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‘Absolutely a quick study’: Ukrainians master Patriot system faster than expected

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

FORT SILL, Okla. — A Ukrainian soldier runs across the field, shielding his face from the Oklahoma wind with one hand and dragging a long, fiber-optic cable with the other. He hooks the cable into another cord, linking the control station with the five Patriot launchers that fan out 90 meters apart across the grass, all pointed due north.The soldier is one of 65 Ukrainians, mostly men but a few women as well, who are wrapping up training here to operate the Patriot missile defense system, considered one of the most advanced in the world at shooting down threats such as missiles and aircraft.When the Pentagon announced in January that the Ukrainians would begin their training in Fort Sill, officials cautioned that the instruction could take months — even up to a year. But U.S. military officials here said the Ukrainians, who were already experienced air defenders when they arrived in January and were handpicked by Kyiv to complete the instruction, mastered the American syst...

Artist, brain injury survivor hosts art show at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

One woman using art to help with her healing recently hosted an art show at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, showcasing work that has helped her recover from a traumatic brain injury. March is Brain Injury Awareness Month. At Spaulding in Charlestown, Ali Rheaume helped mark the occasion Tuesday evening. Rheaume is an award winning artist from Franklin and a brain injury survivor. She entered Spaulding in 2017 with only 10% brain function after an injury in 2016. “I needed to learn how to walk, talk, eat, bathe — everything again,” Rheaume said of her recovery. Dr. Chris Carter, a neuro-psychiatrist, was part of Rheaume’s care team. “She was in a minimally responsive state at that point,” Carter said. “The interface at that stage is to try to understand how much she’s understanding [and] how she’s interacting with the environment.” From Spaulding, Rheaume went into speech therapy, occupational therapy and speech language pathology. As...

Crime briefs: Romance in the times of international scams

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

A man the feds say scammed people out of millions of dollars by running romance scams with co-conspirators has been sentenced to four and a half years in federal prison.U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani on Tuesday sentenced Kofi Osei, 30, to 54 months in prison to be followed by two years of supervised release. Talwani also ordered Osei to pay more than $4 million in forfeiture and restitution.In a four-year scam, from 2016 to 2020, Osei opened at least 77 bank accounts using stolen identities to process the more than $8 million in fraud money he milked out of people after he and his co-conspirators began fake relationships with them through online dating profiles. More than $4 million of the profits went directly into Osei’s accounts.In the end, you smuggle yourselfA member of the Gangster Disciples street gang the feds say pushed fentanyl, cocaine, meth and suboxone throughout the greater Lawrence area, including in Haverhill and Methuen, was sentenced in federal court in B...

Marv Albert remembers Willis Reed as ‘heart and soul’ of the Knicks: ‘He was literally The Captain’

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

“Here comes Willis Reed.”Marv Albert now says it was a throwaway line before Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals, but it became a signature sound byte of his Hall of Fame career — and the signature moment of the New York Knicks.Albert made the call on the radio knowing prior Reed’s intention of playing that night. The Madison Square Garden crowd, however, was in the dark until The Captain ran through the tunnel.“What I recall was the decibel level of the roar from the crowd in the building,” Albert said. “It was an explosion.”The Knicks famously beat the Lakers that night for their first championship, at least partly due to Reed’s presence intimidating the opposition into jitters. Almost 53 years later, Reed died Tuesday at 80 and Albert, upon hearing the news, immediately thought of the fitting nickname.“He was literally The Captain,” Albert said. “That’s my first thought. He’s the heart and soul of the t...

Whistleblower fired by Deval Patrick denied punitive damages, court rules

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

A whistleblower fired by former Gov. Deval Patrick in 2014 for interfering with a state decision that allowed Patrick’s brother-in-law to stay off the sex offender registry is not entitled to punitive damages, a Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday.Essex Superior Court Judge James Lang wrote that while Patrick’s decision to fire Saundra Edwards, former chair of the Massachusetts Sex Offender Registry Board, “constituted an unlawful act of retaliation,” it was not done “out of an evil motive or any intent to harm the plaintiff’s career.“The court concludes that the evidence does not support a finding that Governor Patrick’s actionable conduct was undertaken in reckless indifference to the plaintiff’s rights,” Lang wrote.Upon becoming SORB chair, Edwards allegedly sought to change a 2007 decision from hearing officer A.J. Paglia, who ruled that Bernard Sigh’s 1993 spousal rape conviction in California — involving Patrick’s brother-in-law and sister — was “more akin” to indecent assault ...

Boston invites more early education providers to join expansion of universal pre-K

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

The city is expanding pre-K access a step further for the 2023-24 school year, the city announced Tuesday, opening up funding for more early education providers and taking another step in the Universal Pre-K plan.“We’re determined to make Boston the first choice for families, and that includes closing gaps in access and availability of early education options,” said Mayor Michelle Wu.The city’s Universal Pre-Kindergarten (UPK) model aims to offer kids ages three and four free early education for 6.5 hour school days 180 days a year, according to the city. Tuesday’s announcement follows a $20 million investment in the program last July.The city is looking to expand the program by inviting in new community-based childcare providers to participate in the UPK model.Providers — including “nonprofit and for-profit organizations, early education providers, private schools, religious schools” — may apply through the city’s portal to receive ci...

Boston councilors seek ‘scofflaw’ landlord list

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

Some city councilors are looking at creating a “scofflaw property owner list” in an effort to rein in any misbehaving landlords.The proposal from City Councilors Liz Breadon and Ruthzee Louijeune would target “rental property owners who continually fail to comply with the City’s rental unit regulations and provide tenants with safe and adequate housing,” according to the filing that’s set to be introduced at Wednesday’s council meeting.The idea is to disincentivize bad behavior by publishing an annual “scofflaw” list and also by preventing anyone on it from doing business with the city until they get their act together.“For too long, negligent landlords and owners who refuse to clean up their properties have been getting nothing more than a slap on the wrist,” City Councilor Ruthzee Louijeune said in a statement. “This ordinance will give our neighborhoods stronger protections and enforcement mechanisms against these ...

Former Patriots LB Dont’a Hightower announces retirement

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

Former Patriots linebacker Dont’a Hightower didn’t play last season, and he won’t be playing any NFL football moving forward.On Tuesday, Hightower officially announced his retirement after playing nine seasons in New England. The 33-year-old shared his news in an article he published on The Players’ Tribune.“They say time flies in this league. Boy, they’re not lying. Today, I am officially retiring from the NFL,” Hightower wrote in the article. “I know these announcements always feel bittersweet, but I can’t think of a better story than the one I wrote in New England. A decade, three Super Bowls, two Pro Bowls, and the birth of my son — all playing for one franchise. How many guys have a story like that?”Hightower played in 117 regular-season games with the Patriots, who selected him in the first round of the 2012 draft. He quickly proved to be an impact player in the middle of Bill Belichick’s defense with 13 starts as a rookie and a Super ...

Macron welcomes back to France journalist freed in Mali

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

PARIS (AP) — A French journalist who was held hostage by Islamic extremists for nearly two years in Mali was welcomed home by French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday, one day after his release.Olivier Dubois was kidnapped in April 2021 in northern Mali, a region wracked by jihadi violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group.Leaving the plane at the Villacoublay military airport, southwest of Paris, with a big smile on his face, Dubois was applauded by the group of people waiting for his arrival. He was greeted with great joy by his sister and father, and then he hugged Macron. Speaking to French media, Dubois said he listened to French radio to keep himself sane in captivity and read the Quran “to understand” his captors. Dubois told RFI radio Tuesday that although he was not “hit or humiliated,” it was a grueling experience.“You are chained, you are a prisoner, you are considered a disbeliever, an infidel,” he said. “It was living outside all the time — w...

Lawsuit seeks to block abortion pill ban in Wyoming

Published Fri, 27 Dec 2024 13:24:40 GMT

Abortion-rights supporters filed an amended lawsuit Tuesday seeking to block Wyoming’s new abortion pill ban from taking effect.A group hoping to open what would be the state’s second clinic offering abortions filed the amended lawsuit days after Republican Gov. Mark Gordon signed what is the nation’s first explicit ban on abortion pills. Absent court intervention, that ban would take effect July 1. Abortion-rights supporters already were seeking to block a separate sweeping abortion ban that took effect Sunday in Wyoming without the governor’s signature. That law seeks to overcome objections that prompted a judge to suspend a previous ban. Both of the new Wyoming abortion bans make exceptions to save a pregnant woman’s life and for cases of rape or incest that are reported to police.Until Gordon signed the ban on medication abortions, no state had passed a law specifically prohibiting such pills, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that s...