New England Sun-Times

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - The annual lighting of the Christmas tree in the Statehouse rotunda has been scheduled for next week. Gov. Gina Raimondo announced that the tree lighting ceremony will take place on Dec. 3. The 16-foot balsam tree was donated by a farm in Greene, Rhode Island. Raimondo is hosting the event with her husband, Andy Moffit. It features a visit from Santa and performances by two middle school choirs and the Rhode Island Army National Guard's "Governor's Own" 88th Army Band. Raimondo says this is the time of year to come together with loved ones. Unwrapped toys for Toys for Tots will be collected. The event begins at 5:30 p.m. The tree will be lit at 6:15 p.m. The public is invited to attend.

BOSTON (CBS/AP) – Philadelphia 76ers center Jahlil Okafor says he’s embarrassed about a Boston nightclub scuffle captured on video and is dealing with the team and league on possible discipline. The rookie taken with the third pick in the 2015 draft said after a shootaround Friday that the fight following a loss to the Celtics was “definitely dumb on my part.” Okafor says he reacted to heckling about the 0-16 Sixers, the only team in the NBA without a win. TMZ Sports claims the video shows Okafor and some friends getting into a confrontation with a small group of people outside  Storyville  on Exeter Street after the game. According to TMZ: We’re told the altercation began because one of the men in the other group yelled at Jahlil, “The 76ers suck.” We spoke with a rep for Jahlil who tells us … Okafor says he was being heckled from the moment he left the club and felt threatened because people swarmed him on the street. A young man said to be Okafor in the vi...

BOSTON (CBS) – Kristen Torres wants her son not to worry, but she can only worry about her oldest son. Charlie, 6, was pricked by a used needle on the grounds of his school. “He’s only 6 and he had to be tested for HIV, Hepatitis C,” said Torres. His kindergarten class at Ellis Elementary School in Roxbury was collecting leaves for a composting project on Monday. Charlie picked up a pile where there was a used needle. It drew blood and left him with two needle pricks on his palm. “We have to be careful. Our children need to be safe at home, as well as, at school. And, I don’t feel safe bringing my child to school anymore,” said Torres. Charlie, 6, was stuck by a needle at a Boston school (WBZ-TV) Torres said it wasn’t until she raised concern with an EMT that the needle was found later that night. She said the school needs to do a better job keeping the grounds safe and communicating with parents. According to Torres, the school did not send out a voicemail to students unt...

BOSTON (CBS) – An MBTA commuter rail conductor was killed and three other people were wounded in a shooting near a bar outside Fenway Park early Thursday morning. It started around 2 a.m. when officers patrolling on Van Ness Street heard gunshots just feet away on Yawkey Way near the bar ‘Who’s on First?’ “They’re brazen. They shot with my officers probably a half a block away,” Boston Police Commissioner Bill Evans said. “As they were responding they saw several hundred people fleeing the area,” Boston Police Superintendent-in-Chief Williams Gross told reporters. A spokesman for Keolis Commuter Services, which operates the MBTA’s commuter rail, told WBZ-TV, they were mourning “the senseless loss of conductor Jephthe Chery.” Chery, who would have turned 30 on Friday, was found dead outside in front of the bar from a gunshot wound.  Investigators say it appears he may have been an innocent bystander. Jephthe Chery. (Family photo) “He was beloved and respected b...

By Denise Lavoie, AP Legal Affairs Writer BOSTON (AP) — Less than three years after bombs killed three people and wounded more than 260 others at the  Boston Marathon , two movies, a play and an HBO documentary are in the works, causing decidedly mixed feelings among some of those most touched by the tragedy. News that Boston native Mark Wahlberg planned to star in “ Patriots Day ” surfaced earlier this year during the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was convicted and sentenced to death for his role in the attack. Recently, Wahlberg and CBS Films — the producers of “Patriots Day” — purchased the rights to “ Boston Strong ,” a book by former Boston Herald reporter Dave Wedge and author Casey Sherman from 20th Century Fox. Wahlberg is expected to play Boston police Detective Danny Keeler in the movie. Mark Wahlberg. (Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images) A second movie will be based on “ Stronger ,” a book written by bombing survivor Jeff Bauman, who lost both le...

MANCHESTER, N.H. (CBS) — A man accused of threatening a group of driver’s education students with a gun is now free on bail. Joseph Duven, 22, of Manchester, N.H. is charged with four counts of criminal threatening and one count of falsifying physical evidence. Driving instructor Marie Ramsdell was teaching three teens how to parallel park on Chestnut Street Tuesday evening when a man approached and knocked on the front passenger window. The man, identified by police as Duven, allegedly threatened to shoot everyone in car if they hit his vehicle during the lesson. The instructor and her students told investigators Duven had a black and silver handgun on his hip when he made the threat. “He was very clear,” Ramsdell said, Wednesday. “If the student hit his car he would shoot us,” Ramsdell said she calmly allowed the 17-year-old student driver to finish parking before driving away and dialing 911. “He handled it very well and he deserves hi...

NATICK (CBS) – A Hopkinton man has been identified as the pedestrian  killed Tuesday by an elderly driver  in a Natick shopping plaza. Natick Police said Kenneth McDonald, 73, died after a car hit him and two other people on the sidewalk in front of Harbor Freight Tools on Speen Street. McDonald, a father of six and grandfather of five, was a retired engineer who was also a Vietnam veteran. Kenneth McDonald. (Family photo) The two other pedestrians and the driver were hurt. All three were in stable condition Wednesday. Police have not yet released the name of the driver, but WBZ-TV has learned she is an 88-year-old woman from Framingham. Her driver’s license has now been suspended, but no charges have been filed at this point in the investigation. An elderly woman hit a group of pedestrians on Nov. 24 in a shopping plaza. (WBZ-TV) Al Mellor saw the crash from nearby and called 911. “Carnage,” he told WBZ-TV Wednesday. “I cou...

MILLIS (CBS) – The Millis police officer who was fired after he was accused of fabricating a shootout that shut down schools and briefly put part of the town on lockdown last summer has died. Bryan Johnson , 24, was found dead in his home in Millis around 3:30 a.m. on Thanksgiving, according to the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office. “No signs of foul play were found at the scene. The death is not currently being investigated as a homicide. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has accepted the case for autopsy,” Peggie Krippendorf, a spokeswoman for the D.A., said in a statement Thursday afternoon. Bryan Johnson’s police SUV was towed away after the fire and crash, Sept. 2, 2015. (WBZ-TV) A grand jury issued six indictments against Johnson on November 19. He was charged with calling in a bomb threat, misleading a criminal investigation and making a false police report. Johnson’s death closes the case. Investigators say Johnson made up a claim in September that a gu...

HAMILTON (CBS) – A babysitter charged with kidnapping a two-year-old from Hamilton last Friday has a history of mental illness. A court psychologist says 21-year-old  Abigail Hanna  is hallucinating and showing psychotic symptoms. Court officers had to help her walk and stand as she was charged with the kidnapping and beating of 2-year-old Lyndon Albers. Lyndon Albers. (Photo credit: Massachusetts State Police) Court psychologist Dr. Tammy Howe said Hanna was not communicating as she sat on the floor during an interview at the courthouse prior to her arraignment on kidnapping charges and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, a cigarette. Abigail Hanna was held up by a court officer at her arraignment in Newburyport District Court, Nov. 23, 2015. (WBZ-TV) A newly released search warrant affadavit says she babysat the girl only once in Hamilton, and after an intensive search of the area last Friday police were led to Hanna’s Topsfield home where they say sh...

HYANNIS (CBS) — A patient’s hair caught fire during surgery at Cape Cod hospital Monday evening. The hospital says a “heat generating piece of equipment” is to blame for the incident. Hospital staff members quickly extinguished the fire. The Hyannis Fire Department was called to the hospital as a precautionary measure, a hospital spokesperson said. The extent of the patient’s injuries is unclear.

NORWOOD (CBS) —  Most of us have seen the Jimmy Fund coin canisters on store counters — they collect money for kids with cancer. But to 44-year-old David DeShiro, it was something to be stolen. Police say Thanksgiving Day, DeShiro walked into AJ’s maket on Walpole Street, and took the Jimmy Fund can from the store counter, and stuffed it under his jacket. David DeShiro, 44, of Norwood. (Courtesy: Norwood Police Department) But security cameras captured the theft and as soon as police put out his picture, DeShiro’s mother recognized him in the video. “She confronted him, and convinced him to do the right thing,” said Norwood Police Sgt. Bob Doucette,”and today, he turned himself in. He said he did something stupid.” DeShiro was arraigned in Dedham District Court, and held on $500 dollars cash bail.

Shoppers turned out in droves to capitalize on retailers' doorbuster deals on Thanksgiving evening and into Black Friday, but will it be enough? After a sluggish start to the holiday shopping season, millions of Americans finished their turkey dinners and headed out to malls and shopping centers around the U.S., with lines forming outside  Best Buy , Target ,  Wal-Mart  and Toys R Us before the doors opened. Still, with many of retailers' promotions kicking off before Thanksgiving or online, the frenzy of years' past was noticeably more tame. Deloitte's Kate Ferrara, who arrived at South Shore Plaza in Braintree, Massachusetts, at 6 a.m., said people were shopping, but overall, it was pretty calm. In general, she said the department stores — which opened ahead of the smaller tenants — tended to be the busiest. The sales staff at some of the specialty stores, by comparison, looked a little tired, she said. Getty Images Shoppers purchase electronics and o...