It'll take more than one day to melt all the ice that formed in our brief sub-zero blast. Along the Charles River in Millennium Park in West Roxbury, a one-time homage to leather from Mechanics Hall (bulldozed to make way for the Pru) remained encased in ice around 3:30 p.m. today.
The ice also snared some tree branches: Read more.
A federal appeals court today declined to toss criminal charges against Newton District Court Judge Shelley Joseph and her courtroom deputy Wesley MacGregor that stem from the way they helped a defendant wanted as part of a Trump-era ICE crackdown on immigrants slip out the back door of their courthouse while ICE agents waited in the lobby. Read more.
JJFree shows off her husband's form on some ice-covered steps in Needham this morning: Read more.
Lucas Brunelle is part of a small (very small) fraternity of people who try to bike on the Charles River in the winter. Yesterday, he got out on the ice in Brighton and pretty promptly fell through thin ice and into the water.
Today, more people joined him on the river, but on two feet and further downstream by the Esplanade. Thanks to the folks who sent us photos and comments, if for no other reason than we now know there are two divergent schools of thought about people who go out on the Charles on days like today: Read more.
Boston Police report that when officers pulled over a driver on Harvard Street in Dorchester for a traffic stop early this morning, one passenger got out and ran away - only to slip on ice outside Sun Pizza on Blue Hill Avenue, which let them catch up and arrest him for the gun they say he tossed during his failed escape. Read more.
A federal appeals court today dismissed a preliminary injunction that had barred ICE agents from arresting immigrants appearing in Massachusetts court cases during a suit against the practice by district attorneys in Suffolk and Middlesex counties and several civil-rights groups. Read more.
Government lawyers agreed today to drop an ICE policy that would have forced foreign students to leave the country if they were unwilling or unable to find a school that would teach their classes in person. Read more.
MIT and Harvard today asked a federal judge to block a new ICE ruling that would force foreign students already enrolled in college here to either find schools that would teach them in person or leave the country. Read more.
WBUR reports.
Update: The BPD sergeant who was coordinating with ICE has been removed from his position, WBUR reports.
Suffolk County Sheriff Steve Tompkins is not breaking with ICE out of any newfound moral qualms, but because he needs the space ICE Is now renting at the South Bay jail to house 200 to 250 women prisoners. Read more.
Blowing a shofar against ICE at 101 Main St., Kendall Square. Photo by Ron Newman.
Jewish protesters and their allies marched across the Longfellow Bridge during the evening rush hour for a protest against companies that sell technology to ICE, including Amazon, whose Kendall Square lobby at 101 Main St. was briefly occupied before police arrested 13 of the Never Again Action demonstrators. Read more.
The Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports prosecutors this morning dropped trespassing charges against 18 people arrested in a Jewish-led "Never Again" protest at the ICE detention facility at the South Bay jail last evening.
A federal judge today sided with two Massachusetts district attorneys and the state's public defenders and barred ICE from detaining people with business in Massachusetts courts while a lawsuit over the issue proceeds. Read more.
WFXT reports ICE agents went into the Chelsea and East Boston courts this week to arrest two men they say are here illegally and who were facing local charges - one an alleged MS-13 member, one an alleged member of the rival 18th Street Gang.
Earlier:
Two DAs, public defenders sue to keep ICE out of local courthouses.
Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins and Middlesex County District Attorney Marian Ryan joined today with public defenders to file a federal lawsuit that seeks to keep ICE agents out of state courthouses - such as Newton District Court, where a judge now faces federal criminal charges for trying to protect a man from an ICE agent waiting in the court lobby. Read more.
Newton District Court Judge Shelley Joseph and court officer Wesley MacGregor were both charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice, obstruction of justice, obstruction of a federal proceeding and perjury for an incident on April 2, 2018 - in an indictment today by a federal grand jury that has been investigating them for nearly a year. Read more.
The City Council agreed today to hold a hearing to look into the specific case of an immigrant construction worker whose boss allegedly reported him to ICE, which then arrested him with the help of Boston Police, after the worker was injured on the job and applied for worker's comp. Read more.
ND reports on the state of the staff parking lot at the Orchard Gardens K-8 Pilot School in Roxbury this morning:
I hope other schools fared better than we did - this is our staff parking lot at arrival this morning.
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