State

Federal prosecutors say a subsidiary of health care company Johnson & Johnson has agreed to pay nearly $10 million to settle allegations that it violated federal and state law by providing free products to a surgeon. Under the settlement with DePuy Synthes announced Friday, the company accepts responsibility for giving the surgeon instruments for spine surgeries in the Middle East that were intended to induce the surgeon to use the company's products in spine surgeries performed on Medicare and Medicaid patients in Massachusetts. The company in a statement said it cooperated with the investigation and is committed to complying with all laws and regulations.

A former Boston man charged with the 2007 killing of a live-in girlfriend whose body has never been found has pleaded not guilty to murder at his arraigmment. David Pena was held without bail after Tuesday's plea in connection with the presumed death of Felicia McGuyer, who was reported missing by her mother in October 2007. Prosecutors say she has not been heard from since. Pena’s lawyer did not argue for bail. An email seeking comment was sent to the defense attorney. Pena was charged based on the statements of several witnesses, including one who told police in 2017 that he helped dispose of McGuyer’s body.

Hundreds of court documents from the 1692 Salem witch trials are being transferred from the Salem museum where they have been stored for more than four decades to the newly expanded Judicial Archives facility in Boston. Officials from the Peabody Essex Museum and the Supreme Judicial Court said Thursday that the 527 documents were moved to the museum in 1980 for safekeeping. They include transcripts of testimony, depositions, warrants and other legal papers. Of the 20 people convicted in the trials, 19 were hanged and one was crushed to death by rocks.

A new study says Exxon Mobil’s scientists were remarkably accurate in their predictions about global warming. But at the same time, the company made public statements that contradicted its scientists' conclusions. The study in the journal Science looked at research that Exxon funded. The research forecast the coming warming with precision equal to or better than government and academic scientists. This was during the same time that the oil giant publicly doubted that warming was real and dismissed climate models’ accuracy. Exxon says its understanding of climate change evolved over the years and that critics are misunderstanding its earlier research.

Prize-winning author Russell Banks has died. He was 82. His editor says Banks, who was being treated for cancer, died Saturday in upstate New York. He rooted such novels as “The Sweet Hereafter” and “Affliction” in the wintry, rural communities of his native Northeast and imagined the dreams and downfalls of everyone from modern blue collar workers to the radical abolitionist John Brown. Banks was a self-styled heir to such 19th century writers as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Walt Whitman, aspiring to high art and a deep grasp of the country’s spirit. His other books included the novels “Continental Drift” and “Cloudsplitter” and the story collection “The Angel on the Roof.”

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey marked her first full day on the job Friday by issuing an executive order creating what she says is the nation’s first cabinet-level state climate chief. Healey said the climate chief will be charged with working with state officials and municipal leaders to help Massachusetts meet its climate goals. She named Melissa Hoffer to serve in the role. The Democrat said Hoffer will be responsible for driving climate policy across executive department agencies under Healey’s control and ensuring climate change is considered in all relevant decision-making. Healey called climate change the state's greatest challenge and opportunity.

Federal officials have named two dozen people to examine safety practices at Boeing, and one of them is a man whose sister died in the crash of a Boeing Max jetliner. The Federal Aviation Administration said the panel includes representatives from NASA, airlines and airline unions. The group will have nine months to issue findings and recommendations. One of the members is Javier de Luis, an aeronautics expert at MIT. His sister was a passenger on the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 737 Max that crashed in March 2019, killing everybody on board. Another Max jet crashed in 2018 in Indonesia.