TOKYO (AP) — A wandering bear that scared residents of a Japanese city just north of Tokyo was captured on Tuesday after several days of panic during which all schools were closed.
The bear was first spotted on Saturday near a park in Utsunomiya, a city north of Tokyo with a population of half a million.
City officials have said they received dozens of reports of bear sightings in the following days, including near a library, schools and a community center, causing them to close all city-run schools Monday and Tuesday.
The city issued bear warnings via social media and dispatched a public announcement vehicle, urging residents to take shelter inside buildings and vehicles if they encounter a bear, and to make sure to lock doors and windows and not to put out garbage at night.
On Tuesday afternoon, the bear was found on a private property and shot by a veterinarian with a tranquilizer gun, city official Ryuhei Irie said. Nobody was injured.
City officials used a drone Tuesday to track the animal down after it was spotted earlier in the day at a university campus, causing cancellations of all classes.
Officials believe there was only one bear but that they are investigating to be safe, Irie said.
The bear scare in Utsunomiya was the latest example of encroachment by Japan's growing bear population in areas with an aging and declining human population.
Last week, another bear attacked four people in a residential area of Fukushima, in northeastern Japan, causing moderate injuries.
The Japanese government in March estimated the country's overall bear population at around 57,800. Officials have adopted a road map for bear population management that calls for systematic culls.
Police are seen at a residential area where a bear showed up in Utsunomiya, north of Tokyo Tuesday, June 9, 2026. (Kyodo News via AP)
BOSTON (AP) — A jury Thursday convicted the brother of Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell of sexually assaulting women while he posed as a rideshare driver.
Jurors found Alvin Campbell, 45, guilty of 21 out of 22 counts for sex assaults from 2017 to 2019, the Suffolk County district attorney's office said. The jury was deadlocked on one of the rape charges.
“We will determine our action, if any, at a future date on that charge,” the district attorney's office said in a statement.
Campbell faces up to life in prison for aggravated rape when he is sentenced on June 29.
Campbell posed as a rideshare driver to target women outside bars or other locations, prosecutors said.
His younger sister became the first woman of color to win statewide office in Massachusetts when she was sworn in as attorney general in 2023. A spokesperson for the attorney general's office didn't immediately return an email from The Associated Press late Thursday seeking comment on the verdict.
Andrea Campbell has spoken previously about her family's troubled history in the criminal justice system, including her brother's rape charges.
“One thing I do frequently is share my story because I think there are so many who carry their story with a sense of shame and don’t want to talk about it, including the criminal aspects of my family,” she said in a previous interview with the AP. “But there is no shame in one sharing their story. There is power in it.”
The attorney general is the chief lawyer and law enforcement officer in the state.
After the verdict, Suffolk County District Attorney Kevin Hayden told reporters he hadn't spoken with the attorney general.
Alvin Campbell “deceivingly and calculatedly” preyed upon women in their most vulnerable moments, Hayden said. “I can't imagine what that horror must have been like for them.”
Campbell's defense attorney didn't immediately respond to a phone message and email from the AP.
Hayden expressed gratitude to the women who testified: “We’re happy that we were able to secure justice and accountability for them and so we thank them.”
FILE- Alvin Campbell Jr. sits at the defense table during his sexual assault trial, in Suffolk Superior Court, in Boston, May 18, 2026. (Pat Greenhouse/The Boston Globe via AP, Pool, File)
