Local presidential candidate Robert Haines, 60, was arraigned Thursday in Manchester District Court on a charge of disorderly conduct, according to the New Hampshire Union Leader. The charge against him alleges that Haines began yelling at passersby on the corner of Elm and Merrimack Streets in Manchester shortly after 6 p.m. on Sept. 19 and refused to lower his voice. Haines argued in court that he was targeted by a police department that supports Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, for president. Haines reportedly arrived more than two hours late for his arraignment. After entering the courtroom, Haines was escorted from the premises for disrupting court proceedings when he loudly asked prosecutors and court personnel to support his presidential campaign. Judge Norman Champagne set Haines's disorderly conduct trial for Dec. 20.
San Luis Obispo County police have identified the bodies of three family members found dead from gunshot wounds as Barbara C. Rivard '85, her husband John and their seven-year-old daughter Olivia. Rivard and her family were found in their home on Wednesday morning. Police believe the deaths to have been a murder-suicide, but, at press time, they said it was unclear as to who shot whom. The results from autopsies performed Wednesday afternoon have not yet been released. Police believe that a gun found in the house was used in the incident. The couple also has two other children, a five-year-old girl and a four-year-old boy, who were found unharmed in the family's home.
University of Toronto graduate Malcom Gladwell will argue that the Ivy League should be dissolved at the New York Society for Ethical Culture on Friday night. Gladwell, author of "Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking" and contributor to The New Yorker, will speak to a full house about how the Ivy League's admission process fosters elitism in American society. Another writer for The New Yorker, Adam Gopnik, will argue against Gladwell, asserting that simply dropping the "Ivy League" title, originally designated in 1954 as an athletic conference, will do nothing to eliminate the League members' famed reputations. Simon Schama, an art history and history professor at Columbia University, will moderate the debate. Although his children attended Harvard and Columbia, Schama told the New York Sun that he has no position on the issue.
