Mayor Won't Fire Cop In Fatal Shooting, Emails Show: Patch PM

Welcome to Wednesday, Oct. 14. Here are some of the top stories we are covering.

Framingham Mayor Yvonne Spicer in an email exchange this summer told a city resident that she does not have the ability to fire the Framingham police officer who fatally shot Eurie Stamps in 2011.

The email exchange is the most explicit statement Spicer has made about Officer Paul Duncan after activists and Stamps' family renewed calls for his firing this summer. The Middlesex County District Attorney's Office is taking a fresh look at the Stamps case, but so far has not announced any new revelations.

On Aug. 15 — the day Spicer spoke at a rally organized by Stamps' family at Memorial Hall — resident Greg Soboff emailed the mayor to ask why Duncan was still working in Framingham.

Stamps, 68, died in January 2011 when a now-disbanded local SWAT team raided his home looking for Stamps' stepson in connection with a drug investigation. Stamps, a retired MBTA employee and grandfather, was watching a Boston Celtics game when police burst into his home. Police ordered him onto the ground, and Stamps was lying on his stomach when Duncan apparently tripped and fired his rifle.

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Other top stories

MA Will Be Shortchanged After Census Count Cut Short: Galvin

The Supreme Court's ruling clearing the way for the Trump Administration to abruptly end the U.S. Census count early "is going to shortchange Massachusetts," Secretary of State William Galvin said.

The court's Tuesday decision means counting will stop for the 2020 Census this week, blocking a lower court's decision that said the government had to see the counting through to Oct. 31, the originally scheduled end date.

The Census Bureau this week said they have already counted 99.9 percent of U.S. households, including 99.9 percent in Massachusetts. Galvin said in a press conference last week that number was "truly absurd."

"I don’t know what [U.S. Commerce Secretary] Wilbur Ross is smoking, but it must be good," Galvin said.

Reading Cop Pleads Not Guilty To Manslaughter Charge

A Reading police officer who shot and killed an unarmed man in 2018 has pleaded not guilty to a charge of manslaughter. Officer Erik Drauschke was indicted by a grand jury last month in the death of 43-year-old Alan Greenough. Drauschke went before a Middlesex Superior Court judge in Woburn Wednesday.

Prosecutors say Drauschke did not wait for backup to arrive before opening the door of Greenough's car, shooting Greenough twice as he rushed out of the car with his hands in his sweatshirt pocket, yelling, "Shoot me, shoot me!"

Nursing Homes, Other Long-Term Care Facilities Could See Changes

Long-term care facilities could be required to cap residential rooms at two people and meet minimum staffing requirements under changes the state is seeking.

The Department of Public Health detailed the regulations at a Public Health Council meeting Wednesday morning, according to the State House News Service.

The proposed changes come after the coronavirus ripped through nursing homes, skilled nursing facilities, rest homes and other long-term facilities. More than two-thirds of the state's 9,413 deaths related to the virus have come from such places, according to Tuesday's coronavirus report.

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