By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A Level 3 sex offender is being held without bail on charges that he raped a man in Taunton, according to prosecutors.

Kenneth Stone, 37, of Taunton, was arraigned Monday, said Gregg Miliote, a spokesman for Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter.

Stone's attorney didn't immediately return messages seeking comment.

Prosecutors sought to have Stone civilly committed after he had served his sentence for sex offenses committed in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but Superior Court Judge Richard T. Moses declined last May.

It's the third case in recent months in which a Level 3 sex offender released by Moses has been charged with a new crime.

By Megan Woolhouse, Globe Staff

A 48-year-old Everett man is facing a first-degree murder charge in the death of a hairdresser who left her Malden shop in mid-February to get a cup of coffee and never returned, prosecutors said.

Lesly Cheremond will be arraigned Monday in Malden District Court in the death of Norma Dorce Gilles, 37, of Lynn, Middlesex District Attorney Gerry Leone said at a news conference last night. Gilles' body was found Wednesday in the trunk of her car.

Cheremond, who was arrested yesterday afternoon, was Gilles' ex-boyfriend, Leone said.

The prosecutor began the news conference by repeating Gilles' name. "I remind you of the name of the victim in this matter because of an all-too-familiar story line" of domestic violence, he said. "We never want to forget the victim in these matters."

An autopsy found that Gilles had been asphyxiated by smothering and that she had suffered "forced compression to the neck area," Leone said.

Gilles had taken out a restraining order against Cheremond after an incident of alleged domestic abuse last year, Leone said.

(Wendy Maeda/Globe Staff)

By Keith O’Brien, Globe Staff

MAYNARD – The tiny town of Maynard has supported the Giunta family for nearly two years, ever since a car accident left Paul Giunta, a father of three, unable to walk and unable even to live in his own house due to his bulky wheelchair.

Town residents raised money for the Giuntas, sometimes in donations of thousands of dollars. They made meals for them and kept them in their prayers. But they couldn’t give them what they really needed – a new house. Not until this week. That’s when thousands of local volunteers gathered for a good old-fashioned barn-raising with the help of some modern-day Hollywood magic courtesy of ABC’s “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.”

This was television. But it was also real life. As the Giuntas drove into sight of their new home today in the back of a black limousine, the thousands of people gathered on their little street in their little town began chanting a simple phrase.

“Bring Paul home.”

(Joanne Rathe/Globe Staff)

Much of February look like this: driving rain and heavy slush. On Feb. 13, Harold Miles shoveled on Cambridge Road in Woburn.

By Mike Bello and Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

This long, miserable month has already set a February record for the most rain, sleet, and snow ever to fall in Boston. And it is not done yet.

Snow is expected to start today near Interstate 495 at 7 p.m., with flakes hitting the Boston area by 8 p.m. When the storm blows out to sea by 10 a.m. Saturday, Boston may have 1 to 3 inches of snow, with a higher total north and west. The South Shore should get 1 to 3 inches snow, while Nashua, N.H. may be buried by 10 inches.

"People are sick of the storms," said Bill Simpson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.

By yesterday, 7.91 inches of snow, rain, and sleet had fallen at Logan International Airport, washing away the previous February record of 7.81 inches of precipitation set in 1984, according to Neal Strauss, another meteorologist in Taunton.

Single day precipitation records were set on Feb. 1 and 13. On six different days, more than 1/2 inch of moisture fell from the sky. It rained, snowed, or sleeted 14 of the first 28 days of the month.

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

Federal prosecutors charged a major contractor on the Big Dig and one of its managers with defrauding the government of more than $300,000 by overcharging for construction work done on the Interstate 93 tunnel.

A criminal complaint filed by US Attorney Michael J. Sullivan alleged that McCourt Construction engaged in a scheme to overbill the Central Artery/Tunnel Project by falsely categorizing apprentice ironworkers and other trades workers as higher-paid journeymen. The company also allegedly failed to verify that subcontractor bills were submitted correctly.

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

Massachusetts snow plow operators are furious with the state Legislature for failing to pay them $69 million owed for clearing off roads this winter.

Plow operators in the Massachusetts Snow & Ice Contractors Association voted late Thursday night to continue working through this winter while they push legislators to approve a supplemental budget bill needed to pay them. But they also voted not to sign a contract with the state to replace their current pact that expires in May unless it includes a "prompt pay" clause, association president Matt Frazier said.

"You've got to understand the emotions of contractors that are owed tens of millions of dollars,'' said Frazier, who runs a Wellfleet company that plows stretches of Route 6 on Cape Cod. One "mom and pop" contractor in rural Worcester County is waiting for $110,000, Frazier said, and many members are resorting to home-equity loans and personal loans to stay solvent while they wait to get paid.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

A woman suffered a broken leg this morning when she was hit by cab at the intersection of Beacon and Tremont streets, police said.

The woman in her 30s was hit at about 8:30 a.m. not far from the Omni Parker House Hotel. She was taken to Massachusetts General Hospital.

Investigators are trying to determine what happened, said Eddy Chrispin, a Boston Police Department spokesperson. The identity of the woman and the name of the cab company were not released.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

A 29-year-old Springfield man was injured by a train Thursday in New Bedford, police said.

The victim, whose name was not released, and a friend were drinking and trespassing on the railroad tracks at about noon Thursday when the victim attempted to jump onto the train’s caboose. He slipped off the train and was struck, New Bedford Police Lieutenant Jeffrey Silva said in a statement.

The victim was taken to St. Luke’s Hospital with life-threatening injuries.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

Authorities are asking for the public's help in finding whoever was responsible for an arson fire that ravaged a Hanson home Tuesday night.

The two-story home, which was completely destroyed in the fire, was a part-time residence and was unoccupied at the time, said Hanson Fire Chief Jerome Thompson.

The fire on Maquan Street left one firefighter with a minor ankle injury, the chief said.

Anyone with information regarding the fire is encouraged to call the confidential arson hotline, 1-800-682-9229, or to contact Hanson Police Detective Steven Gorman, the state fire marshal's office said in a statement.

By Noah Bierman, Globe Staff

Massachusetts Turnpike Authority director Alan LeBovidge was thrilled this week that a piece of the I-90 connector tunnel survived, almost unscathed, after a truck hauling a big crane smashed into the ceiling.

The trucker had dodged a height restriction, almost, until his load met with the ceiling, causing sparks to fly. He was not injured, but he was ticketed, a turnpike spokesman said.

LeBovidge went to the crash site Tuesday and handed out videos of the crash to reporters on Thursday.

"It's unbelievable," LeBovidge said. "He just cremated himself and the tunnel was solid as a rock."

"It was good to see that this section where he was, was solid."

By Globe Staff

The Green Line has reopened this afternoon after a portion of the subway was shut down for several hours because of a wire problem at North Station, according to the MBTA’s website.

At 10:44 a.m., smoke was reported on the Green Line's westbound platform at North Station, said spokesman Joe Pesaturo in an e-mail. A section of the overhead wire that powers the trolleys had come down as one of the trains was entering the station. No one was injured, Pesaturo said.

T riders were being bused between the stations at Government Center and Lechmere.

By Globe Staff

The state’s highest court today rejected a bid for a new trial from a man who was convicted of a sexually motivated slaying in Springfield in 1993.

Kevin Montez was convicted of first-degree murder for killing his 27-year-old neighbor, Joan Andres, a lawyer who was found dead in her apartment Jan. 14, 1993. Andres had been stabbed and shot, and was found naked with her ankles tied to her bed with nylon stockings.

Montez, who is serving life in prison without the possibility of parole, argued in his appeal that his trial judge made several mistakes. The SJC rejected all of his claims.

By Matt Gunderson, Globe Correspondent

The Groton-Dunstable Regional School Committee has approved a new football program at the high school which will be largely funded through donations.

The committee made the decision close to midnight Wednesday before a crowd of about 30 parents and students. The new Groton-Dunstable Football Club will allow athletes to compete locally, instead of the current practice, which sends them to the Ayer public schools, where they can play football.

“I think it’s going to be an enormous boon for the spirit of this school,” said Principal Shelley Marcus Cohen.

The shift to a donation-funded team signifies the growing financial pressure on public schools as local officials wrestle with lackluster state aid and rising education costs. Paul Wetzel, a spokesperson for the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association, said the step taken by Groton-Dunstable is becoming increasingly common.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A Boxborough man was sentenced yesterday to 78 months in prison on child pornography charges, federal prosecutors said.

Robert Mittel-Carey, 25, pleaded guilty in December to an eight-count indictment that alleged he chatted online with a person whom he believed to be a 14-year-old girl, but who was actually a law enforcement officer, the US attorney's office said in a statement.

Mittel-Carey told the undercover officer he wanted to have sex, engaged in explicit conversations, and sent images of child pornography, prosecutors said.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation executed a search warrant in 2005 on the residence Mittel-Carey shared with his girlfriend and found numerous images of child pornography on his computer, leading to his arrest for possessing, receiving, and distributing child pornography.

By Megan Woolhouse, Globe Staff, and Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

Officials are beefing up security after a series of threatening notes were found in bathrooms on the campuses of Bridgewater State College, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and Framingham State College.

Bridgewater State officials have added police patrols on campus after finding several notes. Two were found today, including one threatening the life of college president Dana Mohler-Faria. Yesterday, four other messages containing the words "murder" and "death" were found.

At UMass-Amherst, police presence was increased today after a janitor found a message threatening violence.

At Framingham State, officials evacuated a campus building today after a student found a note that mentioned a bomb, weapons, and "leap year." This year is a leap year, in which an extra day is added to the calendar, Friday, Feb. 29.

None of the schools disclosed the full contents of the messages, citing security concerns.

A UMass-Amherst spokesman said officials weren't sure whether the incidents were linked.

"Police haven't gotten that far yet," spokesman Edward F. Blaguszewski said. "There are news reports of other incidents that might be similar, but authorities will have to decide what commonalities there are."

By Daniel Peleschuk, Globe Correspondent

Malden Police, State Police, and the Middlesex district attorney's office are investigating the death of a woman whose body was found in a car on Faulkner Street in Malden this afternoon.

Officials are treating the death as a homicide and interviewing a number of people whom they believe might have information regarding the case, District Attorney Gerry Leone said in a statement.

The woman's name is being withheld pending identification and family notification, officials said.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

Leonard "The Quahog'' Paradiso, a convicted murderer whose reputation was so bad that a judge once ruled he was libel-proof, died in a prison hospital today after a long illness.

The 65-year-old former Revere fish peddler was serving a life sentence for killing one woman and attempting to rape two others. His death comes a couple of weeks after the release of a new book implicating him in a series of unsolved slayings in the 1970s and 1980s. Paradiso was convicted in 1982 of the murder of 20-year-old Marie Iannuzzi of East Boston. She had been strangled and sexually assaulted three years earlier and dumped in a Saugus marsh.

Paradiso gained notoriety in the 1980s during his highly publicized trial for Iannuzzi's murder when he was also linked to the unsolved slaying of Joan Webster, a Harvard graduate student who vanished on Thanksgiving weekend 1981 after getting off a plane at Logan International Airport. Investigators pulled Paradiso's sunken boat, the Malafemmena -- Italian for "evil woman" -- from Boston Harbor in an unsuccessful bid to locate Webster's remains. In 1990, Webster's remains were found in an unmarked grave in Hamilton.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

The eastbound lanes of Soldiers Field Road were closed for an hour this afternoon after a car rammed a tree near North Harvard Street in Boston.

State Police reopened the left lane of the roadway at about 3:30 p.m., but the right lane remained closed.

Few details were released about the crash, which occurred at 2:30 p.m. The driver, who had to be cut out of his car, was rushed to Brigham and Women's Hospital. The extent of the driver’s injuries were not immediately available.

By Russell Contreras, Globe Staff

A Boston assistant superintendent is among the six semifinalists for the top job in the Lowell public schools, a selection committee announced today.

Janie Ortega, who is in charge of helping low performing schools in Boston, made the first round of cuts for the Lowell superintendent job after a selection committee reviewed 21 applications. Before becoming assistant superintendent in Boston, Ortega was a principal at McKay K-8 School and a principal in Austin, Texas.

By Matt Collette, Globe Correspondent

A former student who had been missing for three weeks had Northeastern University abuzz, prompting a front page story in the campus newspaper and sparking an investigation by Boston police.

Nicholas Sova had not been seen or heard from by friends and family since Feb. 4, the morning after he attended a Super Bowl party. His parents in Monroe, Conn., were worried, and detectives were asking the public’s help in locating the 22-year-old business major.

Sova was found today unharmed -- a long way from campus -- in Paris, France.

By John C. Drake, Globe Staff

Mayor Thomas M. Menino gathered top city officials today to try to demonstrate that his administration was committed to battling the local impact of the nation's foreclosure crisis.

Housing, public safety, and legal officials who are members of the city's newly created Foreclosure Intervention Team briefed the mayor on their progress in acquiring foreclosed and abandoned properties. The meeting took place in a formerly unused first-floor City Hall room that received a makeover and has been dubbed a "war room" by the mayor.

"It's something that's plaguing our neighborhoods," Menino said of the increasing number of foreclosed homes that are left vacant.

Officials said the problem in Boston is only likely to grow as hundreds more homeowners in the city with adjustable-rate mortgages are set to see their payments jump over the next year. The team will meet in the room "every couple of week" to assess the city's progress toward averting foreclosures, acquiring foreclosed homes, and cleaning up vacant properties, officials said.

(AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

William F. Buckley Jr., the conservative pioneer who died today at his home, smiled during an interview in July 2004.

By Mark Feeney, Globe Staff

William F. Buckley Jr., who as author, journalist, and polysyllabic television personality did more to popularize conservatism in post-New Deal America than anyone other than Barry Goldwater or Ronald Reagan, died early today at his home in Stamford, Conn. He was 82 and had been ill with emphysema, said his assistant, Linda Bridges.

Mr. Buckley’s political importance has long been acknowledged across the political spectrum. Pat Buchanan, the three-time presidential candidate, once called him “the spiritual father of the movement,” while the historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. called Mr. Buckley “the scourge of American liberalism.” Although Schlesinger, very much a man of the left, did not mean it as a compliment, Mr. Buckley cheerily took it as such.

By Globe Staff

The Legislature is expected today to debate a $1 billion bill to fund life sciences, a plan first proposed 10 months ago by Governor Deval Patrick.

Earlier this month, House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi unveiled his own version of the 10-year plan.

While DiMasi's proposal to boost the biotechnology and medical-device industry differs in some key respects from the one Patrick proposed last year, it does incorporate the major elements of the governor's initiative to build on the state's reputation as a national hub for scientific research.

Patrick first introduced the life-sciences measure in May 2007, and with DiMasi and Senate President Therese Murray smiling at his side, it appeared it would be quickly passed. But the governor did not file the bill until July, the House did not assign it to a committee until the end of summer, and there were disagreements over how the money should be distributed.

If the bill passes, it could be a major victory for Patrick.

The debate, which was set to begin in the House at 1 p.m., can be watched live here.

(David L. Ryan/Globe Staff)

A driver stopped to pay as snow began to fall last Friday at the Weston tolls.

By Megan Woolhouse, Globe Staff

A long-time Massachusetts Turnpike Authority policy allowing toll takers to carry .38-caliber Smith & Wesson pistols has been scrapped, a Turnpike spokesman said.

Turnpike executive director Alan LeBovidge ordered the guns confiscated in December after learning that the toll takers did not receive firearms training and that the guns were not routinely maintained, said Mac Daniel, the authority spokesman.

Toll takers have been allowed to carry guns for at least three decades as protection against robbery of toll money, Daniel said.

By Marc Robins, Globe Correspondent

Malden police are looking for a man who attempted to abduct a 9-year-old boy this afternoon.

The boy was walking home on Highland Avenue at about 3:15 p.m. when a red Nissan pulled up next to him. The man asked the child if he wanted a ride and where he lived. After being approached, the child ran to his home, which was located around the corner, police said.

The driver sped off after the incident, police said.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

Bridgewater State College officials say they are increasing security after threatening messages were found written inside women's bathroom toilet stalls in four buildings on the campus today.

"The threats were not specific enough to warrant closing the college but we did decide that we would step up our police presence on campus for the next few days," David Ostroth, vice president for student affairs at the college, said this evening.

The threats, written inside bathrooms in the student center, the campus library and two academic buildings, mentioned the date Feb. 28, but did not mention any specific targets or methods, Ostroth said.

"For the most part [the messages] were one word, sometimes a word repeated" and the date, Ostroth said. "They had words like 'death' and 'murder' in them."

The first message was found around 10 a.m. and the last around 4 p.m., he said.

"I think with the news that has been happening in the last year, and even in the last week or two in higher education with attacks on campuses, we have to take this kind of thing seriously," Ostroth said.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A fight this evening between two inmates at the state prison in Walpole left one of the men in the hospital suffering from stab wounds, officials said.

The inmate's injuries did not appear life-threatening, said Diane Wiffin, a spokeswoman for the prison system.

He was stabbed around 6 p.m. during what appeared to be an altercation with another inmate in a general population housing unit at the prison, MCI-Cedar Junction, Wiffin said. He was taken to an outside hospital.

The other inmate injured his ankle and was taken to the MCI-Cedar Junction Health Services Unit, Wiffin said.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

After more than three years in jail awaiting trial on federal charges of lying and obstruction of justice, former New England Mafia boss Francis "Cadillac Frank" Salemme is poised to plead guilty under a deal that could make him a free man by the end of the year.

"I think there comes a time when it makes sense to move on," Steven C. Boozang, one of Salemme's three lawyers, said today after details of the plea deal emerged during a hearing in US District Court in Boston. "We're hoping to have him home by Christmas."

Salemme, 74, has agreed to plead guilty to a two-count indictment that charges him with making false statements and obstruction of justice after he began cooperating with investigators in 1999 in a probe into the FBI's corrupt handling of longtime informants James "Whitey" Bulger and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi.

However, Salemme will not admit to allegations in the indictment that he watched his son, Frank, strangle South Boston nightclub owner Steven DiSarro in 1993, then helped him dispose of the body. The younger Salemme died two years later of lymphoma. DiSarro's remains have never been found.

"He 100 percent denies any involvement in DiSarro's disappearance and presumed murder," Boozang said. He added that Salemme has yet to sign the agreement, but he is expected to do so within the next couple of days.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

An approaching storm is expected to spare Eastern Massachusetts another blast of winter, with up to a half-inch of rain -- and not snow -- predicted to fall today during the evening commute.

Forecasters say the same storm will blanket upstate New York and Northern New England with up to a foot of snow. In Eastern Massachusetts, however, temperatures are expected to top 40 degrees.

“In the Greater Boston area there may be a flake or two, but it’s going to be just about all rain,” said Alan Dunham, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton. Some snow is expected west and north of Interstate 495, he said.

The precipitation started falling in the afternoon and was expected to get heavy this evening and taper off overnight and early Wednesday.

(David L. Ryan / Globe Staff / File)

The city cracked down in South Boston again this week on parking space savers, such as this lawn chair shown on L Street in February 2007.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

South Boston: Don’t blame your neighbor. Nobody moved that hunk of broken furniture you were using to save the parking spot you shoveled after Friday’s snowstorm.

The city cracked down Monday and collected 220 milk crates, orange cones, lawn chairs, recycling bins, and other random objects that residents were using to stake claim to parking spots. Under city rules, space savers can only be used for 48 hour after heavy snowfalls.

The mayor’s office sent a special crew to South Boston after the city received complaints on its resident hotline, said spokeswoman Dot Joyce.

In other neighborhoods, trash crews picked up items marking spaces along their regular routes. The practice of saving parking places has long been a point of friction between South Boston residents and City Hall.

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

A federal judge said today he is considering asking federal prosecutors to investigate whether state officials transferred a legally blind, 91-year-old retarded resident of the Fernald Developmental Center in Waltham against her will in violation of an order he issued in August.

US District Judge Joseph L. Tauro is weighing the issue after a day-long hearing into allegations that the Department of Mental Retardation and the corporate guardian for some of the 170 residents of the center moved the woman, identified only as A.T., to a group home in Bedford after telling her she was going on an outing.

Early in the hearing, Tauro left no doubt that he intended to refer the matter to prosecutors, saying he was going to ask the US Attorney's Office to undertake a ``very brief investigation to find out what happened.'' But he surprised many in the courtroom at the end of the hearing by saying that he was taking the matter under advisement and would issue an order soon.

A representative for US Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, who finished a study last March of Fernald and determined it should remain open for residents who want to stay, said prosecutors would investigate the allegations by the Fernald League for the Retarded. The league, which represents families and guardians of residents, wants the center to remain open.

In August, Tauro barred officials at Fernald from moving any residents unless they and their guardians agreed. Governor Deval L. Patrick, like Governor Mitt Romney before him, wants to close Fernald and move residents to group homes. The Patrick administration is appealing Tauro's order to the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, where arguments are expected in a few months.

During the hearing, a former employee of the Arc of Greater Boston, the corporate guardian for some of the residents, testified that she had spoken with A.T. several times while working as a case manager at Fernald and was sure that she did not want to leave the center. A.T. has lived there about 50 years.

“She clearly stated no,'' recalled Linda Curran, who worked for Arc from August 2006 until last week. “She was so adamant about staying.''

After Curran conveyed A.T.'s objections to supervisors and expressed her own opposition to such moves, she said, higher-ups stripped her of her caseload and transferred it to an Arc co-worker. That employee recently approved moving the elderly woman to a group home in Bedford.

Under cross-examination by lawyers representing the Department of Mental Retardation and Arc, however, Curran acknowledged that she was not present when A.T. was transferred on Feb. 13 and had not spoken to her at that time.

Christine Oliveira, deputy assistant commissioner for facilities management for the
Department of Mental Retardation, said that A.T. had visited the group home several times in recent weeks, referred to it as her home in addition to Fernald, and grew fond of staff members. Oliveira also said that she had heard A.T. give conflicting responses when asked whether she wanted to move.

The hearing, part of years of litigation over whether the residents would be best served by staying at Fernald or moving to a group home, is expected to go all day. Beryl Cohen, a lawyer representing families and guardians of residents, has also asked the judge to order prosecutors to look into the circumstances of the recent transfer of nine other residents from Fernald. The judge said he will consider that request as well.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

The FBI verified today that a couple videotaped in Sicily last year who resembled fugitive gangster James "Whitey" Bulger and his girlfriend were, in fact, two harmless German tourists.

The couple came forward after a German television show broadcast the video last week with an appeal from FBI agents from Boston.

The photos and video of the couple were removed from the FBI’s website today after it was confirmed that they did not show Bulger and Catherine Greig, said spokeswoman Gail Marcinkiewicz. However, the international manhunt for Bulger will persist.

"We're going to continue our worldwide media outreach to arrest Mr. Bulger and his companion,'' Marcinkiewicz said.

By Globe Staff

Boston Police are investigating a woman's report that her car window was shot out in Chinatown as she took the Kneeland Street exit ramp off Interstate 93. Police searched the exit ramp and did not find bullet casings or other ballistic evidence.

The woman, who was not identified, called police at 10:38 a.m. and said that the front passenger window of her green Chrysler Cirrus was hit by gunfire as she was driving down the ramp. She called police after she arrived at work downtown.

Police found the window smashed. The woman was not injured.

By Megan Woolhouse, Globe Staff

A 23-year-old Lynn man fatally stabbed his mother after an argument yesterday afternoon in Revere, then was shot by police officers responding to the scene, prosecutors said.

The stabbing victim, 42-year-old Lisa Bryson Roche, was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital yesterday afternoon. Her son, Cory Roche, was in stable condition last night. He is to be arraigned on a charge of murder tomorrow in Chelsea District Court, prosecutors said.

"We will investigate Mrs. Roche's tragic final moments until the facts are known," Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said at a press conference this evening at Revere City Hall.

Conley said the officer who shot Cory Roche apparently "acted in self-defense" but the district attorney would not provide details, saying only that "some actions" by Roche prompted the officer to shoot. Roche was hit in the torso. Officials did not disclose how many shots were fired.

Police got a call for a domestic disturbance on Fernwood Avenue at 3:15 p.m. today. Conley said officers arriving at the apartment found a "live" conflict. Lisa Bryson Roche had been stabbed and her son held a knife. Officers ordered him to drop the weapon but "the order went unheeded," Conley said.

By John R. Ellement and Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

After hearing a description of a gang melee at a Boston nightclub that had bullets and champagne bottles flying, a judge today didn’t just grant a prosecutor’s request for bail. He doubled it.

Also, late today officials announced that patrons of the Arias nightclub on Tremont street whose belongings were locked inside the club can pick them up on Tuesday. They must come by between noon and 6 p.m., according to officials from the city and the club. Anyone who cannot make it then should telephone the club to make other arrangements, said George Regan, spokesman for the club's owners.

In Boston Municipal Court, Judge Michael Coyne ordered that Damion Jamaal-Anthony Haley be held on $1 million cash bail after he pleaded not guilty to assault and battery on a police officer and other charges. Haley was arrested after two people were shot early Sunday at Aria, a dimly lit hip-hop nightclub on Tremont Street in Boston. Officers were on scene before the shooting in clearly marked Boston Police jackets because they had been tipped days earlier that gang members were planning to show up looking for trouble, prosecutors and police said.

At 1:45 a.m., a verbal argument turned violent. Three or four shots rang out and two people were struck in the arm. Police said they saw Haley standing on a platform holding a 9mm Lugar.

Susan Terrey, an assistant Suffolk district attorney, told the judge that Haley was cavalier, even after he had been arrested and read his Miranda rights.

“I had a beef,” Haley told police, according to Terrey. “They threw a drink so I had to come out with it.”

By Michael Paulson, Globe Staff

A sweeping new study of religious affiliation in the United States finds a country in which Protestants are becoming a minority, Catholicism is becoming heavily Hispanic, and the number of people who say they are not affiliated with any religion is growing.

The study, which is the most comprehensive such examination in at least a half century, finds the United States to be in a period of unprecedented religious fluidity, in which 44 percent of American adults have left the denomination of their childhood for another denomination, another faith, or no faith at all.

"Americans are not only changing jobs, changing locations, changing spouses, but they're also changing religions on a regular basis,'' said Luis E. Lugo, the director of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, which conducted the study. "We have nearly half the American public telling us they're something different today than they were as a child, and that's a staggering number. It's such a dynamic religious marketplace, and very competitive.''

The study is based on a survey of 35,000 Americans, a very large number for survey research, and the size of the pool allowed the researchers to get more detail about minority religious groups than is usually available from smaller studies.

The nation is still predominantly -- 78 percent -- Christian, but 5 percent are now adherents of other faiths and 16 percent are unaffiliated.

The full report is available at pewforum.org.

Michael Paulson can be reached at mpaulson@globe.com.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

Methuen police today are investigating an apparent homicide after a man was killed Sunday night in his home on Haverhill Street.

William Escobar, 41, was found dead when police responded to a 911 call at 10:45 p.m. Authorities released few details about the case, including how Escobar was killed.

"It's an ongoing investigation right now and police are following leads," said Stephen O'Connell, spokesman for the Essex District Attorney’s office.

By John C. Drake, Globe Staff

PROVIDENCE -- Senator Hillary Clinton told Rhode Islanders she was not overlooking their March 4 primary as she looks to blunt Senator Barack Obama's momentum following his victories in 10 straight contests across the country.

"Rhode Island is right up there with Ohio and Texas," Clinton said to an estimated crowd of 5,000 in a gymnasium at Rhode Island College today, aligning New England’s smallest state with those that some say are key to sustaining her campaign for president.

By Andrew Ryan, Peter J. Howe, and Tania deLuzuriaga, Globe Staff

A blinding storm has shrouded Massachusetts in a white blanket of snow, slowing traffic to a crawl and causing spinouts across the state.

What began this morning as a dusting has roiled into a near blizzard that is expected to dump up to 8 inches of snow. Despite the intensity of the squalls, however, few major accidents or traffic jams have been reported.

Traffic is “definitely lighter today being a school vacation week,” said Lieutenant Eric Anderson of the State Police. “I think people also realized the storm was coming. The state and businesses let people go home early. I think that really helped.”

There are reports of cars skidding on Cape Cod and the South Shore. In Boxborough and Action, eastbound Route 2 has been treacherous between Interstate 495 and Route 27. Other accidents have been reported in Needham, and I-495 South in Hopkinton was at a complete standstill.

The MBTA reported that about a half-dozen trains were delayed by 20 to 30 minutes during the afternoon rush hour, including the 2:45 p.m. train to Worcester from South Station. Usually running express as far as Natick, the train was making stops at every station in Newton and Wellesley to accommodate a crush of passengers leaving the city as the snowstorm began to intensify and was expected to be at least 30 minutes late in Worcester.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

Boston Fire Commissioner Roderick Fraser today blasted the findings of a report about the deaths of two firefighters, saying that he would reopen the inquiry and hire medical experts to scrutinize autopsy results and toxicology tests.

The report by the panel is incomplete, Fraser said, and he wants to definitively determine whether drug and alcohol impairment played a role in the deaths of Warren J. Payne or Paul J. Cahill. The panel members said in the report that they did not have access to the autopsies. News reports on the autopsies said they showed that Cahill was legally drunk and that Payne had traces of cocaine in his system.

In a day that saw three dueling press conferences, the fire department union shot back. “The commissioner just doesn’t want to accept any responsibility,” said union president Ed Kelly. “He wants to shift the responsibility to two firefighters who lost their lives. We think that’s a disgrace.”

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

At Logan International Airport, airlines are already canceling flights in droves in expectation of today's winter storm throwing flight schedules into chaos. By 1:30 p.m., at least 54 arriving flights and 68 departing flights had been canceled, according to the Massachusetts Port Authority website. Logan normally handles about 1,100 incoming and departing flights daily.

Flights that have been canceled include many likely to be popular with families returning from vacations in Florida during the public school vacation week, including American's flight from Miami due to arrive at 3:30 p.m., Delta flights from West Palm Beach and Fort Lauderdale landing soon after that, and JetBlue flights due to arrive about 6:30 p.m. from Fort Myers and Orlando.

Families pushed off those flights could have a hard time rebooking flights Saturday or Sunday because airlines are expecting many flights those days to operate 95 to 100 percent full, because of the heavy vacation week travel.

"The airport has been open, but we started getting delays and cancellations around 6 o'clock this morning because of storm conditions and weather problems at other East Coast airports, particularly the three New York-area airports and Philadelphia,'' said Logan spokesman Phil Orlandella. Delays of three to six hours at those airports began snarling Logan-bound traffic long before any snowflakes showed in Boston, Orlandella said.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

A civil trial began in Suffolk Superior Court today between a Boston couple and a Boston funeral home, which lost the remains of the couple's stillborn son apparently by cremating him with that of an adult woman in July 2003, according to testimony.

Robert Benedict testified today that he and his wife, Therese Bellissimo Benedict, were expecting twins when they learned at Brigham and Women's Hospital in April 2003 that one of the boys had died in the womb. The couple named him Lourdes and delivered the second child, named Cole, who is now a healthy 5-year-old.

Benedict testified that the couple hired J.S. Waterman and Sons funeral home in Boston to care for the remains of Lourdes. He testified that he brought to the funeral home a crochet blanket, a crucifix, and other items that the couple wanted kept near Lourdes. He also later brought a casket and had planned to lay Lourdes to rest in a mausoleum in an Everett cemetery.

But on July 28, 2003, Waterman staff called to report that they had lost Lourdes's remains, apparently when his body was accidentally put into a coffin being used to cremate a woman, according to testimony.

By Noah Bierman, Globe Staff

A helicopter carrying Massachusetts Senator John Kerry and two colleagues made an emergency landing in the mountains of Afghanistan this morning because of a snowstorm.

Kerry and others on board, including fellow Democratic Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware and Republican Senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, made it safely to Bagram Airbase, after waiting several hours in the mountains, according to Kerry’s office.

“No one was injured, everyone is safe,” said Kerry spokesman David Wade in a written statement.

Once at the air base, the senators continued on to a scheduled stop in Ankara, Turkey. The senators are on a trip that includes India, Turkey, and Pakistan, where they observed recent elections.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

A 51-year-old nursing assistant died today in Lowell after she helped evacuate elderly residents from a nursing home during a small fire in a dryer.

Rawlene Lizotte collapsed outside the Fairhaven Healthcare Center after helping to evacuate six residents, said Deputy Chief Patrick McCabe of the Lowell Fire Department. Rescuers tried to resuscitate Lizotte and rushed her to Lowell General Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

By Brian R. Ballou, Globe Staff

BROCKTON -- After just over a week in which two people were shot dead and two people were left wounded by gunfire, city officials said today they are dedicating all available resources to breaking the wave of violence that has left residents in fear.

"The Brockton Police, the State Police, and all the other assets here in the City of Brockton have been working around the clock since the terrible homicide of Mr. Conley, the cab driver, last Saturday evening,'' said Timothy Cruz, Plymouth district attorney. He was flanked at an afternoon press conference by William K. Conlon, the chief of police, Mayor James Harrington, several city councilors, and representatives from the State Police, which is conducting patrols in the city and aiding current investigations.

"Every one of these shootings are the same,” Harrington said. “They all take a bite out of the community, they create fear. All we can tell people is that we’re doing every thing that we can possibly do. Right now it doesn't seem like enough, but we're going to continue to do everything we can do to bring all the resources that are available to solve this problem.''

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

RUTLAND, Mass. -- State biologists conducting their annual mid-winter "bear census" made a happy discovery in the woods here this morning: One of 13 bears they've tagged with radio collars has given birth to three healthy cubs.

After anesthetizing the mother bear with a drug-filled dart at the end of a 10-foot-pole, researchers from the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife carefully picked up the estimated month-old cubs to check their gender and weight. The cubs, two males and one female, all clocked in within a few ounces of 5 pounds. Their mother -- who has the less-than-poetic name of "Worcester County Bear'' -- registered a healthy 176 pounds when workers picked the sleeping bear up in a net and weighed her on a scale suspended from a hastily chopped maple limb.

Being briefly stunned and handled won't do any damage to the mother, nor are the cubs harmed by a brief period of handling by humans, according to officials involved in the now 38-year-old bear count. "We've never had any ill effects from it,'' said Ralph Taylor, a district manager for the wildlife department. "Most of the time, though, I do think they wake up and wonder what the heck happened.''

Taylor and his fellow employees were careful to put the mother black bear and her cubs back in the same position where they found them, in a makeshift den under fallen red oak and maple trees in woods about a half-mile from Route 68 in this northern Worcester County town.

By Peter Schworm, Globe staff

City officials are urging Boston College to find alternatives to its controversial plan to build dormitories on the former Archdiocese of Boston property, which many Brighton neighbors sharply oppose.

In a report released late Wednesday, the Boston Redevelopment Authority, which reviews and must approve college expansion plans, called on BC to study ways to restrict undergraduate housing to its main Chestnut Hill campus.

The recommendation is a "very clear signal that we have heard the message from the neighbors about the concerns they have, and we are insisting Boston College look at alternatives before we make any decisions," said authority spokesman Jessica Shumaker. "We feel at a minimum BC needs to address why they can’t meet their housing goals on their current campus, and expect a good faith effort from BC to show us other options."

By Globe Staff

A judge convicted a 23-year-old man today of manslaughter today for a fatal stabbing in East Boston in 2005.

Rafael Bonilla was convicted by Judge Christine McEvoy after a bench trial in Suffolk Superior Court. He was accused of killing Nang Lim, 23, during an early morning fight on Meridian Street on June 11, 2005.

Matt Collette, Globe Correspondent

Before last weekend, Shana Kelley was your average student at Bunker Hill Community College. Now she's a millionaire.

The 21-year-old Somerville resident pushed a button on a "Wheel of Fortune" themed slot machine Sunday at Mohegan Sun and won $3.5 million. The game is a penny slot machine, but players like Kelley can place bigger bets for bigger wins.

"I asked the guy next to me if it said thousands or millions and he said 'Hon, that's millions,'" she said today by phone. "And I screamed. I had probably about 20 people around me, clapping and screaming. I just can't even believe it."

Kelley had gotten lucky at the same machine at the Connecticut casino before, winning $500. On Sunday, she plunked a total of $100 in and won big. While Kelley hasn't received a check from the casino, she has enlisted a lawyer and financial planner.

"I want to do the right thing and save it all, and not blow it all," Kelley said.

Still, she already has two big splurges in mind: a baby blue Cadillac Escalade and a house. "I want everything: big windows, a garage, a picket fence, everything."

(John Tlumacki/Globe Staff)

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

Gleaming new plum-blue seats. Intelligible, automated station announcements. A smoother ride with maximum air conditioning.

Those are some of the features MBTA Blue Line riders can expect as the first four of 94 new subway cars, each costing $1.8 million, began operating today. They are the first new cars to ply the Revere-to-downtown line in 29 years.

By summer, T general manager Daniel Grabauskas promised, riders can count on not just nicer cars but more of them. Six-car trains, 50 percent bigger than now, will begin operating on the Blue Line during the morning and evening rush hours, giving commuters and luggage-laden travelers heading to Logan International Airport some badly needed breathing room. Although millions of dollars in renovations remain at Government Center, Maverick, and State, the critical work of extending passenger platforms to accommodate the longer trains has been finished at every Blue Line stop, T officials said.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

FBI agents from Boston are in Munich today, appealing to the public for help in capturing fugitive gangster James "Whitey'' Bulger.

The 78-year-old fugitive will be featured tonight on "Aktenzeichen XY...ungelost," which means "File XY Unsolved" and is German television's equivalent of Fox Television's America's Most Wanted.

There haven't been any reported sightings of Bulger in Germany, but FBI agents will appear on the show as part of an effort to boost Bulger's profile overseas, according to Gail Marcinkiewicz, a spokeswoman for the FBI's Boston office.

The multi-agency Bulger task force launched a media blitz throughout Europe after a couple resembling Bulger and his girlfriend, Catherine Greig, 56, were videotaped by a vacationing federal agent as they strolled through the Sicilian resort of Taormina in April. The FBI posted a portion of the video on its website in September after efforts by American and Italian law enforcement officials to locate and identify the couple were unsuccessful.

"We're working with various media outlets around the world to help us identify that couple sighted in Taormina and to get the Whitey Bulger story out,'' Marcinkiewicz said. A video clip of the couple observed in Sicily will be featured on the German show, along with photos of Bulger and his girlfriend.

Bulger was featured on television broadcasts in Rome in September, in London in October, and in Madrid in November, according to Marcinkiewicz. He has also been featured many times on America's Most Wanted, most recently in November.

Bulger, one of the FBI's 10 Most Wanted, fled just before his January 1995 federal racketeering indictment in Boston and was later exposed as a longtime FBI informant and charged with 19 murders. The last confirmed sighting of the gangster was in London's Piccadilly Circus in September 2002, according to the FBI.

(Reading Police Department)

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

Reading police today are searching for a brazen robber who walked into the branch of Sovereign Bank without a mask and demanded that a teller hand over large bills.

The robbery occurred Tuesday at 10:45 a.m. at the bank on Main Street, police said. The suspect, who handed the teller a note, claimed he was armed but did not show a weapon. He fled in a 1987 Chevy Monte Carlo, which was recovered 20 minutes later at Harrow's Restaurant.

The man appeared to be in his late 30s to mid 40s and was about 6 feet tall and clean shaven. He was wearing a blue Red Sox hat, small framed glasses, blue jeans, and a blue zip-up sweatshirt.

Anyone with information about the suspect is asked to call Reading police at 781-942-6767.

(John Tlumacki/Globe Staff/file 2003)

A total lunar eclipse could be seen over the Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge on Nov. 8, 2003.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

Tonight’s total lunar eclipse should be visible across Massachusetts with partly cloudy skies expected to become increasingly clear as the moon slips completely into the earth’s celestial shadow.

If clear skies prevail, stargazers will be treated to the last total eclipse visible from earth until Dec. 21, 2010.

“This is a prime time lunar eclipse,” said Richard P. Binzel, a professor of planetary sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “It’s a chance to connect with the universe. A chance to look up and consider things other than our everyday earthly concerns.”

The moon will begin slipping into the earth’s shadow at 8:43 p.m. and will be completely immersed from 10:00 to 10:52 p.m. The forecast calls for partly cloudy skies that should dissipate as the eclipse proceeds.

“It’s not going to be totally clear, but there will be more stars visible than clouds,” said Alan Dunham, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.

David Flavell (Braintree police photo)

By John R. Ellement, Globe staff

A Level 3 sex offender is scheduled to be in court today, charged with entering a women’s bathroom at a Braintree bookstore where he allegedly peered underneath a wall, startling a woman inside, Braintree police said today.

David Flavell, 38, was arrested Tuesday night in Brockton after two witnesses positively identified him from surveillance video and a photo array as the man who entered the bathroom at the Borders bookstore on Grossman Drive on Jan. 29, Deputy Chief Russell Jenkins said in a statement.

Flavell is to be arraigned today in Quincy District Court on two misdemeanor changes of annoying and accosting a person sexually and disorderly conduct. Jenkins said in the statement that Flavell allegedly entered the women’s room in the store and then stuck his head underneath the wall separating two stalls, “startling a 36-year-old Holbrook woman.’’

“Although the two charges against Flavell are misdemeanors and not very serious offenses in the scheme of things, we consider his actions extremely serious and Flavell a very dangerous individual,” Jenkins said in his statement.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

A 91-year-old man escaped from a three-alarm fire in Cambridge overnight that gutted his 2 1/2 story home.

The man, whom firefighters did not identify, noticed flames in his home on Broadway just after midnight, rushed out the front door, and pulled a fire alarm box, said Deputy Chief Jim Burns of the Cambridge Fire Department. The man lived alone and was not physically injured, Burns said.

By Maria Sacchetti, GLOBE STAFF

The telephone awakened Aida Lopez at 6 a.m. today, piercing the silence of her little apartment above her Jamaica Plain gift shop, the one with the "Parking for Cubans only" sign in the window.

Her son was calling with the news she had been waiting 37 years to hear. Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader she had fled with her husband, four children, and one change of clothes, was stepping down. She snapped on the television and smiled.

"Today is the day of my liberation," Lopez said later in her shop, surrounded by rows of pink lace, ribbon, and, in the corner, a portable radio that plays the Cuban national anthem. "I’m going back."

The 72-year-old widow conceded that her return probably will not happen for a while, but today’s announcement stirred Cubans across Massachusetts and beyond.

In interviews on neighborhood streets and corporate office buildings, most local Cubans said they expect democracy to come slowly to their native land, largely because Castro’s 76-year-old brother, Raúl, is expected to succeed him as president. Still, Castro’s announcement revived old passions and bitter memories among Cubans who have grown old in exile in the United States — still clinging to the hope that they might go home again.

(George Rizer/Globe Staff)

When a wild chase in a stolen tow truck last April ended in Dorchester, Globe staff photographer George Rizer was there with his camera. The image he captured showed police in action -- guns drawn and batons ready -- as they pulled the suspect out of the cab of the truck.

Rizer’s picture, which ran in the Globe’s City & Region section, was chosen by the Boston Press Photographers Association as the spot news image of the year for 2007. Rizer was one of 12 Globe shutterbugs honored by the association, including Bill Greene, who was named photographer of the year.

The judges made special note of Greene’s multimedia work, which included an audio slideshow about the suicide of Marine Private Jonathan Schulze after his return from Iraq. Greene also won first place in the multimedia and pictorial categories. A collection of Greene’s videos can be found here.

Other globe photographers honored include Suzanne Kreiter, who won first place in the feature picture story category, and Pat Greenhouse, who won first place in the fire category for images of a blaze on Blue Hill Avenue in November. To see a photo gallery of all the Globe’s winners, click here.

(Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff)

By Noah Bierman, Globe Staff

The new chief of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority said today he will replace toll-takers at four booths with electronic machines and look at adding more automation throughout the system.

“We have 204 lanes. One hundred of them are manual …We’re looking at what’s the right balance,” said Alan LeBovidge, executive director of the Turnpike Authority.

By Donovan Slack, Globe Staff

A group of mayors and labor leaders kicked off a lobbying effort today to push for casino gambling in the Bay State, saying it would generate tens of thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in tax revenue.

The group, calling themselves the Massachusetts Coalition for Jobs and Growth, said it hopes to generate broad, grass-roots support for Governor Deval Patrick's plan to license three resort casinos in Massachusetts.

"This is so important to the vitality and vibrancy of our cities and towns in Massachusetts," said Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston, who joined Mayor Kim Driscoll of Salem and City Manager Jay Ash of Chelsea at a press conference to announce the effort in downtown Boston. "We must do it now."

By Globe Staff

Boston police are hunting for a bandit with red dye on his hands who they say robbed a bank this afternoon on School Street. The alleged robber tried to make his getaway in a cab after the heist, but the dye pack exploded and he was forced to run away on foot.

The robbery came as the city is grappling with a surge in bank holdups, with 30 in the Boston area in January and another six in surrounding communities. On a single day, Jan. 22, four local banks were robbed.

The suspect in today’s robbery is described as a man in his early 50s. He walked into the First Federal Savings Bank at 12:23 p.m., demanded money, and said he had a gun, police said.

(Josh Reynolds for the Boston Globe/file 2006)

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

Saying the state ignored its own rules, the Massachusetts Appeals Court today ordered MassHealth to revisit its decision not to pay for surgery for an HIV-positive teenager who developed a hump on her neck from powerful medications.

Ashley Shaw's doctors at Children’s Hospital Boston said in 2004 that she needed to get the large pad of fat removed from her neck because it was changing her posture, giving her headaches, and leading her to be withdrawn from others. The day before surgery, MassHealth notified Ashley’s mother, Elizabeth Shaw, that it would not pay for the liposuction procedure because it did not qualify for payment under state and federal Medicaid rules.

Matt Collette, Globe Correspondent

Two hikers who had been missing for almost 48 hours in the White Mountains were found today on Mount Washington by a search team in a helicopter.

The two men, who were described by officials at the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department as experienced hikers, were not injured when they were found at 10 a.m.

"They were in good shape, they were well prepared," said Lieutenant Kevin Jordan of Fish and Game. "They did exactly what they should have done. They knew to get down from the heights, down from the tree line, and that's what saved their lives."

Alex Obert, 30, and Steven McCay, 29, are both from Arlington, Va. They set out Sunday to cross the Presidential Traverse, which is a hike of 12 to 19 miles. Bad weather forced them down the mountain and into an area with no cellphone reception, Jordan said.

(Harvard Law School)

By Peter Schworm, Globe Staff

Harvard Law School has scored a major academic coup, luring renowned legal scholar Cass R. Sunstein from the University of Chicago Law School to join its star-studded faculty.

Sunstein, who graduated from Harvard College in 1975 and Harvard Law School in 1978, will begin teaching in the fall and direct the new Program on Risk Regulation, which will focus on how law and policy deal with hazards such as terrorism, climate change, and natural disasters.

"Cass Sunstein is the preeminent legal scholar of our time -- the most wide-ranging, the most prolific, the most cited, and the most influential," said Elena Kagan, dean of the law school, in a statement released this morning. "His work in any one of the fields he pursues -- administrative law and policy, constitutional law and theory, behavioral economics and law, environmental law, to name a non-exhaustive few -- would put him in the very front ranks of legal scholars."

"If I could add only one person to the faculty," Kagan added, "Cass would be that person."

By Emily Sweeney, Globe Staff

BROCKTON - Joseph Nee was handcuffed today moments after being given a sentence that will keep him in prison for six months for his role in plotting a Columbine-style ambush at Marshfield High School in 2004.

Nee sat silently as the Plymouth Superior Court clerk outlined his fate: The total sentence spanned 2 1/2 years and included 2 years probation. Judge Charles M. Grabau ordered Nee to spend 9 months of that in the Plymouth House of Correction, but gave him credit for 92 days he has already served. The remaining 21 months of the sentence was suspended.

Nee, now a 21-year-old student at Bunker Hill Community College, is the son of Thomas J. Nee, the president of the Boston Police Patrolmen's Association. Thomas J. Nee said after the hearing that the family was “heartbroken.”

Nee's lawyer, Thomas Drechsler, vowed to appeal. His client faced up to 20 years in prison. Nee, who has been free on $20,000 bail since January 2005, was taken into custody.

The sentence came after a four-day bench trial that included testimony from a dozen witnesses. Nee was acquitted of two other charges: promotion of anarchy and threatened use of deadly weapons at a school.

By Globe Staff

A Brockton cab driver was slain by a single gunshot to the head, Plymouth County prosecutors said today as they continued to search for the person who killed 56-year-old Edward Conley early Saturday in the South Shore city.

A spokeswoman for Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz said today that an autopsy by the state medical examiner’s office had concluded Conley was killed by one shot to his head. Assistant District Attorney Bridget Norton Middleton said investigators need to hear from anyone in the public who might have information about the first slaying of a cabbie in Brockton since at least 1997.

Brockton police detectives can be reached at 508-941-0234. No arrests have yet been made and a motive is unknown, she said.

Conley, who lived in Bridgewater and was the divorced father of two children, was a driver for Cowen's Taxi Service on Warren Street. He had worked for the company on and off for the last year, colleagues said this weekend.

Police responding to emergency calls about a car crash on Galen Street just before 1 a.m. found Conley sitting in the cab. He was pronounced dead at Brockton Hospital.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

A 48-year-old Newbury man faces charges of failing to store weapons safely after police said they discovered more than 20 weapons inside his home, including what one officer described as a “cannon’’ that uses bullets the size of a man’s palm. Police said the weapons were improperly stored in the house where two children are living.

The .50-caliber rifle was found Sunday when Officers Keegan Stokes and Stephen May responded to a domestic disturbance call at the Hanover Drive home of David J. Balkus, who lives there with his girlfriend and two children, a 13-year-old boy and a 3-year-old girl, police said. The officers found Balkus intoxicated and placed him in protective custody, Newbury police Lieutenant John Lucey said today. The officers, however, suspecting that something was still amiss, summoned their supervisor, Sergeant Patty Fisher, and searched the home, police said.

“Their gut instinct said something was not right,’’ Lucey said.

(The Hatchet: Journal of Lizzie Borden Studies)

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

It may be a new image of Lizzie Borden: An angelic 8- or 9-year-old girl with a hint of baby fat still noticeable in her creamy white cheeks. In the black-and-white photograph, she seems proud of the feather in her straw hat and her wool coat with a satin lined collar.

That is far from the prevailing impression of Borden. Despite her acquittal at trial, she is commonly depicted as an ax-wielding spinster who got away with the murder of her father and stepmother in Fall River in 1892.

The photograph, which does not identify the girl, was found last month in the collection of the Swansea Historical Society by Stefani Koorey, publisher of ''The Hatchet: Journal of Lizzie Borden Studies."

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

While searching for what they feared was a person trapped on the third floor of a burning building, two Lawrence firefighters themselves became trapped when a pressurized container detonated, shaking the building so badly that it jammed the door they had planned to escape through, according to the Lawrence fire chief.

"We are fortunate they were able to find their way out and actually get that door unjammed themselves,'' Lawrence Fire Chief Peter Takvorian said of the Thursday night fire. "Things could have gotten a lot worse.''

The three-alarm fire, however, did claim the life of a resident of the three-story Royal Street building, according to Takvorian and Lawrence Police Chief John J. Romero. Romero identified the deceased as Thomas J. Madden, 53, who was well known to police 911 operators due to the frequent, rambling calls he made to them over the past several years.

Late today, State Fire Marshal Stephen D. Coan and local officials announced the cause as improper disposal of smoking materials which ignited upholstered furniture in the living room.

Coan, in a statement, said it was not known if Madden was using fire-resistant smoking materials.

By Matthew Collette, Globe Correspondent

Two brothers had to be rescued by Waltham police and fire crews after their sport utility vehicle drove into a man-made pond.

At about 1:30 p.m. Thursday the driver hit the gas pedal rather than the brake and drove out of a parking lot and into the drainage pond behind 201 Jones Rd., police said.

Both men were taken to Newton-Wellesley Hospital, but neither suffered serious injuries, said Lieutenant Kevin O'Connell.

The garment that may help to solve a case.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A colorful sweatshirt may be the key to finding a man wanted for stabbing and robbing a woman in Fall River earlier this month, according to police.

The garment features pictures of dogs, rings, and dice and other designs. Police are looking for the person who was wearing it.

Around 6:30 p.m. on Feb. 6, in the parking lot outside Self Esteem Hair and Nail on Wade Street, a woman walking to her car was approached by a man who demanded her bag. After a struggle, the woman was knocked to the ground and stabbed, police said in a statement issued today.

The connection between the sweatshirt and the alleged attacker wasn't clear in the statement. No further information was available last night on the case, Lieutenant Robert Flynn said.

By Russell Contreras, Globe Staff

LAWRENCE -- A man who ran for the District 16 state representative seat two years ago but was tossed off the ballot for not living in the district is seeking the seat again.

This time, he says it is the incumbent who doesn't live in the district.

Former Lawrence city councilor Marcos Devers announced that he is challenging incumbent William "Willy" Lantigua for the seat on Sept. 16 and said he has evidence that Lantigua hasn't lived in the district for a few months.

In a telephone interview, Devers said he will make that evidence available for state officials "if it's needed."

"I've seen him living somewhere else," said Dever, a former city councilor who has openly battled with Lantigua. "It's easy to notice in a city like Lawrence."

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

Homeless sex offenders who list a shelter as their address cannot be prosecuted for violating the sex offender registry law if investigators learn they do not spend every night in the shelter, the state’s high court said today.

Angelo M. Rosado was a Level 3 sex offender in the fall of 2005 who listed the Pine Street Inn in Boston as his address when registering with Boston Police. But when mail from Sex Offender Registry Board was returned as undeliverable, Suffolk Country prosecutors charged that he violated the registry law. Rosado was convicted by District Court Judge Rosalind Miller, who imposed a 30-day suspended sentence.

In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Judicial Court threw out Rosado’s conviction, saying that the state needs to change its record keeping to reflect the reality that a homeless person is not routinely guaranteed a bed.

By Bryan Marquard, Globe Staff

In cars and kitchens from Cape Cod to Canada, the first voice hundreds of thousands of people heard each morning belonged to Jess Cain. Sound effects, song parodies, and witty commentary were his stock in trade, and for 34 years of mornings on WHDH AM he had few rivals, becoming the highest-paid radio personality in Boston.

Cain, who started out as an actor and kept returning to the stage during and after his radio career, died in his Beacon Hill home this morning. At 81, he had been battling cancer for several years.

"What you're trying to do," he told the Boston Herald American in 1974, "is jolly people into facing the day."

His trademark was drawing humor from sources likely and unlikely. In Cain's hands, Frank Sinatra's hit song "Fly Me to the Moon" became the parody "Fly Me to Methuen." He could do dead-on impressions and draw chuckles by asking guests in his studios or on the phone seemingly innocuous questions.

"What I liked about radio is that you had to rely on your own imagination and compliment your audience by attributing to them a vivid imagination," he told the Boston Herald in 1991.

When the Red Sox soared through the Impossible Dream year in 1967, Cain recorded a tribute to Carl Yastrzemski. Three years ago, "The Yaz Song" became popular with a new generation as part of the soundtrack to "Fever Pitch," a movie about an obsessive Red Sox fan.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

A 20-year-old Petersham man died after jumping off an overpass and then getting struck by a State police cruiser as both were trying to help a woman trapped inside a crashed car on Route 2 Wednesday night in Phillipston, authorities said.

The man was identified by Worcester District Attorney Joseph Early Jr.’s office as Andrew S. Castonguay of Briggs Road in the central Massachusetts town.

By Globe Staff

Legislative leaders released the hard details of a $1 billion plan to fund life sciences today, nearly 10 months after Governor Deval Patrick unveiled the proposal to great fanfare at the BIO 2007 International Convention.

House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi said in a statement that the bill embraces the key elements of Patrick’s 10-year plan and expands state grant funding and programs to train top scientists and researchers in Massachusetts. It includes $500 million in bonding for capital investments, $250 million in direct research grants, and $250 million in tax credits.

The bill “boldly carries forward the vision” outlined by the governor last May and will have “an immediate, direct impact on creating good jobs and growing our economy,” DiMasi said in a statement. “Massachusetts is a world leader in the life sciences industry, and this investment will help keep us there for years to come.”

Patrick had voiced concern in recent months that the proposal had stalled and was costing the state jobs. Some critics of the governor's plan had said that his proposal lacked specifics.

(Tom Landers/Globe Staff/File 2004)

Joseph Nee, seen in 2004, was accused of masterminding the plot.

By Emily Sweeney, Globe Staff

BROCKTON -- A former student accused of planning a Columbine-style attack at Marshfield High School was found guilty today of conspiracy to commit murder but was acquitted of two other charges.

Joseph Nee, 21, sat silently when Judge Charles M. Grabau read the verdict after the four-day bench trial in Plymouth Superior Court. Nee was acquitted of promotion of anarchy and threatening to use deadly weapons at school.

When Nee is sentenced Tuesday, he faces a maximum of 20 years in prison. He remains free on $20,000 cash bail.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

Call it the killer pothole. Dozens of drivers required a towing service to get home tonight, after driving through a particularly egregious pothole on I-93 North near Exit 31.

"We've done about 30 calls since 5 p.m." because of the pothole, said Debbie Pizziferri, a dispatcher for Rigano's Towing in Malden.

Basil Rigano, one of the company's drivers, said he had towed at least seven cars damaged by the pothole. The family-owned towing company dispatched four drivers to the site, said Rigano.

Rigano, who drove through the pothole himself, guessed that it was about a foot deep.

Rigano's truck was not damaged, but other cars were not as sturdy. "It's bending the whole wheel." he said, "Some cars are getting two flats."

By Daniel Peleschuk and Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondents

Smoke from a fire in the old Filene's Basement building forced authorities to evacuate about 50 people from the Downtown Crossing MBTA station and close the station for nearly two hours, Boston fire officials said tonight.

One person was taken to the hospital for treatment of smoke inhalation, said Deputy Chief Steve Dunbar.

Part of the station is underneath the Filene's building, a fixture for decades in the Downtown Crossing area that is currently being redeveloped.

Police and firefighters responded at about 7 p.m. to the fire in the eight-story building at the intersection of Summer and Washington streets, Dunbar said.

Pipe insulation and other materials caught fire in one of the buildings's sub-basments, said Steven MacDonald, a fire department spokesman.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

By Peter Schworm, Globe Staff

Amherst College may lack ocean-front property in the Pioneer Valley, but owning a sliver of the California coastline has netted the school a $58 million windfall.

The deep-pocketed private college, which already boasts a $1.6 billion endowment, received its largest single contribution last month when it sold a stretch of beach in San Clemente, Calif., that a member of the class of 1919 donated to the school four decades ago.

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

His own father wanted him executed, calling him "pure evil.'' But Daniel T. Tavares Jr. has reached a plea deal with Washington prosecutors that will allow him to avoid the death penalty.

Prosecutors said today at a news conference that Tavares, 41, who was accused of jumping bail in Massachusetts and traveling to Washington where he killed a young couple, will plead guilty to the two murders and waive all of his rights to an appeal, in exchange for a sentence of life in prison.

Pierce County prosecutor Gerald Horne said that the families of Tavares's victims, Brian and Beverly Mauck, plan to push for legislation that would require law enforcement officials to alert their counterparts in other states whenever a "dangerously violent person'' moves out of their jurisdiction.

By Globe Staff

Boston has been ranked the third greenest city in the United States because of its recycling program, public transportation, and a plan to generate electricity from yard clippings, according to a study that will appear in the March issue of Popular Science.

The study, which has been published on the magazine’s website, analyzed census data and government statistics in 30 categories for cities with more than 100,000 people. Out of 30 possible points, Boston scored 22.7, ranking just behind Portland, Ore., (23.1) and San Francisco (23.0).

Mayor Thomas M. Menino trumpeted Boston's third-place finish as evidence his administration has made the city an environment leader.

"Beantown truly is Greentown," Menino said in a statement. "Being green helps us build a better city and improve our economy at the same time. The success of Boston depends on us making the city greener."

By Kate Augusto and Matt Collette, Globe Correspondents

Portions of Interstate 91 in Western Massachusetts flooded today as a winter storm pounded the state with up to 2 inches of rain.

Several inches of water pooled on the interstate between Springfield and Greenfield when snow blocked storm drains.

"Early this morning there were spots where there were several inches of water, generally in the left travel lane," said Trooper Eric Benson, a State Police spokesman.

The owners of buildings with flat roofs were urged to clear off the wet, heavy snow that fell overnight because it could cause collapses. Snow left on flat roofs can act like a sponge and absorb sleet and rain, adding more stress to structures, said Don Boyce, director of the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency.

In metropolitan Boston, there have not been any reports of significant standing water in communities that are often prone to flooding. No problems were reported in Quincy, Peabody, Scituate, Revere, and Winthrop.

(Coast Guard)

By Globe Staff

Full electrical power has been restored to the floundering liquefied natural gas tanker that broke down off Cape Cod, and crews are working today to repair the ship's propulsion system.

The 933-foot LNG tanker Catalunya Spirit is being repaired off the coast of Gloucester at the site of a planned offshore liquefied natural gas facility near Eastern Point Light, according to a press release from the Coast Guard.

By David Abel, Globe Staff

Black community leaders today urged lawmakers at a Beacon Hill hearing to create a state commission to examine the social status of black men in Massachusetts.

They called on lawmakers to pass a bill proposed by Senator Dianne Wilkerson that would appoint 21 people to study trends among black men, assess existing programs, and propose new ones that would benefit black men.

“There are many people in the Commonwealth who are struggling, but I don’t think there’s much debate that there’s a particular segment of our population who is really, really reeling for a host of reasons,” Wilkerson said.

(Jim Davis/Globe Staff)

Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester got in some throwing early this morning in Fort Myers, Fla. Some pitchers and catchers came to spring training early, ahead of Thursday's reporting date.

By Globe Staff

The Patrick administration has asked each of the state’s electric and natural gas companies to extend a moratorium on utility shut-offs until May 1 because of high energy costs.

"In a year that is requiring everyone to dig deeper to pay rising energy bills, low-income, elderly, and disabled consumers are especially at risk," said Paul Hibbard, chairman of the state Department of Public Utilities, in a statement. "We are urging the Commonwealth’s utility companies to lend a hand during this particularly difficult year."

(AP photo/Weather Underground)

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

You wasted your time this morning if you bothered to shovel the walk.

The heavy snow that blanked metropolitan Boston overnight will likely be washed away. Temperatures are expected to creep up near 50 degrees this afternoon as the region is pounded by up to 2 inches of rain.

That means the fear of icy roads will give way to another potential problem.

“The concern will be street flooding,” said Charlie Foley, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

A dog that can sniff out money aided in the arrest of a Massachusetts man who was poised to fly from Florida to Venezuela with $1.3 million in stolen cash, federal authorities said.

Allen Seymour of Oxford was arrested Friday night on federal charges shortly after Zeek, a dog used by officers from US Customs and Border Protection, detected the cash in the baggage compartments of a private aircraft at the Opa Locka Airport near Miami, according to a sworn statement filed yesterday by an FBI agent in US District Court in Worcester.

Seymour illegally obtained the cash through a complicated series of transactions from an Oxford lawyer who had received it from a client to buy a commercial property in Pennsylvania, the agent, Albert D. Lamoreaux, said in the affidavit.

The lawyer, who was identified in the affidavit only as "R.D.," was under investigation himself by federal and state authorities for allegedly misappropriating $1.99 million from the client.

By Maria Cramer, Globe Staff

After Andrew Boisvert killed his ex-wife in her Medfield home Wednesday afternoon, he picked up their 7-year-old daughter at her bus stop, took her to the movies, then returned to the scene of the crime to call police, authorities said during a press conference today.

Boisvert killed Margaret "Meg" Ninos sometime after 2 p.m., beating her to death with a blunt instrument during a fight, said Norfolk District Attorney William R. Keating. Boisvert then changed clothes, picked up his daughter, and did not return to Ninos's apartment until 7 p.m., when he called police.

In the recording of a 911 call played at the press conference, Boisvert told a dispatcher that his ex-wife had been shot in the head. "She's cold to the touch," Boisvert said in a breathless voice.

Boisvert was questioned at the Medfield Police Department but said little to investigators and left shortly after midnight Thursday with his lawyer. His car had been impounded, but he managed to flee the state in his lawyer's Jeep.

By Matt Viser, Globe Staff

House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi this afternoon outlined a proposed budget that would slash the state's corporate income tax -- from 9.5 percent to 7 percent -- and increase the cigarette tax by $1 per pack.

DiMasi’s corporate tax cuts would be spread over three years, with the first reduction to arrive in January 2009 followed by stepped decreases in 2010 and 2011. The cuts are deeper and faster than a proposal by Governor Deval Patrick. At the same time, DiMasi has agreed to the governor’s plan to tighten the state’s corporate tax codes and close what Patrick has called loopholes that are costing the state hundreds of millions of dollars.

“It has to be a balanced approach,” said DiMasi, who in the past has vigorously opposed corporate tax changes. “This is a very difficult fiscal year, and we were looking for revenue sources.”

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

A former Boston police officer was sentenced to a year and a day in federal prison today for distributing steroids, committing perjury, and obstructing justice in a continuing federal grand jury probe of police corruption.

Edgardo Rodriguez, 38, of Hyde Park, apologized in court to his family and the public for his crimes, saying, "I wish it would never have happened. I made a bad choice.'' But he insisted that he was never a drug dealer and that he had only obtained steroids for himself.

His lawyer, Philip A. Tracy Jr., had asked US District Judge Rya W. Zobel to show leniency to Rodriguez and perhaps sentence him to home confinement. Tracy said Rodriguez was a Marine veteran who served in the first Persian Gulf War and had recently been married.

But the judge agreed with Assistant US Attorney John T. McNeil that Rodriguez deserved a prison sentence. She said he lied to a grand jury in October 2006 about steroid use and distribution in the Police Department and tried to discourage another Boston police officer from testifying before the grand jury.

"I do not think this is a case for home confinement,'' Zobel said. "It is appropriate that perjury be recognized as one of the most serious offenses against the [judicial] system.''

By Noah Bierman, Globe Staff

The MBTA’s tardiest commuter train line will be getting a new schedule to better reflect the time it actually takes to run the train, state representative Alice Hanlon Peisch announced today.

Peisch said she has been told by the train’s private operator, the Massachusetts Bay Commuter Railroad Company, the new schedule will take effect Feb. 19.

“Riders of the Worcester-Framingham line need an accurate schedule to plan their lives accordingly. The train schedule has been unreliable for too long,” said Peisch, a Democrat from Wellesley.

Scheduling will not make the chronically late trains go faster. The MBTA and its contractor have been struggling to merge commuters' needs with those of CSX, the freight rail operator that dispatches the line.

(Coast Guard)

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

A tanker filled with liquefied natural gas that broke down off Cape Cod has been corralled by four tug boats and is no longer adrift, according to the Coast Guard.

The 933-foot Catalunya Spirit is being towed west to an offshore location 25 miles east of Provincetown where its propulsion system will be repaired. The tanker was churning to Boston from Trinidad and Tobago when it broke down Monday morning. To view a Coast Guard video of the stranded tanker, click here.

By Erica Noonan, Globe Staff

NATICK --- The Redmen aren't fading away without a fight.

A group wanting to preserve Natick's controversial sports moniker scored a victory Monday night when the town's Board of Selectmen voted 5-0 to put the issue to a public vote.

The town will add a nonbinding question to its March 25 ballot asking residents whether the School Committee should reverse its decision to dump the long-standing nickname.

Some feel use of the name Redmen denigrates Native Americans and that the use of Indian warrior images on unofficial athletic paraphernalia is racist.

Last year, the School Committee voted to drop the name by the 2008 football season and appointed a task force to consider new names for the team. Locals have not rallied around the proposal for a new name -- the Hawks.

On Monday night, the board heard nearly two hours of impassioned discussion before approving the ballot question.

"Everyone gets a chance to vote on this, which is exactly what we wanted, and what everyone felt was missing from the process so far,'' said Sue Lamont, who has collected 1,800 signatures from residents who want to keep the Redmen name. "This is about the sprit of the town and its history, not just sports teams.''

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

Newton police released a sketch today of a man who allegedly tried to strangle a woman Monday inside the Greater Boston Chinese Cultural Center.

The suspect is described as a dark-skinned Asian male who is approximately 40 years old and 5 feet 5 inches tall. He has a thin build and weighs about 120 pounds.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

A Boston teenager with no prior criminal record pleaded not guilty to manslaughter charges today after he allegedly shot his friend in the face while waving a handgun around a Dorchester apartment, police and prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said Rashard Monroe shot Kendell Floyd in a second-floor apartment on Wainwright Street in Dorchester. The shooting took place Monday around 2:30 p.m., police said. Floyd turned 17 last week and Monroe will turn 18 in April.

Relatives of both teens, who lived around the corner from each other, were in court today, but declined to comment.

At Monroe's arraignment in Dorchester Municipal Court, Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Hickman said Monroe, Floyd, and two others boys, ages 14 and 15, were smoking marijuana. At some point, Monroe pulled out a handgun, Hickman said.

“He was waving the handgun around and it went off in the face,’’ of Floyd, she said in court. Hickman said Floyd was shot in the eye. He was rushed to Boston Medical Center where he was pronounced dead, police said.

By Globe Staff

Law enforcement officials believe that a man who apparently hanged himself at a North Carolina rest stop yesterday may be the Bridgewater man who was being sought for the murder of his ex-wife in Medfield.

A man whose appearance matched that of Andrew Boisvert was found dead yesterday at a rest stop on Interstate 77 near Statesville, N.C., prosecutors said.

The car that Boisvert had been driving was parked at the rest stop and the man who was found hanging had Boisvert's license in his pocket. The dead man also had in his possession an envelope addressed to law enforcement whose contents indicated he was wanted for murder in Massachusetts.

The postcard that finally made it to its destination.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

A postcard from Yellowstone National Park's Tower Falls arrived in the mail last week for a "Miss Margeret McDonald" at an address on Sparhawk Street in Brighton. Unfortunately, the card was mailed nearly 80 years ago, and Ms. McDonald no longer lives there.

Since purchasing the house from the McDonald family 10 years ago, Michael Cioffi, the current resident, has found in cobwebbed corners of the house various remnants of the McDonald family, such as glass bottles from the family's bottling company. But he is not accustomed to receiving mail from their past.

"I thought it was something someone found in a drawer," said Cioffi, 40. When he discovered his roommate had brought it in with the mail, he was very surprised, he said.

Cioffi did not know how long ago Margeret McDonald lived in the house, but said the family had owned the house for about 90 years before he purchased it in 1998. He said he didn't know where the woman or her relatives might be now.

The postcard's message, simply "Greetings," is scrawled in script and signed by "M.C." The card is in good condition, considering it has been en route to the Sparhawk address for 79 years.

The card, mailed with a one-cent stamp, was postmarked June 30, 1929, from Yellowstone, Wyoming. The card was postmarked a second time on Jan. 28 of this year in Seattle.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A plane carrying more than 300 Marines was forced to make an unscheduled stop at a New Hampshire airport early today. The troops who were aboard are staying overnight in the Portsmouth area.

A mechanical problem forced the World Airways MD-11 plane to land at Portsmouth International Aiport at 2:35 a.m., said Stephen Bourque, airport security coordinator. The troops have been shuttled to local hotels for tonight, he said.

Jim McCain, son of Republican presidential candidate John McCain, was one of the Marines on board, the Portsmouth Herald reported.

The plane was headed to Bangor, Maine, and had about 330 to 350 troops on board, Bourque said. The Associated Press reported that the Marines had just completed a seven-month tour of duty in Iraq and had taken off from Germany. Their plane was to refuel in Bangor and then return to Camp Pendleton in southern California.

By Michael Naughton, Globe Correspondent

Boston police have identified the man who was fatally stabbed yesterday inside an apartment in a Chinatown building as 28-year-old Edward Quiles of Boston.

Quiles was found stabbed inside a second-floor apartment in The Metropolitan at 1 Nassau St. at about 1:40 p.m.

Shortly after they arrived, police located Anthony Chambers, 51, of Boston, near the scene and arrested him. Chambers pleaded not guilty today to murder during his arraignment in Boston Municipal Court.

By Globe Staff

A howling west wind gusting near 70 miles per hour made it feel like almost 20 degrees below zero as Massachusetts shuddered in a blast of arctic air.

The state low wind chill of 16 degrees below zero was measured at 6 a.m. at Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory and again at 8 a.m. in Worcester.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if some wind chills hit minus 20,” said Alan Dunham, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton. “Just because we didn’t record it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

(Tom Landers/Globe Staff/File 2004)

Joseph Nee, seen in 2004, is charged with planning a Columbine-style attack at Marshfield High.

By Emily Sweeney, Globe Staff

A lawyer for a former student accused of planning an attack at Marshfield High School told a judge today that his client deserves the same immunity that prosecutors gave to his two classmates who are planning to testify against him.

Joseph Nee went to police in the fall of 2004 with two friends -- Daniel Farley and Joseph Sullivan -- and told officers that another classmate was plotting a deadly attack at the school, said Nee’s lawyer, Thomas Drechsler. They told authorities that the student, Tobin "Toby" Kerns, had masterminded a plan to shoot students and staff.

After Kerns's arrest, Farley and Sullivan told police that Nee had actually orchestrated the plot. Nee was arrested and prosecutors agreed not to charge his friends if they testified against him at trial.

“Mr. Nee didn’t do anything that Mr. Farley and Mr. Sullivan didn’t do,” Drechsler said today during his opening statement in Plymouth Superior Court. “My client deserves the same outcome as Mr. Sullivan and Mr. Farley.”

David Meier, who led the homicide unit in Suffolk County for 11 years, today joined a Boston law firm known for trial work. He is joining Todd &Weld, a 40-lawyer firm.

“It’s a match made in heaven,’’ said J. Owen Todd, one of the firm’s top attorneys, said today. “We are just a bunch of guys who like to try cases. He’s a consummate trial lawyer who has ethical values without parallel. He’s real old school.’’

(Globe file photo)

Cheyenne Baez, 19, was killed April 8, 2007.

By John R. Ellement, Globe staff

Over the objections of the victim's family, a Suffolk Superior Court judge today sentenced an 18-year-old Jamaica Plain man to five years in prison for using an unlicensed handgun to shoot another man in the eye, killing him.

Enrique Baez admitted to Judge Margaret Hinkle that he shot and killed 19-year-old Cheyenne Baez shortly after 5 a.m. in his Washington Street apartment on April 8, 2007. The men were not related.

Baez insisted in court that it was an accidental shooting, not a murder, and Judge Margaret M. Hinkle, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley's office and Baez's attorney, Shannon McAuliffe, all agreed. Baez had two handguns in his bedroom, both .357-calibers that looked similar, according to prosecutors. One was loaded; the other empty.

(AP Photo/Guillermo Arias)

President Felipe Calderón of Mexico, shown above in Guadalajara on Sunday, will speak tonight at the Kennedy School of Government.

By Globe Staff

President Felipe Calderón of Mexico is expected to a deliver a speech tonight at Harvard University in which he will outline the challenges faced by his country.

The speech at the Kennedy School of Government is part of a four-state US tour that will also take him to New York, Chicago, and California. Calderón's visit has been billed as an effort to meet Mexican immigrants in this country, according to a story published today in the Dallas Morning News.

Calderón is from the central state of Michoacán, home to a large number of US immigrants. While standing next to President Bush in Mérida last year, Calderón acknowledged that he had relatives working illegally in the United States, according to the Dallas Morning News report.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

A 29-year-old man was killed overnight in Lynn when he was shot twice in the chest, police said.

Officers responded to a call and found Darling Guzman lying in the parking lot of a White Hen Pantry in Austin Square at 11 p.m., said Lieutenant Dave Brown of the Lynn Police Department. Guzman was taken to Salem Hospital and pronounced dead.

(Stone Zoo)

An artist's rendering of the new exhibit, which will house the 2-year-old black bear pictured above and his brother.

By Globe Staff

The Stone Zoo is building a $750,000 habitat to house a pair of 250-pound black bears that will go on exhibit this spring, zoo officials announced today.

The 2-year-old bears are coming to the Stoneham zoo from the Appalachian Bear Rescue in Tennessee, which has raised the animals since they were confiscated as cubs from breeders in Georgia. The new exhibit will be on the site that was previously home to Major, a well-known polar bear who died in 2000.

“New England has a large population of black bears in the wild and the separation between their habitat and ours is shrinking,” John Linehan, president and chief executive officer of Zoo New England, said in a statement. “By building this new exhibit and giving a much-needed home to these bears, we hope to educate people about these incredible animals and the ecosystem we all share.”

(George Rizer/Globe Staff)

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

Everett firefighters overcame two frozen hydrants, a burst hose, and a brutal wind as they battled subzero temperatures and extinguished a two-alarm blaze this morning on Cleveland Avenue.

"It was a little demanding, but the guys did a great job," Everett Fire Captain Joe Hickey said.

By Caitlin Castello, Globe Correspondent, and Megan Woolhouse, Globe Staff

Cambridge police are investigating a shooting that has sent one man to the hospital.

The man was shot earlier this evening at Windsor and Harvard Streets. He ran to a house for help. The occupants of the house called police, said Patrolman Frank Pasquarello, a police spokesman.

The man was shot in the chest. His injuries appear likely to be life-threatening, said Sergeant James DeFrancesco, another police spokesman.

No arrests have been made, Pasquarello said.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Staff

A Weymouth man was convicted today of using a dead person's name to get cheaper motor vehicle insurance from one company and lying about his driving record to another, the state attorney general's office said today.

Christopher A. Falco, 25, was convicted of larceny, perjury and insurance fraud in Norfolk Superior Court. In April 2004, prosecutors said, he used the name of a deceased individual with a good driving record who was eligible for senior citizen discount to get a nearly $2,000 reduction in his car insurance.

After the insurance company discovered the inaccuracies and re-rated the policy to the correct amount, Falco canceled his insurance and applied for a policy from another company, prosecutors said in a statement.

On the second application, Falco failed to disclose his driving record and the money he owed the first company. The insurance companies referred the matter to the Insurance Fraud Bureau, prosecutors said.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

Brookline police are looking for a robber who held a knife to the neck of the cashier of a convenience store Wednesday night and demanded that he empty the cash register.

The robber entered the One Stop Market on Cypress Street twice before attacking the store clerk shortly before 9 p.m. Wednesday, police said in a statement.

The man initiated conversation with customers both times. The third time he entered, he waited in the back of the store for other customers to leave, then approached the clerk.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Staff

A Taunton man was indicted today on a murder charge in the November death of a close family friend who was found shot to death in his car at a Taunton industrial park, Bristol County prosecutors said.

Timothy Cassidy, 38, is charged with killing James Madonna, 44, also of Taunton, around noon on Nov. 21, prosecutors said in a statement.

The motive was "monetary," said Gregg Miliote, a spokesman for the district attorney's office.

By Globe Staff

A man accused of raping a woman at knife-point early this morning in Chelsea was arrested after police said they followed his snowy footsteps from the scene of the alleged crime.

Police were searching for a suspect in a reported sexual assault at 3:30 a.m. on Cherry Street when officers spotted fresh footprints in otherwise undisturbed snow, according to Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley's office. The footprints lead police into an alley, where they arrested Juan Amaro, 25, who was wearing beige pants that were similar to those described by the victim.

The footprints led police "to where he was hiding and helped locate a critical piece of evidence, the knife believed used in the attack,” said Chief Brian Kyes of the Chelsea Police Department. "We were able to corroborate the victim's story."

By Globe Staff

The state’s highest court today overturned the conviction of a Methuen police officer who was found guilty of raping an intoxicated woman in 2000 whom he drove home because she was too impaired to drive.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled that former officer David Blache is entitled to a new trial because the original judge gave improper instructions to the jury. The court ruled that the trial judge did not adequately explain that the state had to prove that the victim was too intoxicated to consent to sex, not that she was merely high and drunk.

“The evidence presented conflicting views about whether the complainant was capable of consenting, and if she was capable, whether she did so,” Associate Justice Margot Botsford wrote for the court. “We cannot say that the errors in the charge were not prejudicial. The defendant is entitled to a new trial.”

By Khristopher Flack, Globe Correspondent

Owners from more than 80 Boston liquor-serving establishments met with police and city officials yesterday to be briefed on two related sexual assaults, police said.

The owners were given overviews of each incident, one last August and another in November. In both cases, a female victim was picked up in the downtown area and taken to Charlestown, where she was sexually assaulted, police said. The assaults were recently connected by DNA evidence.

By Globe Staff

A five-car crash this afternoon on Route 6 in the Cape Cod town of Harwich has sent five people to the hospital, but none of them have life-threatening injuries, state police said this afternoon.

The accident happened at about 2:45 p.m. in the westbound lanes, said Trooper Eric Benson, a state police spokesman. The busy artery was closed in both directions, with the eastbound lanes reopening at about 3:30 and the westbound lanes reopening at 3:50 p.m.

The accident is under investigation, Benson said.

By Erin Ailworth, Globe staff

Seeking to increase the public’s role in keeping dangerous sex offenders off the streets, officials today filed legislation that would give prosecutors the right to demand that a jury decide whether an offender is a sexually dangerous person.

Under state law, a person deemed sexually dangerous is civilly committed to the Massachusetts Treatment Center in Bridgewater for “one day to life.’’ The issue gained bitter prominence last week when a Level 3 sex offender was charged with raping a six-year-old boy in New Bedford’s downtown public library.

Bristol prosecutors had tried in 2006 to have Corey Saunders declared sexually dangerous, but Superior Court Judge Richard T. Moses disagreed, and Saunders was released from prison.

Lawmakers, Middlesex District Attorney Gerard T. Leone Jr. and Mary Lauby, the executive director of Jane Doe Inc. appeared at the State House today to support the measure. Lauby said the New Bedford incident stunned her.

By Jonathan Saltzman, Globe Staff

A federal jury should be allowed to consider a lawsuit brought by a female secretary against the Grafton town administrator in which she complained that her boss created a hostile work environment by frequently staring at her breasts, a federal appeals court ruled today.

The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit ruled that District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV erred when he sided with the town and the retired town administrator, Russell J. Connor Jr., and dismissed the suit by Nancy M. Billings on the defendants' motion for summary judgment.

The three-member appeals court panel said that Billings' suit had raised serious claims of sexual harassment, including that Connor had created a hostile work environment by staring at the breasts of several town employees and had retaliated against Billings for complaining to the board of selectmen by transferring her to another municipal job.

"Taken in the light most favorable to Billings, the evidence depicts a supervisor who regularly stared at her breasts for much of the two and a half years they worked together," the appeals court said in its 42-page decision.

By Globe Staff

Investigators probing the cause of a massive Jan. 21 fire in Lawrence say that they have ruled out arson as the cause.

"There is no information to suggest nor evidence to indicate the fire was intentionally set or the result of a criminal act," State Fire Marshal Stephen D. Coan said today in a statement.

But Coan also said the building where the fire started was so completely destroyed that investigators were unable to pinpoint a single accidental cause for the fire and eliminate all others. So the cause will remain officially undetermined.

By Noah Bierman, Globe staff

The MBTA board of directors voted today to buy 75 double-decker coaches for the commuter rail system, following up on a promise made last year.

The contract with Rotem USA Corp, of Philadelphia, is worth $190 million. The T approved an additional $10 million contract for engineering services.

The engineering contract was nearly held up because one board member was concerned the firm, PB Americas, had not fully disclosed its link to Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, the firm involved in a Big Dig lawsuit.

General Manager Daniel A. Grabauskas said this week that the first of the new coaches should be in service in three years.

The MBTA owns 410 coaches, including 140 double-deckers, to carry about 72,000 riders daily. The system’s on-time performance has been riders’ biggest complaint, but cramped coaches is also high on many commuters’ list of complaints.

By Eric Moskowitz and Maria Cramer, Globe staff

NORTH ANDOVER -- A 53-year-old social worker, described by a co-worker as a “special person,’’ was identified today as the woman allegedly killed by her patient inside an apartment here Wednesday evening.

Diruhi S. Mattian was allegedly stabbed by 19-year-old Thomas Belanger, said Steve O'Connell, spokesman for Essex District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett.

Belanger was sent to Bridgewater State Hospital for a competency evaluation late today.

Mattian was working for Family Continuity Inc., a social service agency with an office in Lawrence, said O'Connell.

Mattian was the director of the Lawrence FLEX program, which was designed to keep adolescents with chronic mental illnesses in their homes while receiving treatment. "The services are primarily aimed at keeping the children safely at home with their families, in their community, out of residential programs, and away from hospital care,'' according to the program summary posted under Mattian's name.

Earl Stuck, executive director of Family Continuity, where Mattian had worked for a decade, said it was not unusual for Mattian to visit a patient in the evening. Many of the social workers and therapists on the 250-member staff visit the homes of overwhelmed clients to provide counseling services or help with menial tasks, like paying for bills or planning the family's dinner menu for the week.

"She was a very special person," Stuck said. "I hope people realize the hard work that people like Diruhi do, and how much it benefits all of us."

By Brian Ballou, Globe staff

MEDFIELD – A long-time nurse at a Boston hospital who was the mother of a 7-year-old girl was identified today as the woman found dead inside her home Wednesday night, the apparent victim of a homicide, authorities said.

Margaret E. Ninos, 47, had worked for the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center since 1986 and spent most of her career in its labor and delivery unit, the hospital confirmed today.

Dr. DeWayne Pursley, interim chief of the obstetrics and gynecology unit, said in a statement, “We are a fairly tight-knit group, joined in our strong desire to provide the best care possible for mothers and babies. Meg certainly shared in this goal and was an integral member of our care team. This is tragic, and we will miss her greatly.”

Neighbor Stacey McNamara, in an interview this morning near the home on Marlyn Road where Ninos died, described her as “very nice, very sweet.’’ McNamara said Ninos usually worked nights and that her 14-year-old daughter often babysat for Ninos’s daughter.

By Elizabeth Ratto, Globe Correspondent

A flight from New York to Paris was diverted to Boston tonight after an unruly man struck a flight attendant, state police and airport officials said.

American Airlines Flight 44, which was heading from JFK Airport to Charles DeGaulle Airport with 136 people on board, reported the incident at 8:10 p.m.

Lieutenant Eric Anderson, spokesman for the State Police, said that when the flight landed in Boston, the suspect, French national Ansoumane Conde, was taken into custody.

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

Jay Garrity, the former operations director for Mitt Romney's presidential campaign who resigned last July amid allegations he repeatedly impersonated police officers, will not be charged in connection with a call made to a Wilmington drain-cleaning company from someone calling himself "Trooper Garrity."

"We have no plans to charge Mr. Garrity,'' said Jake Wark, a spokesman for Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley. "While the investigation does remain open, at this stage of the investigation, evidence consistently points away from Mr. Garrity.''

Garrity was identified in June 2007 as the focus of a State Police investigation into a call made to Wayne's Drains of Wilmington, in which a man calling himself "Trooper Garrity of the Massachusetts State Police” The caller threatened to issue a citation against a driver of a Wayne's Drains van he said was speeding and cutting off cars in the Ted Williams Tunnel. Published reports, which Garrity and his lawyer denied, said the cell phone number from which the call was placed was traced back to Garrity.

By Globe Staff

Phillips Academy in Andover announced today that the school had received a $25 million donation, the largest single gift in its 230-year history, from retired Wall Street investor Oscar L. Tang.

Tang is an Andover alumnus and president of the school's Board of Trustees. The gift will help support need-blind admission for students across the economic spectrum, the elite prep school said in a statement. Tang's donation will also be used to jump-start a fund-raising campaign.

By Globe Staff

The high school wrestler struck and killed on Tuesday in Bolton was hit by a car driven by a teammate, according a statement issued today by Worcester district attorney's office.

"This is a senseless tragedy," District Attorney Joseph D. Early Jr. said today in the statement. "This calls out for young people to be more careful in and out of moving vehicles. You can never underestimate the power of a moving vehicle."

Francis J. Demeo, a 19-year-old from Stow, was a senior at Nashoba Regional High School. He jogged to a teammate’s house Tuesday afternoon before a meet.

By John C. Drake, Globe Staff

The Boston Firefighters Union told city councilors today that its members' reputations have been unfairly tarnished by a series of reports about alleged wrongdoing in the fire department.

The meeting, attended by seven of the 13 council members, came as the union and city are in the midst of contentious contract negotiations. Aides to Mayor Thomas M. Menino criticized the gathering at City Hall, calling it a distraction from the key point of contention in negotiations, which is requiring random drug testing for firefighters.

Union President Ed Kelly said recent news reports suggesting broad substance abuse, cheating on civil service exams, and pension fraud among firefighters were "offensive and unwarranted." Union backers also criticized the city for not providing adequate hazardous materials equipment and training.

"In a post 9/11 world, the fire department is very resistant to change,” Kelly said.

By Globe Staff

Governor Deval Patrick came out today against a plan by the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe to place more than 500 acres of land in Middleborough into trust to build a resort casino. The administration said in a letter to the Bureau of Indian Affairs that it was concerned that the federal land trust would exempt the tribe from zoning and environmental regulations and other state laws.

While Patrick is supportive of tribal gaming, the administration said the application submitted by the Mashpee Wampanoag did not include enough safeguards to protect the state.

“Because the placement of lands in trust may exempt certain activities on those lands from state and local laws, there are significant jurisdictional concerns at the state level which, unless resolved, should preclude the BIA from recommending approval of the tribe’s proposed acquisition,” the letter states, according to a copy provided by the Patrick administration.

By Kate Augusto, Globe Correspondent

An 83-year-old woman was struck and killed by an Amtrak train this morning when she was crossing the tracks at an MBTA commuter rail station in West Medford.

The woman was identified as Lillian Silva of Methuen, according to the Associated Press.

It was not immediately clear why Silva was crossing the tracks at the north end of the platform shortly before 11:15 a.m. Investigators do not believe she was trying to commit suicide, said Joe Pesaturo, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.

"It appears she was attempting to cross the tracks at the time of the incident," Pesaturo said. "The train is stopped at the scene, and police are interviewing the train crew."

By Globe Staff

A sloppy winter storm is expected to coat much of Massachusetts in a sheet of ice tonight as plunging temperatures turn rain into sleet.

Patches of rain and drizzle are predicted to persist this afternoon as temperatures hover in the upper 30s. That should leave roads clear for the evening commute.

"When I drive home to Boston at 5:30 p.m., I expected clear sailing," said Walter Drag, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton. "Tomorrow will be the slow commute, especially from the north and west. People should prepare for frozen door locks and hazardous road conditions."

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

Two lawyers were disbarred today by the state’s highest court, which ruled that the attorneys violated ethical rules when they tried to find evidence of bias against a former Superior Court judge who was then presiding over the bitter and costly family fight for control of the billion-dollar Demoulas supermarket company.

In bluntly written rulings, Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice Margaret Marshall said the actions of former federal prosecutor Gary C. Crossen and Boston attorney Kevin P. Curry were unprecedented and were also clearly improper and unethical. The attorneys lured a law clerk of then Superior Court Judge Maria Lopez to Canada and New York with a false promise of a job.

They questioned the law clerk, Paul Walsh, repeatedly about Lopez’s actions during the lengthy and bitter feud, tape recorded some conversations, and Crossen insisted that Walsh sign critical statements about the judge or his actions would be disclosed to the Board of Bar Overseers, according to the SJC. Walsh went to the FBI, which chose not to prosecute, but which triggered the BBO investigation and today’s disbarment rulings.

By Frank Phillips and Matt Viser, Globe Staff

Mitt Romney held onto his Republican base to handily beat John McCain today, while Hillary Clinton withstood a string of high-profile endorsements for Barack Obama to glide to a surprisingly decisive victory, in the most competitive and meaningful Massachusetts presidential primary in memory.

Clinton surged to a lead with the earliest returns tonight, then never gave it up -- in sharp contrast to the public surveys which had shown Obama closing in over the final week.

Obama -- who had the support of Governor Deval Patrick and Senators Edward M. Kennedy and John F. Kerry -- carried the city of Boston by a small margin of under 10,000 votes, as Mayor Thomas M. Menino's political machine kept Clinton close. Obama also ran strong in the liberal, affluent suburbs.

Clinton ran up large margins in urban areas such as Quincy, Worcester, Fall River, and New Bedford.

"The people have spoken," Menino said last night, speaking from Boston City Hall. "The women, the students, the ones who work for living, want a candidate with knowledge and depth to deal with the issues that the working people face every day."

Romney, proving to some skeptics that he has strong support among local Republicans, far outpaced McCain, who had taunted the former Massachusetts governor by making an unusual foray into his home state just a day before the primary voting. Partial returns from around the state showed that Romney was holding a comfortable lead over the Arizona Senator.

Romney's victory is particularly significant for the one-term governor who had to inject resources to make sure he held his home state. Much of the Republican establishment, including two of three former GOP governors, had endorsed other candidates. But House Minority Leader Brad Jones of North Reading said the Republican establishment was out of touch with average GOP voters.

"It was a big win," Jones said. "There were some polls that thought it would be very close, and he put that myth to rest. People knew him, people appreciated him."

By Marc Robins, Globe Staff

A woman was seriously injured this afternoon when her car ran off the edge of Interstate 495 in in Andover and struck a tree.

The 1998 Ford Contour went off the left side of the road at about 4 p.m. The car traveled 130 feet into a wooded area, coming to rest after striking a tree and going up an embankment, state police said in a statement.

Three of the highway's northbound lanes were closed for an hour while the driver was freed using the Jaws of Life and the vehicle was removed, police said.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

The South Boston condominium fire that killed two people on New Year's Eve was caused by the "careless disposal of cigarettes," the Boston Fire Department said today.

The fire broke out at 309-311 Emerson Street at about 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 31. It displaced people from 18 units in the building and killed Peter and Arvette Clancy, who lived in the unit where the fire started. Fire investigators said the blaze started in the kitchen.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

The rest of the country might not understand the political color scheme here in Massachusetts: The ballots with red headers in today's presidential primaries were for Democrats, while the ballots with blue headers were for Republicans.

That meant former governor Mitt Romney, who derided Massachusetts to conservatives as "the bluest state in America,” had his name emblazoned on a blue Republican ballot. Likewise Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama had their names on a red ballot.

Most of America paints conservatives a fiery red and liberals a royal blue, a view rooted in the coloring of political maps on television news during presidential elections.

“The coloring of the ballots in Massachusetts far antedates red state and the blue state schemes,” said Brian McNiff, a spokesman for the secretary of state, who estimated that the tradition stretched at least 50 years. “We were printing them that way long before cable television.”

The origin of the red state, blue state political view is difficult to trace, but it took hold during the disputed election in 2000, said David Starkey, who edited a collection of 21 essays in 2007 titled “Living Blue in the Red States.” People spent so much time scrutinizing the red state, blue state maps that it began to view the county solely in those terms, he said.

“We are all much more purple than we want to acknowledge,” said Starkey, an English professor at Santa Barbara City College. “I think purple is good. The fact that Mitt was governor of a liberal state probably shows that he has a little more purple in him than he might want to admit.”

(John Tlumacki/Globe Staff)

Willie Andrews, shown above during the AFC Championship game against the San Diego Chargers, was arrested this morning in Lowell.

By Globe Staff

A New England Patriots defensive back and special teams player was arrested in Lowell this morning and charged with possession of marijuana and for driving an unregistered car, according to the office of Middlesex District Attorney Gerard T. Leone Jr.

Willie Andrews was stopped by Lowell police around 9:30 a.m. on Middlesex Street. Andrews was arraigned this afternoon in Lowell District Court and pleaded not guilty to drug possession. Prosecutors said he had $6,800 in cash, three bags of marijuana, and no means to smoke the drugs.

Andrews is 24 years old and has been on the team for the last two seasons, having arrived from Baylor University after being chosen in the seventh round of the 2006 draft, according to the team's website.

The investigation into Andrews was triggered by an anonymous call to Lowell Police at 9:30 a.m. today, reporting that there was a Ford Crown Victoria with tinted windows in the neighborhood that could be involved in drug activity, Lowell Police Deputy Superintendent Bob DeMoura said in a telephone interview.

By Eric Moskowitz, Globe Staff

Massachusetts voters picked Mitt Romney for governor in 2002. But will they stick with him today in the state's Republican presidential primary?

Some voters interviewed outside the polls said they were happy to vote again for Romney. But some former supporters said they were dissatisfied with his term as governor and were looking elsewhere.

"I think that he has a firm grasp on economic issues -- the economy and creating jobs," said Charles Johnston, a 47-year-old Republican voter who supported Romney for governor in 2002 and voted for him again.

But Johnston, an Ashland resident who works in the financial industry, was in the minority in an informal survey by the Globe of nearly 50 voters in three communities -- Ashland, Medway, and Westwood -- where Romney cleaned up in 2002, when voters in Boston's western suburbs and along Interstate 495 supported him in much greater numbers than they had shown for previous Republican candidates.

Of 21 who said they voted in the Republican primary today, 16 chose John McCain and five Romney. On the Democratic side, a handful of Democrats and unenrolled voters who picked Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama said they had voted for Romney in 2002.

(Yoon S. Byun/Globe Staff)

Helen Webster cast her ballot early this morning at the Yawkey Club in Roxbury.

By Andrew Ryan and Matt Viser, Globe Staff

The gray, gloomy rain that had soaked early primary voters stopped this afternoon when storm clouds moved south. The dry weather is predicted to last until after the polls close at 8 p.m., which may give turnout an extra bump in an election that is expected to draw 1.3 million voters across the state.

“There is a chance of light rain again tonight, but not until after the polls close,” said Bill Simpson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.
By noon in Boston, ballots had been cast by more than 44,000 people, which is almost 13 percent of the city’s 345,000 registered voters. Early turnout was especially heavy in Back Bay and Roxbury.

Secretary of State William F. Galvin predicted that more than a million voters, more than 30 percent of the state's 4 million voters, will show up at the polls, drawn largely by the excitement spilling out of this year's elections.

The turnout could meet or surpass that of the 1980 presidential primary, when nearly 44 percent of Massachusetts registered voters went to the polls, the highest primary turnout since records were first compiled in 1948. In the 1980 primary, George H. W. Bush ran against Ronald Reagan in the Republican primary, and Edward M. Kennedy challenged President Carter.

In 2000, the last time there were competitive primaries in both parties, Massachusetts voters cast almost 1.1 million ballots. About 700,000 voters turned out in 2004, when the primaries were held March 2 after many other states had already voted and when President Bush was uncontested for the Republican nomination.

By Globe Staff

A man who was going to vote at an elementary school in Randolph lost control of his sport utility vehicle this morning and hit a 8-year-old girl, according to police and the school principal.

The second-grader was pinned underneath the SUV, which had to be lifted off the child by police and staff at Lyons Elementary School, said Principal Leo Flanagan. The girl was rushed to Boston Medical Center, where she was admitted to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit with serious injuries.

“She’s a very feisty, great little girl,” Flanagan said. “I can’t bear to imagine everything not being fine.”

An initial investigation by police found that 86-year-old William Geisler was trying to park his 2001 Ford Escape outside the school at 8:40 a.m. Geisler apparently lost control of the vehicle and veered across the grass and onto the sidewalk, police said.

By Globe Staff

The commanding officer of a Coast Guard cutter based in Newport, R.I., has been suspended after allegations he had an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate.

Commander Jeffery Dow was temporarily relieved from his command of the Coast Guard cutter Willow on Friday.

"We take these types of allegations very seriously, and we will investigate this case fully," said Rear Admiral Timothy Sullivan in a statement.

The Coast Guard did not describe the nature of the alleged inappropriate relationship or release the name of the subordinate.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

Two people suffered life-threatening injuries when they were attacked by a machete-wielding man in Springfield last night, police said.

A Springfield man, Allan Manning, 26, was arrested in the attacks after a foot chase. He faces charges that include assault with intent to commit murder and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, said Springfield Police Captain Peter Dillon.

By Michael Naughton, Globe Correspondent

A Merrimack, N.H. man who allegedly used an infant to help him steal donation jars from Dunkin' Donuts store counters was arrested today.

Mark Palmer, 28, was arrested in Salem, N.H. for stealing a total of about $40 recently in three American Red Cross donation jars from Dunkin' Donuts shops in Merrimack, police said.

On Saturday, in two of the thefts, Palmer and a female accomplice allegedly used an infant to try to shield their hand movements from surveillance cameras.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

House fires in Milton and Mattapoisett killed two people Sunday.

Milton firefighters responded to a two-alarm blaze on Mathaurs Street at around 7:30 p.m, Milton Deputy Fire Chief Kevin Mahony said.

Mahony said the first and second floors were on fire and the flames had blown out the windows of the home when they arrived.

The home was very cluttered, making it difficult to enter the building, so the fire was fought from outside, Mahony said today. After the fire was brought under control, the victim was found in a second-floor bathroom near a window.

In Mattapoisett, firefighters responded to a three-alarm blaze on Briar Road at about 12:45 p.m., Fire Chief Ronald Scott said.

The victim was the only person who lived in the home, Scott said. One firefighter was taken to the hospital with injuries, but was later released.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A Brockton man was convicted today of the 2006 murder of a Roslindale man, and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, Suffolk County prosecutors said.

Hassaun Harris, 33, was found guilty of stabbing Jeff Igbineweka, 28, of Roslindale to death at a Cleary Square restaurant in October 2006.

Prosecutors said Harris was angry because Igbineweka was dating his ex-girlfriend.

By Andrew Ryan and Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff

Election officials in Massachusetts are bracing for heavy turnout in tomorrow’s Democrat and Republican primaries as two tight political races are expected to bring more than a million people to the polls.

"We're projecting -- it's a guess, really -- something in excess of 1.3 million, all told," Secretary of State William F. Galvin said today.

Just under 700,000 people voted in the last presidential primaries in 2004, which was about 15 percent of the state’s 4 million registered voters. That year, however, the primaries were held March 2 after many other states had already voted and the GOP nomination was won uncontested by George W. Bush.

If 1.3 million people go to the polls tomorrow, that would push turnout past 32 percent, which would be nearly double the number of people that participated in 2004. The total number of eligible voters in Massachusetts is about 4 million, but Galvin said that number includes inactive voters, such as those who have died or moved away but whose names have not yet been removed from the list.

Springfield was preparing for a crush of voters that was expected to push turnout near 25 percent, which would be near triple the number of people who participated in the last presidential primaries.

"The way things have been going -- and especially today -- it’s absolutely insane," said Kathleen Hoar Fleury, the city election commissioner. "The phones have not stopped. There's a line of people dropping off absentee ballots. It’s like Election Day today."

By Matt Collette, Globe Correspondent

They say a dog is man's best friend. But yesterday, firefighter David Ferola proved to be two Labrador retrievers’ best friends when he rescued the hounds from an icy pond on Cape Cod.

The dogs had chased birds onto a small lake behind Pond Meadow Drive in Marstons Mills at 4 p.m. when the ice began to crack. The Labradors -- one black, one yellow -- got stranded after running onto a small island in the middle of the pond, Ferola said today in a telephone interview.

Residents heard frantic barks and called the fire department, which is a regional team from Centerville, Osterville, and Marstons Mills. Ferola and other rescuers donned survival suits and used sleds connected to a series of ropes and pulleys to work their way across the ice.

By Globe Staff

A new poll out this afternoon shows that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are statistically tied among likely Democratic voters heading into Tuesday's primary in Massachusetts.

On the Republican side, former Bay State governor holds a sizable lead over John McCain, according to the 7News/Suffolk University survey. However, 27 percent of Democratic voters and 24 percent of Republican voters say they may change their minds before Tuesday.

Obama has 46 percent to Clinton's 44 percent, while 7 percent of Democratic and independent voters likely to vote in the Democratic primary were undecided.

The endorsement last week by Senator Edward M. Kennedy for Obama is a key factor. Asked to size up the impact of three endorsements for Obama and Clinton, 43 percent of Democratic respondents cited Kennedy's endorsement as the most influential, followed by Bill Clinton's of his wife (23 percent) and Oprah Winfrey's of Obama (9 percent).

"The Bay State's senior senator Ted Kennedy clearly has more clout in Massachusetts than the popular former president, Bill Clinton," said David Paleologos, director of the Political Research Center at Suffolk University. "Add to that the backing of Senator Kerry and Governor Patrick, with the resonant message of change as well as the Kennedy call for 'a new generation of leadership' and you have the reason why what was once Clinton country has become an Obama opportunity – and a political choice between the nostalgic and the new."

By Globe Staff

A light but steady drizzle is expected to make for a soggy Super Tuesday in Massachusetts as voters head to the polls in one of the most significant presidential primaries in state history.

Temperatures are forecast to climb into the mid-40s with a gentle onshore breeze blowing at 10 to 15 miles per hour. The rain is expected to taper off in the late afternoon, according to Bill Simpson, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.

"It appears now mostly cloudy and a rainy day all day," Simpson said.

A dreary day is predicted for much of the Northeast, where primaries will also be held in Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Delaware.

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff

A 35-year-old father of four was being mourned today after he was fatally shot on a Dorchester street Sunday night en route to his job as a security supervisor in downtown Boston.

Boston police said the victim, Donald George Smith Jr., was not the intended target.

"At this time, detectives do not believe that he was the intended target,'' said Elaine Driscoll, police spokeswoman.”They believe he was struck by a bullet meant for someone else.’’

Shortly after the Super Bowl ended, Smith left his girlfriend’s apartment on Washington Street and was walking on Park Street when he was struck by gunfire, police and relatives said. Smith was shot about 10:40 p.m. on Park Street near its intersection with Greenbrier Street, police said. He was rushed to Boston Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

By Caitlin Castello, Globe Correspondent

A woman who was driving down a Rehoboth road found an unfamiliar passenger in her back seat after an accident Tuesday night -- a cow.

Tanya Coccia, 46, of Seekonk was driving on Providence Street when she hit two cows. After rolling over the hood and roof of the car, one of the cows fell through the back windshield into her back seat.

"It is shocking and really weird," said Coccia, who was returning home with her daughter, Haley, 14, after running errands at about 10 p.m.. "Who would have ever thought I'd end up with a cow in the back seat of my car?"

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

Two people were killed in a small plane crash in Maine this evening, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Cessna 525, a twin engine turbo-fan aircraft, crashed with two passengers aboard in a rural area of West Gardiner just after taking off from the Augusta State Airport at around 5:40 p.m., according to FAA spokesman Jim Peters.

The victims were being identified by local authorities last night, Peters said, but the aircraft was registered to Jeanette Symons of San Francisco.

The plane, bound for Lincoln, Neb., was in contact with a controller at the Portland, Maine, jetport when the pilot declared an emergency about 5 minutes after taking off, at an altitude of 3,000 feet, ascending to 10,000 feet. The controller asked if the pilot needed help returning to Augusta, but the plane then began a rapid descent and radar contact and radio communications were lost, Peters said.

(John F. Kennedy Presidential Library)

By Globe Staff

The autographed pair of red boxing gloves is inscribed with a note for Senator Edward M. Kennedy that could have only been written by Muhammad Ali: “I hope this glove helps you knock out injustice.”

The football, given as a gift to President John F. Kennedy, includes the signature of Coach Belichick -- Steve Belichick -- the father of the Patriots’ guru who was an assistant coach at Navy in 1962.

And the golf clubs belonged to President Kennedy himself and were used to play courses in Palm Beach, Fla., and Hyannis.

The mementos are part of an exhibit at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library called “Shaping Up America: JFK, Sports and the Call to Physical Fitness.” While most items have been on display since September, the library unveiled the boxing gloves for the first time today to honor Black History Month.

By Donovan Slack, Globe Staff

Mayor Thomas M. Menino issued warnings to Super Bowl celebrants today to keep the partying safe on Sunday.

The mayor and his staff have been coordinating with local colleges and universities as well as bar owners to ensure fans are kept under control when the New England Patriots face off against the New York Giants for the championship.

"Public drinking will not be tolerated," Menino said in a press conference this morning. "Neither will destructive and dangerous behavior."

Boston police Commissioner Edward Davis said there would be significant police presence around Kenmore Square near Fenway Park during the game. Streets around the area will be closed at the beginning of the fourth quarter to prevent fans from gathering in the square and causing havoc. Parking restrictions around the square will be in effect beginning at 9 a.m. Sunday.

By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff

MBTA riders trying to add value to their Charlie Cards with credit or debit cards this morning faced problems for nearly two hours, T officials said.

Between 7:40 and 9:24 a.m., the machines "started experiencing intermittent disruptions of service" that typically lasted between five and seven minutes, spokesman Joe Pesaturo said. T officials were meeting at noon today to discuss what went wrong and why and how to keep it from happening again.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

The federal government recently gave Fred Feldman $50,000 to take a year off work and search for the meaning of happiness.

No, he did not buy a one-way ticket to Las Vegas, rent a thatch-roofed cottage on some remote Caribbean island, or use the cash to buy two tickets to Super Bowl XLII in Arizona.

Feldman is a philosophy professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and the $50,400 came as part of a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

"It's not $50,000 to make me search for happiness," Feldman said this week by phone from his home in Leyden in Western Massachusetts. "It's to explain what it is, not get of much of it as I can in the next 12 months."

By Globe Staff

Good news: A storm is expected to drench metropolitan Boston with up 1 1/2 inches of rain. The sleet, ice, and snow will stay far west of the city, hitting Worcester County and cities and towns in southwestern New Hampshire.

“We’re going to get a good slug of rain,” said Charlie Foley, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Taunton.

Showers are expected to begin by 11 a.m. and will get heavy in the afternoon. West of Interstate 495, the rain is predicted to mix with sleet and snow in Fitchburg, Leominster, and Worcester.

By Andrew Ryan, Globe Staff

More than 28,000 dentists have descended on South Boston this morning for a conference, triggering traffic jams that have clogged local roads and backed up the Massachusetts Turnpike, and the Southeast Expressway.

The Yankee Dental Congress has drawn dentists, hygienists, and office assistants from across the country to the Boston Convention and Exhibition and Center.

“Congress Street is backing up onto the Pike,” said Trooper Eric Benson of the State Police. “Apparently all the dentists converged on the convention center at once.”

State troopers have responded to the scene and are directing traffic.

The conference, which is in its 33 year, is not just seminars about cavities, gingivitis, and fluoride. On Thursday former Red Sox slugger Jim Rice posed for pictures. Tonight’s entertainment: Grammy winner Sheryl Crow. Saturday there is a celebrity lunch with Geena Davis.

By Globe Staff

A 25-year-old man who was not wearing a seat belt was killed overnight in a car crash in the Sumner Tunnel, State Police said.

Brian P. Bartlett was driving a 1998 Mercedes sedan at a high rate of speed when he hit a wall in the tunnel just before midnight, according to a State Police press release. Bartlett, of Hanover, was ejected from the car and pronounced dead at the scene.

Three passengers in the car suffered minor injuries. They were identified as Matthew Shea and Douglas Newcomb, both 25-year-old Randolph residents; and Christopher Ray, 27, of Concord.

The crash remains under investigation by the State Police Collision Analysis and Reconstruction Section and the State Police Crime Scene Services Section.

By Sarah Gantz, Globe Correspondent

A wintry mix of snow, sleet, and rain will sweep through the Boston area today, but it will arrive just as the morning commute is finishing, a National Weather Service meteorologist said.

The storm is expected to begin at about 9 a.m. Winds will reach 13 to 22 miles per hour. But with a high for the day of 37, little or no snow accumulation is expected, said Rebecca Gould of the National Weather Service.

After 2 p.m. the storm is expected to turn into rain, she said.

By Jillian Jorgensen, Globe Correspondent

A man with a gun entered a Lawrence restaurant last night and shot another man multiple times, killing him, police said early today.

The slaying was reported at about 9:30 p.m. at the La Bahia restaurant on Newbury Street, said Lawrence Police Chief John Romero.

The victim, a man in his late twenties, was rushed to Lawrence General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival, Romero said. Police did not identify the victim, pending notification of his relatives.