Disqus - Friends of nashuatelegraph

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Trouble at Mine Falls Park? Look to the trees for help

Andrew_Wolfe — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 16:07:01 -0000

Correction: as the photo so clearly illustrates, the new marker signs are rectangular, not diamond shaped. My bad.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Drugs a central issue, city police chief says

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 07:51:35 -0000

The short term answer is "probably not," but that's a good question. The arrest and court logs are published as often as space can be found in the paper for them, not on a regular schedule. I am hopeful that someday soon we may begin publishing them online first, in a more timely way. We get the arrest logs from police nearly every day; we have to gather the court logs ourselves. The logs, however, are not what we were talking about. What we hope to get, and never have before, are numbers for actual reported crimes and arrests, on a regular and highly local basis.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Drugs a central issue, city police chief says

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 15:48:21 -0000

I need to add, The Telegraph will no longer be gathering court logs as of next month. Apparently it's too expensive, and too few people are interested.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Former deputy sheriff cleared of sex charges

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 08:57:59 -0000

There were two sessions of questioning. At first, police questioned Mr. Cote while trying to figure out exactly what had happened. That session ended when Mr. Cote decided he wanted to consult a lawyer. The judge ruled those statements could not be used at trial, because police had taken him into custody and questioned him without reading him his Miranda rights.
The second session took place hours later, after Mr. Cote had been arrested. He had been arrested, and held for several hours at that point. This entire second session was recorded, Miranda warning and all, and played for the jury. Mr. Cote gave a full confession, which he later said was false and coerced. I did not attend the entire trial, and jury deliberations are conducted in secret, so I am reluctant to draw any conclusions about the jury's reasoning, but their verdict suggests that they were inclined to believe Mr. Cote, or had doubts.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Former deputy sheriff cleared of sex charges

Andrew_Wolfe — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 08:40:17 -0000

Police don't need to read Miranda unless a person is in custody (tho ultimately, 'custody' is up to judges and juries to decide). Police routinely ask people with information to come to the station to give statements concerning crimes. If a person then incriminates himself, the police at that point have to stop and read him his rights (or her).
In this case, a judge ruled that Mr. Cote was in custody when police handcuffed him and drove him to the station, so they should have read him his rights at the get-go. I think that in general, the police sometimes bump against or even cross the boundaries it's simply out of enthusiasm for the job. They are supposed to gather evidence of crimes, and help to convict persons responsible for them.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Former deputy sheriff cleared of sex charges

Andrew_Wolfe — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 08:44:00 -0000

You have the general idea, but not exactly. In this case, the judge ruled that Mr. Cote was, in fact, in custody during the initial interview, and thus police should have read him Miranda. Common practice counts for something, but it must comply with the law. NH law says that if the police are going to record an interview (which they are under no obligation to do) they should start at the point where they read Miranda.

Re: Nashuatelegraph.com: Judge won't rethink trial date

Andrew_Wolfe — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 14:40:45 -0000

There was no news black out. I simply failed to notice the significance when I saw his name on the arrest log the next day. I'd never heard of him, and I didn't notice the DC address. I'd like to think it would have occured to me that someone arrested on Jan. 7 with a DC address might be Somebody. In any case, the news took several days to get out, but that's my fault, not Clinton's.

Re: Clinton aide accepts deal in DWI case

Andrew_Wolfe — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 09:15:27 -0000

Speed was the aggravating factor in the DWI charge.

Re: It’s a murder case, not a sports story

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 07 May 2008 20:15:04 -0000

As the reporter who wrote the most recent story on the case (May 6), I challenge you to cite specifics for your claim. The prosecutor said the argument was all about the rivalry. I think we'd be remiss not to report that.
- Andrew Wolfe

Re: Sexual assault plea deal questioned

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 14 May 2008 15:30:43 -0000

They are routine, in the sense that they are common, and it is offensive how common. There are so many, we can't even come close to reporting on all of them... and of course many more are never even reported to police or prosecuted. There are many details in most sexual assault cases that we are unable to report because the information would tend to identify the victim. In this case, the victim was between 13 and 16 at the time of the assault. As for downplaying pedophile cases, check the archives; you're just flat wrong.

Re: Man pleads guilty to sexual assault

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 15 May 2008 08:08:30 -0000

Her case remains pending. She hasn't been convicted, let alone sentenced, so it's premature to say that she's getting off easy (unless you refer to the statutory maximum sentence for child pornography?). The other two women who found the tape apparently learned of it long after it was created (at least, so far as police could charge).

Re: Sexual assault plea deal questioned

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 15 May 2008 09:03:42 -0000

It's not insane; I'm merely stating the facts. We have reported extensively on the sexual abuse of children, and will continue to do so, but we can't fully cover every case, because there are too many of them, and too few of us. Frankly, I don't think people would want to read about it that often. We do report on almost all of the arrests.

Re: State: Baseball had little role in death

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 15 May 2008 20:55:11 -0000

And once again, someone else says otherwise. I don't pretend to know the truth; I wasn't even there. I report what people (presumed to be in a position to know) tell me, or tell the court. In this case, the prosecutor said she was there, the bar owner says not. We reported both statements. When we get more or better information, we will report that too.

Re: Gas-saving tips widely agreed on

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 22 May 2008 12:36:45 -0000

Think how much gasoline would be saved collectively if our state governments would eliminate all toll booths, and simply collect needed highway revenue through the gas tax. All that gas wasted in slowing down, idling in traffic, getting back up to speed, mainly so that the EZ Pass company and a bunch of toll takers can earn a living.

Re: Mom has history of abuse

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 09:17:53 -0000

We've reported about all we can on that issue: it was reported to DCYF, and nothing happened so far as we can tell. By state law, records relating to cases of suspected or actual child abuse are entirely confidential, and DCYF employees are prohibited from talking about any individual case. There are good reasons for this confidentiality, but it also has the effect of making it all but impossible to examine the agency's effectiveness. I have no information on Brittany's current whereabouts or well-being, though obviously she survived the abuse at the time.

Re: City teen sentenced on statutory rape charges

Andrew_Wolfe — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 21:53:24 -0000

Attorney Devine is right, of course. There is no such crime as 'statutory rape' in New Hampshire, technically, just Aggravated Felonious Sexual Assault, Felonious Sexual Assault, and sexual assault. And far too much of all them.

(To anyone coming in late, the original headline I wrote read "City teen sentenced on statutory rape charges")

I was using the term loosely in the headline, to recognize that the crime apparently involved sex that was consensual but for the victim's age... but as I think she is trying to point out, that way leads to absurdity. The crime was charged as AFSA (and not the lesser felony FSA) because she was younger than 13. What if she was, say, eight? Same charge, and I wouldn't have considered using the term 'statutory rape.'

Re: Nashua schools have few reported cases of sexual harassment; family feels they dropped the ball on this one

Andrew_Wolfe — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 12:52:57 -0000

Note to readers: I made the bushleague mistake of spelling the Carmosinos' name wrong in the original (and newsprint) version of this story. I was certain that I had confirmed the correct spelling with the family months ago, but I was mistaken. I have corrected the spelling in the article you see here; the person who posted a comment previously spelled it as they did because that's how it appeared before I fixed it. For what it's worth, I am mortified.

Re: Fugitive captured

Andrew_Wolfe — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 23:26:08 -0000

RE 'don't drop it,' give us a break, will you? This article was posted within SECONDS of his capture. Of course we will have a longer story, with more information tomorrow, as we did at the time of his arrest (and the one before that, and the one before that...)

Re: Mass. man says he molested girl

Andrew_Wolfe — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 08:03:44 -0000

What makes you think that of her? Nothing in the article says that. I would urge everyone to please read carefully (both the story and your own writing) before posting such potentially hurtful comments.

Re: Cops catch teen 'tagger'

Andrew_Wolfe — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:49:49 -0000

My thinking was that to publicize his "tag" would only reward the behavior. Not sure if that was the right call, though. It rhymes with "toys."

Re: Woman held in stabbing

Andrew_Wolfe — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 09:14:00 -0000

She is charged with stabbing her boyfriend, and it happened in her home. I think it's fairly obvious that it is a case of domestic violence, and fail to see how or why any reasonable person would perceive any bias.

Re: Man held on sexual assault charges

Andrew_Wolfe — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 12:27:01 -0000

Read the rest of the sentence. I applaud your reminder, however; it's important to keep in mind that just as not everyone who commits a crime gets caught, not everyone who gets caught has committed a crime.

Re: Milford man's sex assault trial begins

Andrew_Wolfe — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:05:51 -0000

We don't have a booking photo. Some PDs provide them, others do not.

Re: Teens arrested after fight at gunpoint

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:17:00 -0000

Juvenile cases are not public record, so we don't have access to those reports.

Re: Teens arrested after fight at gunpoint

Andrew_Wolfe — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 14:19:02 -0000

The Telegraph was first to report the news, on our Web site Tuesday, soon after the Nashua Police Dept. released information on the arrests.