Terral Ainooson, 25, was arrested along with roommate, Ryan Oshima, 23, on November 11, when police found more than a dozen plastic bags of marijuana, and seized cash, a grinder and a scale after searching their Sudan Street apartment.

Each was charged with drug possession with intent to distribute.

Ainooson, elected student body president in fall 2008, is a senior International Management major, according to the school’s student senate Web site. He has a criminal record. Jake Wark, spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney’s office, said records show Ainooson had faced similar charges at least once before. The records did not indicate other details about the charges except to say they were not brought in Suffolk County, Wark said.

Oshima is a former UMass Boston student, a school spokesman said. The school’s official athletics Web site says he’s from La Jolla, Calif. and played baseball at Umass for three years.

In the raid, police knocked on the apartment door, but when no one responded officers forced their way in. They found the suspects in a bedroom, detained them and read them their Miranda rights, according to a police report. After officers showed them a search warrant, the pair volunteered the locations of the drugs, some of which were hidden in a Cheerios cereal box, and paraphernalia. The report also indicates that Ainooson and Oshima had been under investigation by the drug unit prior to the raid.

Oshima faces up to two years in jail or a fine or both. Ainooson, as a repeat offender, faces at least one year in prison or a fine or up to $10,000, or both.

Superintendent Carol R. Johnson unveiled a five-year strategic plan for the Boston Public Schools, outlining new direction and priorities for “closing access and achievement gaps and graduating all BPS students from high school>”

“The days of business as usual are over,” said Johnson. “If we intend to see all, not just some, of our schools become centers of excellence we must take bold and swift action. Every student in our city has the right to a high-quality education. I believe this plan is the road map that will lead us to new heights, where Boston can serve as a model for every urban school district in America.”

Johnson identified 14 schools that are under-performing:

• William Blackstone Elementary School in the South End
• Paul Dever Elementary School in Dorchester
• Ralph Waldo Emerson Elementary School in Roxbury
• E. Greenwood K-8 School in Hyde Park
• Curtis Guild Elementary School in East Boston
• John P. Holland Elementary School in Dorchester
• John F. Kennedy Elementary School in Jamaica Plain
• William Monroe Trotter Elementary School in Dorchester
• Orchard Gardens K-8 School in Roxbury
• Maurice J. Tobin K-8 School in Roxbury
• Henry Dearborn Middle School in Roxbury
• Harbor Middle School in Dorchester
• The English High School in Jamaica Plain
• Odyssey High School in South Boston

Johnson wants to focus on strengthening teaching and leadership among school administrators, copying best practices at “working” schools and looking at ways to streamline services throughout the school district.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino, fresh off his re-election victory and a recent knee injury, sent a letter to the Boston School Committee in support of the Superintendent’s proposals.

“There may be some who will find it easier and safer to sit back, to stall – to use our stretched dollars as an excuse to postpone this critical work,” Mayor Menino wrote. “To these people, I say time has run out. We can no longer wait to take action. From this day forward, we must collectively re-commit ourselves and pool our energies. With diminishing resources, it will be all the more important to think creatively and to rely on those measures that are cost effective, but reap big returns.”

Toby Ryan, 17, was arraigned today in a Chelsea court and also charged with armed robbery, unlawful possession of a firearm and assault and battery. He was also charged, in an East Boston court, with receving a stolen motor vehicle. Bail was set at $1,500 and $5,000 respectively.

A 14-year-old boy who is believed to be the second perpetrator was taken into custody today but was not arraigned. He is expected to be arraigned tomorrow in a juvenile court.

Officers spoke with the Dominos Pizza delivery man shortly after receiving a report regarding the armed robbery. The man said he was robbed by two teenaged gunmen, named “Toby” and “Macho”, both of  whom he proceeded to describe. He said the teens demanded his car keys and cash at gunpoint.

Revere Police contacted Boston Police, who were familiar with the names and descriptions given by the victim. One hour after receiving the report, Boston Police located the stolen Toyota Corolla near Vallar Road. An attempt to stop it failed, as the driver and passengers sped away and then fled the vehicle.

Local officers then paid a visit to the 14-year-old’s home. The boy was not present but his mother told police he was with ‘Toby”.

The officers then went to Ryan’s home, where he was present. Ryan, who was allegedly sweating heavily, denied ever having left his home. He was taken into custody.

Officers later found “Macho” in  the lobby of a Waldemar Road building just a street over from Ryan. He was taken into custody as well.

Ryan’s trial will resume on Dec. 15.

Eaton has found an artist’s office job — a management position that calls for raw creativity and that satisfies both her idealism and her longing for community. She is Project Manager of Outside the Lines, an art-based day program for adults with developmental disabilities run out of a giant warehouse on the Tufts University campus. The people served by O.T.L. are not simply given art projects to do, they are managed as artists — it is both a workshop and a gallery space in which participants’ artwork graces the walls and gets sold at shows.

“We’re different from other programs,” Eaton explains, “because a lot of them are work-related programs where people mostly just do piece work.”

O.T.L. is an experimental offshoot of the nonprofit organization, Resources for Human Development (R.H.D.). “We call ourselves an ‘alternative day program.’ We give them work that’s more meaningful, I would say.”

Eaton and the staff she oversees are different from most social workers. They are themselves, artists, and they know how to treat their clients as such. Everyone in the building shares the same talents and obsessions, and they enjoy learning from one another.

“Hiring artists works, because we’re all sensitive, we’re intuitive. We’re free with them, and we can treat them like human beings, rather than, like, ‘You’re a patient and we’re going to analyze you,’ we can just be like ‘We are who we are and you are who you are,’ and we appreciate them for that.”

Eaton is 30 years old. She is tall, and although she is soft-spoken, her stature and her constant state of calm make her a convincing figure of authority. She could not, however, be easily mistaken for corporate. While her office is the only closed room with a desk in the scattered warehouse, her speech and dress are informal. Today, she wears a short skirt over a pair of jeans, a dark blouse and a colorful silk scarf.

Eaton was not always specifically drawn to working with the disabled. She has, however, always been an artist. Before O.T.L., she struggled to find an artistic community that felt like home. At Mount Holyoke College, she majored in art and anthropology, and while these disciplines excited her, the “art crowd” she discovered, did not.

A painting by Jose DeJesus, who was awarded “Best in Show” in a recent statewide exhibition at the capitol building for his piece Man from Burma

“I actually got really fed up with the whole ‘Art World.’ It can be really inclusive, if you’re in it. People are making pieces that are speaking to other artists—meaning that those other artists have prior knowledge of art history, or contemporary artists — rather than having an original vision of how to express themselves, with the idea that they can reach people through what they’re creating.

“But art for me is really just doing a thing that I like. Something that I feel like I always have to do — is part of my life in some way. I have to manipulate materials and make pretty things — well not necessarily pretty, but visually interesting. When I was at school though, I got involved with that whole scene.”

Eaton spent her junior year studying photography in Florence, Italy. Her exploration of this new medium combined with her experience abroad and her studies in anthropology led to a new inspiration.

“I wanted to travel, I wanted to tell people about what’s going on in the world through art. I was idealistic, and I did do that for a while. I did travel the world and take pictures. I went to Southeast Asia. I went to Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos. That was pretty awesome. It was really amazing.”

Before long, however, she ran into a barrier. Just as she hadn’t been able to connect with what she perceived as the art world, she came to feel that photojournalism prevented her from connecting with the people she found on her travels.

“I took pictures. I mean, I had my camera with me. I was a person with a camera. People would ask me for money for taking their pictures. That’s when I realized that it wasn’t what I really wanted to do.”

Back from the States and out of college, Eaton continued to pursue her skills where she could, but there was a lot missing. “I was working for a jewelry designer and working as a house painter,” she recalls with a laugh, “so the stuff I was doing was kind of isolating and I really felt like working on my own artwork was self-indulgent. I really wanted to be able to reach out to people and be creative.”

Eaton heard about O.T.L. from a friend who worked there before it had a management structure. She began on the floor, as a “Direct Support Professional,” and was prompted once R.H.D. decided a manager was necessary. Her first breakthrough with an artist did not come while working on an art project, but it did call for an important kind of creativity. She was working with a woman known for acting out.

“If she’s not getting what she wants she’ll do temper tantrum kinds of things like, screaming and whining. So she started to do that one day, and I started whining back, and I made it into like, oh, you sound like a seagull,’ Eaton remembers, laughing. “And it totally just threw her off. She thought it was hilarious. So she started doing it in a way where she was calling like a seagull, and then I was calling back like a seagull, and it was just really funny.”

Eaton calls this “redirecting,” and it is central to the work of O.T.L. where one of the defining practices in working with the developmentally disabled is never to punish, never to provide negative attention. As much as in designing art projects, this is where the creativity and sensitivity of the artist are called upon. It’s about finding ways to make abnormal behavior OK, to laugh together and direct focus back to the shared value of art-making. This seems to be exactly the atmosphere Eaton has been searching for, and she is not alone.

“There is a strong feeling of community here,” says Allison Stroh, an Art Therapist, recently hired for the ‘Direct Support’ role. “Everyone here feels part of it. When Else walks in, all of the artists smile. She has a million tricks up her sleeve to make them feel at ease. Meanwhile, she’s got me singing, dancing, working on giant monsters– stuff I never thought I’d get to do at work.”

“We really try to make it so that everyone here just feels comfortable being who they are. No matter who they are,” says Eaton. You know we’re all awkward and weird in some ways and we just let that be. Both the staff and the clients, their personalities really come out here.”

Outside of Eaton’s office, a heavyset man wearing an unattached pair of earphones is showing off his brand new cowboy boots — from L.L. Bean, he boasts — to a bespectacled twenty-something in skinny jeans. The subject exhausted, he shows off his latest glowing cityscape. The kid looks impressed. So does The Hulk.

Police told the television station that, of youths arrested, 55 were charged with alcohol possession after the blew above .02 percent blood-alcohol content. Others were released to their parents.

The party’s hosts, three Colby-Sawyer students, identified by the television station as Lindsey Randlett, 21, Margaux O’Connell, 21, and Kayla Flynn, 20, were charged with hosting an underage drinking party.

The three live in a house that’s owned by the college and is located 200 yards away from a police station.

Colby-Sawyer College President Thomas C. Galligan Jr. said it was not immediately known what action the college would take. He said, in an e-mail to the news station: “We are aware of the incident last night but have not had a chance to review everything that happened and have not made any decision yet about what processes the college might undertake. Our primary concern is with our students’ education, well-being and safety. We are grateful no one was hospitalized or otherwise injured and will strive. As we understand more, to use these events as an opportunity for community discussion and education. It is normally not our policy to pursue College Community Council processes with events which occur off campus; however, we have not yet determined whether what we will do in this matter. I also do not believe that the lease specifically mentions under age drinking but in my experience it is not common in residential leases to expressly mention many types of illegal conduct. That failure to expressly include does not mean the conduct is condoned.”

Here is a statement released by organizers of the event that Levasseur was scheduled to speak at:

The U.S. Parole Commission has unexpectedly denied Ray Luc Levasseur permission to travel to Massachusetts tomorrow. Though Ray Luc Levasseur will not attend, the talk and forum entitled “The Great Western Massachusetts Sedition Trial: Twenty Years Later” will nonetheless take place on Thursday November 12 at 7:15 p.m. at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in School of Management Room 137. Participants will include sedition trial defendant Pat Levasseur, members of the 1989 Springfield sedition trial legal defense team, and a juror from the trial.

Levasseur was released from federal prison in 2004 after serving 18 years for his involvement in United Freedom Front. The group was linked to shootouts with police, bank robberies, and a series of bombings. He was invited to be part of a panel Thursday night speaking about terrorism. The news has sparked outrage from law enforcement and political leaders and very little defense from freedom of speech advocates.

As is with any controversial, or even outwardly unpopular event, police have to be present to maintain peace. This happens all the time — even black officers have been forced to work security details protecting Ku Klux Klan members marching down city streets across the country.

“The (International Brotherhood of Police Officers, Local 432) union leadership wishes it to be recognized that the Local, on behalf of the Officers who will be forced to work this event for public safety concerns plan to donate all proceeds obtained for working this
paid over-time detail to the National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund in the name of Fallen New Jersey State Trooper Philip Joseph Lamonaco,” said Gerald Perkins, a union spokesman.

Preliminary sketch of Plymouth Rock Studios front gate, which may never exist

The Boston Globe has reported that mere weeks before groundbreaking, the $550 million in funding for the construction of Hollywood East in Massachusetts has been pulled, leaving the future of Plymouth Rock Studios, the movie industry in Metro Boston, and countless jobs up in question.

A week ago, the Globe started investigating Prosperity International LLC, of Orlando, Fla., finding “its track record was thin, at best.” Today the studio said it was cutting ties with its would-be financier.

In January, we said Plymouth Rock Studios would be a marvel in green technology, being a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified structure with a 21st century earth-friendly setup. The studio, when finished, is supposed to have 14 sound stages and 10 acres of outdoor sets.

Now it’s just a question mark.

The event will go on next year, August 20-28, but the pen company will drop its sponsorship when its contract is up after that.

The register reported that Pilot Pen has been sponsor of the annual event, which features a men’s and women’s tournament, since 1996. It is held in downtown New Haven, near the Yale Bowl and Yale Field in the 13,000-seat Connecticut Tennis Center. The newspaper reported that Pilot Pen put up $1.4 million annually for the tournament.

“We firmly believe that Pilot Pen Corporation’s long-term support of the Pilot Pen Tennis tournament has helped us grow the sport of tennis in the Northeast and put us in a solid position to attract a new title sponsor,” tournament director Anne Worcester said in a statement “This tournament has developed into an entertainment event featuring some of the world’s best professional tennis players as well as many off-court events which have expanded our reach to all types of fans. A combined men’s and women’s tournament is a very desirable sports property and will appeal to national and regional partners alike.”

“We have enjoyed being the title sponsor of the Pilot Pen Tennis tournament” said Dennis Burleigh, President and CEO of Pilot Pen Corporation of America in the same statement. “Unfortunately, the economic recession has severely impacted our consumers and the office products industry in particular, necessitating this difficult decision.”

Jackie Liebergott, Emerson’s president, in a campus-wide e-mail, reported that Starring died this week.

“He was a bright and talented young man, earning Dean’s list honors every semester,” Liebergott said. “He was a former President and active member of the student A Capella group Noteworthy, lighting up the stage each time he took the lead. He also served as a Student Ambassador in the Office of Admission, providing campus tours for prospective students and their families.”

Liebergott called Starring’s death “an enormous loss” for the college.

Emerson is making staff at the Counseling Center and Center for Spiritual Life available for students tomorrow from 3-4:30 p.m. in Emerson’s Campus Center. A memorial service will be held before the end of the semester.

Based on Boston’s rich musical history (Boston boasts one of the oldest choral companies in the United States, and one of the most acoustically exact concert halls in the world), Steppin’ Out focuses on the city’s tradition of jazz. Past headliners of the event include famed percussionist Tito Puente (2007), jazz and R&B singer Roberta Flack (2003), and contemporary R&B singer Lalah Hathaway (2008).

This year will bring as many as 20 musicians to feature the talent of local and national artists. Included with the amazing evening of music is dinner, community and corporate awards, and an evening of socializing. Last year nearly 3,000 music lovers and community supporters came out to the event for the Dimock Center.

The Dimock Center, which the Steppin’ Out event benefits, was originally founded in 1862 as the New England Hospital for Women and Children and is considered a National Historic Landmark. It holds nine acres in Roxbury in order to deliver sincere care for over 46,000 patients and clients in its Health Center alone each year. The Center offers services ranging from health screenings, immunizations, women’s health, HIV/AIDS services and more.

Steppin’ Out provides the Dimock Center with funding that is vital to maintaining the center’s outstanding service.

Ruth Ellen Fitch, President and CEO of the Dimock Center, began work at the center in August of 2004, and was previously practicing law with Palmer & Dodge LLP. There she became the first Black female partner at a large Boston law firm.

Before practicing law, Fitch was Director of the METCO program for the Brookline Public Schools and taught at University of Massachusetts, Boston. She has contributed to the community as serving as a member of the Board of the Boston Public Health Commission, Director of Health Law Advocates and as a Director of the Boston Municipal Research Bureau. Now she continues to provide in the health field at the Dimock Center, whose vision is a healthy community, and whose mission is to “commit to enhance the quality of life of each individual (they) serve”.

The Dimock Center has announced this year’s Honorary Chairs for Steppin’ Out as Governor Deval L. Patrick and First Lady Diane B. Patrick, with the Gala Chair being Clayton H. W. Turnbull (The Waldwin Group, Founder and CEO).

The event will take place November 7 at The Westin Boston Waterfront Hotel.

To purchase tickets online, click here.

“Scott Brown knows that you don�t create jobs by making government bigger, letting spending get out of control and increasing taxes,� said Healey, in a statement. �Scott has been a leader in the never-ending battle to restrain state spending, and that is exactly the kind of leadership we need in Washington right now.�

Healey also said that she worked closely with Brown when she was lieutenant governor under Mitt Romney: �The Massachusetts taxpayer has a great friend in Scott Brown and he was a solid ally in our efforts to balance the budget and create new jobs.�

�I am proud to have the support of Kerry Healey, who is a strong fiscal conservative with a record of opposing taxes and higher spending,� said Brown, responding, in a statement.

Brown (Wrentham) is in his third term as a State Senator.

More than 30 suspect brothels could be raided by police soon as Gov. Don Carcieri signed legislation Tuesday banning prostitution and making it a misdemeanor.

Rhode Island was, until now, the only state except Nevada where prostitution was not a crime. This began in the Ocean State as a loophole in 1980 when legislators passed legislation aimed at cracking down on people who sold sex in “public,” which was a major problem in Providence’s West End. Judges would later rule that the law actually made prostitution legal in private, and the brothels sprung up all over. The effect was that a law aimed at cracking down on the sex trade actually made it proliferate.

But the part’s over now.

The deal, reached with D.A.W. Inc, a subsidiary of Florida-based Nyer Medical Group,

Shares of the penny Nyer stock were up some 200 percent in after hours trading.

Eaton has stores in Dorchester, Brockton, Danvers, Peabody, Salem, Sherborn, Framingham, Southborough, Gloucester, Wellesley, Lynn, Westwood, Weston, Marblehead, Woburn and Newton.

Walgreens promised to keep on most of the Eaton employees.

“Today is a very special day for our Boston market,” said Dave White, Walgreens market vice president for Boston, in a statement yesterday. “Not only are we keeping most of the pharmacies open, but we also intend for eligible employees at all 12 locations to join our team.”

White said Eaton’s long-time customers will see the same familiar faces and level of service with the expanded Walgreens umbrella of products and services.

“We look forward to continuing Eaton’s 100-plus year tradition of quality pharmacy service in communities around the Boston area,” White said.

“I am confident that the best choice for our customers and employees is Walgreens,” said Mark Dumouchel, President of D.A.W and Nyer Medical Group

The acquisition is subject to certain terms and conditions, and is expected to close within the next 90 days, Walgreens said.

Walgreens is the nation’s largest drugstore chain, operating some 7,000 stories in all 50 states, D.C., and Puerto Rico. The company did $63 billion in sales in fiscal year 2009.

The speech, delivered at MIT’s Kresge Auditorium, praised the school’s faculty members and students for their commitment to energy research and achieving new advancements in clean energy technologies. He spoke about his excitement after touring the school’s Energy Initiative program laboratories and the benefits that these new technologies can bring to the world.

“Windows that generate electricity by directing light to solar cells; lightweight high-power batteries that aren’t built but are grown. That was neat stuff. Engineering viruses to create batteries; more efficient lighting systems that rely on nanotechnology; innovative engineering that will make it possible for offshore wind power plants to deliver electricity even when the air is still,” said Obama.

He pointed out that every country has recognized that the world’s energy supplies are growing scarcer and “that’s why the world is now engaged in a peaceful competition to determine the technologies that will power the 21st century. The nation that wins this competition will be the nation that leads the global economy,” he said. “I am convinced of that. And I want America to be that nation. It’s that simple.”

Obama also promoted Ricovery Act Investments that are creating advancements in wind energy as well as creating jobs. He said the Act includes $80 billion to create thousands of jobs for Americans developing new battery technologies for hybrid vehicles, modernizing the electric grid and doubling the country’s capacity to generate renewable electricity.

Susan Hockfield, the president of MIT, said that having Obama speak about renewable energy at the university can motivate more students in getting involved in new energy technology and policy development.

“It’s enormously energizing. The Energy Initiative has become a real centerpiece at activities here at MIT. And having the president here to make a major statement about energy really confirms and amplifies the work that’s already been done on campus,” said Hockfield.

MIT’s Energy Initiative program director Ernest Moniz said that energy research conducted around the country has helped the US be a frontrunner for leading the global economy in clean energy. However, he said there’s still much work to be done.

“United States still has, in my view, the world’s foremost science, technology and innovative system. In the other hand, we cannot be complacent. We can compete as long as we have the resources sustained and commitment from the highest levels, which the president demonstrated today,” explained Moniz.

Obama has been the second president to visit MIT but was the only one who met with faculty members and received a tour of school laboratories. The previous presidential visit was made by Bill Clinton who delivered a Commencement address in 1998.

Video report by Melissa Unger

Instructors are donating their time to hold a 3 hour spinathon and a 2 hour zumbathon, with a suggested donation of $5 per hour per participant for charity.

Zumba is a high energy, latin dance class that can easily be adapted for people with a limited range of motion, and spinning burns the most calories of all our group fitness classes, at an average of 500 calories per class.

Commonwealth Sports Club is also holding a raffle to help raise money for the cause. The staff at CSC and Joint Ventures Physical Therapy have donated their time to offer raffle prizes such as an acupuncture session, personal training packages, pilates packages, and massages. Other prizes include CSC gear, $25 Visa Gift Cards, and a $100 gift certificate to The Kells Bar and Grill, Blast’s perennial party spot, donated by restaurant owner and sports club member Jerry Quinn.

There will also be inspirational artwork sold with part of the proceeds going to breast cancer research.

Be there from 6-9 p.m. tonight, and make your workout for a good cause.

“My Democratic opponents Martha Coakley and Mike Capuano are having an ongoing debate over who’s more liberal,” Brown says in the video. “Each one is trying to be softer on crime than the other. Unlike both of them, I support the death penalty. Anyone who reads the newspaper or watches the nightly news knows there are some crimes that are so horrific that they shock our conscience.”

Brown sites acts of terrorism, murders with torture, and the killing of law enforcement officials as the types of crimes he feels deserve the death penalty.

“I believe a well-crafted death penalty law that relies on advances in DNA evidence and other forensic science to conclusively prove a defendant’s guilt will deliver the justice that the public demands,” Brown says, “and innocent victims deserve.”

Massachusetts is a non-death penalty state.

As part of the Massachusetts Freedom to Vote Act, the proposed measure would allow a 16 1/2-year-old to pre-register to vote when they apply for a driving permit at the Registry of Motor Vehicles, so that when they turn 18, their registration will automatically kick in.

“This is an easy, no cost, common sense bill,” said State Rep. Ellen Story (D-Amherst), at a press conference before the hearing this week.

Story, who is lead sponsor for the bill, said she has had this proposal on her desk for a couple of years, and believes this is the right time to get it passed.

“The legislature is looking for things to do between now and Nov. 18, when we recess, that are good government bills and that don’t cost money,” Story said after her testimony to the Committee. “This doesn’t cost anything.”

Story said a person under the age of 18 should have the opportunity to pre-register, because young people at that age are starting to form their own opinions, and she said voting at a young age would lead to a lifetime of responsible voters.

“Voting is addictive,” said Story, who said the bill did not make it far last year but has heard no opposition from anyone. “If you start voting, you will never stop.”

In a study by Common Cause, the government watchdog found that only 50 percent of 18-year-olds are registered to vote in the US, and in the 2008 elections only 59 percent of eligible voters between the ages of 18 and 24 were registered to vote.

The bill has already been implemented in 10 states around the country, including Connecticut and Maine.

The new bill would not change the voting age to 16, since 18 is the legal age to vote as stated in the US Constitution, but the bill might make it easier for 18-year-olds to vote.

“I’m a junior, and if I could just register to vote now it would make things that much easier because things are going to be hectic with college,” said said Donovan Birch, a junior at Boston Preparatory Charter Public School, who testified to the committee. “The first half of my year will be applying to college, then getting ready for it, then I have to fulfill all my requirement for my senior year.”

Birch, a member of Young Civic Leaders, a program sponsored by MassVote, a voters’ rights organization, designed to build leaders in the community, said this new bill would make it easier because senior year of high school can be a very busy time.

“Even though I’ll be 18, registering to vote isn’t going to be the first thing on my mind.”

Rep. Michael J. Moran, chair of the Election Laws Committee, was impressed by Birch’s testimony.

“We need more kids like you getting active,” said Moran, who jokingly told the group of 10 to 15 high school students that he tried to get them a half-day of school. “I know it can be very boring, but very important stuff goes on in here, and I appreciate you all coming.”

Avi Green, executive director of MassVote, said it was important for the high school students to voice their opinion to the Committee.

“It’s critical,” said Green, who, along with MassVote, sponsored the press conference before the hearing. “Everyone’s always saying ‘This is good for high school students or that is good for high school students or this is good for youth’ but I think youth can speak for themselves.

“I think Donovan was just as impressive as the adults that I heard, and I really hope that bill passes.”

Green is also an advocate for the other major proposed bills in The Mass Freedom to Vote Act. Including, Election Day registration, which would allow voters to register on the day of elections providing they have proof of residence and ID, and early voting, which would give voters a week in advance to vote in case they were not available on Election Day.

No vote was made on the bill, and Green said he hoped the Committee to act sooner rather than later.

We talked to Barracuda Networks, a California-based company best known for its spam and virus firewalls. The company also offers storage, backup and e-mail archiving solutions.

The controversy originated from a Boston Globe request to review e-mails from advisers to Mayor Thomas M. Menino. But city hall could only account for 18 e-mails sent or received in a six month period from Michael J. Kineavy, Menino’s Cabinet chief of policy and planning and one of his closest advisers. City hall acknowledged that Kineavy deletes his e-mails on a daily basis, which circumvents the city’s nightly backup process. The city has said Kineavy’s actions exploited a glitch in the backup process because he both deleted his messages from his inbox and cleared his deleted items folder.

Government officials’ e-mails are a matter of public record.

Kineavy has since taken an unpaid leave of absence. But could this all have been prevented?

After talking with Barracuda and doing some of our own research, it is clear that City Hall addressed the issue of preserving its e-mail messages incorrectly. Boston’s backup process is a poor solution for archiving e-mails, and it runs contrary to accepted best practices.

“Relying on users to save e-mails (i.e. ‘do the right thing’) and not delete e-mails is prone to failure as people can mistakes,” said Barracuda spokeswoman Kylie Heintz.

Having faith in traditional backup systems is not the right answer. Even without the “glitch” that allowed e-mails to be permanently deleted, the City of Boston’s approach to ensuring all e-mails are saved by backing up the e-mail system was not ideal.

–

There is a functional difference between “archiving” and “backing up.”

Archiving is like storing e-mails in a filing cabinet in your office or an alphabetized library card catalog. Backup is like locking them all in a safe deposit box in the bank, behind a time-lock and a password that only the bank manager knows.

Backup systems typically compress all the files and messages into a single file — similar to “zipping” your photos so they take up less room on your hard drive. This creates another problem, because it’s more difficult to search inside these compressed files.

Even if Kineavy hadn’t deleted his e-mails, it still may have been difficult for the city to find, isolate and release his messages.

A backup process is routine, predictable and easy for an end-user to avoid. These processes rely on the end-user’s system. Products like the Barracuda Message Archiver and many of its competitors completely take the end-user out of the equation. An archiver is ideal in these situations, because these products save messages at the server level. Whenever an e-mail is sent or received by the server, the archiver takes it, copies it, saves it and makes a search-able index so that messages can be found later on.

Since public officials’ e-mails need to be saved, it is expected that they will need to be searched through at some point in time — like if a journalist requests copies of them. Backup systems are not designed with archiving in mind. The only way to access e-mails from backup systems is to restore the backup file and then manually search through the results. This is very time consuming, error prone and expensive.

Several cities in Massachusetts use hardware archiving solutions, and Heintz confirmed that some used Barracuda’s Message Archiver. None of the cities would go on the record for Blast, however, given the controversy surrounding e-mail

Boston’s backup script was a good solution for a disaster or system failure, but not necessarily the best solution for a public records request. Archiving is a superior method for public records requests.

“Organizations have needs for both,” according to Aseem Asthana, Message Archiver Product Manager at Barracuda Networks. Backup is vital to organizations. If something happens to an e-mail server, or a natural disaster wipes the server out, a backup can be used to restore all the data present at the time of the backup. But pulling individual files is more difficult. Often, an information technology professional is required to restore individual files from a backup.

An archiver, as opposed to a backup, allows e-mails to be accessed readily and seamlessly.

Menino’s office did not respond to a request to comment on this story.

We acknowledge that Barracuda is a for-profit company. Its Message Archiver starts at $1,999, but it would cost about 10 times that for a model amped up to serve a major city like Boston.

But it would also have saved a few headaches and maybe prevented Boston’s E-mailgate scandal.

John M. Guilfoil of the Blast staff contributed to this report.

Clarification: We changed the sentence “A backup process is routine, predictable and avoidable.” to “A backup process is routine, predictable and easy for an end-user to avoid.”

According to George F. Noonan, Emerson College’s police chief and director of public safety, the victim was leaving the movie theater when she was approached by a man in his 30s or 40s, who made her sit on a park bench near a bus stop and then touched her “in an inappropriate and impermissible manner,” Noonan said.

The student escaped without physical injury and immediately went to campus police. The suspect is described as white, with a birthmark on the right side of his bald head. He was wearing a gray suit at the time. Campus and Boston police are investigating.

The president, a former Harvard Extension student, was invited by the university to host an open-ended forum with college students. The protesters represented those disquieted by the possibility of a referendum that would allow Uribe to run for a third term in 2010. Students at Harvard also presented the president with a letter encouraging the president to cede his position in the name of democracy, arguing that a third term would go against the fundamentals of the country’s constitution.

“We believe that such a decision will weaken the rule of law, as well as threatening the separation of powers of the Colombian state,” the students wrote in their letter.

While Uribe did not formally announce his intention to seek a third term, the actions of the legislature clearly suggest that he could follow the growing trend of Latin American leaders amending their Constitutions in order to extend their time in power.

Students tried from every angle to get him to disclose his intentions, but Uribe asserted that what he ultimately seeks is a competent leader for his people. “My own destiny does not depend on me, it depends on the constitutional court, on the people and on my God,” Uribe said. “Of course, I consider that it’s much better for my country to have many leaders committed with the general principles that we are fighting for, but, at the same time, … we have lived (through) many, many years of weak governments.”

Uribe also spoke of how his administration has improved the country on many fronts, including his record on human rights, health care, labor laws and public safety.

“This is the government that has recovered freedom in Colombia,” Uribe said. “During our administration, we have received over 51,000 terrorists members who have demobilized.”

He encouraged people to visit Colombia, ending the forum by saying that “the only risk of going to Colombia is wanting to stay.”

Click here to download the map now so that you’ll never get lost again.

Savoie, who would now be 45 years-old, went missing on April 7, 1974 after leaving his State Road home to shine his shoes and buy an Easter present for his mother. Savoie, 36 years ago, was last seen wearing blue pants, a blue sweater, brown shoes, and a white shirt reading, “Try it, you’ll like it.” He had blue eyes and brown hair and stood at about 4’ tall.

On the day of his disappearance, Savoie left home with a shoe shine kit that was returned to his mother later that afternoon by the owner of a Revere restaurant. The owner told Savoie’s mother that the boy had left it there before heading to Revere Beach.

Reardon told media he believes the case is still very much alive and the prospect of finding Savoie is still “worthy of our best efforts.”

Conley shares Reardon’s sentiment. “As long as there’s hope – hope of finding Leigh or hope of finding justice for him – we will not rest. With law enforcement resources bolstered by the Carole Sund/Carrington Foundation, and with the public’s assistance, we have a chance to write this story’s final chapter.”

The Carole Sund/Carrington Foundation, a private organization that funds rewards for missing persons cases, posted the $5,000 reward.

Savoie is currently listed as missing, however if evidence is discovered that renders the case a homicide, State police will overtake the matter.

Anyone with any information regarding Savoie’s disappearance, no matter how trivial, is urged to contact Revere Police at 781-286-8203 or State Police at 617-727-8817. Those who had relations with the boy or family in the early 1970s are also asked to call.

Prosecutors said Woodward, a former English teacher at Foxborough High School, had viewed and downloaded images of young girls, under the age of 12, having sex and engaged in sexual acts with adult men, and that he had been viewing such images for several years. The FBI found thousands of images of child pornography on his computers at home.

Some of the young girls were known to the government and provided victim impact statements which were read aloud at Woodward’s sentencing hearing. At the hearing, prosecutors also said that Woodward, while in prison awaiting sentencing, wrote stories and hand-drew pictures of young girls being raped, tortured and mutilated and passed them around to other inmates.

According to the Globe, 168 passengers and six crew were on-board American flight 1640, which left Miami around 9:30 p.m. and returned 45 minutes later. Passengers got off, were bused to the terminals and got on another plane.

No one was hurt, and officials did not comment on any possible arrests.

Clark was taken into custody Tuesday, but released after he volunteered a DNA sample.

According to The New Haven Register, police have now obtained a DNA match that implicates Clark in the strangling death of the student, who was supposed to get married last Sunday.

Clark is holed up in a motel in Cromwell, Conn., and police have told the Register that he could be arrested at any time and charged in Le’s death.

ABC News has reported that Clark text messaged Le on the day of her disappearance. ABC News also said that Clark had wounds on his back, his chest and arms after Le’s death.

Raymond Clark, 24, of Middletown, Conn. was taken into custody by police Tuesday. Officers searched his home also.

But DNA appears to have cleared Clark from wrongdoing.

The question remains, now, who murdered the tiny, helpless grad student who was supposed to have gotten married last Sunday?

According to the New Haven Register, Jared Rohrig, 25, is charged with first-degree sexual assault and criminal impersonation in the case.

“Jared Rohrig’s decision to resign from his position as probationary officer was in his best interest as well as the best interests of the town of Orange, Police Chief Robert Gagne said in a statement released to the Register Tuesday morning.

The alleged assault happened July 18. Police said Jared pretended to be his brother Joseph, but the woman he is accused of assaulting realized she was being duped when she saw a cowboy on Jared’s buttocks. Joseph doesn’t have such a tattoo.

But the whole story takes a sour and violent turn when the victim tries to leave and is allegedly stopped and then assaulted by Jared.

The two brothers live at home with their parents. Their mom, Joanne is on the board of education in Milford, Conn. She said she would not be running for re-election, in order to spend some more time with her family.

Police have now switched from a missing person investigation to a homicide case, said New Haven Assistant Police Chief Peter Reichard, in a press conference Sunday night.

“Detectives and investigators have a large amount of physical evidence on the scene that we’re going through to determine if it’s linked to this case or not,” Reichard said.

Bloody clothing was found above ceiling tiles in the same Yale building on Saturday, according to reports.

Le, 24, was last seen at the 10 Amistad St. building this past Tuesday. Her family has been notified about the finding of a body, Reichard said.

“Our hearts go out to Annie Le’s family, fiancé and friends, who must suffer the additional ordeal of waiting for the body to be identified,” said Yale President Richard Levin, in a statement to the Yale community. “I have met again with her family and conveyed to them the deeply felt support of the Yale community.”

WTNH-TV New Haven reported that bloody clothing has been found above ceiling tiles in a Yale University building where missing graduate student Annie Le was last seen.

The sources told WTNH News Channel 8 reporter Erin Cox the area where the items were found is now considered a crime scene, but New Haven police officials would only say that “no body has been found.”

Le has not been seen since sometime on Tuesday.

The grad student was supposed to get married on Sunday, but the family has canceled the ceremony.

The local newspaper, The New Haven Register, reported that police are about to brief reporters on the situation.

Anyone with information pertaining to Le’s disappearance is asked to call the FBI tip line at 877-503-1950.

Annie Le, 24, went missing on Tuesday. Credit: Yale University

Police at Yale University have issued a missing person’s report on 24-year-old Pharmacology student Annie Le. Le, according to police, left her purse, money and credit cards, her cell phone and all of her identification behind before vanishing earlier this week.

Le was last seen wearing “a knee length brown skirt, bright green short sleeved T-shirt, brown shoes and a brown necklace,” the New Haven Register reports. She was last seen outside Yale’s School of Medicine on 10 Amistad St., this past Tuesday.

Le has no medical conditions that could explain her absence, and apparently has no access to a vehicle. She is 4-foot-11 inches tall and of Asian descent with brown eyes and straight shoulder-length brown hair, weighing about 90 pounds.

CNN reports Le was scheduled to be married Sunday to Columbia University grad student Jonathan Widawsky. Widawsky has not heard from his fiancée. Le’s family is assisting Yale, Connecticut and New Haven police, as well as the FBI, with the case.

Anyone with any information is urged to contact the Yale Police Department at 203-432-4400.

I commend the president for strong leadership on health care. This President is clearly prepared to seize the best chance we have had in generations to deliver security and stability for those Americans who have health insurance and affordable choices for those Americans who don’t.

Massachusetts has the most successful experiment in health care reform in the country right now, with nearly 98 percent of our residents with the peace of mind of adequate, reliable coverage. We accomplished this because people reached across all kinds of differences and recognized that our choices were not limited to the usual two: a perfect solution or no solution at all. The President has challenged the Congress to do the same, and to do so quickly. The best health and economic interests of the American people are at stake.

It is more than a little disappointing to see the House minority leader announce that Republicans will not vote for health care reform whatever the final bill contains — even though many of the ideas incorporated in the President’s plan come from Republican leaders. Tonight some Republicans even showed by their lack of decorum that they are more committed to a campaign of distortion than to facing up to one of the greatest challenges before the American people.

The people of America are ready for change. The president is leading the way. It’s time for the Congress to close the deal.

Canton selectman Bob Burr, 43, is the first Republican to stand up and say he's running for Senate.

The day after former Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey decided not to run for the US Senate seat vacated with death of Ted Kennedy, we thought State Senator Scott Brown (R-Wrentham) might announce his candidacy, but it was an obscure town selectman who became the first Republican to officially announce he is running for Senate.

Bob Burr, a three-term selectman from Canton, a town 20 minutes south of Boston, announced his candidacy Monday.

Burr, 43, gets press coverage for being first. He makes up in balls what he lacks in statewide or national experience.

“This election represents a great opportunity for the people of Massachusetts to shape the future for a stronger America,” Burr said in a statement. “By electing a Republican to the United States Senate, the people of Massachusetts can ensure that there will be debate on the issues affecting healthcare, taxes, and deficit spending. If the Senate were to remain at a 60 member, filibuster proof, Democratic majority, I fear that opportunity will be lost in the coming months. And that loss could put America on a trajectory that is not necessarily in concert with desires of the American people.”

Burr is a 1989 graduate of Boston College with a degree in business.

Dunn’s reporting revealed a pattern of at best unscrupulous and at worst blatantly racist behavior by Emerson over several decades of tenure review.

House and another professor named Pierre Desir, who are both black, were denied tenure last year. They were the only professors denied tenure, and they were the only professors who were black.

House filed a complaint with the state Commission Against Discrimination last year.

According to Dunn’s latest reporting, Emerson agreed to take both professors back without tenure. House agreed, and he will be re-reviewed in 2011 for promotion. Desir appears to have declined, and he will not be returning this fall.

Dunn has reported that in Emerson Colllege’s 129-year history, it has never promoted a tenured black male faculty member, even though tenure is usually accompanied by a promotion from assistant to associate professor.

Dunn wrote a series of articles last spring attracting national attention and leading the school to convene an independent review of its tenure process.

The Beacon could not reach house Wednesday night for comment.

Walsh, (D-Boston) who covers a district that includes Boston College, is sponsoring legislation that would ban any alcohol-related advertising on state-owned property. The crazies in the anti-alcohol (and even the anti-advertising) lobby have joined, and they are calling on the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (The T) to join in and ban alcohol ads on buses, trains and stations.

No other state in the US has such an advertising ban, which would eliminate things like billboards and limit advertisements for locally-owned wine and spirits shops, which is simply a bad idea in this economy.

“It is unfathomable that in the midst of an epidemic of underage drinking in Massachusetts, a government agency would allow alcohol advertising on public property,” said Amy Helburn of the collaborative, “Supporting an Alcohol Advertisement Free Environment,” in a statement supporting Walsh’s legislation.

The bill also has the support of a group called “Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood.”

Because that’s possible.

Ok. You’ve heard the facts and seen what’s proposed.

This is never going to happen.

It’s a perennial bad idea like many that come up each year from a relatively new and a creepy alliance of teetotalers and helicopter parents.

Blast is the only media outlet that’s entirely run by Generation Y, so let me be as frank with you as possible: The ads aren’t screwing up your kids. Teens don’t start drinking because a whimsical frog says so.

Young people don’t start drinking because of commercials or billboards. Young people start drinking for two reasons. First, they start drinking because it’s (perhaps only in the US) considered a rebellious taboo. And second, the vast and overwhelming majority of American adults drink.

But that alone is a pretty poor argument against liquor legislation. The fact is alcohol is dangerous. It kills people and can lead people to do things that can hurt them or others. Like all vices, it’s users, especially young people, are not taught moderation. In fact, the only people telling us to “drink responsibly” are the liquor companies in their commercials!

I’ve seen lives ruined by alcohol, but I’ve also seen lives ruined by overbearing colleges that take away scholarships, throw students out of residence halls, charge fines and publicly embarrass students for a first time alcohol offense. I’ve seen college newspapers report the names of students that got caught with a beer in their hands. I’ve seen them come into my office when I was in the Northeastern University student government in tears when they got turned away from internships and jobs because of it. I’d need a drink, too, if my school just ruined my life.

HEY, OLD PEOPLE: Listen up.

Your precious little honor student is going to drink when he or she gets to college. (They’re also going to have sex, a lot, and they might even try pot!) More than 90 percent of college students drink. You wanna help them? Teach them responsibility. Teach them to know their own limits. Give them cash for a cab. Teach them the warning signs of alcohol poisoning so they don’t leave some kid in a bathroom to die.

Commercials aren’t the problem. There is a much deeper issue here. Alcohol, sex, smoking, marijuana, etc. etc. etc. The more you tell someone “no” without an explanation, the more curious they become. If Massachusetts is such a liberal bastion, they should do something really radical: teach kids safe sex and drinking in moderation.

Let’s start small: Colleges could give students the phone number of a cab service instead of a pamphlet of vague threats.

Just don’t waste my time trying to convince me that it’s all the commercials’ fault.

Dr. Harry Rubash, chief of orthopedic surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital, performed Patrick’s surgery and she he was “alert and resting comfortably.”

“The procedure lasted approximately 2 1/2 hours without any complications,” Rubash said. “Gov. Patrick is expected to remain in the hospital for four to five days, followed by a few weeks of outpatient rehabilitation.”

Lt. Governor Timothy P. Murray will assume the governor’s responsibilities while Patrick is in the hospital.

His co-defendant and close gang associate Todd Donofrio, 39, of Stoughton, was sentenced to 10 years to be followed by five years of supervised release. Both pleaded guilty in October 2008.

The two men were arrested in July 2007 during a raid on their Taunton clubhouse. The search turned up 17 guns, $100,000 in cash and 116 grams of cocaine.

Silvia, 44, and Donofrio were charged in connection with “Operation Roadkill”, a two-year investigation in Southeastern, Mass. The operation has resulted in charges against 15 members and associates of the “Outlaws”, according to the FBI.

The case against Silvia and Donofrio was investigated by the FBI, Massachusetts State Police, Taunton Police, Brockton Police and the Plymouth County sheriff’s department.

The Outlaws Motorcycle Club was established in Illinois in 1935. Today the gang, who’s main rival is the Hell’s Angels, has more than 200 chapters across North America, Asia, Australia and Europe.

Edward Moore Kennedy was born in St. Margaret’s Hospital in Dorchester on February 22, 1932, preceded by eight brothers and sisters, to Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and Rose Fitzgerald, both from well-connected Irish-American families. As a result of several moves, to New York, Florida, and London, Kennedy attended many schools and was a mediocre student at most of them. He spent his high school years at Milton Academy where he maintained average grades and excelled on the football team.

Tragedy marked his life early on, and by age 16 he had suffered the deaths of three of his siblings: Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. in World War II, Rosemary Kennedy to a failed lobotomy, and Kathleen Agnes Kennedy in a plane crash.

After completing high school, Kennedy enrolled in Harvard University, where his grades once again took a back seat to his football career. He had a friend take his Spanish exam in hopes of maintaining high enough grades to continue his sports career. When caught, both were expelled, leading to a stint in the United States Army for Kennedy in 1951.

Thanks to his father’s political connections, he was never assigned to combat in the ongoing Korean War and instead served as an honor guard in Paris after completing basic training and Military Police school.

Shortly after he was discharged as a private first class in March 1953, Kennedy returned to Harvard to finish his studies and, after his sophomore year academic probation ended, his football career as a second string end, working his way up to starting end by senior year. Despite not receiving a varsity letter he was contacted by a Green Bay Packers recruiter with an offer to play professionally, which he turned down to go to law school and “go into another contact sport: politics.”

While attending the University of Virginia School of Law between 1956 and 1959, Kennedy studied abroad at the Hague Academy of International Law and managed his brother John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s 1958 Senate re-election campaign, helping to achieve a record-setting landslide victory. He also received charges of reckless driving and operating without a license, the first of his vehicle-related incidents.

He graduated from law school and was admitted to the Massachusetts Bar in 1959, after marrying Virginia Joan Bennett on November 29, 1958, at St. Joseph’s Church in Bronxville, New York. They had three children together: Kara Anne, Edward Jr., and Patrick. Due to his womanizing and her growing alcoholism, the marriage was soon troubled.

In 1960, Ted’s brother John ran for president, and Ted managed his campaign in the Western States, helping John win the first battleground state of Wisconsin in the Democratic primary. After the general election, Ted wanted to remain out West and not run for office immediately, and he was not eligible for John’s vacated Massachusetts Senate seat until his 30th birthday on February 22. Instead, John asked Governor Foster Furcolo to name Benjamin A. Smith II to the seat, which would hold it so Ted could later run in a special election.

Rehashing his brother’s campaign slogan from 10 years prior, Ted Kennedy went against Massachusetts Attorney General Edward J. McCormack Jr., who said that Ted would be “one Kennedy too many.” He faced his first public scandal when McCormack revealed his Harvard expulsion publically, but Kennedy rose above this, aided by McCormack’s overbearing nature in a debate, in which he said “the office of United States Senator should be merited, not inherited,” and called Kennedy’s campaign a joke. Kennedy went on to crush McCormack in the primary by a two-to-one margin and Republican candidate George Cabot Lodge II in the November special election.

Ted Kennedy spent his early Senate career avoiding the spotlight and trying to avoid making enemies of the older, more established Senators, and instead focused on his committee work. Not long after his career started, while presiding over the Senate, he was informed of his brother John’s assassination on November 22, 1963. Seven months later, Ted suffered severe injuries in a plane crash in Southampton, Mass., including a punctured lung, broken ribs, and internal bleeding, and a back injury that persisted throughout the remainder of his life. The pilot and one of his aides died in the crash.

For a review of some of Ted Kennedy’s major political accomplishments, read Dan Kennedy’s piece for Blast on the Lion’s legacy.

In 1968, after securing the California primary against President Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, the family member Ted was closest with, was assassinated, devastating the young Senator. He delivered a eulogy at his speech, which included one of his most famous quotes:

My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life; to be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.
Those of us who loved him and who take him to his rest today, pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him: ‘Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.’

Seen by many as the natural successor to his brother, Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago and others encouraged Kennedy to make himself available for a draft to take the nomination, though he declined as he felt unprepared and did not want to be seen as a filler now that his brothers were gone.

With his brothers dead, Ted took on the role of paternal figure to their 13 children, and rumors persist that he coordinated the marriage of Jacqueline Kennedy and Aristotle Onassis.

Despite the trauma and hardships he had recently suffered, Kennedy threw himself into his work and became the youngest ever Senate Majority Whip in 1969, a move that seemed to further position him for the presidency, which he still felt conflicted about.

A few months later, Kennedy was involved in what is now known as the “Chappaquiddick incident.” After leaving a party for the Boiler Room Girls, a group of women who had helped in Robert’s presidential campaign, Kennedy drove his 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88 off the Dike Bridge and into the Poucha Pond inlet. He quickly swam to safety, but his passenger, Boiler Room Girl Mary Jo Kopechne, drowned. Kennedy did not report the incident to police until her body was found the next day.

Kennedy received a suspended sentence after a guilty plea to leaving the scene of an accident a week later, and gave a nationally-broadcasted speech in which he avoided admitting guilt to driving under the influence of alcohol or improper relations with the 28-year old Kopechne, but expressed his decision to leave the scene as “indefensible.” Despite the scandal, Kennedy received a positive response to stay in office from the Massachusetts electorate.

Doubts have clouded the reports of the events of that night, and to this day many question Kennedy’s story, which a secret inquest by Judge James A. Boyle found to be inconsistent. A grand jury on Martha’s Vineyard also conducted an inquest which was inconclusive. Kennedy condemned Boyle’s inquest, which was made public after the local inquest’s report, as “not justified.”

Kennedy overcame the allegations and easily won re-election the year following the incident, 1970, but lost his position as Majority Whip to Robert Byrd of West Virginia, which he confided to Byrd was a blessing as it allowed him to focus on his committee work.

Kennedy spent much of the 1970s focused on real political work, pushing through legislation such as the National Cancer Act of 1971 and working tirelessly on issues such as the conflict in Northern Ireland, health insurance reform and campaign finance reform. He repeatedly entertained thoughts of running for president, but family problems and the ongoing coverage of the Chappaquiddick incident kept him from committing, despite polling suggesting he could easily win the primary and the lack of other viable Democratic candidates.

In 1973, Kennedy’s son Edward Jr. was diagnosed with chondrosarcoma, resulting in a leg amputation. His other son, Patrick, was suffering from severe asthma attacks, and Ted’s wife Joan sunk deeper into her alcoholism, resulting in several stints in instutitions and an accident due to drunk driving leading to her arrest.

In the late mid to late 70s, Kennedy was at his lowest point politically, as he found himself without a chairmanship and Carter taking the reins as the ranking Democrat. Carter’s differing priorities put a strain on Kennedy’s efforts to improve health care, and he instead focused on international good will, visiting China and the Soviet Union in 1977 and 1978. He rose to take the mantle of Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, but suffered another blow when Carter refused to back the $60 billion price tag of his proposed national health care plan.

In an unusual bid to unseat Carter, a member of his own party, Kennedy eventually ran for president in the 1980 election, and was the favored candidate due to Carter’s unpopularity and weak stances on many issues, but he ultimately lost, in part due to negative press regarding his answer to the Chappaquiddick incident question and the electorate’s sudden support of the president during the Iranian hostage situation and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. When Carter badly bruised Kennedy in the Iowa caucuses, many of Kennedy’s key fundraisers bailed, and it was a downward slope from there. Kennedy, however, clung to his fearless nature, no doubt earned on the grid iron in high school and at Harvard, and pushed his campaign all the way to the Democratic National Convention despite almost impossible odds, but conceded the nomination when his measure to free delegates from their voting commitments was defeated on the first night of the convention. Ultimately, Carter’s inability to win over Kennedy supporters aided in his defeat to Ronald Reagan in the general election.

In 1981, Kennedy faced unique challenges, including being a minority member of the Senate for the first time, and announcing his divorce from Joan Kennedy, settling for $4 million in 1982 after a relatively benign proceeding. Kennedy, meanwhile, tirelessly fought against policies of the Reagan administration, once again turned down calls for a 1984 presidential run, and embarked on a landmark trip to South Africa, staying at the home of Bishop Desmond Tutu, which could easily have cost him his life in the tumultuous apartheid atmosphere of the time. He later went on to be a key member of arms control talks with Mikhail Gorbachev under the Reagan administration; despite political differences, he and the president respected each other and maintained amicable relations.

After his divorce, drinking and womanizing became more of a public burden for Kennedy, and he was involved in drunken incidents with fellow Senator Chris Dodd in Washington, including allegedly unwanted physical contact with a waitress in a D.C. restaurant. These factors played a big role in his cutting short any plans of running in the 1988 presidential election.

Following the 1986 Congressional elections, the Democratic Party regained control of the Senate. As a result of his good working relationship with many prominent Republicans, Kennedy was once again one of the most powerful men in Washington, and used his position to effectively defeat Reagan’s nomination of Judge Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, which he saw as a threat to the civil rights he had fought so hard for. Kennedy used caustic tactics, including a speech which painted a picture of Bork’s America as a land of back alley abortions and segregation, which many saw as slanderous, but which was ultimately effective.

The 1990s saw Kennedy’s flaws magnified, through rape charges against his nephew following a night of drinking with the elder Kennedy, which Kennedy suppressed with a negative press campaign, as well as many articles and jokes about his conduct with women and his persistent drunken antics. This image put him in a position of ineffectiveness against the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, which he opposed due to Thomas’ refusal to comment on Roe v. Wade. His silence on the issue hurt Democrats chances of blocking the nomination, but to speak out would have been regarded as highly hypocritical.

The acquittal of his nephew, William Kennedy Smith, and his serious relationship with Victoria Anne Reggie, which led to their marriage in 1992, improved his image, and Victoria is credited with stabilizing his personal life, which let him focus on the larger challenges ahead, including his fight against Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America legislation which earned his title of Lion of the Senate, alater challenge from Republican Mitt Romney for his Senate seat, and his defense of President Bill Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky scandal. More recently, Kennedy served as a voice against the Iraq War from the start, though he supported the overthrow of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

By far his most passionate endeavour was the reform of health care in America, “the cause of his life,” he said, but which he died unable to attain. After a seizure in May of 2008, doctors announced Kennedy suffered from a malignant glioma, a brain tumor. After a risky operation to remove the tumor, which was considered a success, Kennedy underwent chemotherapy and radiation therapy. His condition declined quickly over the next year, and he died at his home in Hyannis Port, MA on August 25, 2009.

Frederick Rincon contributed research for this story.

Health care reform was one of Kennedy’s flagship issues and a cornerstone of his policy throughout his decades in the Senate. By naming the bill after him, many hope that he will accomplish in death what he was not able to in life, another in a long line of personal and publicized tragedies in his expansive career.

Byrd’s full statement:

I had hoped and prayed that this day would never come. My heart and soul weeps at the lost of my best friend in the Senate, my beloved friend, Ted Kennedy.

Senator Kennedy and I both witnessed too many wars in our lives, and believed too strongly in the Constitution of the United States to allow us to go blindly into war. That is why we stood side by side in the Senate against the war in Iraq.

Neither years of age nor years of political combat, nor his illness, diminished the idealism and energy of this talented, imaginative, and intelligent man. And that is the kind of Senator Ted Kennedy was. Throughout his career, Senator Kennedy believed in a simple premise: that our society’s greatness lies in its ability and willingness to provide for its less fortunate members. Whether striving to increase the minimum wage, ensuring that all children have medical insurance, or securing better access to higher education, Senator Kennedy always showed that he cares deeply for those whose needs exceed their political clout. Unbowed by personal setbacks or by the terrible sorrows that have fallen upon his family, his spirit continued to soar, and he continued to work as hard as ever to make his dreams a reality.

In his honor and as a tribute to his commitment to his ideals, let us stop the shouting and name calling and have a civilized debate on health care reform which I hope, when legislation has been signed into law, will bear his name for his commitment to insuring the health of every American.

God bless his wife Vicki, his family, and the institution that he served so ably, which will never be the same without his voice of eloquence and reason. And God bless you Ted. I love you and will miss you terribly.

In my autobiography I wrote that during a visit to West Virginia in 1968 to help dedicate the “Robert F. Kennedy Youth Center” in Morgantown, “Senator Kennedy’s voice quivered with emotion as he talked of his late brothers and their love for West Virginia. ‘These hills, these people, and this state have had a very special meaning for my family. Our lives have been tightly intertwined with yours.’

I am sure the people of the great state of West Virginia join me in expressing our heartfelt condolences to the Kennedy family at this moment of deep sorrow.

But what did Kennedy actually do? The answer: More than I can possibly detail here. He was the author of more than 2,500 bills and the driving force behind many of the most important liberal initiatives of the past 50 years. His biographer Adam Clymer wrote in 1999 that Kennedy “deserves recognition not just as the leading senator of his time, but as one of the greats in its history.”

If you’re a student dependent on federal loans to attend college, Ted Kennedy was there for you.

If you use a wheelchair and are worried that an employer might discriminate against you, the Americans with Disabilities Act — another Kennedy legacy — will protect you.

If you’re barely scraping by at a minimum-wage job, your wages would be even lower were it not for Kennedy’s tireless efforts on behalf of the working poor.

And though Kennedy never succeeded in his decades-long quest for universal health care, he managed — by working with Republican senators such as his unlikely friend Orrin Hatch of Utah — to extend coverage to poor children who had previously fallen through the cracks.

As Boston Globe reporter Susan Milligan writes, Kennedy’s name also appears on hundreds of bills that don’t necessarily fit with his liberal image, but that helped shape American society in profound ways — from deregulation of the airline industry to helping the second President Bush pass his No Child Left Behind legislation — an action Kennedy came to regret after Bush refused to fund it fully.

And when Bush broke the law by ordering secret, warrantless wiretaps as part of his anti-terrorism efforts, it was a law — the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — that Kennedy had helped write some three decades earlier.

Ted Kennedy was a deeply flawed human being whose many years of boozing and womanizing had, by the early ’90s, made him a symbol of excess. A night of drinking in Palm Beach, Fla., leading to rape charges against his nephew William Kennedy Smith (who was acquitted), nearly ended his career — a career that may well have culminated in the presidency were it not for an earlier scandal over his role in the death of a young campaign aide named Mary Jo Kopechne.

By 1994, Kennedy was on the ropes and vulnerable to a challenge. The Republican candidate that year was Mitt Romney, a telegenic Republican businessman whose crisp soundbites, wholesome lifestyle, and vague if generally liberal agenda seemed more than a match for the aging incumbent.

Yet Kennedy, newly remarried and with his self-acknowledged alcohol problem apparently under control, rose to the occasion, besting Romney in a nationally televised debate at Faneuil Hall in which he brilliantly (if unfairly) invoked the memory of his dead brothers in response to one of Romney’s attacks. (Romney later served as governor of Massachusetts, and ran for president in 2008.)

Kennedy was not above petty politics. I recall following him around Burlington one day in the late 1980s, when I was a reporter for the Daily Times Chronicle of Woburn. Kennedy had just sneaked an amendment into a bill to deny Rupert Murdoch the regulatory waiver he was seeking that would allow him to own both the Boston Herald and WFXT-TV (Channel 25), which Murdoch had just purchased. At every stop, Herald reporter Wayne Woodlief would ask him, “Senator, why are you trying to kill the Herald?”

If Kennedy’s ploy had been aimed at shutting down the Herald, as many suspected, it didn’t work: Murdoch kept the paper and sold the TV station. (Several years later, he sold the Herald to his longtime protégé Pat Purcell and repurchased Channel 25.) The episode led Kennedy’s most caustic critic at the Herald, columnist Howie Carr, to write a particularly memorable lede: “Was it something I said, Fat Boy?”

In a few days, the focus will turn to the question of who will be Kennedy’s successor in the U.S. Senate. The special election that will be held five months from now is likely to be the most wide-open we have seen in Massachusetts since 1984, when Sen. Paul Tsongas retired and was succeeded by John Kerry.

But the next senator from Massachusetts will not match Ted Kennedy’s influence or power. What’s especially sad about his death is that, at his vigorous best, he could have made the difference in President Obama’s push for universal health care, a push that, at the moment, seems to be going nowhere.

Perhaps Democrats and Republicans alike will honor Kennedy’s legacy by coming to an agreement on a bill that will bear his name.