The Massachusetts Appeals Court today reinstated the bulk of a suit against the owner of Dunkin' Donuts franchises in Worcester because of the way one of its employees allegedly reacted to a Black man who ordered food by first delaying his order and then, when he and other employees asked about the delay, tossed the food - and a racial epithet - at him. Read more.
Woodman, spare those trees, well, some of them. Map shows trees to be chopped (blue), saved if possible (red) and left alone (yellow).
Cambridge and Algonquin Gas Transmission today filed a plan that will let the pipeline company use part of a quarter-acre city parcel off Rte. 2 in Lincoln to haul in new equipment for a pipeline facility on the company's adjoining lot. Read more.
A firefighter on Tower Ladder 10 at the 746 Centre St. firehouse in Jamaica Plain today sued the city and Fire Commissioner Paul Burke for the four-day suspension he says he got after the department had done nothing about the poor condition of the sidewalk and driveway outside the station and he wrote directly to the city's chief of streets. Read more.
A Hyde Park homeowner and a Cambridge resident last week filed what they hope will be a class-action suit against Eversource for what they charge is constant false advertising and marketing about the supposed environmental and health benefits of natural gas, claims they say are belied by recent scientific studies and even the company's own statements, even if buried away in footnotes in documents most people will never read. Read more.
A federal judge today dismissed a lawsuit by a former Boston Medical Center registered nurse who sued the hospital after it fired her in October, 2021 for refusing to get vaccinated against Covid-19. Read more.
A group of Tesla owners who feel deceived that their electric cars don't get the range they were promised last week sued Elon Musk and his family trust for taking advantage of them. Read more.
The owners of the violence-plagued Garage on Linden Street and the group that once hoped to turn it into a hi-fi club are now battling in court over the space, even as the Boston Licensing Board plans to consider whether the space still warrants a liquor license. Read more.
Cambridge says a pipeline company that wants to cut down trees on a small city-owned parcel near the city reservoir on the Lincoln/Waltham line is disregarding the law, the rights of the town of Lincoln and the purity of Cambridge drinking water in its demand to use the parcel as a way to get heavy equipment to a neighboring lot for installation. Read more
A Texas developer that wants to build a suburban-style low-rise apartment complex on 14 acres of hillside that a Mattapan church owns off American Legion Highway this week sued both Boston and the BPDA, which has now twice rejected the development proposal as inappropriate for the city. Read more.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court today tossed a lawsuit by the owner of the Davio's chain of Italian steakhouses against its insurer, which had told Davio's that its "all risks" policy did not, in fact, cover all risks, specifically losses from being forced to close or limit service in dining rooms during the Covid-19 pandemic. Read more.
The MBTA this week sued Hitachi Rail, hired to install systems to keep commuter-rail trains from slamming into each other for $50 million for delays in finishing the system on routes in and out of North Station. Read more.
Some residents living near a church-owned "reading room" in Readville that once served as a BPL branch have gone to court to counter the church's own court court effort to win approval to replace the building with a six-unit apartment building even as the Hyde Park Historical Society is offering to buy the building to keep it a public site. Read more.
Possible bad news for people who were hoping for a presidential debate between two virulent anti-vaxxers with Massachusetts ties: A federal judge in Washington, DC this week threw out Shiva Ayyadurai's lawsuit bid to get on presidential ballots, concluding he sued too early, because he has yet to actually try to get on ballots anywhere and get rejected for having been born in Mumbai. Read more.
Two views of Cambridge's land next to the gas-company site, from the company's affidavit.
Update: City responds.
A Texas gas-pipeline company yesterday asked a federal judge to order the city of Cambridge to let it cut down trees on a city-owned lot in Lincoln so it can haul in some pipeline equipment for installation on a neighboring parcel the company owns. Read more.
A group of Rockport residents yesterday filed a federal lawsuit against the way their town is planning on moving forward with rezoning to comply with a state mandate to increase allowable housing density near MBTA stations (federal courts let people file suits even on Sundays). Read more.
One day after it dismissed a lawsuit by some Nantucket residents against wind turbines now being installed south of their island, a federal appeals court dismissed a similar lawsuit by the president of a solar-energy company who has a summer home there. Read more.
A federal appeals court yesterday tossed a lawsuit by a group of Nantucket residents who say the wind turbines now being built off their island will kill endangered right whales. Read more.
A federal appeals court ruled yesterday that Savannah Kinzer, fired from her job at the Cambridge Whole Foods in 2020, should be allowed to continue her wrongful-termination and discrimination suit against the company. Read more.
A federal appeals court yesterday dismissed a lawsuit by the sister of Juston Root, shot 31 times in 3 seconds by Boston and State Police officers along Rte. 9 in Brookline in 2020, ruling that the officers had more than enough reason to fear for their lives and the lives of nearby people, both because he had pulled what appeared to be a gun on officers outside Brigham and Women's Hospital and because when the officers approached they thought he was about to pull a gun on them. Read more.
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