Massachusetts
Missing Massachusetts cat miraculously found underneath owners’ new bathtub — after disappearing for 30 hours
You’ve got to be kitten me!
A beloved feline went missing for an excruciating 30 hours in Massachusetts, only to be found in the most unlikely of places — a hole underneath a newly installed bathtub in its owners’ bathroom.
The Kirby family was renovating a bathroom in their Needham home last week when their cat, Fluffy, suddenly vanished, NBC10 Boston reported.
Assuming the snow white kitty had sneakily slipped out the front door while the construction was ongoing, the Kirby family began to fear for the worst after it failed to return home later that night.
Fluffy’s worried owners raced to Staples the following morning to print out missing cat posters and engaged a pet retrieval specialist equipped with a German shepherd to scour the Boston suburb for the cat.
Treats were also left out to lure Fluffy home — but the search came up empty.
“I thought I was never going to see him again,” Melissa Kirby told the outlet.
Thirty hours after the puzzling disappearance, things took a bizarre turn.
“I was upstairs crying and I heard a little meow,” she said.
“I thought at that point I was hallucinating.”
Melissa was left stunned when she saw a “little paw sticking out a hole” in the bathroom floor where a new bathtub had been recently installed.
Her husband, Ed Kirby, frantically called an after-hours plumber, who asked if it was an emergency.
“Yes, this is an emergency. It’s not a leak,” he desperately recalled telling the plumber.
“Our cat is trapped under our tub.”
Photos showed Fluffy peeking its little white head up from the hole it was stuck in.
In under an hour, Fluffy was rescued from the hole, unharmed and unbothered, and reunited with his family.
While it was a miracle that Fluffy wasn’t hurt, the Kirby family said they won’t be taking any more chances on their little escape artist — and plan to install an AirTag tracker on him.
“If he ever gets out again or gets trapped under another appliance,” Melissa Kirby said, “we’ll be able to locate him.”
Two people were seriously hurt in a crash that closed Interstate 95 north in Canton, Massachusetts, on Sunday morning, police said.
The crash was reported at Exit 25 just after 8 a.m., according to Massachusetts State Police. Two people were taken to the hospital with serious injuries.
All travel lanes were temporarily closed and traffic was being diverted off the highway at Exit 23, according to police.
No further information was immediately available in the early stages of the investigation, including what’s believed to have led to the crash.
A man was critically injured in a multi-vehicle crash late Friday night in Webster, Massachusetts.
Webster police say officers responded to a crash on Worcester Road involving two cars around 11 p.m. One of the drivers, a 46-year-old Worcester man, was found unconscious.
Life-saving efforts were initiated on scene, and he was taken to UMass, where he remains in critical condition, police said.
There was no word on whether the other driver was injured, or what caused the crash. Further information is not being released at this time.
An investigation into the crash is ongoing by the Webster Police Department and the Central Massachusetts Law Enforcement Council accident reconstruction team.
Aug. 14 (UPI) — A Massachusetts mayor was arrested Friday on charges of fraudulently obtaining more than $1.5 million in COVID loans for small businesses, federal prosecutors said.
Lawrence Mayor Brian DePena, 61, was charged with wire fraud and money laundering for allegedly using the loans to fund his campaign, pay personal taxes and pay off other loans.
DePena applied for pandemic relief loans in 2020 and 2021 to support Tenares Tire Services, an auto shop he owned in Lawrence.
Prosecutors say he used nearly $900,000 of the loans to pay off mortgages, $85,000 for personal tax debts and at least $130,000 to fund his campaign.
“This was emergency financial assistance meant to be a safety net for struggling businesses, not Mr. Depena’s own personal ATM,” said Ted Docks, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Boston office, in a statement.
DePena was first elected mayor of Lawrence in 2021 and was reelected last November.
If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison for each charge.
“Mayor DePena was elected to be a leader for the City of Lawrence,” U.S. Attorney Leah Foley said in a statement. “He was looked up to and trusted by his constituents, but he betrayed that trust through his alleged corruption and lies,”
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