Repeat drunk driver gets prison term

A Hull man was sentenced yesterday to four years and a day in state prison after he was convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol for the fifth time, said David Traub, spokesman for the Norfolk district attorney. Joseph Buckley, 48, crashed a stolen truck in Quincy in November outside his former home on Warfield Avenue. Five years is the maximum for a fifth offense.

Six Massachusetts charter schools were among 21 nationwide singled out for recognition yesterday by a national nonprofit that analyzes charter school achievement. The Effective Practice Incentive Community, or EPIC, grant program honored Community Day Charter Public School in Lawrence, Boston Preparatory Charter Public School in Hyde Park, Roxbury Preparatory Charter School in Roxbury, Boston Collegiate Charter School in Dorchester, MATCH Charter Public School in Boston, and Prospect Hill Academy Upper School in Cambridge. The organization will give individual principals, teachers, and instructional staff from the schools awards totaling an estimated $735,000. EPIC considered 144 schools for the award.

A Massachusetts man has been charged in a federal indictment with stealing $20 million from trusts his company managed and using the money on personal extravagances, including three airplanes. John Doorly was accused Wednesday of hiding the theft by manipulating an internal trust accounting system and sending false statements to trust beneficiaries. Doorly, 60, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. Doorly's lawyer, John Andrews, said yesterday that his client will plead not guilty. According to the indictment, Doorly managed trusts for more than 100 descendants of the late industrialist Frederick Ayer while working at Tenens Corp. in Beverly. (AP)

The state Senate voted 33 to 5 yesterday to approve legislation reinstating the state's credit backing behind risky interest-rate swap agreements the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority had used to help finance the Big Dig. The state backing is intended to prevent taxpayers and tollpayers from getting stuck with a $363 million termination payment from the investment firm UBS, but it does not guarantee that outcome. The final version of the legislation authorizes Treasurer Timothy P. Cahill to join Patrick administration officials as they attempt to negotiate with UBS to avoid the balloon payment, which UBS could demand if Standard & Poor's downgrades the credit rating of turnpike insurer Ambac Assurance Corp. (State House News Service)

A little bundle of joy decided not to wait until her mother could reach the hospital yesterday. At around 8 a.m., Boston EMS received a call from a 29-year-old woman in Hyde Park who was going into labor. EMTs Kenneth Edwards and James Testa responded and headed to Boston Medical Center with the woman. But her contractions were about a minute apart, and it became clear that they were not going to make it to the hospital. "We were about a mile from her house in Roslindale Square when Testa yelled back that the baby was crowning." Edwards immediately pulled the ambulance over and rushed to the rear of the vehicle. The baby was born without complications at 8:45. Mother and daughter were in good condition at Boston Medical Center yesterday.

Opening statements were given yesterday at Suffolk Superior Court in the second retrial of two men accused of killing a woman and wounding her boyfriend during a 2004 robbery and home invasion. Quincy Butler, 34, of Dorchester and William Wood, 34, of Roxbury are charged with first-degree murder in the killing of Betsy Tripp, 49, and with the attempted murder of Morris Thompson, 47. The two are also charged with robbery and home invasion in the reported attack on Feb. 12 and 13, 2004, according to the Suffolk district attorney's office. The pair's first trial, in April 2008, ended in a mistrial, and a retrial two months later was halted when the judge became ill.