A dead Border Patrol Agent in Vermont. An LSD-taking vegan carrying a pistol linked to two Pennsylvania homicides. An elderly California witness ambushed and fatally stabbed. AI researchers living in box trucks, armed with knives and a samurai sword. It sounds like something from a dystopian science fiction novel. But police, court records and witnesses are beginning to link a series of six seemingly unconnected deaths across the country. Two people - who may or may not be married to each other - have been detained in connection with two...

Most productions of “A Christmas Carol” don’t require forty-five actors. But that’s how many people auditioned for a recent staging near Hardwick, Vermont, and Rose Friedman, the director, decided to populate a whole village and cast them all. Friedman is the co-founder of the Civic Standard, a community organization based in Hardwick. “A Christmas Carol” was its third production, though the Civic is not exactly a theatre company, and many of the people in the show were not exactly seasoned performers. But they all braved whiteout conditions to attend a...

A new study shows Vermont needs to build 7,000 new homes every year for the next 25 years − a total of 172,000 new homes − to keep up with demand and end its chronic housing shortage by 2050. If that sounds daunting, it is. The state's peak year for building homes was 4,800 in 1988. In 2023, building permits were issued for 2,456 homes statewide, an improvement over the historic low of 1,300 permits in 2011 − but nowhere near the 7,000 new homes annually that are required, according...

On January 20, Youngblut was pulled over by Maland during a traffic stop in Vermont. She immediately exited the vehicle and opened fire on Maland, who was struck by a bullet and killed. Other officers returned fire and struck both Youngblut and Bauckholt. Youngblut was injured and transported to the hospital, while Bauckholt died at the scene. Investigators are still trying to determine if the bullet that struck Maland was fired from Youngblut's weapon, or if he was accidentally hit by responding officers. According to an FBI affidavit, Youngblut and...

Mikaela Shiffrin finished 1oth Thursday in a World Cup slalom race in Courchevel, France, marking her return to the top-tier alpine skiing circuit after two months out due to injury. The American star and three-time Olympic medalist — competing for the first time since a hard fall during a giant slalom race in Killington, Vt., in November left her with a puncture wound in her abdomen — was seeking her 100th career World Cup win but was showing the effects of the time away, struggling a bit down the hill...

For the better part of the last two decades, federal testing data consistently saw Vermont students out-performing their peers in other states in math and reading. But no longer. The latest results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, released Wednesday, show continued, steady declines in reading scores for Vermont fourth- and eighth-grade students. And while Vermont students fared slightly better in math, scores still reflected a slide toward the national average in both subjects and both grades. NAEP — also known as the Nation’s Report Card — is administered...

Vermont is the latest of 39 states to enact a premium fee for electric vehicle registration. On Jan. 1, electric vehicle owners in Vermont received a letter stating they would have to pay twice the price of registration per year compared to gas-powered vehicles to make up for revenue lost from the gas tax. Electric vehicles made up 12% of new vehicles sold in Vermont last year, slightly above the national average of 8%. Vermont state legislators passed a law last year to charge electric vehicle owners a premium with...

A 3.8-magnitude earthquake was felt in parts of southern Vermont on Monday morning. The earthquake originated off the coast of York, Maine, at 10:22 a.m, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Residents of Springfield and Brattleboro shared in community social media groups that they felt shaking for about 10-15 seconds. A magnitude of 3.8 is relatively mild, and there were no reported harms from Monday’s weak seismic activity, according to New Hampshire’s emergency management division.