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McCowen lawyer charges trial judge is shirking his duty; Delahunt denies being ‘Kennedy’s man’; Hurricane #1

Lawyer criticizes judge in slay case
Bias reports still unheard

More than six months have passed since a black trash collector was convicted of murdering a white fashion writer on Cape Cod, and his lawyer says the trial judge is shirking his duty to address allegations that jurors made racist remarks during deliberations.

Robert A. George, who defended Christopher M. McCowen in the high-profile trial, said that one of three jurors who alleged racial bias in sworn statements shortly afterward has moved out of state and that another will also do so. George said that will make it harder for Barnstable Superior Court Judge Gary A. Nickerson to hold a hearing to interview jurors, if he concludes the assertions have merit...

 The three jurors said other jurors referred to McCowen as "an intimidating big black guy" and voiced fears that he was staring at them.  Because Nickerson has not acted on the original request, George said, he will have to delay an appeal of McCowen's Nov. 16 conviction to the state's highest court...  Read The Globe story here.
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Tilting against windmills? Book focuses on Delahunt
He denies being ‘Kennedy’s man’

BOSTON - A new book portrays U.S. Rep. William Delahunt as the front man for wealthy Cape Cod boaters trying to run the nation’s first off-shore wind farm out of exclusive Nantucket Sound.  The book, ‘‘Cape Wind: Money, Celebrity, Class, Politics, and the Battle for our Energy Future on Nantucket Sound,’’ pits Delahunt and monied political power - including the storied Kennedy clan whose Hyannisport compound overlooks the sound - against proponents of a clean and renewable energy source to help meet New England’s growing power needs.

‘‘Delahunt was widely seen as Sen. Edward M. Kennedy’s man,’’ reads the book’s prologue. ‘‘What Ted Kennedy hated, Bill Delahunt hated. And Ted Kennedy loathed Cape Wind.’’  Delahunt takes strong objection to his portrayal in the book, and maintains he fully supports the concept of wind energy. The Democrat says the federal government has yet to develop a siting and competitive bidding process for wind farm developers, and he traveled to Germany recently to study deepwater wind farm technology...

Former state Democratic Party Chairman Phil Johnston is quoted in the book as saying Nantucket Sound should be protected out of respect for Kennedy and the sacrifices of his family.  Read the rest of this Patriot Ledger story here.
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Hurricane season opens with formation of Tropical Storm Barry

As if on cue, nature rolled out Tropical Storm Barry on Friday, the first day of the 2007 hurricane season.  And, if forecasts hold, Barry's wet, weakened remnants should swing through northeast North Carolina and Hampton Roads this weekend with clouds moving into the area today and cooler air and rain arriving tonight.

Rather than a menace, however, Barry may be a blessing.

By Sunday afternoon - barring a significant change in its path, which forecasters are quick to say is always possible - its center is expected to be moving into northeast North Carolina and then extreme southeast Virginia before emerging into the Atlantic.

By then, however, it's likely to have lost most of its tropical punch, the Hurricane Center said...  The weakened storm should be south of Cape Cod, by midday Monday.  Read the rest of this Hampton-Pilot story here.