Federal immigration officials on Friday extended a legal status for Haitian immigrants — who make up the majority of the population of new arrivals into Massachusetts — for an additional 18 months.
Temporary Protected Status is an …
Massachusetts
Who was on the first Karen Read jury? We may never know
The closely watched Karen Read murder case ended in a mistrial Monday, with the jury’s foreman reporting that deep divisions in the body meant they wouldn’t be able to come to unanimous verdict.
The jury had deliberated for five days in a trial that stretched from the end of April to the first day of July, all under intense scrutiny and major media coverage that Judge Beverly Cannone worked to shield them from.
But how the conversations in the jury room played out may remain private — a clerk at Norfolk Superior Court told NBC10 Boston that the list of jurors will not be made public.
Who serves on Massachusetts juries is a matter of public record, according to a 2015 Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling in a murder case out of Middlesex County, but only, with rare exceptions, for “jurors who have been empanelled and rendered a verdict in a criminal case.”
The jury in the first Read trial did not render a verdict.
That doesn’t mean no juror will speak out about the case — they can come forward on their own.
And another jury will eventually be empaneled to weigh the charges against Read, since the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office announced that they will re-try the charges against her. Read pleaded not guilty.
More Karen Read news
This story uses functionality that may not work in our app. Click here to open the story in your web browser.
Person hospitalized after shooting in Dorchester
A person was injured in a shooting Monday afternoon in Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood.
Police say the shooting happened on Oldfields Road. Officers responded around 4 p.m. to find the victim suffering from non-life-threatening injuries…
Downtown dilemma: How can Boston revive its empty office buildings?
Experts are warning that empty office space in Boston, brought on by the pandemic, could create financial problems for the city.
NBC10 Boston went inside a past project that could be used as a model to revive Downtown Boston.
The Godfrey Hotel project completed in 2016 was ahead of its time. The space was once an old historic office building and now it’s a modern hotel.
In a post-COVID world, remote or hybrid work has become the norm, leaving many downtown office buildings empty.
In May, the commercial vacancy rate in the city was around 15%, according to the Boston Planning and Development Agency.
A recent report from Tufts University says in the next five years, Boston is likely to face a shortfall of more than a billion dollars in revenue because of vacant office space.
“Re-using buildings is just part of Yankee ingenuity that we have here in Boston,” said Arthur Jemison, chief of planning for the City of Boston.
Right now the focus is on converting empty office space into housing. BPDA announced a program in October that offers up to 75% in tax breaks to builders who convert offices into residential buildings.
Last week Boston Mayor Michelle Wu announced the extension of a program to convert empty office space into housing. Massachusetts will now offer $15 million in funding to make this happen in addition to the city’s incentive program which has been in place since last fall.
So far two projects have been approved, one on Devonshire Street that will have 95 units and another on Franklin Street that will have 18.
“It’s a way of taking underutilized office space and turning it into units to help us with our housing crisis in the region,” said Jemison.
Back at the Godfrey, principal architect Ellen Anselone said this project could be used as a model.
“When this was done, there was not a lot happening down here so the Godfrey really activated this section of Washington Street,” said Anselone.
She said whether it’s a hotel or apartment building, converting an empty space can revitalize a whole area and could help solve the city’s problem.
“I think it could. I think it really is thinking outside of the box on how to re-imagine the buildings and spaces,” said Anselone.
Jemison said the City of Boston is open to all ideas.
“We’re going to continue to have an all of the above approach and if there’s new ideas out there about doing it , we’re going to embrace them,” he said.
Karen Read’s defense vows to continue fighting charges after mistrial declared
A mistrial was declared in the high-profile murder case against Karen Read Monday, a Massachusetts woman accused of killing her police officer boyfriend by hitting him with her SUV in January 2022.
Read’s defense has argued from the begi…
Prosecutors say they will re-try Karen Read case after mistrial is declared
The Norfolk District Attorney’s Office announced that they will re-try the Karen Read case after a mistrial was declared Tuesday afternoon.
“First, we thank the O’Keefe family for their commitment and dedication to this long process. They maintained sight of the true core of this case — to find justice for John O’Keefe,” the district attorney’s office said in a statement. “The Commonwealth intends to re-try the case.”
The next step in the case will be a status conference scheduled by Judge Beverly Cannone on July 22 at 2 p.m. in Norfolk Superior Court.
A jury foreperson told the judge Friday that they hadn’t reached a unanimous verdict despite an “exhaustive review of the evidence.” They were told to continue deliberating. They did but came back Monday afternoon and said it would be futile to continue.
The jury was tasked with deciding whether prosecutors proved that Read drunkenly and intentionally slammed into her Boston police officer boyfriend with her Lexus SUV and left him to die. The defense challenged the evidence and suggested that one or more law enforcement colleagues killed John O’Keefe, dumped his body outside in a panic, and then framed Read to cover it up.
Read was charged with second-degree murder, punishable in Massachusetts by life in prison with the possibility of parole. She also faced lesser charges of manslaughter while operating a vehicle under the influence, punishable by five to 20 years, and leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death, punishable by up to 10 years.
