WARWICK, R.I. -- The fiancée of the late Michael Woods testified in Kent County Superior Court today that she had no recollection of any Kent Hospital doctors examining Woods during the first hour of his arriving at the hospital emergency room the day he died.

Lisa Konopka testified in the Woods' family's negligence suit brought against Kent Hospital by Woods' brother, the actor James Woods. She said that, except for approximately 15 minutes when Woods was in the x-ray department, no doctor examined him until she screamed for help as he suffered what became a fatal heart attack July 26, 2006.

Two Kent Hospital doctors, John McCue and Kelli A. Naylor, testified previously that they met with and examined Woods, at times with Konopka present. Konopka insisted she had no recollection of meeting Naylor, the doctor who was overseeing Woods' treatment, until she was called into a meeting room with Naylor and told Woods had died.

In afternoon cross examination by hospital lawyer David Carroll, Konopka stopped short of denying that McCue or Naylor had seen Woods or that other staffers had taken information from him, saying that she could not recall it.

Konopka said the only time she and Woods were separated from the time he arrived at the emergency room at 4:25 p.m. until he was stricken in a hallway at 7:10 p.m., was his visit to the x-ray department.

Even on that point she disagreed with hospital employees testimony and records. She said Woods walked to the x-ray department on his own; hospital records indicated he went on a stretcher.

She also said she had no recollection of telling a nurse or doctor that Woods had suffered from a panic attack that day, though hospital records indicate nurses and doctors were told he did.

Carroll presents Konopka with a July 28, 2006 Providence Journal article which quoted her saying " then he started having some kind of panic attack."

She denied making that statement.

Konopka is scheduled to return to the stand Monday afternoon.

Extra: Read about Thursday's trial developments.

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Lisa Konopka, the fiancée of the late Michael Woods, took the stand Friday morning and contradicted testimony by several Kent Hospital employees when she said no doctor spoke with Woods in the first hour he was at the hospital's emergency room on July 26, 2006.

Hospital nurses and doctors, who have previously testified in the Woods family's negligence lawsuit against the hospital in connection with Woods's death that day, testified that Woods was looked at and talked to by at least two doctors in that first hour.

Dr. John McCue testified he looked at Woods in the emergency room and sent him on to a more serious treatment unit.

The doctor who treated Woods in that unit, Kelli A. Naylor, testified she discussed Woods' symptoms with the patient.

Konopka said she never saw a male doctor talk to Woods and said she first met Naylor when Naylor told the family Woods had died.

Konopka also disputed testimony by hospital witnesses that Woods said he had a history of anxiety attacks. Direct examination by the family's lawyer was expected to resume Friday afternoon.

Extra: Read about Thursday's trial developments.

Not really, according to the Northeast Regional Climate Center in Ithaca, N.Y.

Climatologist Jessica Rennells said Friday that while the summer was not very hot and July was the wettest since her center began keeping records in 1932, everything essentially averaged out.

"The season as a whole was really close to normal."

Some farmers in New York had low crop yields, she said. The same proved true in Rhode Island, where some farms in October said they lost a lot of their pumpkin crop to soggy conditions. Some farmers on Friday, however, reported a better-than-average harvest of apples.

Rennells' rundown of temperatures: "April was a little above normal, May was right at normal, June was a little colder, average 64.4 degrees, and normal is 67.6. July was a little bit cooler, the average being 70.3, where normal is 73.3 degrees. August was a little above normal - the average was 73.9, where normal is 71.9. September was below normal at 63, with normal 64. October was one degree below normal with 52, while the normal is 53."

As for November, she said, it has been warmer than usual but it's not over yet. The average temperature so far has been 49.2, with normal at 43.8.

As for rainfall, July and October won the race. "In July we had a lot of rain - 10.52 inches," she said. "Normal is 3.17. That's a lot of rain."

Then along came October, with 7.13 inches, "a lot above normal at 3.69," Rennells said.
The total rainfall from April to November was 37.76 inches. Normal is 30.06.
"July and October really drove those numbers," she said.

Speaking of rainfall, the overnight deluge from Thursday to Friday caused the cancellation of the planned opening Friday evening of the Bank of America City Center Ice Rink in Kennedy Plaza.

Bob McMahon, city parks director, said the compressor that chills the concrete surface of the rink and freezes layers of water lost out in the overnight bout with the rain.

"We were able to hold ice just fine [Thursday]," he said. "You put the water on it in thin layers, so it took us three nights to make it. We had a good inch, inch and a half. But when rainwater in that volume lands on top of the ice, especially in 50 degree weather, you just have warm water sitting on the ice."

McMahon predicted that the excess water would evaporate overnight and allow the rink to open for business on Saturday.

At Snowhurst Farm in Chepachet, owner Daniel O'Connor grows apples. He said Friday that the combination of warm weather and plentiful rain has counterintuitively brought problems.

"Right now everything's growing too fast," he said. "The leaves have come off, so this is the time to start pruning, and there's an awful lot of growth on them."

O'Connor said the weather combination had reduced his expected crop by about half.
"If you don't have the sun, nothing will grow," he said.

At Knight's Farm in Glocester, manager Chris Fortini had just the opposite problem with his trees. He said they were not growing as much as normal, and he fears that wet weather will let fungus attack their roots.

But his biggest weather problem, he said, was that rain perversely seemed to select weekends. His farm is a pick-you-own, he said. "People weren't coming out because they didn't want to get soaked."

John Steere, at Steere Orchards in Smithfield, another apple grower, reported "No problems, not at all."

People who work outdoors also had to contend with the quirky weather.

Steven V. Guilmette, owner of Heritage Improvements Roofing, in Harrisville, said, "The rain always affects us, puts behind schedule. But after years of doing this we learn how to work around things. Weather is a force in our industry. The spring was bad. The summer was good. The fall weather is a big help."

He said the comparatively balmy weather since September had brought an increase of about 20 percent in business.

Earl Gelineau, owner of CertaPro Painters of Providence, said the weather affected his business, but not in a way one might expect.

Usually, in March, his exterior painting work "takes off."

This year, with many people staying indoors and unable to do yard work or worry about exterior paint, he theorized, they would say, " 'Let's get the inside spruced up.' We ended up doing about 35 percent more interior work this year."

As for exterior painting, "If it rains on Monday you can't touch anything until Wednesday," he said. "If the moisture content is too high, the paint won't adhere."

CUMBERLAND, R.I. -- Graffiti involving a bomb threat, discovered this week in two bathrooms at Cumberland High School, put the school district on high alert.

But there were no problems reported Friday as staff at a table checkpoint searched high school students, who had been instructed to bring their items in clear bags, the schools superintendent said.

Police Chief John Desmarais said late Friday morning that no one has been charged.

"We are still conducting interviews. We have some leads that we need to track down," said the chief, who said the graffiti was found in one bathroom on Monday and another on Thursday.

Supt. Donna A. Morelle said Thursday that discovery of graffiti forced district officials to evacuate the campus and cancel all after-school activities and sports events Thursday to search the students' lockers.

"Very uneventful," Morelle said of how things went Friday morning. "It went pretty seamlessly."

Morelle said students who did bring items with them had them in zip-lock type bags or plastic bedding-type bags.

Morelle said Friday that plans were for school to go on as normal, with a state debate tournament scheduled to go on over the weekend.

Monday's threats, Morelle said, were found to be a "hoax."

Morelle said members of the state fire marshal's office -- and a bomb squad -- had searched the high school Monday, and "we had no evidence of any paraphernalia in the building." She said a search Thursday again found no concerns.

On Thursday evening, Morelle refused to give more information on the nature of the threats, saying that district parents had already been notified.

Earlier versions of this report were published at 8:06 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.

The Judicial Nominating Commission on Tuesday selected five finalists for the position of associate justice on the Rhode Island Supreme Court, a seat that became vacant when Paul A. Suttell was promoted to chief justice in July.

The finalists are: Superior Court Judges Judith Colenback Savage and Gilbert V. Indeglia and lawyers John A. "Terry" MacFadyen III, Samuel D. Zurier and Sandra A. Lanni.

Under Rhode Island law, the governor is required to fill the vacancy within 21 days after the commission sends him the finalists. But Kempe said Carcieri views the 21-day time frame as merely advisory and said that with the holidays that are coming up, it's unclear whether he will have the time to make his choice in 2009. Kempe said Carcieri has made it a point to interview every candidate submitted to him as a finalist for a judgeship and that he intends to schedule individual interviews for the candidates for the Supreme Court.

Currently, the state's highest court is hearing appeals with just four instead of five justices, which has increased the workload for individual justices. This could lead to a time lag in the court's decision-making since each justice is currently being assigned more cases to write than is usual.

But there may be strategic reasons for the governor delaying making a new appointment. State law requires the House and Senate to take up a Supreme Court nomination within seven days of receiving a nomination from the governor. If either chamber fails within 60 days after the submission to confirm the nominee, the governor is then required to appoint someone else to fill the vacancy.

The legislature is on recess until the first week of January so it would have to come back into special session to take up a nominee if it wanted to do so before the end of the year.

"There were no backups," said Frank Corrao III, the DOT's deputy chief engineer for construction.

He said that the DOT mistakenly said in its announcements of the highway closing that it would reopen the road by 5 a.m. However, he said, its contract with the prime contractor, Cardi Corp., gives the company until 5:30 to reopen the highway.

He said the northbound side opened at 5:25 and the southbound side at 5:40 and that heavy morning traffic doesn't start until about 6 a.m.

Corrao said that the highway was closed beginning at 11 p.m. and traffic diverted to detours while a pair of cranes set two beams in place. Contractors have to install at least two beams because, after bracing is put in place, they support each other. A single beam could fall over.

The DOT says it will close Route 95 again on Sunday through Tuesday nights for more work. It will start closing lanes at 8 p.m., will all lanes closed at 11 p.m. The highway will reopen by 5:30 a.m., the agency says.

Cardi Corp. is the prime contractor on the bridge, which is part of the DOT's ongoing relocation of a section of Route 195 and reconstruction a section of Route 95. The Clifford Street Bridge will replace the former Friendship Street Bridge and will connect Clifford Street, on the east side of Route 95, with Friendship Street on the west side.

One lane of travel will be closed overnight Friday night on Route 95 South and reopen by 6 a.m. Saturday to make this change.

DOT is doing the work on a weekend to achieve its goal of removing the split-lane pattern before the holiday season, the release said. The project is presently several months ahead of schedule.

Motorists will still find lanes shifted to the left on both 95 North and South at the project for the next several months. RIDOT has been shifting and splitting travel lanes on this part of Route 95 to allow for the reconstruction of the Weaver Hill Road Bridge.

As part of the work, RIDOT will close the right lane on 95 South, and Weaver Hill Road completely, to local traffic at 9 p.m. Sunday in order to safely demolish a portion of the old bridge. All lanes will be restored by 5:30 a.m. Monday, the department said.

The removal of the split-lane traffic pattern will eliminate the need for an oversize-truck detour route along Route 3.

The $4.4-million project began earlier this year and is scheduled to be completed in Spring 2011. The project involves rehabilitation and widening of two separate bridge structures that carry 95 North and South over Weaver Hill Road, approximately 1 mile south of Exit 6. The bridges are more than 40 years old.

The multimillion-dollar IBM computer will be used by scientists at Brown and other educational institutions in Rhode Island to assist research in so-called "grand challenge" problems in medicine, the environment, energy and other complex fields.

"I think it will really spur things and make things go forward very, very fast in ways we never imagined," said Clyde Briant, vice president for research at Brown.

The computer is 50 times more powerful than any machine Brown had before and is equivalent to about 5,000 ordinary desktop computers, said Jan Hesthaven, director of the Center for Computation and Visualization at Brown.

Governor Carcieri attended the ribbon cutting as did Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts and Providence Mayor David N. Cicilline.

The governor said the supercomputer will advance research in the state and boost knowledge industries such as biotechnology.

"We need to reposition the economy of this state," he said."We need a different dimension to the economy. Research and innovation will be at the core of that."

The new supercomputer - with a total of 1,440 microprocessors - is based on three IBM iDataPlex systems, equal to the size of six refrigerators; an IBM Cluster 1350; and multiple IBM storage systems running General Parallel File System, supported by IBM Global Services.

These are some highlights of the system:

-- Operates at a peak performance speed of more than 14 teraflops, nearly 50 times faster than what had been available at Brown.

-- Has 390 terabytes of storage capacity and holds 4.5 terabytes of memory, about 70 times more memory than what had been available at Brown.

--Allows parallel programs to be run, that, in aggregate, are 20 times faster than what had been available at Brown. Researchers can now compute a problem that is 20 times larger in the same time.

-- Is six times more energy efficient than what had been available at Brown.

Fifty-five Barrington students were attending the four-day Fall National Leadership Conference of the Future Business Leaders of America, which began Nov. 5, when a chaperone checked a room and discovered that six students were in possession of alcohol.

According to Barrington High School Principal Joseph Hurley, on Nov. 7, the last night of the conference, a student who apparently had been drinking called home. A family member, who was concerned about how the student sounded, contacted one of the chaperones, Hurley said.

When the chaperone entered the room, the adult discovered that the students had been drinking. Since the conference was to end the next day, the chaperones decided to stay at the conference and leave after it was over.

On Monday, the high school's two assistant principals, Nicole Varone and Michael Messore, spent the day interviewing the students and their parents. Afterward, they imposed a five-day suspension on all six teenagers.

Hurley said that his office will look into imposing further sanctions against the teenagers. According to the school activities handbook, students who violate the school's drug and alcohol use policy can be suspended from participation in other school-sponsored clubs and activities.

"We will continue to stress the importance of decision-making," Hurley said. "In this case, all of the students involved will meet with our student assistance counselor to talk about those decisions.

"You know the work we have been doing with the new Breathalyzer policy and The Life of an Athlete program," he said. "This is confirmation that we have to be vigilant and continue these efforts."

NEWPORT, R.I. -- The injuries that ultimately killed six-week-old Naiomi McCoy earlier this year could not have been caused by a simple fall, a state medical examiner testified Friday morning.

Dr. Alexander Chirkov testified in the second day of evidence in a bail hearing for Rachin McCoy, Naiomi's father and the man accused of fatally abusing the child to death. He is charged with first-degree murder and has been held without bail since his arrest in January.

During Naiomi's autopsy on Jan. 31, Chirkov said that he found fractures on 17 of Naiomi's ribs that had been caused within days of her death. He also found 5 older, healed rib fractures, he testified.

"The rib fractures were the result of symmetrical pressure," Chirkov testified. "It would not have been caused by a fall."

In the days after Naiomi's death, Rachin McCoy told a cousin and police detective that he'd dropped his daughter as he stood on the couch playfully throwing her in the air.

MIAMI, Fla. -- Investors claiming they were fleeced by a high-profile attorney filed a $100 million lawsuit Friday contending that the lawyer orchestrated a massive Ponzi scheme with the help of a Canadian bank's U.S. subsidiary and several accomplices.

The 147-page lawsuit, filed in Broward County Circuit Court, in South Florida, alleges that attorney Scott Rothstein and others in his now-defunct firm used faked legal settlements -- or faked their involvement in real cases -- to promise fat returns for investors. TD Bank, the lawsuit claims, "was complicit in this scheme" by making the deals appear more legitimate and reassuring investors.

"The Ponzi scheme simply could not have gained traction without TD Bank's involvement in sanctioning, or otherwise, willingly failing to authenticate the origin of the enormous amounts of money coming through its doors," said the lawsuit, filed on behalf of six investors by attorney William Scherer. "TD Bank was the financial epicenter of the Ponzi scheme."

Besides his numerous Florida properties, Rothstein owned two houses in Narragansett until October, when he transferred them -- without payment -- to a limited-liability Delaware corporation.

The lawsuit filed Friday claims numerous red flags were ignored, such as the movement of some $500 million through Rothstein accounts at a TD Bank branch in Fort Lauderdale in October alone.

A TD Bank spokesman did not immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment. TD Bank, with headquarters in Maine and New Jersey, is the U.S. subsidiary of Canada's publicly traded Toronto Dominion Bank. It has some $134 billion in assets and about 1,000 branches, according to the company Web site.

Rothstein's attorney Marc Nurik declined comment on the lawsuit.

"This is the first I'm hearing of it," Nurik said.

The suit accuses a number of unnamed officials in the "executive branch" of government, which includes Governor Carcieri and his staff, of playing key roles in denying contracts to Shire or offering to award them if the company dropped embarrassing claims against the state Department of Transportation.

Stern, who was sworn in as a judge Oct. 5, is not named in the lawsuit the company filed in late September, a lawsuit that a spokeswoman for Governor Carcieri has described as "entirely without merit.''

But Stern is named repeatedly in a deposition given by Shire vice president Thomas Gammino on Oct. 21 that spells out the underpinning for the suit.

The rollbacks did not affect the fares paid by customers, but allowed Yellow Cab to keep the taxis on the street after their mandated retirement at 200,000 miles. The allowed the company to lower its costs while carrying passengers in vehicles considered too old for use as cabs.

Yellow Cab, which acknowledged sufficient evidence of its misconduct, also was cited for charging illegal flat rates for fares, rather than mileage-based charges based on the taxi meter, and for operating outside territory of Providence, Cranston and T.F. Green Airport.

Yellow Cab lost its license for six of its 12 cabs and is on five years probation.

Yellow Cab in Rhode Island is actually a consortium of four companies: D&T Cab Inc., White Rock Cab Inc., Doris Cab Inc. and Bobby's Cab Inc.

Figures released Friday morning for all 50 states solidify Rhode Island's ranking behind Michigan and Nevada, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Jobless rates in both of those states also dipped in October. Michigan fell to 15.1 from 15.3 percent. Nevada reported a decrease to 13 percent from 13.3.

It is a familiar trend. Closer to home, every New England state except Connecticut saw slight declines in unemployment rates.

Connecticut's unemployment rate jumped to 8.8 percent, but Massachusetts reported a drop to 8.9 percent, Maine declined to 8.2 percent, with New Hampshire and Vermont even lower.

But Rhode Island is not expected to see its jobless rate dip below 10 percent until 2013, according to a forecast by the New England Economic Partnership, a nonprofit regional outlook group.

Overall, 29 states recorded unemployment rate increases in October, while 13 states registered declines, and 8 states had no change, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. Few states reported major statistical swings.

According to the Rhode Island Department of Labor and Training, this state's unemployment rate remains at an all-time high. 73,300 residents are still out of work. The state lost 1,100 jobs in October and saw its labor market contract slightly -- a potential sign that some frustrated workers have given up looking for work.

WARWICK, R.I. -- Hours after a fatal crash in Cranston that killed one of his friends from the University of Rhode Island, the 19-year-old man driving the car was charged with drunk driving.

Sonny Pham, of 22 Hartwell Drive, Foxboro, bowed his head in Third District Court Friday morning as Judge Mary McCaffrey arraigned him on a charge of driving under the influence, death resulting.

The judge set bail at $15,000 with surety and forbade Pham from drinking alcohol. If he was caught drinking, McCaffrey said, his bail would be revoked.

His friend Erica Rose, of 3748 Flat River Road, Coventry -- a sophomore education major at URI -- was riding in the back seat of Pham's Pontiac Grand Prix when the car crashed on Route 10 in Cranston at around 1:30 a.m. The state police said the car lost control in the rain, swerved into the median, hit a guardrail, and skidded across the two northbound lanes before stopping in the breakdown lane.

Rose, 19, was killed, and another passenger, Valerie Goulet, of 28 West Walnut St., Milford, Mass., appeared to have minor injuries, according to the state police. Goulet also attends URI. Pham was not injured. None wore a seat belt, said state police Lt. Arnold "Skip" Buxton.

The prosecution told the judge that Pham had failed the field sobriety test and took a Breathlyzer, which showed a blood-alcohol content of .091 at first, and then .092 sometime later.

His attorney, John Bevilacqua, tried unsuccessfully to convince the judge to release Pham on his own recognizance, saying he has no record and is a URI student with an uncle living in Rhode Island. Seven of Pham's relatives were in court.

Afterward, Pham's mother, Helen, said that her son and Rose had known each other from school and were friends. "I am so sorry for what happened to Erica," she said.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the city where Pham would be arraigned.

This story was originally published at 7:16 a.m. and updated at 7:35 a.m., 8:41, 9:02 and 11:45 a.m.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Average prices for heating oil, diesel and unleaded gasoline remained virtually unchanged from last week, according to Friday's survey by the Rhode Island Office of Energy Resources.

The typical price of unleaded stayed at $2.70 per gallon, diesel was at $2.91 and home heating oil remained at $2.72.

But the home heating oil average reflects a wide range of prices among dealers. The state typically surveys nine companies to reach its average.

The state found per-gallon prices ranged from a low of $2.25 to a high of $3.10, suggesting that consumers could save as much as 85 cents per gallon if they shopped around.

One year ago, the difference among dealers was even larger: nearly a dollar per gallon.