Rhode Island
R.I. grandparents fighting for visits with 4-year-old granddaughter rest their case – The Boston Globe
Naso’s in-laws, Dr. Siavash Ghoreishi and Dr. Jila Khorsand, took him to Family Court in July 2024, three months after their daughter, Shahrzad “Sherry” Naso, died from metastasized breast cancer.
Naso had refused to let them see Laila, their only grandchild of their only daughter, saying he wasn’t comfortable with their behavior and was alarmed by their medical care of Sherry and Laila.
The retired physicians used a little-known state law that allows grandparents whose children have died or divorced to petition the Family Court for the right to visit with their grandchildren.
It’s led to a bitter trial that began in October and has continued off and on over the last six months, with testimony about medical negligence, abuse, and control.
Naso, a Middletown narcotics detective, accuses his in-laws of prescribing dozens of medications and providing poor medical care, which he believes contributed to Sherry’s death and sickened Laila. Ghoreishi and Khorsand deny any wrongdoing.
“We love that child with every fabric of our beings and have never harmed her in any way or shape,” Khorsand testified in October. “I love that child to death and would never do anything to harm her. … Why would she be deprived of this love?”
Naso has argued that the expense of the trial and the state law allowing grandparents to sue parents for visitation violates his constitutional parental rights.
But Gill said on Monday that the state law was “narrowly tailored” to respect the constitutional rights of parents, and he denied Naso’s motions to dismiss or stay the ongoing trial.
Now that Michael Ahn, the lawyer for Ghoreishi and Khorsand, has rested his case, Naso’s lawyer will argue that the grandparents haven’t met their burden under the law and the case should be dismissed.
Veronica Assalone told the judge that she will argue for the dismissal on Thursday.
If her motion is denied, and the Supreme Court justices reject the emergency motion, the trial proceedings will resume, with at least a dozen witnesses expected to testify on Naso’s behalf.
On Wednesday, the court heard more testimony from Cheryl Allspach, the former longtime office manager for Ghoreishi’s pediatric practice and a close friend of the family. She had testified glowingly on Tuesday about Ghoreishi and Khorsand’s relationship with Laila.
She also testified about Ghoreishi’s recordkeeping at his practice and his medical treatment of Scott, Sherry, and Laila Naso, and explained the process for billing and filing for insurance claims.
Assalone questioned her about Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island’s payment policy, since 2009, regarding self-treatment and treatment of immediate family members. The insurer’s policy follows the American Medical Association code of ethics, which warns physicians not to treat or prescribe medications for themselves and close family members, and does not cover those services.
Allspach read the two-page policy aloud for the court. “Why did you bill?” the judge asked when she concluded.
“I just did it as part of normal billing, and truly I didn’t realize that,” Allspach said. “If I realized, I would have said to [Ghoreishi], ‘you cannot treat your family members.’”
The judge quickly stopped more detailed questions about billing practices, chart-keeping, and whether Allspach was aware that it was a felony for physicians to prescribe narcotics to relatives.
“It’s a grandparent visitation case, not a medical malpractice case,” Gill snapped at Assalone. He added that she should take her claims about illegal prescriptions to the state police, “not here.”
Julie Emmer, the owner of Strengthening Family Foundations, testified that Naso had alleged “serious things” about his in-law’s medical care when she was handling the supervised visits between Laila and Ghoreishi and Khorsand.
Emmer testified that Naso told her “there were prescriptions in different names for his late wife” and that his in-laws were being investigated by the US Drug Enforcement Administration and the state police.
“He thought they shouldn’t have visits,” Emmer said. “He thought they were responsible for what happened to his wife.”
Emmer began supervising visits in September 2024, after then-Family Court Judge Debra DiSegna temporarily ordered one-hour supervised visits every other week. The visits continued until late January 2025 and were suspended after Naso filed a complaint with the Department of Children, Youth, and Families. The investigation was closed, but Naso has refused to resume visits.
Emmer supervised nine visits, all at public places, and performed a home inspection at the grandparents’ condo in Jamestown at Ahn’s request in December 2023. They wanted to visit with Laila at their home, but Naso refused, Emmer said, and he is the custodial parent.
Emmer testified that the grandparents abided by the court order not to give Laila any gifts or medication.
Khorsand played with the little girl, while Ghoreishi stayed in the background, filming them or taking pictures, Emmer said. (Some of the photos and videos have been entered as evidence in the trial.)
Emmer said she noticed over time that Laila was anxious at the start of the visits and said she didn’t want to go. During one visit, she said, Laila whispered to her over and over “they are bad people.” At another visit, Laila was late because she vomited on the way over, she said.
She told the court that Laila would eventually warm up to her grandparents.
Emmer said she saw Naso crying and shaking, but that he was careful to compose himself so Laila didn’t see him becoming emotional. She testified that she didn’t hear him make any derogatory comments about his in-laws in Laila’s presence.
She said that Laila was reluctant to leave her father during the visits, but he encouraged her to go. “He often made comments, ‘Go have fun with Miss Julie. You’ll be safe,’” she said.
Amanda Milkovits can be reached at amanda.milkovits@globe.com. Follow her @AmandaMilkovits.
The Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra announced their 2026 Summer Pops schedule.
All concerts are free and open to the public. No tickets are required.
The Summer Pops series will be held in:
- Narragansett at the North Beach Clubhouse on July 10 at 8 p.m.
- Providence at the Roger Williams Park Temple to Music on Aug. 5 at 7 p.m.
- Newport at the Rosecliff Mansion on Aug. 9 at 7 p.m.
- Bristol at Independence Park on Sept. 5 at 7 p.m.
BE THE FIRST TO COMMENT
The program will feature overtures to “West Side Story,” “Wicked” and “The Marriage of Figaro and William Tell.”
Whitehouse climate speeches over the decades
Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse has been speaking out about climate change for decades
On Aug. 7, 2025, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse gave his 300th “Time to Wake Up” speech about the dangers of climate change.
“It’s hard, given our peril, not to feel a bitter sense of failure about where we are,” he said.
Since then, he’s given at least seven more of these speeches. This session alone, he’s sponsored more than 30 bills on environmental protection. And he warns about the dangers of climate change almost every day on his social media channels.
Climate change has long been a priority of the left. But lately, Whitehouse seems like the only Democrat remaining who’s still trying.
“The Democrats have been running away from this issue,” said J. Timmons Roberts, a professor of environmental studies at Brown University.
He’s not sure why they’re backing away. Maybe they are preoccupied with other issues, he said, such as the Iran war and immigrants’ rights. Or maybe they think that Democrats should stop talking about climate – a group Whitehouse calls “climate hushers.”
This group includes Matthew Huber, a professor of geography at Syracuse University, who argued in an opinion piece for The New York Times that climate change fuels polarization and that Democrats should stop talking about it in order to win back the working class.
But Whitehouse has taken to social media to address this line of thinking, saying in posts that it’s wrong “about pretty much everything.”
In a recent interview for Political Scene, he said it’s worth it to keep trying because the risks are so high. And he thinks that, politically, it’s actually “a winning issue that my party has just gotten wrong and overlooked.”
Do people care about climate change?
Addressing climate change under the Trump administration is “brutal,” Roberts said.
“It’s hard to know where to start,” Rachel Cleetus, senior policy director with the climate and energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said. “They’ve pretty much torn up federal agencies. Attacked budgets and staffing and expertise. They’ve undermined climate science. They’re spreading propaganda and lies about climate science. They’re boosting the fossil fuel industry, attacking clean energy. It’s just from every possible angle.”
Yet around the country, Democrats have been backing away from talking about climate change. Many rising Democratic stars, such as New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, speak more about affordability than climate action. And Roberts thinks that even historically climate-friendly politicians, such as Sen. Ed Markey, D-Massachusetts, who he said has been “legendary” in the climate fight, have lately been quiet on the issue.
Their silence seems to correlate with polls showing that climate ranks low, or falling, on people’s priority lists. Regular Pew Research Center surveys consistently find that climate is near the bottom of people’s priority lists. An April poll from the center found that support for the United States prioritizing renewable energy development over fossil fuels has declined from 79% to 57% in the last six years – and it even declined among Democrats. And a compilation of YouGov polls show that 4.5% of Americans currently rank climate change and the environment as the most important issue for them, down from a high of 16.6% in December 2021.
Roberts said that people do care about the issues – the 2025 Rhode Island Life Index survey found that 62% of Rhode Islanders say that climate change is a serious problem in their community. But it’s not always at the top of people’s priority lists because things like the economy and crime can take precedence in voters’ minds.
Climate hushers, Whitehouse argues on social media, fall into the problem of “poll-chasing,” where they ask what voters think and parrot that back instead of leading on an issue. Instead, he and Roberts said, politicians themselves can raise the salience of climate change.
“Democrats can drive this public opinion if they choose to,” Roberts said. “These issues don’t just happen by themselves. There’s a whole theory on what drives public opinion, and there’s some great research on environmental sociology that says that it comes from party elites. That the opinion on climate change doesn’t just happen by itself; it’s really what are the politicians talking about that drives public opinion.”
Plus, Whitehouse suggested in the interview that when people connect the dots between climate change and their lives, the issue skyrockets in priority to them. He mentioned a poll he often cites that found 92% of voters in Texas are worried about home insurance, a higher amount than were worried about health care, and that 66% of Texas voters connected their home insurance concern to climate-driven extreme weather.
Why is Whitehouse still trying?
Climate change, along with what he sees as political corruption from fossil fuel companies funding legislators, is Whitehouse’s top policy issue because of its urgency and how it’s intertwined with everything else.
“It’s already in your increased grocery prices. It’s already in your increased electricity prices. It’s already in your increased home and auto insurance prices. So if you want to deal with those big cost increases, you’ve got to face the facts about what fossil fuel emissions do,” Whitehouse told Political Scene. “We’re in kind of a gradual stage of this economic distress, but there’s every prediction that this goes really bad all at once.”
It’s not that climate change is more important than issues such as wars or rights, but that it’s the context in which everything is happening, said Cleetus, of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
“Yes, there are many pressing challenges, geopolitical challenges, that are making news headlines,” Cleetus said. “Climate change is not stopping for the politics. It’s here. It’s the background condition that’s exacerbating a lot of the acute challenges people are already facing.”
And it’s not some abstract, future problem either, Whitehouse said. While states such as Florida and Texas may be seeing the brunt of the home insurance crisis, Rhode Island won’t be far behind. He’s afraid of another insurance meltdown in the state, like the Rhode Island Share and Deposit Indemnity Corp. collapse in 1991.
Whitehouse argues that voters are ahead of politicians on this issue. And Roberts is optimistic that lawmakers will come around, too, especially if the midterms don’t go Trump’s way.
“I think the pendulum is about to swing back, and people, I mean this, people do care about this issue over the long haul,” Roberts said. “We need people like Sheldon Whitehouse who are continuing to talk about it.”
Video: Braden Lynch, of Lincoln, wins RI tennis singles title
Braden Lynch, of Lincoln, wins RI tennis singles title on May 17 at Slater Park.
PAWTUCKET – Sunday afternoon brought a breakthrough for Braden Lynch, the first boys tennis state singles champion from Lincoln in 38 years.
The sophomore was impressive throughout on the hardcourts at Slater Park, taking care of Bishop Hendricken standout Luca Testa in straight sets.
Lynch never appeared anything but comfortable under the warm sunshine and in front of the crowd gathered outside the fence, posting a 6-3, 6-2 triumph in 75 minutes. He became the first member of the Lions to lift the trophy since Tom Evans did the honors in 1988 and just the third sophomore to claim the crown in the last two decades.
“I’m proud to do it for my school,” Lynch said. “I’m proud to do it for myself. Proud to do it for my coaches, for my family – I’m just very proud right now.”
David Levy and Liam Levy took even less time to become the first boys doubles champions from East Greenwich, racing to a 6-4, 6-0 victory over the La Salle tandem of Gavin Britt and Connor Cavanagh. That match wrapped up while Lynch was taking full command against Testa, using multiple breaks of serve in the second set to build what turned out to be an insurmountable lead.
“Luca’s obviously a great player, so I knew I was going to have to play pretty much at my best if I was going to beat him,” Lynch said. “I ended up playing pretty well.
“I thought my forehand was able to dictate, and I was very happy with how I served throughout the match. I was able to keep that in mind.”
Lynch held at love to take the opening set and closed the match with what became a familiar sequence by the end of this one. He approached the net behind a forehand down the line and put away an overhead smash to clinch it. Lynch lived up to his No. 1 seed in the process and delivered on his own expectations entering the season.
“I definitely did think I could,” Lynch said. “That was in my mind from the start of the year – to be able to do this. It’s great to see it come to life.”
Testa needed three sets to eliminate North Kingstown’s Will Michaud in the quarterfinals before dropping just three games in his semifinal meeting with Barrington’s Gabe Anderson. Lynch traveled the more difficult path, beating South Kingstown’s Jonah Plonsky in straight sets in the quarterfinals before matching up with La Salle’s Andrew Smith in the semifinals. Lynch dropped the opening set to the defending champion before rallying to a 4-6, 6-4, 6-4 victory.
“It definitely gave me a whole bunch of confidence,” Lynch said. “He’s obviously a great player with a huge serve. He has a huge wingspan. He’s hard to pass.
“I felt that I was able to play super well in that match, and that definitely gave me some confidence going into this one.”
Lynch was immediately penciled in as Lincoln’s top singles player as a freshman and lost to Smith in the quarterfinals. His offseason work included time in the gym and some sessions with a mental skills coach to sharpen his focus. Lynch joined Kyle Burke (South Kingstown, 2007) and Max Schmidhauser (Classical, 2018) among recent second-year winners of this event.
“It was a ton of work, to be honest,” Lynch said. “A lot of time on court. A lot of work in the gym, speed – pretty much doing everything you could think of to better my game.”
Levy and Levy were surprise finalists in 2024 as the No. 2 doubles team for the Avengers. Thet fell to Gabe Anderson and Bryce Kupperman in straight sets, as the Barrington duo put an end to a storybook run. Levy and Levy authored a different finish this time thanks to their steady play both from the baseline and at the net.
It had been more than 40 years since two brothers teamed up to win a doubles championship in the state. Gordie Ernst and Bobby Ernst were the last to do it from Cranston East, capturing three straight from 1983-85. The tournament format has since changed – Gordie Ernst was also a four-time state singles champion, and doubles entries are now based on the team ladder rather than a selection off the roster.
bkoch@providencejournal.com
On X: @BillKoch25
-
News27 minutes agoLong Island Rail Road strike ends as MTA, unions reach tentative deal
-
New York2 hours agoRead the judge’s decision on evidence in the Luigi Mangione state murder trial.
-
Los Angeles, Ca2 hours agoSimi Valley School District cancels school Tuesday as Sandy Fire doubles in size
-
Detroit, MI2 hours agoTwerking for your vote: Detroit 13th Congressional Candidate not shy on social media
-
San Francisco, CA3 hours agoSan Francisco’s last jeepney helps highlight city’s Filipino culture
-
Dallas, TX3 hours agoDallas Sumer of Safety initiative is back
-
Miami, FL3 hours agoFIFA launches official World Cup merchandise shop in Miami Beach
-
Boston, MA3 hours agoWith the World Cup weeks away, Boston and the T clash over Summer Street closure – The Boston Globe
