Monthly Archives: June 2010

Amy Bishop Indicted For Murder In ’86 Shooting

Published June 16, 2010

This is big:

A Norfolk County grand jury has indicted Amy Bishop on a single count of first-degree murder after it found sufficient evidence she killed her 18-year-old brother, Seth, in Braintree in 1986.

Remember? Amy Bishop was the University of Alabama teacher who went on a shooting rampage after being denied tenure. That’s when the details of her bizarre past began to emerge.

WBUR has covered this story extensively. Can’t-miss stories from our archive, in order of can’t-miss-ness:

WBUR Wins Knight Grant For Courts Coverage

Published June 16, 2010

WBUR has won a $250,000 Knight Foundation grant for “Order in the Court 2.0,” a project that aims to bring transparency to the judicial branch through new media.

My boss, John Davidow, the executive editor of wbur.org, wants to turn a local courtroom into a digital laboratory, with the goal of modernizing the standards for electronic newsgathering in courts.

The Nieman Journalism Lab wrote up the idea:

Davidow said the court system has, by and large, continued to operate under the same video and audio recording standards it adopted in the 1970s and 1980s.

“The courts have sort of gone further and further (away) from the public and public access. In the old days, they were built in the center of town,” he told me. “The community was able to walk into the courts and see what was going on. Modern life has done away with that. The bridge that was going in between the courts and the public was the media. The media has just less resources.”

[…]

The test kitchen is the Quincy District Court here in Massachusetts, a courthouse Davidow described as ideal: Its chief judge is open to the idea, and the courthouse has a tradition of dabbling in new technologies. It’s also one of the busiest courthouses in the state, so it should also serve as a good model for even large courthouses.

Knight awarded the prize today at MIT as part of its News Challenge, which is an incubator for new ideas in journalism.

Brewing By Hand Brings Them True Hoppiness

Published June 16, 2010

The New York Times reported last week that Boston Beer Company — which “helped create the red-hot small-beer movement when it introduced Sam Adams 26 years ago” — is in danger of losing its “craft” beer status. The company is getting too big.

“If we’re not a craft brewer,” said Jim Koch, president of Boston Beer, to the Times, “what else are we? We’re certainly not Budweiser.” (Don’t miss WBUR’s interview with Koch back in April.)

Sen. John Kerry has introduced a bill that would increase the production limit of small breweries from two to six million barrels a year.

Last night, I met a Cambridge couple that is definitely not in danger of losing their craft beer status — but they are growing fast. Dann Paquette and his wife, Martha Holley-Paquette, hand-brew Pretty Things beer. And they’re one of the few brewers left inside of 128, they say. (Pretty Things can’t officially be called a “brewery,” since federal law forbids that label unless they own the equipment.)

Pull up a chair. Dann Paquette and Martha Holley-Paquette brew Pretty Things artisan beer in Cambridge. (Andrew Phelps/WBUR)

Pull up a chair. Dann Paquette and Martha Holley-Paquette brew Pretty Things artisan beer in Cambridge. (Andrew Phelps/WBUR)

My foodie friends rave about the stuff, and I came away impressed after a tasting at Deep Ellum in Allston. I sampled the flagship Jack D’or, whose mascot is a dancing, mustachioed barley corn; the complex Baby Tree, which is made with dried plums; and the rustic Field Mouse’s Farewell, the late spring seasonal.

Paquette has been brewing beer for about 18 years (after a stint as producer for “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous”). The couple launched Pretty Things almost three years ago on $10,000 in capital. In the first year, Paquette says, they sold $180,000. Their brews are served at a number of high-quality establishments in Boston, and they’ve just hired the first employee, a sales rep, to branch out in New York and Philadelphia.

And it’s clearly a craft. Paquette tends to every ingredient and detail, even using a microscope to inspect for bacteria in the final product. The two designed the fantastical labels themselves, and each bottle is inscribed with poetry about that brew.

I interview them for a future radio story on Radio Boston. Look for a post on Public Radio Kitchen later this week.

Reporters Barred From Garden Bars

Published June 16, 2010

I’m trying to get to the bottom of some confusion last night involving bars blocking access to reporters.

Our Sonari Glinton was turned away repeatedly from bars and pubs near TD Garden while trying to cover Game 6 for WBUR. Managers of two establishments told us the city had banned reporters from entering during the NBA Finals, and that they were just following orders. Sonari had to resort to hiding his mike to gather sound and do his job.

Thing is, I was in the same area and had no trouble. When I heard about the confusion, I asked a couple of cops on the street. They told me, in fact, no one was allowed to enter that Canal Street cluster after the third quarter as a safety measure — reporters were not being singled out, an officer told me. But Sonari got to the area at 7, well before the game began.

Margaret Evans, our senior editor, contacted one of the bars giving us trouble, a bar near Fenway, Cask’n Flagon, and received this e-mail response from Dana Van Fleet:

Superintendent William Evans from BPD has ordered that no bars or restaurants allow ANY media in any establishment for any playoff game.
Sorry!

It is within a bar’s rights to keep out whomever they want. But as far as I know, the Boston Police Department can’t order a bar to keep out certain people.

Margaret then contacted Boston Police spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll for clarification. Driscoll explained it was not the Police Department but the city’s licensing board that imposed the restrictions. She provided copy of a letter sent — restrictions that should not have barred Sonari from entering a bar.

Here is the relevant text from a letter sent to licensees on June 8:

Establishments may not use their premises as a location for remote broadcasting by the media. For example, licensees may not allow a television station to set up camera to broadcast (or tape for later broadcast) activities in or around the premises. This is a safety and order measure aimed at promoting crowd control at licensed establishments.

My guess is that this rule is meant to avoid those big, boisterous crowds that gather to be on TV. The police are rightly cautious. People have died celebrating Boston sports victories in recent years, including an 18-year-old Emerson student in 2004, when the Red Sox won the pennant. She was struck in the eye by a police projectile. And a 22-year-old Celtics fan died in 2008 while in police custody. He was said to have had heart problems. The U.S. attorney said in that case the police acted reasonably.

Of course, Sonari had no camera, and he was not broadcasting live. Driscoll forwarded us to the city’s licensing board, and we’re still awaiting a response.

What You Need To Know For Game 6

Published June 15, 2010

Game time is 9 o’clock. If the Celtics win tonight, we win it all.

Want to meet the Bub? I’ll be starting my evening at The Four’s, a classy joint in that cluster of bars near the TD Garden. (Actually, I’m starting my evening at a different bar for a different story — beer tasting at Deep Ellum in Allston. I know, my life is hard.)

Be warned of traffic delays, especially around the Garden and Fenway Park. Many streets in those areas will be closed during the fourth quarter to prevent vandalism.

And be safe out there. In the past six years, three people have died celebrating major Boston sports victories. Boston police say they’re ready. And the Staties are sending in more than 100 troopers to beef up patrols.

There's An App For Rescuing Oil-Soaked Birds

Published June 15, 2010

The effort to find and rescue oil-soaked birds is too enormous for overtaxed and undertrained crews in the Gulf of Mexico.

MoGO (Mobile Gulf Observatory) is a new iPhone app created by UMass Amherst wildlife biolgists.

MoGO (Mobile Gulf Observatory) is a new iPhone app created by UMass Amherst wildlife biolgists.

That’s why wildlife biologists at UMass Amherst are tapping the power of the crowd. A new iPhone app aims to create an army of “citizen scientists” by allowing people to snap and submit photos of animals in distress.

It’s called MoGO, for Mobile Gulf Observatory, and I just grabbed the free download (iTunes link). It’s dead simple: Select the animal (birds, sea turtles, marine mammals, fishes, seashore creatures) or the blight (tarballs, oil slicks, oiled habitats). Then take a photo. Then choose one: Alive, Injured, Dead. The photo is geotagged and submitted to the Wildlife Hotline, as well as a database the researchers are using to track the disaster.

The idea came to Charlie Schweik, the press release says, “as he listened to yet another depressing story about the Gulf oil spill.” Schweik, associate director of the National Center for Digital Government, turned to his colleagues at UMass to reach out to the fisheries and wildlife community.

UMass Amherst wildlife biologist Curt Griffin is our guest today on Radio Boston.

Meanwhile, the folks at eBird.org are mapping observations of endangered animals with the Gulf Coast Oil Spill Bird Tracker.

Mary Jo Did Haunt Him

Published June 15, 2010

Newly released FBI files show the frequency and range of death threats against Sen. Edward M. Kennedy over four decades. This person fixated on the death of Mary Jo Kopechne on Chappaquiddick island.

Newly released FBI files show the frequency and range of death threats against Sen. Edward M. Kennedy over four decades. This person fixated on the death of Mary Jo Kopechne on Chappaquiddick island.

“Mary Jo will haunt you to death.” It was scrawled over and over again on anonymous death threats for years after that fateful night.

Mary Jo did haunt him. In his 2009 memoir, Sen. Kennedy wrote that he “made terrible decisions” on Chappaquiddick. Decisions that haunted him for four decades, he said. You almost wonder if the sender doubted that.

It must have been a little less worrisome that the sender seemed crazy. Law enforcement eventually gave up searching. But the Mary Jo obsessor was only one of many people who wanted the senator dead, the documents show. The possible threats were endless, and they came from everywhere. The man who killed Bobby. The Ku Klux Klan. Even the Mafia, maybe, although those reports seem to have been a hoax.

Listen: Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin

Doris Kearns Goodwin, the famed historian and longtime Kennedy friend, told WBUR today she was surprised by the range of threats the senator faced.

“I remember, in 1980, when we were talking with him about the question of whether he would run for the presidency, and he noted to us that his children were concerned about whether or not there would be an attack on him as there had been on his brothers.

“But he just said, at a certain point you have to decide, almost by a matter of will, that you will not allow yourself to be afraid. And he talked about the fact that life would be diminished if you allowed yourself to live that way.”

Imagine, watching the assassination of your two brothers and then being the subject of a letter like this:

Continue reading →

What About 1987-2009?

Published June 14, 2010

The FBI’s Kennedy files, released today, stop at 1986. The senator died in 2009. Where are the rest of the files?

Update: Wait, there is a 151-page document (out of order) covering the years 2/1971 to 5/1991. (PDF on FBI.gov)

The Globe says there are no documents beyond 1985, but that appears to be wrong.

The Kennedy Files: Chappaquiddick

Published June 14, 2010

Unfortunately for conspiracy theorists and Chappaquiddick obsessors, newly released FBI files don’t shed much light on that famous car crash of 1969. The documents serve as a fascinating time capsule, though.

The FBI says upfront that it had no investigative role in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne:

Limited public source information was collected by the FBI regarding Senator Kennedy’s vehicular accident at Chappaquiddick Island that resulted in the death of Mary Joe Kopechne. The FBI had no investigative role in this case, since there were no violations of federal criminal law involved. Although there was a mistaken contemporary report about FBI involvement in the case, the Bureau was not asked to provide support to the local police investigation.

But there are a few nuggets, such as this confidential teletype and memorandum delivered to the Bureau after the crash. You’ll see that Kennedy’s involvement was meant to be kept secret but that WBZ broke the story shortly thereafter:

The 77-page file on Chappaquiddick (view on Scribd) is mostly a collection of newspaper clippings. Consider this sample of headlines, in chronological order:

  • Is Kennedy Set To Quit The Senate?
  • Judge Kirk Bows Out Of Ted Inquest (as in Paul G. Kirk, who would one day succeed Kennedy in the Senate)
  • Dinis Under Guard After Death Threat (Dinis was the DA)
  • No Crime — No Autopsy, Argue Kopechne Aides
  • Ted Ruled at ‘Fault,’ Registry Ends Probe
  • Vast Majority of Letters Say Ted Should Resign Senate Seat

The calls for Kennedy’s resignation seemed overwhelming, if you believed the opinion pages of the time. But a poll published in the evening edition of the Globe, dated July 29, 1969, showed a staggering 78 percent of respondents wanted Kennedy to remain in office; six percent thought he should resign. Moreover, Kennedy’s approval ratings remained in the 80s (and in the 70s among Republicans).  You don’t find support like that anywhere else in politics.

FBI Releases Ted Kennedy Files

Published June 14, 2010

The FBI has released thousands of its files on the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. I’ll be combing through them today for any juicy bits. Watch this space.

This release consists of material from seven FBI files—three Headquarters files and four field division files, totaling more then 2,200 pages. It covers the FBI’s relationship with Senator Kennedy from 1961 to 1985. At no point do these files suggest that the FBI investigated Senator Kennedy for a criminal violation or as a security threat. The bulk of this material concerns FBI investigation of threats of violence and other extortion claims against Senator Kennedy and other public officials.

FBI: The Kennedy Files