crowds more akin to what you might see in Florida, only more warmly dressed and in a state that still has Covid-19 restrictions.
The Worcester Business Journal reports how UMass Memorial Health Care is fighting the Boston hospital chain's effort to build an outpatient facility in Westborough, just two towns over from UMass's affiliated Marlborough Hospital.
Two Massachusetts residents say Amazon's Alexa devices are "recording every conversation she has with users" but without the consent required under the state law on recording conversations, so they've sued. Read more.
The Hampshire Gazette reports the Commonwealth's Flagship Campus has ordered all students - including off campu - to stay in their rooms except to get testing or meals due to an outbreak that has so far hit several hundred. The Daily Collegian reports one frat was suspended for "two massive back-to-back parties, packed to the brim with young people dancing and drinking."
A Worcester man was arrested this week on charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft for a scheme in which he'd allegedly buy commuter-rail passes to resell them at a discount over their face value. Read more.
Update: One UMass employee no longer has a job.
UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester tweeted this morning: Read more.
You can read the whole thing here, which hinges in large part on talks with CSX on whether passenger trains can or can't travel on its tracks west of Worcester, but bottom line: Don't be penciling in a relaxing, roughly three-hour ride to Pittsfield on your schedule anytime soon.
Parts of Worcester lost their Internet service today - along with cable TV and credit-card processing.
Worcester Public Schools, which announced in October it wouldn't cancel school because of snow, at least while classes were being taught remotely, announced today: Read more.
The Albany Times-Union takes note of the latest Massachusetts effort to consider extending the Worcester Line to Springfield and maybe even Pittsfield and asks that as long as we're going to the bother, could we push the line a bit further and hook them up? Read more.
Gov. Baker today announced the state will be re-opening a 240-bed field hospital in the DCU Center by December as the Covid-19 hospitalization rate continues to rise.
The Supreme Judicial Court today ordered a new trial for a man convicted on OUI charges for a 2014 crash because state troopers handcuffed him and restrained him so a nurse could withdraw two blood samples that were then used against him at his trial. Read more.
The challenges faced by the Boston housing market have been well documented in 2020. The pandemic has caused massive shifts in urban population distribution in metropolitan areas all across the country, and Boston is no exception. It effectively took one of the nation’s hottest real estate markets and caused it to come to a grinding halt as apartment vacancies soar all over the city.
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