NEW YORK (AP) — Mets star Juan Soto fouled a ball off his right foot, forcing him from the New York Mets' game against the Detroit Tigers on Wednesday night, and manager Carlos Mendoza said X-rays were negative.
“We got good news there, he’s day to day,” Mendoza said after the 3-2 victory. “See how he comes tomorrow, whether he’s a player for us in the starting lineup.”
Soto hopped toward the Mets dugout after fouling off Framber Valdez’s 2-0 pitch in the third inning. He dropped to one knee as he was tended to by an athletic trainer and Mendoza. Soto, the Mets’ designated hitter, remained in the game and struck out, then grounded out in the sixth.
“I was concerned as soon as he got hit, because it got him pretty good,” Mendoza said. “You could tell that he was in pain. And then just that (next) at-bat, he didn’t look right.”
Soto’s spot in the batting order came up with a runner on third base in the seventh after Bo Bichette’s tying single. MJ Melendez was at the plate as the pinch hitter when Carson Benge was thrown out at the plate by shortstop Zack Short on a delayed double steal as catcher Dillon Dingler applied the tag.
Soto, who missed 15 games last month with a strained right calf, was injured one night after teammate Francisco Alvarez tore the meniscus in his right knee while fouling off a pitch in the sixth inning of a 10-2 win. Alvarez will undergo surgery and is expected to miss at least six-to-eight weeks.
Soto went 0 for 3 and is 6 for 41 in May. He is hitting .263 with four homers and 11 RBIs.
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New York Mets designated hitter Juan Soto (22) reacts after getting hit by the ball on his ankle during the third inning of a baseball game against the Detroit Tigers, Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
New York Mets designated hitter Juan Soto reacts after getting hit by the ball on his ankle during the third inning of a baseball game against the Detroit Tigers, Wednesday, May 13, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) — A sexual assault trial started Monday for a New Hampshire man whose arrest more than seven years ago kicked off one of the biggest youth detention scandals in U.S. history.
Former youth counselor Jeffrey Buskey, 60, of Litchfield, faces allegations involving four boys held at the Youth Development Center in Manchester in the late 1990s. In the first of his cases to go to trial, he is charged with 21 counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault involving David Meehan, who was 14 when he arrived at the facility now called the Sununu Youth Services Center in 1995.
Meehan filed the first of more than 1,100 lawsuits alleging physical, sexual or emotional abuse spanning six decades. His allegations led to the arrest of Buskey and another former worker in 2019, an unprecedented criminal investigation, nine additional arrests, and the establishment of a settlement fund to compensate victims.
As testimony got underway Monday, prosecutor Audriana Mekula asked Meehan, “What is YDC to you?”
“Hell,” he answered.
During his civil trial, Meehan described Buskey's transformation from trusted father figure to horrific abuser, testifying that he gave him soda and snacks and let him play basketball with a local high school team before subjecting him to near-daily rapes.
“It went from being somebody I trusted, that I thought was not just there to help me, but somebody I thought cared for me, to hurt,” he said.
The Associated Press generally does not identify those who say they were victims of sexual assault unless they have come forward publicly, as Meehan has done. A jury awarded him $38 million in May 2024, though that verdict remains in dispute as the state seeks to reduce the amount to $475,000.
In his opening statement Monday, Associate Attorney General Thomas Velardi told jurors that Meehan had intended to take his experiences to the grave but finally told his wife in 2017 when he feared one of their sons might get sent to the facility.
“What you’re going to hear is a true horror story of what a 16-year-old boy was put through,” he told jurors. “The very thought of his own flesh and blood being sent to this same place where he was terrorized finally broke the seal for him on keeping this secret.”
He said Buskey used violence and the threat of it to overpower or coerce Meehan, who he said eventually stopped fighting back.
“It just became a way of life, whether he was fighting or he was just trying to survive,” he said.
In a police interview transcript recently filed in court, Buskey couldn’t remember his home address from the 1990s and struggled to spell his then-fiancée’s last name, but brought up Meehan’s name unprompted. He denied abusing him, saying they had a “great relationship.”
“I was always nice to the kid; I was always trying to help him," he said.
In her opening statement, defense attorney Delia McCarthy told jurors there is no evidence to corroborate Meehan’s allegations. Meehan’s room was in a central hallway in a building that was “like an echo chamber,” she said, making it impossible that he could have been violently assaulted without anyone else noticing.
McCarthy also said the trial will highlight inconsistencies in Meehan’s claims. He has suffered from mental illness since childhood and as an adult, experienced delusions and hallucinations, she said.
“This is an unbelievable story, contradicted by the records and the people who were there and told by an unreliable, deeply troubled storyteller,” she said.
Meehan was the first witness called to testify after the jury was selected Monday morning.
The youth center, which once housed upward of 100 children but now typically serves fewer than a dozen, is named for former Gov. John H. Sununu. Lawmakers have approved closing the facility, which now only houses those accused or convicted of the most serious violent crimes, and replacing it with a much smaller building in a new location.
In the other criminal cases, three men have been convicted: Bradley Asbury, Stanley Watson and James Woodlock. Jurors acquitted Jonathan Brand and deadlocked in the case of Victor Malavet, leading to a mistrial. Charges were dropped against Trevor Middleton; Frank Davis was declared incompetent to stand trial, and Gordon Searles died while awaiting trial. Stephen Murphy, who has pending charges, had one trial end in a mistrial and another end with an acquittal on three charges and a hung jury on five others. Lucien Poulette is awaiting trial.
This photo taken with a smartphone shows David Meehan testifying during Jeffrey Buskey's trial in Manchester, N.H., Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Holly Ramer)
This photo taken with a smartphone shows defense attorney Delia McCarthy, left, and Jeffrey Buskey, center, charged with multiple counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault, leaving a courtroom during a break in Buskey's trial in Manchester, N.H., Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Holly Ramer)
FILE - Youth Development Center. plaintiff David Meehan testifies as his intake photo, when he was 14 is displayed during his civil trial at Rockingham County Superior Court in Brentwood, N.H. on April 17, 2024. (David Lane/Union Leader via AP, Pool, file)
