"Not very professional" axmen who were supposed to take down two damaged trees on land belonging to an NBA owner instead whacked down 90 trees along a path on Wellesley conservation land, Wicked Local Wellesley reports. The town's now deciding what sort of fine to levy against the property manager for Atlanta Hawks owner Steve Belkin.

From the annals of history:
Genteel Chicago suburb rages over MR. T's tree massacre.

Via the Swellesley Report.

NotloB surveys recent changes at the venerable Cambridge folk emporium.

Akamai Technologies, which helps companies speed up their Web sites, yesterday sued Deutsche Bank for the money Akamai says it lost due to a fraudulent investment by a bank subsidiary.

In its lawsuit, filed in US District Court in Boston, Akamai says it asked Deustche Bank Securities in 2007 to find a safe, short-term investment for $217 million in cash. Akamai says the company put the money into "auction rate securities," even though it allegedly knew the market for those was already softening and that they carried substantial risks - to the point that the bank was reducing its own investments in them:

But Deutsche Bank did not reveal these risks to Akamai. Nor did Deutsche Bank disclose to Akamai that the liquidity of the ARS market was being artificially supported by Deutsche Bank and other financial institutions, which were secretly propping up the ARS market. As one means of covertly supporting the ARS market so that it would appear to investors to be safer than it actually was, Deutsche Bank and other financial institutions were party to or aware of secret side deals with ARS issuers to ensure that auctions did not fail due to lack of demand. In addition, through strategic and undisclosed bidding in ARS auctions, Deutsche Bank, as well as other financial institutions, sought to set artificially low rates for ARS in order to make the securities appear less risky and more liquid than they actually were. Deutsche Bank thereby perpetuated the illusion that the securities were fully liquid, even when it knew demand for ARS was waning. Customers like Akamai thus remained unaware of the increasing liquidity risk that ARS posed.

In February, 2008, Akamai says, the market for the securities collapsed and Akamai was left with useless paper. Akamai is seeking all the money back, plus interest and court costs. Akamai says it wouldn't mind criminal charges, either.

Complete complaint.

The Conservation Law Foundation yesterday formally accused the city of failing to stop high levels of bacteria, oil and dissolved metals and chemicals pour into Boston Harbor through its 201 "outfall" pipes that collect road runoff from nearly 20,000 catch basins - and from the neighboring town of Brookline.

In a lawsuit filed in US District Court, the foundation accused the Boston Water and Sewer Commission of not fulfilling even the barest minimum of testing to find the pollutants pouring into the Charles, Mystic, Muddy and Neponset rivers and Boston Harbor - as required under a 1999 agreement with the federal EPA - let alone cutting off illegal connections. The suit seeks an end to the pollution from the "municipal separate storm sewer system" (MS4) and possible fines against city officials.

The foundation said that testing done through 2005 along Mt. Vernon Street in Charlestown, Hyde Park Avenue, Bussey Brook and Canterbury Brook in Roslindale and Chandler Pond in Brighton found high levels of fecal coliform, copper, zinc and oil. The foundation also said the commission knows about illegal connections to the system yet has done nothing about them.

BWSC's data, and monitoring by EPA and others, demonstrate that discharges from BWSC's MS4 have caused or contributed to violations of water quality standards pertaining to bacteria. Discharges of excessive pathogens and bacteria are causing or contributing to, at a minimum, water quality violations in the Boston Harbor, Boston Inner Harbor, the Chelsea River, and the Mystic River, as well as the Charles and Neponset Rivers.

Complete complaint (3.3M PDF file)
BWSC Stormwater Managemnt - includes a 2008 report on the M4 system.
EPA page on BWSC