From her living room window in Hopkinton, Mass., Judy Keefe can make out the spot where tens of thousands of runners line up every April to run 26.2 miles into downtown Boston, a trek she never quite understood but celebrated anyway.

Journalists, athletes and local luminaries — and generations of friends and relatives — relied on her unquestioning hospitality in the hours before, and during, the Boston Marathon. Every year on race day, they turned her modest wood-frame home on East Main Street home into a combination shelter, operations base and party spot.

Keefe, who grew up watching the race before it became a major international event, asked nothing in return. She saw it as a sort of civic duty, a way to help her community look good, and bring strangers together.

“People did a lot of jogging, but it was always a social event for me,” Keefe, 69, said.

The Boston Marathon exerts a strong centripetal force on the region, unifying the city and its neighbors in a daylong rally that is as much about the race as it is a show of provincial pride. Nowhere is this dynamic more apparent than in the homes, businesses and schools that line the route between Hopkinton, in the city's Western suburbs, and Copley Square, in downtown Boston. And at no time is the sentiment more palpable than now, a year after twin bombings rocked the finish line.

• INTERACTIVE GRAPHIC: Along the Route of the Boston Maraton 

Motivated and defiant

The race course is quintessential New England: undulating back roads passing through leafy town commons, tidy old suburbs, wooded preserves, immigrant enclaves, low-slung commercial strips and belts of light industry before confronting the well-appointed townhouses of Brookline and the bustle of Boylston Street.

Most of the outlying communities don’t typically think of themselves as part of Boston. But that changes on the third Monday in April, when hundreds of thousands of people spend the Patriots Day holiday — which marks the opening battles of the Revolutionary War — crammed along the route. They cheer and high-five people they know, and many more they don’t. They cheer the home they share, and its place in history.

“It’s another one of those patriotic, very American, apple pie, baseball kind of things,” said Jane Nelson, who grew up in Framingham, a working-class town with its share of empty storefronts. She works at Silton Glass, where every year she roots on runners in a gaudy red, white and blue outfit. “Even though it’s 26 miles long, you feel like it’s your community. It’s bigger than the little town you live in.”

This year brings added motivation.

Just after the 4-hour mark of the 2013 marathon, two bombs, allegedly set by a pair of brothers, exploded near the finish line. The attack, which killed three people and wounded more than 260, set off a furious four-day manhunt in which a police officer was shot to death, one of the brothers died in a gunfight, and the other brother was found wounded in a Watertown backyard. The Boston Marathon, one of the most prestigious road races in the world, was now infamous as well.

The 2014 marathon, on April 21, is expected to draw 36,000 runners and more than 1 million spectators. Security will be tight, with backpacks prohibited on the route and party hosts urged to be wary of strangers. But people on the route are united in defiant insistence that no one — not even a pair of murderous brothers — will disrupt their special day.

In a way, the marathon represents the end of a year-long grieving process, and the return to a routine.

“I think, and a lot of people I talk to, it’s, ‘They ticked us off and we got our back up, and there’s no way you’re going to ruin this for us,’” Nelson, 64, said.

Life and marathon, entwined

A few miles down the road, in postcard-quaint Natick, Brian Donovan recalled his earliest childhood memory: he is about 4 years old, on the sidelines, watching for his father to run by.

Donovan missed him, but before he could get upset, his dad turned around and picked him up.

“It sounds all cheesy and stuff, but that’s an indelible moment,” Donovan, 39, said.

In later years, Donovan accompanied his father, a state trooper, on a security detail for Johnny Kelley, a Boston Marathon icon who ran the race 61 times and won it twice. They were together at the finish line for the 1982 “Duel in the Sun” between the long-distance legend Alberto Salazar and Dick Beardsley.

Donovan’s father used to tell him that anyone who ran a marathon was a hero. So when Donovan grew up, he began running marathons himself; he has completed seven, including four Boston Marathons.

When he wasn’t running, Donovan always took Patriots Day off to watch the marathon. In 2009, he and his wife bought a house on the route. Now they host race-day parties on their front lawn.

“Everyone has the same thing they’re embracing, whether you’re in Hopkinton or Ashland or you're a student at Wellesley screeching like crazy, or at the firehouse turn,” Donovan said. “In any of these places, you just drop everything.”

Among his friends and neighbors, Donovan had noticed an urgent refusal to succumb to fear of another attack. The 2014 marathon will represent a “big middle finger to terrorism,” he said.

“I think a lot of people are going to be motivated more by, ‘You’re telling me I can’t do something that’s actually good, cheer people on? You’re telling me I can’t do that? Forget that.’”

"This is our race"

Eric Barry is a photographer whose studio faces the route in Wellesley, a well-to-do college town next door. He isn’t much of a racing fan, but he feels a sense of ownership with the Boston Marathon, a rite of spring that attracts an international field of elite competitors.

“This isn’t the Tour de France where you might watch for a couple of minutes and be like, ‘Yeah, this is beautiful’ and whatever,” Barry, 40, said. “You watch it here because this is our race.”

He added: “I don’t think I could just go anywhere and watch a marathon. I’d rather watch paint dry. But this transcends the sport. It’s the fun, the community, and the people really go crazy when they actually see someone who is beating the odds somehow.”

This year, of course, there will be plenty more underdogs to cheer: people injured at the finish line last year, and thousands whose races were cut short.

Molly Tyler, a senior at all-women Wellesley College, is leading the school's effort to make signs for anyone who asks. Each will be posted along the "Scream Tunnel," a pack of hundreds of hollering students that for decades has urged racers to press on as they hit the approximate halfway point of their journey. Requests are way up this year, she said.

"People say things like, 'I didn't get to finish last year, so make this the best sign ever, because I'm finishing,'" Tyler, 21, said.

"Nothing but resolve"

In the hours following last year’s bombing, the Newton Fire Department scrambled to find a way to uplift the surrounding neighborhood, which borders Boston.

The department’s red-brick Station 2 firehouse at the corner of Washington Street and Commonwealth Avenue was a marathon landmark, a popular gathering spot and a crucial turning point in the race at the base of Heartbreak Hill.

“We gotta do something,” Lt. Tom Lopez, a union leader, recalled telling his chief.

By the end of the week, a “Boston Strong” banner hung from the firehouse’s facade. It will remain there through this year’s race. “That sign is a source of pride,” Lopez said.

Throughout the harsh winter, runners training for the marathon have stopped at the firehouse for warmth, or water, or to chat.

Residents, meanwhile, have said they are looking forward to the marathon more than in years past.

“I have not had anybody say to me that they’re not going to go to the race,” Lopez said. “People say, ‘I can’t wait to be there.’ I hear nothing but resolve.”

Driven by memories

Back in Hopkinton, a semi-rural town that feels a world away from Boston, Rick Macmillan pulled out a 60-year-old autograph book in which he's been collecting signatures of marathon runners since he was a young boy. Johnny Kelley's in there. So's four-time champion Bill Rodgers. And three-time winner Sara Mae Berman.

Macmillan, 67, a former Hopkinton fire chief who lives a block or so from the starting line, worries, as he always does, about security. But that won't keep him and his wife from throwing their regular marathon party, popular among runners and race officials and neighbors.

"I'm proud to be a part of it, to maybe contribute as little as we can to keep it going," Macmillan said.

Along with his own marathon memories, Brian Donovan has been thinking about Martin Richard, the 8-year-old boy who was standing at the finish line with his family when one of the bombs exploded, killing him. “I was that kid,” Donovan said. “Standing there, cheering with an ice cream cone.”

Anyone who has been to the Boston Marathon could relate with that, he said.

“How many kids had that same American or Boston kind of experience? We’re going to keep doing it. It’s not going to go away.”

The man who hit and killed an Enfield child nearly seven months ago is now facing criminal charges.

Brian Dolloff, 29, was arraigned on second degree manslaughter, driving under the influence, and other charges in Enfield Superior Court on Tuesday afternoon.

Dolloff was speeding and drunk when he crashed his motorcycle on Broad Brook Road in Enfield back in September, according to the arrest warrant.

Dolloff hit 11-year-old Nico Fillippa who was riding his bicycle at the time. The boy’s mother, a nurse for LifeStar, helped treat her son at the scene before he was taken by ambulance to Bay State Medical Center, the warrant states.

• Enfield Sixth Grader Killed in Crash

“I’m sure you can imagine the trauma that they’ve gone through, so certainly they’re not taking it very well but they are doing OK,” said Jack Cerrato, the family’s attorney, outside court.

Dolloff initially admitted to drinking just one beer that night, but later admitted having a second beer and a double shot of rum, the warrant says.

An hour after the crash, tests determined his blood alcohol content to be .069 which experts say would have been over the legal limit when the crash happened, according to the warrant.

Police also say Dolloff was driving without a motorcycle endorsement.

Dolloff’s supporters left court without comment.

He’s being held on a $50,000 bond and is due back in court May 14.

Members of the NAACP and the ACLU gathered at the East Hartford Police Department on Tuesday to express concern about the death of Jose Maldonado, 22, who died this weekend after being shot with a stun gun inside the department.

"Since 2004, 14 people have died after being tased, ten of which were black or Latino," said David McGuire, an attorney with the ACLU. "That’s 71 percent, so that’s a big racial disparity here and there’s absolutely no oversight of Taser use in Connecticut."

They’re requesting a meeting with the chief of police to discuss what happened and ways to avoid a similar incident in the future. They also want the surveillance video of the booking area where Maldonado was when he was shot with the stun gun.

"Hopefully that will shed some light on this unfortunate incident," said McGuire.

Maldonado was arrested early Sunday morning, after police were called to Nutmeg Lane for a dispute.

According to police, Maldonado had damaged a vehicle at the complex and he fought with officers who tried to take him into custody.

Authorities say he continued to be combative and refused to comply with officers while he was being processed at the East Hartford Police Department. That’s when Officer Jason Kaplan used his taser to subdue Maldonado.

"All the facts and circumstances will be contained in that report," said State Police Lt. Paul Vance.

Lt. Paul Vance said state police are investigating the use of force by Kaplan, who is still on duty. State Police detectives will interview witnesses and go over evidence, as well as get a cause of death from the medical examiner’s office. It’s currently pending further study, according to the medical examiner's office.

After the information is compiled, it will be sent to the state's attorney's office for an independent review on the use of force in this case.

Vance added that law enforcement officers are trained on use of force and what instruments to use.

A Connecticut state’s attorney has found Norwich police justified in fatally shooting 52-year-old Michael Dugas the night of Feb. 24, 2013.

Dugas was shot six times after calling 911 to report a man with a gun on the Norwich green, then standing in the green with his hands – and a pellet gun – in his pockets, according to a report released by State’s Attorney Michael L. Regan.

The report says Dugas had a history of depression and alcohol abuse and had displayed suicidal tendencies. Autopsy results showed his BAC to be .27, more than three times the legal limit to drive.

A friend and neighbor told investigators Dugas had spent much of the day watching TV and drinking vodka at her apartment, according to the report.. Dugas left around 5:30 p.m. but returned an hour later with a cordless phone, which he used to call 911 to say a man with a gun was on the green.

After hanging up with police, Dugas walked over to the green, where he stood with his hands in his pockets, the report says. Officers arrived at the park and asked Dugas to show his hands, a request that Dugas reportedly ignored.

Dugas paced back and forth in the center of the park and told officers not to approach him, according to the report.

“Show us your hands and get on the ground. We want to help you,” the report quotes an officer as saying over the loudspeaker. “We are not here to hurt you, show us your hands and get on the ground.”

When a K-9 arrived at the scene, the officer reportedly told Dugas he had a dog and asked him to get on the ground, warning that he might otherwise be bitten. Dugas did not get down, and instead drew what looked like a revolver and pointed it at the officer, according to the report.

The report says police repeatedly asked Dugas to put down the gun and opened fire when he refused. Officers discharged 41 rounds and Dugas was struck six times. He was handcuffed and taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Dugas’ revolver turned out to be a pellet gun, according to the report. There were no pellets inside, but the gun had been loaded with a carbon dioxide canister, and witnesses said they heard a “pop” before police shot Dugas.

The report concludes that “the use of deadly physical force was appropriate.”

Dugas’ family filed a lawsuit against the city and responding officers late last month, claiming police had used unreasonable, unjustified and excessive deadly force against Dugas.

Seven responding officers were placed on administrative leave during the investigation.

ESPN baseball analyst and former Major League Baseball player Doug Glanville says police racially profiled him in the driveway of his Hartford home, but West Hartford police call the incident a misunderstanding.

It happened while Glanville was digging out his driveway after a storm on Feb. 18.

Police said that, at the time, they were looking for a black man in his 40s wearing a brown jacket and carrying a snow shovel. A West Hartford resident told police the man had knocked on her neighbor’s door and said the neighbors had previous issues with a man asking for money to shovel.

The man was spotted heading east on Fern Street, then crossed into Hartford at Prospect Avenue. This led police to the area of Glanville’s home.

According to police, the responding officer approached Glanville to ask if he had been “seeking work shoveling driveways” and left when Glanville said he had not. The actual man in question turned up at the intersection of South Highland Street and Farmington Avenue in West Hartford and was given a verbal warning.

Glanville said he was offended by the encounter.

“A police officer from West Hartford had pulled up across the street, exited his vehicle, and begun walking in my direction. I noted the strangeness of his being in Hartford—an entirely separate town with its own police force—so I thought he needed help,” Glanville wrote in an essay posted on his Web site. “He approached me with purpose, and then, without any introduction or explanation he asked, ‘So, you trying to make a few extra bucks, shoveling people’s driveways around here?’”

• Read Glanville's essay

Glanville explained that he decided against identifying himself to the officer and instead explained the home was his own.

“The more I talked, the more senseless it seemed that I was even answering the question. But I knew I wouldn’t be smiling anymore that day,” he wrote. “After a few minutes, [the officer] headed back to his vehicle. He offered no apology, just an empty encouragement to enjoy my shoveling. And then he was gone.”

West Hartford police sent out the following statement Tuesday in a news release from Lt. Ted J. Stoneburner:

“While the officer’s actions in searching for the suspicious party were completely appropriate, we wish he had taken the extra time to introduce himself to Mr. Glanville and to explain the purpose of the question. We have discussed this with the officer and will work to remind all of our officers of the importance of good interpersonal skills and taking time, when practical, to explain their actions.”

Police said the chief has been in regular contact with Glanville since the incident was reported.

Glanville played for the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies between 1996 and 2004 and now works as an MLB analyst at ESPN in Bristol, according to his site.

Police are investigating the robberies of a bank and jewelry store in Danbury during which employees were tied and bound Tuesday morning.

The first happened around 10:30 a.m. April 15. Police said three men wearing women’s nylons over their faces walked into the Michael’s Jewelers at 132 Federal Road. One had a dark-colored handgun.

They bound the hands of three female employees and stole an unidentified amount of jewelry, police said.

An ambulance was called to the scene as a precaution.

The second robbery happened about an hour later at the Webster Bank at 105 Mill Plain Road.

Police said two men wearing masks and dark hooded sweatshirts entered the bank and tied up employees. They made off with an unknown amount of money.

No weapon was displayed and no one was hurt, according to police.

Police are investigating the incidents and said they do not appear to be connected.

Anyone who was in the area between 10:15 and 11:45 a.m. and may have noticed something is urged to contact the Danbury Police Detective Bureau at 203-797-4662.

More than 100 gallons of diesel fuel have leaked onto Interstate 84 westbound after a car and tractor-trailer collided near exit 39A in Farmington, according to the state Department of Transportation.

The off-ramp to Route 9 south is closed while crews work to clean the spill. The DOT and Department of Energy and Environmental Protection are responding.

Traffic is delayed on I-84 west in the area of the crash.

Manufacturing company 3M will be shutting down its facility in Enfield, company representatives confirm.

The company, based in Minnesota, has two other locations in Connecticut. The Enfield branch employs 142 employees – 118 production and 24 salaried – all of whom have the option of transferring to Stafford Springs or Meriden.

They can also apply to work at the Minnesota location, where the Enfield operations are being moved.

Representatives said it’s a result of company streamlining. The Enfield facility, located at 250 South Road, will be phased out by the end of 2014.

3M, formerly known as the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company, makes products used in the communications, health care, security and transportation industries, along with home and office supplies.

Instead of flowers and flags, there are overgrown weeds, littered snack-food wrappers and garbage resting over toppled headstones of Civil War veterans in a local cemetery in Hamden. Residents who live near the cemetery are upset over the conditions and it's unclear who is to blame.

The name of the cemetery is not known. There is no sign out in front, but when you do go in the entrance what you do see is downright disrespectful.

"The dead deserve better," said Scott Howland, who feels those buried deserve not to have their names covered with garbage leaves and dirt.

"It's really going to take a community effort to go over there and get it to a state of good repair."

But some community members are trying to figure out where to turn. The Hamden Veterans Commission says the state doesn't own it; neither does the town. Someone does but it's unclear who.

"I wanted to bring a group of kids there on a Saturday to clean up and I was told don't do it," said Elissa Lupi, a member of the veterans' commission in Hamden and a formal social studies teacher at Hamden Middle School.

If she did bring students there it's unknown who would be responsible if someone got hurt.

"It's very old and it needs to become a viable cemetery," Lupi said.

It's even gotten to the point where Howland says the grave of one family's loved one wasn't touched for an entire year. They are graves that are going to need more than just a thorough cleaning, but perpetual care.

"It's better than it has been and other concerned citizens have gone through," Howland added. "I have a lot of military in my family and I can't imagine."

The Rotary Club has tried to beautify the place as well.  Mayor Scott Jackson could not be reached for comment.

In his first major political investment since leaving office, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced plans to build a nationwide network aimed at curbing gun violence and battling the National Rifle Association, according to published reports.

Bloomberg told the New York Times that he is planning to spend $50 million this year to establish the grassroots gun control lobbying group, called Everytown for Gun Safety.

The new organization will encompass two other Bloomberg-funded gun control groups – Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America – and will first take aim at expanding background checks for gun buyers both at the state and national levels, according to the Times. 

Everytown for Gun Safety will borrow from some of the NRA’s field operation tactics to grow influence, targeting mothers and other women that might be swayed on gun issues. The group has already targeted 15 states across the country with varying views on gun control, with the goal of recruiting 1 million new supporters.

“Right now, women, when they go to the polls, they vote on abortion, they vote on jobs, they vote on health care,” Moms Demand Action founder Shannon Watts told the Times. “We want one of those things to be gun violence prevention.”

Bloomberg said he wanted work with both parties on gun control efforts and assembled an advisory board of Republican and Democratic officials, philanthropists and investors.

The former mayor's $50 million contribution would more than double the NRA’s $20 million in annual spending on political activities, the Times reports. Bloomberg hinted that his contributions to the cause could grow.

“I put $50 million this year, last year into coal, $53 million into oceans,” he told the Times. “Certainly a number like that, $50 million. Let’s see what happens.”

Bloomberg and Watts appeared on NBC's TODAY show Wednesday morning to talk about the group.

It feels more like winter than mid-April today, and it looked like it on the roads as well.

Snow fell overnight and roads were icy this morning, which led to several traffic problems, as well as several school delays.

Mike Potiez, of East Windsor, worked the overnight shift and walked out to snow in Vernon this morning.

“I look out the window and I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh. It’s April and it’s hailing out and the next think you know, you see snowflakes and you’re like. ‘This is incredible,’” he said.

It was incredibly frustrating for some drivers who were stuck in traffic behind several crashes , including a tractor-trailer that jackknifed on Interstate 84 in Tolland.

One person was transported to the hospital, according to John C. Littell, director of public safety, emergency management director and fire chief of Tolland.

Department of Transportation crews treated the hills and elevated part of the highway.

There was also a crash on Interstate 91 Southbound in Windsor between exits 36 and 37, which caused a back up for miles.

Route 44 in Pomfret was closed in both directions in the area of Stickney Road due to a crash.

I-95 Northbound in Guilford was also shut down between exits 57 and 58 because of a jackknifed tractor-trailer. The road reopened after about two hours.

Some people just said they were surprised to see the weather turn so cold after days in the 60s and 70s.

“I actually left my car out last night because I didn’t expect snow,” Kathy Ouellette, of Tolland, said.

Michael Deotte, of East Windsor, said he had already turned the heat off for the season.

It is Spring Break for students in several Connecticut communities, but a baseball field in Tolland was white with snow rather than green.

Farmington police have arrested a man who they said is accused of masturbating in the sauna and locker room of a local gym.

Several members of the LA Fitness at 1600 Southeast Road had complained to management about a man masturbating in the sauna and the men’s locker room over a two-month period, police said.

In March, staff of the gym called police, who investigated and obtained an arrest warrant for Vitor Pina, 68, of Newington.

Pina turned himself in on an active arrest warrant on Tuesday and posted bond.
He was charged with public indecency and second-degree breach of peace  and is due in court on April 23.
 

UConn students will be speaking directly with an astronaut on the International Space Station Friday.

Rick Mastracchio, a University of Connecticut alum, is one of six astronauts stationed on the ISS and he will take part in a live question and answer session with students from UConn’s School of Engineering at 12:45 p.m. EST Friday, April 18.

The event will be broadcast live on NASA TV and streamed on the web at http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

Mastracchio, a Waterbury, CT native, graduated from UConn in 1982 with a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering and computer science. 

He has been aboard the space station since Nov. 7, 2013 and is scheduled to return to Earth in May.

He will receive an honorary Doctor of Science degree from the UConn School of Engineering during commencement ceremonies on May 10.

Two New Jersey teens are facing criminal charges after allegedly sharing nude photos of other teens, some of whom were engaging in sex acts, police said.

The Little Falls Police Department said Wednesday that a 16-year-old West Orange boy was arrested after he texted eight naked photos of a 17-year-old girl to a 16-year-old girlfriend from Little Falls.

That friend is then accused of showing the photos to others, and may have posted them on social media, police say. 

The girl is also believed to have sent other videos and photos of underage teens engaging in sex acts to other juveniles.

The teens are charged with endangering the welfare of a child by possessing child pornography. Both teens were released to the custody of their parents.

Police are urging parents to explain to their children that sending, taking and sharing of naked photos of juveniles is a crime. 

A tree came crashing down on the Norwich Animal Control kennel during high winds and rain on Tuesday.

Five dogs are being put up at the Norwichtown Pet Resort & Spa after a tree split the roof of the animal shelter, showering the animals with debris.

"I heard a giant boom and went about three feet up out of my chair," said Norwich Animal Control Officer Michele Kellough, who was there at the time.

Kellough said at first she thought the building had been hit by a truck, but then she checked on the dogs and realized what had happened. She explained that styrofoam was pouring from the ceiling and it was "raining indoors."

The kennel had just enough room for the displaced dogs.

"It's spring break right now, so we're pretty full," said Megan Forstin, who works at the spa.

The dogs are safe and there's even a silver lining – people have expressed interest in adopting some of the shelter dogs.

At least three are still looking for permanent homes. All adoptions must go through Norwich Animal Control.

The tree was removed from the roof of the animal shelter yesterday, according to The Day of New London. There is no estimate on how much damage was caused. 

The Day reports that it could be weeks before the repairs are complete.

Two years after the start of state police dispatch consolidation, Commissioner Dora B. Schriro has finished a preliminary review of the process and plans to make some changes.

Schriro’s “top-to-bottom” review began Jan. 31 and included meetings, data analysis, and a tour of New York City’s 911 call center, according to a release from the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection.

Schriro recommends that all non-emergency administrative calls be handled – in person or over the phone – by the troop at which they’re directed. All 911 calls will continue going to the consolidated locations.

“Although the State Police dispatch consolidation has had its share of challenges, optimal results can still be realized by addressing outstanding issues associated with planning and implementation, improving the handling of 911 and other urgent calls requiring immediate attention, and redirecting administrative requests that are not urgent in nature to the local Troops for the individualized attention they warrant,” Schriro said in a statement Wednesday.

The plan will be field tested at Troops A and D starting today and will be implemented statewide by the fall, according to the release.

“Starting at Troop A and Troop D will give us the opportunity to assess the rollout and make the necessary adjustments prior to statewide implementation and the addition of the working group of in-house experts and an advisory group made up of representatives of Connecticut’s municipalities will significantly enhance our efforts,” Schriro said.
Two groups, one comprising dispatchers, troopers and sergeants and the other made up of city and town leaders, will give feedback on the plan throughout the process.

The consolidation effort began in April 2012, when two dispatch centers in the Western District were rolled into a third. Two others in the Eastern District were consolidated last fall.

Central District dispatch consolidation remains on hold.

Round-the-clock coverage was reinstated at all 11 barracks last month.

LifeStar responded to a serious one-car crash in Woodstock on Wednesday afternoon.

The crash happened Wednesday afternoon on County Road.

It's not clear how many cars were involved or how many people may have been injured.

No additional information was immediately available.

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New Haven police are looking for the man who they said robbed one bank this week and tried to rob another.

There was an attempted robbery at the People's Bank at the Stop & Shop, 150 Whalley Avenue at 6:39 p.m. on Monday.

Police said a man passed one teller a note indicating that he had a gun and for her to hand over the cash. The teller didn't give the man any money, so he took his note and left.

The teller then notified a police officer who was working at the supermarket and police broadcast the would-be robber’s description, but he'd left the area.

He was described as an older man, around 5-foot-7, with a medium build, crooked teeth and brown eyes.

He was wearing a gray sweatshirt with a "New York" logo on the front, a blue and orange baseball hat and blue jeans and  traveling as the passenger in a black Nissan Altima.

At 9:20 a.m. on Tuesday, a manager at the Santander Bank, located at 215 Grand Avenue, called police to report the bank had been robbed.

The robber had passed a note that was either similar or identical to the one used at the People's Bank the day before.

In this case, the teller handed over an undisclosed amount of cash, police said.

The robber, who was similarly dressed to the robber in the prior incident, was wearing a baseball cap that read “California” on it.

He took back his note and ran through the rear door.

Investigators found clothing the robber wore and said surveillance images convinced detectives that the same man was behind both incidents.

Anyone with information that could help investigators identifying the man involved should call detectives at 203-946-6304.

 

Authorities are investigating after a teen tried to rob a New London convenience store at gunpoint Wednesday morning, police said.

According to police, the suspect, who is described as being 15-18 years old, walked into the Quik Mart at 61 Walden Avenue just after 9 a.m. Wednesday, displayed a “palm-sized” semi-automatic handgun and demanded money.

The clerk activated the store’s panic alarm and the suspect ran out, met another juvenile outside the store and fled on foot, police said.

Officers searched the area but did not find either person.

The would-be robber is described as a black male between 15 and 18 years old, standing 5 feet 9 inches tall with a slim build. Police said he was wearing a black knit hat, a black mask covering his nose and lower face and a black jacket.

The accomplice is described as a black male between 12 and 13 years old standing 4 feet 5 inches tall and wearing a red knit hat.

No one was injured in the incident. 

First impressions are important, especially when meeting the parents and educators of thousands of students in Hartford.

This morning at a forum inside Capital Community College, the two finalists poised to take the role of superintendent introduced themselves to community residents and businesses with a vested interest in the future of Hartford Public Schools.

“It's very important to us to see how the new superintendent will address some of the disparities amongst the schools in Hartford,” said Attorney Lynn Cochrane from the Greater Hartford Legal Aid, Inc. The nonprofit law firm advocates for students with disabilities.

Candidates were not allowed to speak one-on-one with media. But attendees did get to hear from each candidate in small groups.

Dr. Beth Schiavino-Narvaez told attendees she feels she shares similar beliefs with the Capital City that education has the power to transform the lives of children. Narvaez is currently the Deputy Superintendent of School Support and Improvement in Montgomery County Public Schools, one of Maryland’s top school systems. She’s a two-time Harvard grad who’s also worked in Springfield Public Schools.

The other finalist, Dr. Ronald Taylor is a Morehouse grad who focused on early childhood education. He also attended Trinity College and George Washington University. In his nearly 20-year career that started as a teacher, he’s worked in D.C., Boston, Newark and Willingboro Public Schools.

“Even in the most daunting circumstances, you approach should be research based,” said Taylor, when talking to attendees.

But Andrea Johnson, the president of the Hartford Federation of Teachers, says their teachers union was not involved in the search for a new superintendent. Johnson attended the afternoon forum for administrators and teachers and said she hopes whoever the new leader is has an open ear.

“Somebody who would work with all the stakeholders… parents, neighbors, community folks, and have a good relationship," Johnson said. "I think that's what Hartford needs right now – a good, solid relationship for all partners in this district.”

The last forum will be held tonight from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., also inside the 11th floor auditorium of Capital Community College on Main Street in Hartford.

Officials hope the new candidate will be in place and ready to go by the start of next school year.