For months, neighbors have been begging the town’s zoning board to deny Pulte Homes permits to build three condo buildings in North Plymouth. The project was too large, they argued, too dense and out of place in the quiet North Plymouth neighborhood. They cited the arsenic and other toxic substances found in the soil and […]
Author Archives: Andrea Estes - Independent Staff
Posted inGovernment
Airport Commission sues Town over interference
A burgeoning feud between Town Hall and the Airport Commission over which has ultimate authority to run the airport is now in court. The Plymouth Municipal Airport Commission filed suit Wednesday claiming Town Manager Derek Brindisi has overstepped his authority by meddling illegally in airport affairs. The lawsuit – filed against Brindisi and the town […]
Posted inPolice & Fire
Plymouth couple is charged with repeatedly raping their foster child
A Plymouth police officer and her husband were charged Thursday with repeatedly raping a teenaged foster child living in their home for years. But the couple, through their attorneys, insisted the allegations were the fabrications of a troubled young man with a grudge. Plymouth Assistant District Attorney James Duffy said the alleged assaults took place […]
Posted inPolice & Fire
Plymouth man arrested after dramatic confrontation
A Plymouth man wielding a kitchen knife allegedly held his estranged wife captive early Tuesday morning, refusing to surrender even after Plymouth police had him cornered. The terrifying incident, captured on police body camera footage, shows one of the officers running up a flight of stairs, his gun pointed at the man, Nicholas Munroe, and […]
Posted inPolice & Fire
Hand sentenced to life in 40-year-old murder
A Plymouth County jury Tuesday found Michael Hand guilty of first-degree murder in the death of Kingston teenager Tracy Gilpin 40 years ago. It took the jury less than six hours to reach a verdict, solving a cold case that had stumped investigators for decades. Hand, now 69, was immediately sentenced by Plymouth Superior Court […]
Posted inPolice & Fire
Hand murder trial set to go to the jury
Forty years after the body of Kingston teenager Tracy Gilpin was found in Myles Standish state forest, a Plymouth County jury this week will decide whether Michael Hand was her killer. With no DNA evidence, no witnesses and no forensics linking Hand to the murder, prosecutors will rely almost entirely on Hand’s own statements to […]
Posted inGovernment
ZBA delays vote on Pulte condo project
Rattled by relentless pressure from a large group of vocal opponents to a North Plymouth condo proposal, members of the town’s zoning board of appeals took to their microphones Monday night to lament their helplessness to stop it. Their dramatic pleas were met with boos from a vocal crowd that has protested for months in […]
Posted inPolice & Fire
40 years later, a teenager girl’s murder goes to trial
It took more than 30 years for Michael Hand to be charged with the 1986 murder of Tracy Gilpin in Plymouth’s Myles Standish State Forest. And it took another eight years for Hand, arrested in 2018, to stand trial for her killing. A Plymouth County jury is finally hearing testimony in Brockton Superior Court in […]
Posted inGovernment
Golden uses campaign site during storm
It was a Golden opportunity. As the now infamous blizzard of 2026 bore down on Plymouth and plunged the town into darkness, Select Board Chair David Golden seized the moment. Over the next few days, Golden, a recently announced candidate for state representative, worked to make himself an isolated source of information for residents trapped […]
Posted inGovernment
Rep. Keating urges EPA action on Pulte project
U.S. Rep. William Keating has joined an intensifying effort by some North Plymouth residents to halt plans for a controversial 163-unit condominium development next to a Superfund site. In a Feb. 12 letter to the regional director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the congressman urged agency regulators to reassess the safety of the once […]