CloseIf you are logged into Facebook, this box shows items on Boston.com that your friends have recently shared or liked, as well as the most-recommended Boston.com items among all Facebook users.If you log out of Facebook, you will see only the most-recommended items. Continue reading →

CloseIf you are logged into Facebook, this box shows items on Boston.com that your friends have recently shared or liked, as well as the most-recommended Boston.com items among all Facebook users.If you log out of Facebook, you will see only the most-recommended items. Continue reading →

It was May 25, 1979, when the 6-year-old Etan Patz went missing on Prince Street in SoHo. The long cold case gained fresh traction on Thursday when the police said Pedro Hernandez confessed to strangling the child in the basement of the bodega where he worked. Etan was walking to the school bus stop, barely two blocks from his home, the first time he went by himself. It was the same Friday as it was then, the one introducing the Memorial Day weekend. It was the same time, 8 in the morning. The streets were damp from a prior rain, the way they were then. Everything else was different, a reimagined neighborhood of busier activity in a city implanted with security cameras. Etan began at ... Continue reading →

The Child ID App for Androids Today, to help observe National Missing Children’s Day, we’re launching a new version of our Child ID App built specifically for Android mobile phones. The application can be downloaded for free from the Android Apps section of Google Play. The Child ID App, first released in August 2011 for iPhones, provides parents with an easy way to electronically store pictures and vital information about their children in case they go missing—whether it’s a toddler wandering away at the mall or a teen who has been snatched by a stranger. Using the app, you can show pictures of your kids and provide physical identifiers such as height and weight to security or police officers on the spot. You can also ... Continue reading →

By Colin A. Young, Globe Correspondent A quiet evening in a Boxford backyard took an “udderly” dramatic turn Sunday when a bunch of bovines decided to drop by and have a couple of brews. “It started off with a call for loose cows in the area of Foster Street,” Boxford Police Lieutenant James Riter said. “On my way down Main Street, I did see evidence that cows were in the area.” That evidence, Riter said, was -- well, let’s just say you wouldn’t want to step in it. When the bovine bunch stopped in the front yard of a home on Main Street, Riter directed traffic around the herd. Then the cows decided to run off into the backyard, he said. “I could hear screaming ... Continue reading →

By Martin Finucane, Globe Staff The state Senate has voted unanimously to close a loophole in Melanie’s Law, the measure intended to crack down on repeat drunk drivers. A recent Supreme Judicial Court decision said the Registry of Motor Vehicles could not count cases that are “continued without a finding” as convictions in determining what sanctions to bring against repeat drunk drivers. Drivers who acknowledge that they were driving drunk can sometimes have their cases continued without a finding, which means that a judge will suspend their case for a period of time and, if they don’t get into further trouble, the charges will be dropped. The amendment by Senator Bruce Tarr, a Gloucester Republican, passed, 37-0, on Wednesday night, the Senate president’s office said ... Continue reading →

By John R. Ellement, Globe Staff The state’s highest court today ordered a juvenile court judge to explore whether the privacy rights of Boston public school students are violated when their student ID cards are given to Boston police for use in photo arrays. In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Judicial Court said it needed more information from the judge before it could decide the constitutionality of the practice, which was used in 2009 as police investigated the armed robbery of a Boston public school student by a fellow student. During that investigation, a Boston police officer assigned to an unidentified Boston high school obtained the student identification card of the suspect in the case. Police also obtained the ID cards of other students for ... Continue reading →

By Alli Knothe, Globe Correspondent Firefighters battled for 12 hours to quell a fire inside a nuclear-powered US Navy submarine in the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, officials said today. Seven people, including five firefighters, sustained minor injuries. “The fire spread to spaces within the submarine that were difficult to access. The heat and smoke contained in these confined spaces made it challenging for firefighters to combat the blaze,” Rear Admiral Rick Breckenridge, commander of the submarine group that includes the USS Miami, said today in a statement. Officials vented smoke and noxious fumes from the vessel today so they could get inside to assess the damage, the Associated Press reported. A fire department dispatcher said residents were not affected. Breckenridge said the fire aboard the Miami ... Continue reading →