More than 1000 real estate firms from across the country completed the Power Broker Survey, reporting a collective 3,203,736 closed real estate transactions in 2014, accounting for a total $972,888,910,471 in sales volume.

LONGMEADOW - Keller Williams Realty Pioneer Valley, headquartered in Longmeadow, Massachusetts, recently announced its inclusion in the Top 1,000 national ranking of real estate brokerage firms in RISMedia's 27th Annual Power Broker Report.

Keller Williams Realty Pioneer Valley reported 1365 closed residential transactions in 2014 and a total sales volume of $273 million.

This year's Power Broker Report is based on responses to RISMedia's 2015 Power Broker Survey, distributed in early January, according to a news release from Keller Williams.

More than 1000 real estate firms from across the country completed the Power Broker Survey, reporting a collective 3,203,736 closed real estate transactions in 2014, accounting for a total $972,888,910,471 in sales volume.

Military groups, a mummers band, youth sport teams and floats were all part of the annual East Longmeadow parade. Watch video

EAST LONGMEADOW - After being rained out and cancelled last year, town officials were able to hold the annual July 4th parade Saturday.

The sidewalks along the parade route which started at the High School on Maple Street were lined with people eager to watch the annual event which featured a large contingent of fire trucks from area departments, marching bands and floats.

Military groups were well represented, led by the American Legion Post 293, all proudly taking part.

Parade Marshall Ned Obernesser rode in a car with his family during the event, which has been held in the town for many years.

U.S. Rep. Richard E. Neal, D-Springfield, joined other area political leaders to walk the route. Bands atop floats played music while others, such as the popular Polish American String Band from Philadelphia, entertained crowds lining the streets.

Several youth sporting leagues from the town also took part in the parade.

The East Longmeadow Jaycees assisted in organizing the parade.

More than 225 runners competed in the race through downtown Springfield.

SPRINGFIELD - The Springfield Harriers celebrated the July 4th holiday with its annual five-kilometer road race Saturday on Hall of Fame Way at the Basketball Hall of Fame.

More than 225 runners took to the streets around the Hall of Fame and thru the downtown area.

Coming across the finish line first in the men's division was Nicolai Naranjo with a time of 15-minutes, 46 seconds, he was followed by Tim Shea.

The first female to cross was April Sabadosa with a time of 18:24.

Politicians and veterans groups marched in the parade and were were joined by people riding horses and children pedaling decorated bicycles.

WESTFIELD - There were plenty of people decked out in red, white and blue and waving flags at the 59th Hampton Ponds Association July 4 parade Friday.

The event kicked off in the morning and traveled on Route 202, ending at the association's headquarters on Old Stage Road.

A variety of local politicians including State Sen. Donald Humason, Jr. D-Westfield and State Rep. John Velis, D-Westfield marched in the parade.

There were a number of children who joined in, pedaling bicycles decorated in red, white and blue. There was an inflatable Uncle Sam in the parade and horseback riders and floats participated.

Veterans groups and the Western Massachusetts Tractor Pullers Association also marched in the event.

The rollover crash happened at about 4:05 p.m. on the exit ramp.

FRAMINGHAM - Massachusetts State Police troopers are investigating a fatal accident that happened Saturday afternoon on an exit ramp to the Massachusetts State Turnpike.

Currently the Exit 12 ramp from the eastbound part of the MassPike is closed while the State Police Crime Services Section, State Police Crime Scene Services Section, Collision Analysis Reconstruction Section, Troopers assigned to the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office, and the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner are on the scene, working at the accident.

The rollover crash happened at about 4:05 p.m. First responders determined one person died at the scene of the accident, according to State Police officials.

State Police officials are releasing limited information at the time. Motorists are advised to avoid that area.

Members of the Framingham Fire Department are also assisting. Officials for the Massachusetts Department of Transportation have also responded to the scene to assist with traffic.

Masslive will update as more information becomes available.

Besides the Sci-Tech Band, the crowds was treated to performances from with musical performances by Ladies & Gentlemen from Falcetti Music, and a flyover of F-15 Eagle Eagles from the 104th Fighter Wing in Westfield. Watch video

SPRINGFIELD — The "The Pride of Springfield" - its the nickname of the Sci Tech Band, was a major draw Saturday for "Star Spangled Springfield ", the city's annual fireworks extravaganza on Riverfront Park.

"I'd read so much about the Sci Tech Band, the documentary, their journey," said Maureen Costello of Granby. "And this was my first chance to hear them. So I came out. And the Grucci Fireworks. Grucci fireworks are the best."

Costello attended the fireworks with her sister, Peggy Sullivan of South Hadley.

Besides the Sci-Tech Band, the crowds was treated to performances from with musical performances by Ladies & Gentlemen from Falcetti Music, and a flyover of F-15 Eagle Eagles from the 104th Fighter Wing in Westfield.

Riverfront Park was nearly filled by 8 p.m., hours before the first firework was to go off from the Memorial Bridge and hours after iffy weather threatened to dampen the event.

But, just as organizers Spirit of Springfield predicted, the rain cleared up by 5 p.m.

That's about when Vicki Bohn of Springfield arrived to claim her perfect viewing location, a park bench on a paved overlook jutting out toward the Connecticut River. It offered a clear view of the pyrotechnics already set up on the Memorial Bridge deck a few hundred yards away.

"I want to see them up close," she said. "This is the perfect spot."

She said it was her first time seeing the fireworks from Riverfront Park in several years.

Same goes for Tina Isom of Feeding Hills. She and Husband Gary Isom staked out what they thought of as their perfect spot: a section of concrete retaining wall overlooking the river.

"It's been years," she said. "It seems like every year I'd been saying that we would do it. This turned out to be the year.

Gary Isom said he liked the setting of Riverfront Park.

"It's really nice down here," he said.

Police and medical officials say there is a growing heroin crisis in the northeast.

SWANTON, Vt. - A mother was arrested Saturday morning and charged with trying to sneak drugs into prison for her 23-year-old son.

Nancy Richard, 48, of St. Albans, was arrested at about 10 a.m. at the Northwestern Correctional Facility in St. Albans after guards accused her of trying to bring Suboxine, a controlled substance, into the prison, Vermont State Police officials said.

"It was determined Richard was attempting to bring the controlled substance into the jail for her son, Tyler Benjamin," Police said.

She was charged with transportation of a regulated drug into a place of detention. She was released and must appear in Franklin County District Court on July 27.

Suboxine is typically prescribed for the treatment of opiate dependence.

Law enforcement and medical officials say there is a growing heroin addiction crisis in the northeast.

The fireworks show was broadcast on NBC.

NEW YORK -- Hundreds of thousands of people braved tight security along New York City's East River to watch the annual Macy's Fourth of July fireworks display.

Minneapolis resident Joe Cunningham said Saturday's fireworks show was "awesome" and lived up to his family's expectations.

Cunningham said New York's show will be the benchmark for all other fireworks displays.

Nefertiti Perry of Manhattan brought her three children to the show. She said they were "so excited" to see it.

Macy's said the 25-minute show featured more than 50,000 shells set off from five barges on the river.

The fireworks show was broadcast on NBC.

The tight security included officers searching backpacks and purses. Other officers used handheld radiation detectors to scan baby carriages and large suitcases.

Thousands of patriotic revelers filled downtown Springfield on Saturday night to celebrate the United States' 239th birthday and enjoy a spectacular fireworks show. Watch video

Joe Deburro | jdeburro@repub.com 

SPRINGFIELD — Thousands of patriotic revelers filled downtown Springfield on Saturday night to celebrate the United States' 239th birthday and enjoy a spectacular fireworks show.

Rain and cloudy skies cleared out by late afternoon to allow the show to go on. By 8 p.m., Riverfront Park was nearly filled, according to reporting by The Republican's Jim Kinney.

The above video features highlights from the show (unfortunately, the auto-generated thumbnail image of the video you see displayed shows the very end of one of the fireworks, and thus a fairly black sky. If you hit play, you will see plenty of fireworks).

The driver went by ambulance to Mercy Medical Center.

EAST LONGMEADOW - A woman apparently panicked while trying to turn her car around on Fairview Street and avoid the East Longmeadow Independence Day Parade Saturday, hit two cars and a house before coming to a stop.

The woman, who is either 77 or 78 years old, went to Mercy Medical Center in Springfield by ambulance, police Sgt. Steven Manning said.

The incident delayed the parade for a few minutes while responders dealt with the crash, he said. Police have not decided if they will cite the driver.

Manning said the woman was headed down Fairview Street just as the parade was reaching the neighborhood. That stretch of parade route is on Mapleshade Avenue.

The woman saw the parade, Manning said. Realizing that she couldn't get out onto Mapleshade, she  tried to back into a driveway to turn around. She lightly hit a parked car, manning said. then she panicked, witnesses told police, hit another car harder  and accelerated across a law and hit a home.

Children who were nearby because of the parade had to jump out of the way, Manning said.

The gas leak was reported on July 4th.

SPRINGFIELD — A crew from Columbia Gas of Massachusetts will remain at the site of a gas leak on Hickory Street which was reported Saturday night.

The corner of Hickory and Allen streets has been blocked off by police until further notice.

"It was spotted some time last night and we will be monitoring it until tomorrow when a crew will come out to repair it," said Andrea Luppi, Communications and Community Relations Manager for Columbia Gas of Massachusetts.

The leak occurred outside a building which houses L & G Signs & Design, Mechanical Contractors Inc., Bio Catalytic Enterprises, Inc. and other businesses. The building is located near the Elias Brookings Elementary School.

The officer involved in the accident has been released from the hospital.

CHICOPEE - A 37-year-old man who died in an accident with a police cruiser has been identified as a city resident.

Richard Chapin, 37, was killed in the early morning crash on July 4, said Michael Wilk, media officer for the Chicopee Police Department.

"We offer our condolences to his family," Wilk said.

Officer Joseph Pieczarka, who was driving the cruiser, was brought to Baystate Medical Center by ambulance after the collision. He was treated for a head injury and numerous lacerations and bruises. He was released from the hospital later that day, Wilk said.

The accident happened at about 2:12 a.m., Saturday on Front Street near City Hall. The impact from the crash pushed the cruiser into the building's parking lot, police said.

Joseph Pieczarka speaks at his graduation from the Springfield Police Academy in 2014. He was president of his class.Don Treeger/Republican file  

"Preliminary reports show that Mr. Chapin crossed over and into (Officer) Pieczarka's lane and struck him head on," Wilk said.

The Massachusetts State Police Collision Analysis and Reconstruction Section is investigating the accident. Chicopee Police are waiting for the full report when the investigation is concluded, he said.

Pieczarka graduated from the Springfield Police Academy and was sworn in as a new officer in October 2014. He was elected as the president of his academy class and received the physical fitness award.

The young man's death is the first fireworks fatality in Maine since the state legalized fireworks on Jan. 1, 2012, authorities said.

Danielle Duval 

CALAIS, Maine (AP) -- A young man who was drinking and celebrating the Fourth of July tried to launch a firework off the top of his head, fatally injuring himself, authorities said Sunday.

Devon Staples and his friends had been drinking and setting off fireworks Saturday night in the backyard of a friend's home in the small eastern Maine city of Calais, said Stephen McCausland, a spokesman for the state Department of Public Safety. Staples, 22, of Calais, placed a fireworks mortar tube on his head and set it off, he said.

The firework exploded, killing Staples instantly, McCausland said.

His death is the first fireworks fatality in Maine since the state legalized fireworks on Jan. 1, 2012, authorities said.

Calais is on the Canadian border near New Brunswick.

State fire marshals were also investigating several other Fourth of July fireworks accidents involving injuries in Friendship, Jefferson, Lebanon and Woodstock. They said most of the accidents involved burns and eye injuries. McCausland said further details were expected to be released later Sunday.

In 2011, lawmakers voted to repeal a 1949 law banning fireworks, reasoning the industry would create jobs and generate additional revenue.

David Sweat, who was shot and wounded during his June 28 capture, was taken early Sunday from Albany Medical Center to the infirmary at the Five Points Correctional Facility in the central New York town of Romulus.

ROMULUS, N.Y. (AP) -- The surviving escapee from a prison break and three-week manhunt will spend 23 hours a day in a maximum-security cell, much more confined than he and a fellow murder convict were in the prison from which they managed a getaway, officials said Sunday.  

David Sweat, who was shot and wounded during his June 28 capture, was taken early Sunday from Albany Medical Center to the infirmary at the Five Points Correctional Facility in the central New York town of Romulus, the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision said in a news release.

After at least 24 hours in the infirmary for a medical evaluation, he'll be among the up to 150 men held in its Special Housing Unit, where each prisoner sleeps, eats, washes and spends nearly all his time in a 105-square-foot cell with a bed, a writing platform, a toilet, a sink and a shower. The inmates generally are allowed out of their cells to exercise for an hour a day.

Sweat, 35, will be put on suicide watch, the corrections department noted.

Set about 200 miles west of Albany amid New York's Finger Lakes, the 1,300-inmate prison opened in 2000. It housed convicted murderer Timothy Vail for a time after he and another inmate scaled down a homemade rope to escape from Elmira Correctional Facility in 2003. 

Five Points Correctional is 155 years newer than Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, from which Sweat and fellow inmate Richard Matt escaped June 6.

Authorities said Matt and Sweat cut through their adjoining cell walls over months, climbed down catwalks to tunnels, got hold of contractors' tools, broke through a brick wall, cut into and out of a steam pipe and cut a chain holding a manhole cover outside the prison to get away. Sweat is serving a life sentence for killing a sheriff's deputy; Matt, 49, was serving 25 years to life after being convicted of kidnapping and dismembering his former boss.

Clinton Correctional is maximum-security, but as residents of the prison's "honor" block and workers in its tailor shop, Matt and Sweat were able to spend considerable time out of their cells.

They got a guard to give them art supplies, tools and access to a catwalk in exchange for favors and paintings, and they shared their escape plans with a tailor-shop instructor who gave them hacksaw blades and even agreed to be their getaway driver before she backed out, prosecutors said. The guard and instructor have pleaded not guilty to various charges.

The prison's then-superintendent and 11 other staffers were put on leave after the escape. The honor block has been temporarily closed, and new security measures are being enacted.

Matt was shot dead when a U.S. border patrol team caught up with him June 26 in woods near Malone, about 30 miles from Clinton Correctional and near the Canadian border. Sweat was captured a few miles away, in Constable, two days later.

READ MORE:

• Son claims Richard Matt's body, says cops wrongfully killed him
• David Sweat claims to be mastermind behind NY prison escape
• New superintendent named to run prison where 2 inmates escaped

A deck collapsed at a North Carolina beach house as a family got set to take a group photo, leaving at least 14 people injured with two of those in critical condition, authorities said.

EMERALD ISLE, N.C. -- A deck collapsed at a North Carolina beach house as a family got set to take a group photo, leaving at least 14 people injured with two of those in critical condition, authorities said.

A spokeswoman at a nearby hospital later said 20 people, including a young child, were rushed to that one hospital alone following the Saturday evening incident, indicating the injury total was higher.

Emerald Isle Police Chief Jeffrey Waters said an emergency call came in at 6:59 p.m. Saturday and first responders arrived within minutes at the oceanfront home in that barrier island resort community, which was packed with beachgoers for the long holiday weekend.

"The family was on the deck preparing to take a family photo when the event occurred," the police statement said.

The house on Ocean Drive is a 6-bedroom, 5-bath oceanfront home with an elevator currently up for sale for nearly $1.15 million. It also is rented through Bluewater Real Estate. An employee at the rental office said Sunday morning that the company had no statement since the investigation is continuing, but sent thoughts and prayers to the family. She wouldn't give her name.

Police said at least two people were in critical condition Saturday night of the 14 that agency reported as injured. In addition, the police news release said another victim was airlifted to a New Hanover Regional Medical Center. Officials at both hospitals declined give conditions for the injured Sunday morning.

Fire Chief Bill Walker told The Associated Press by phone that a deck area he estimated to be about 12 feet by 12 feet gave way from about 10 to 12 feet above the ground.

"It was a one-story house on pilings," he said, adding many victims were found concentrated around the site of the collapse.

14 people injured after beach house deck collapse in Emerald Isle -- http://t.co/MTawJ4HbRR pic.twitter.com/AgSSU8CDkW

-- WFMY News 2 (@WFMY) July 5, 2015

"There was a lot of people ... but luckily we pulled together and (the emergency operation) went like clockwork," he said. "Our department was the first department in," he said, adding he ran a "command and action center" to coordinate fire, police and emergency medical personnel called in from several nearby communities.

He said there may have been more people present than the 14 reported injured by police but he didn't count them. He added that injuries ranged from minor cuts and abrasions to more severe injuries that appeared to include broken bones.

Walker said a specialized mass casualty bus also had been brought in and that it took at least eight of the victims to one nearby hospital.

He said such a deck collapse was uncommon. "It's been about 10 years since we've had one of these so it's not an everyday occurrence," he said.

Carteret General Hospital spokeswoman Tonya Fluellenin said the hospital saw 20 people, including two brought in a private car. She said six of them were sent to other hospitals, and the injuries ranged from serious to critical.

"We've seen a little bit of everything. I can't give you a whole lot of detail but we've seen some orthopedic injuries," she added, citing patient privacy laws. She declined to elaborate further on a young child she said was injured.

Identities and relations of those injured weren't disclosed. It also wasn't immediately clear if a number of the injured were from one family.

Police said in their statement that the cause of the collapse wasn't yet known.

Emerald Isle is one of several resort communities lining barrier islands tucked along the coast of the southeast corner of North Carolina.

Police continue to investigate the incident which occurred Saturday night.

Conor Berry | cberry@repub.com 

PITTSFIELD — Police in Pittsfield have identified Ronald Pinel, 25, as the victim of an overnight shooting incident in the city.

The shootings occurred around 11 p.m. Saturday night in the area of Dewey Avenue and Linden Street and left four others injured.

Police found three people at the scene who had been shot including Pinel, of Pittsfield, and two men in their 20s, police said. Pinel was pronounced dead at the hospital.

Two other people including a 20-year-old woman and 26-year-old man presented themselves to Berkshire Medical Center for treatment of injuries which allegedly occurred as a result of the shooting, police added.

The shootings are under investigation by Pittsfield Police with the assistance of State Police detectives assigned to the Berkshire District Attorney's Office and State Police crime services.

Anyone with information pertaining to the shooting is asked to call Pittsfield Police at (413)448-9700.

The massacre at a predominantly black South Carolina church has institutions from Alaska to Connecticut evaluating whether they should continue enshrining the names of historical figures linked to slavery and the Confederacy.

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) -- The massacre at a predominantly black South Carolina church has institutions from Alaska to Connecticut evaluating whether they should continue enshrining the names of historical figures linked to slavery and the Confederacy.

The June 17 slaying of nine black worshippers led to calls to curb displays of the Confederate flag after photos emerged showing the suspect posing with one and burning the U.S. flag. But it also has added urgency to discussions on whether it is time to do away with names given to schools, colleges and streets that have come to be seen in a new light in places far outside the South.

A petition is calling for Yale University in Connecticut to change the name of its residential Calhoun College, which honors 1804 alumnus John C. Calhoun, a prominent advocate of the slave plantation system who became a vice president and U.S. senator from South Carolina. The petition says the name, in place since the 1930s, represents "an indifference to centuries of pain and suffering among the black population."

Yale spokeswoman Karen Peart said the university welcomes the discussion. "The tragedy in Charleston, on top of countless preceding tragedies in our country's history, has elevated public opinion and discourse on difficult subjects that have too long been avoided," she said.

Other campaigns around the country include efforts to change the names of Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis and New York City's General Lee Avenue in Brooklyn, named after Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. In Helena, Montana, officials will meet Wednesday to discuss whether anything should be done with a downtown memorial to fallen Confederate soldiers. The foundation was built in 1916 by the Daughters of the Confederacy.

The Charleston shooting took place during Bible study at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, and the man charged in the attack, Dylann Roof, posted photos online showing him holding a Confederate flag, along with writings laying out hatred of minorities.

David Glassberg, a University of Massachusetts professor who has researched public memorials, said the naming or renaming of buildings, monuments and even dinners is always political. And at the time when many were named, African-Americans did not have political power.

"For sure, African-Americans knew that these people were who they were, but they were really powerless to do anything," he said. "These traditions represent the traditions of past people."

In Connecticut, the revisionist sentiment has extended in some quarters to non-Confederate figures. The state Democratic Party will decide this month whether to strip the names of two slave-owning U.S. presidents, Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson, from the moniker of its 67-year-old annual fundraising dinner. The party's chairman, Nick Balletto, said the shooting made him think about how the party has changed and "history has not been kind" to Jefferson and Jackson.

"If we want the party of the people, we need to reflect what our community is and we should step up and make a change," he said.

For some, changing the name would be too easy an answer.

Temple University professor Christopher Rabb, a black 1992 Yale graduate who lived in Calhoun College when it still had a stained glass window depicting Calhoun standing over an enslaved black man, said he would rather see a deeper reckoning with issues of race and the role of white supremacists in building American institutions, such as Yale and other schools.

"Removing a name, removing a symbol is easy and we can say, 'problem solved,'" Rabb said. "But we're dealing with a symbol and we're not dealing with the root cause. And the root cause is systemic racism."

He contends that if Yale was "serious about addressing institutional racism and white supremacy," it would make sure every student knows about that part of the school's history.

"Yale has the ability to transform itself, but it first has to be honest about its roots, just like America has to be honest about its roots," Rabb said. Yale has not commented on the matter beyond its recent statement, but in 2001, in response to a report by several doctoral candidates about Yale and slavery, the school noted that "few, if any institutions or individuals from the period before Emancipation remained untainted by slavery."

Meanwhile, in Alaska, Gov. Bill Walter has informed the U.S. Census Bureau he plans to change the name of a census district named for Confederate military leader Wade Hampton.

The onetime slave owner rose to the rank of lieutenant general while fighting for the Confederacy during the Civil War. He later became governor of South Carolina and a U.S. senator. According to census information cited by U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, Walter's name was first attached to the Alaskan district at the suggestion of his son-in-law, who had been assigned to Nome as a judge in 1913.

History's first Latin American pope returned to Spanish-speaking South America for the first time on Sunday, bringing a message of solidarity with the region's poor, who are expected to turn out in droves to welcome their native son home.

QUITO, Ecuador -- History's first Latin American pope returned to Spanish-speaking South America for the first time on Sunday, bringing a message of solidarity with the region's poor, who are expected to turn out in droves to welcome their native son home.

"The pope of the poor" chose to visit Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay specifically because they are among the poorest and most marginal nations of a region that claims 40 percent of the world's Catholics. He's skipping his homeland of Argentina, at least partly to avoid papal entanglement in this year's presidential election.

Francis' plane landed in Quito, Ecuador, where thousands of people lined the motorcade route that the pope will take to the Vatican ambassador's residence where he'll stay for the first leg of the trip that ends July 13.

Pilgrims came from far and wide. A small group of Colombians had already set up tents at the former site of Quito's airport, where the pope will say Mass on Tuesday.

Francis is likely to raise environmental concerns with Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa and the leader of Bolivia -- who have promoted mining and oil drilling in wilderness areas -- given his recent encyclical on the need to protect nature and the poor who suffer most when it is exploited.

In that document, Francis called for a new development model that rejects today's profit-at-all cost mentality in favor of a Christian view of economic progress that respects human rights, safeguards the planet and involves all sectors of society, the poor and marginalized included.

In a video message on the eve of his departure, Francis said he wanted to bring a message of hope and joy to all "especially the neediest, the elderly, the sick, those in prison and the poor and all those who are victims of this 'throwaway culture.'"

Francis' stops include a violent Bolivian prison, a flood-prone Paraguayan shantytown and a meeting with grass-roots groups in Bolivia, the sort of people he ministered to in the slums of Buenos Aires as archbishop.

Crowds are expected to be huge. While the countries themselves are tiny compared to regional powerhouses like Brazil and Argentina, they are fervently Catholic: 79 percent of the population is Catholic in Ecuador, 77 percent in Bolivia and a whopping 89 percent in Paraguay, according to the Pew Research Center.

Waiting for the pope along his motorcade route, retired schoolteacher Cecilia Alvarez lamented that the visit was being used by politicians in Ecuador, where the government has been facing street protests.

"Francis comes on another mission, in another sense. He comes to make peace," she said.

The Vatican says it expects more than 1 million people to turn out for Francis' major public Masses in each country, and organizers have scheduled plenty of time for the pope to meander through the throngs expected to line his motorcade route.

When St. John Paul II visited Ecuador in 1985, he called for a more just society and reminded indigenous groups of the role played by missionaries who had arrived on the continent centuries before. Francis will likely repeat those messages and pay particular attention to the role his Jesuit order played.

John Paul's visits were shadowed by the Polish pope's concern about the rise of liberation theology, fearing that Marxists were using its "preferential option for the poor" to turn the Gospel into a call for armed revolution.

Guzman Carriquiri, the No. 2 of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America and a top papal adviser, said a less turbulent situation awaits Francis, who has sought to revive a purer, less political version of liberation theology and recently approved beatification for one of its heroes, Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero.

Francis also brokered a historic thaw between the United States and Cuba, countries he will visit in September.

"Francis' visit will be a huge boost to the priests of the Third World and theology of liberation," said 80-year-old Xavier Albo, a fellow Jesuit. "He lives that theology through mercy, modesty and his obligation to the poor, the immigrants and the imprisoned."

Jesuits paid with their lives defending the downtrodden against dictatorships, as the pope knows well from his days as head of the Jesuits during the right-wing military dictatorship in Argentina.

Opponents of dictatorships in neighboring Paraguay and Bolivia were also disappeared. One, who was tortured and killed in 1980, was Father Luis Espinal, a Bolivian close to Albo whose body was dumped by the side of the airport road that Francis will travel on his way into La Paz on Wednesday.

Francis will stop the Popemobile there, get out and pray.

Voters in Greece resoundingly rejected creditors' demands for more austerity in return for rescue loans Sunday, backing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who insisted the vote would give him a stronger hand to reach a better deal.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Voters in Greece resoundingly rejected creditors' demands for more austerity in return for rescue loans Sunday, backing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who insisted the vote would give him a stronger hand to reach a better deal.

The opposition accused Tsipras of jeopardizing the country's membership in the 19-nation club that uses the euro and said a "yes" vote was about keeping the common currency.

With 87 percent of the votes counted, the "no" side had more than 60 percent.

"Today we celebrate the victory of democracy," Tsipras, who gambled the future of his 5-month-old left-wing government on the vote, said in an address to the nation.

Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said Sunday night that creditors planned from the start to shut down banks to humiliate Greeks and force them to make a statement of contrition for showing that debt and loans are unsustainable.

On Sunday night's result, he said that "'no' is a big 'yes' to democratic Europe. It's a no to the vision of Europe an infinite cage for its people. It is a loud yes to the vision of the Eurozone as a common area of prosperity and social justice."

Thousands of government supporters gathered in central Athens in celebration, waving Greek flags and chanting "No, No, No."

"We don't want austerity measures anymore, this has been happening for the last five years and it has driven so many into poverty, we simply can't take any more austerity," said Athens resident Yiannis Gkovesis, 26, holding a large Greek flag in the city's main square.

Governing left-wing Syriza party Eurodeputy Dimitris Papadimoulis said that "Greek people are proving they want to remain in Europe" as equal members "and not as a debt colony." The referendum was Greece's first in 41 years.

Minister of State Nikos Papas, speaking on Alpha television, said it would be "wrong to link a 'no' result to an exit from the eurozone. If a 'no' prevails that will help us get a better agreement."

Tsipras' high-stakes brinkmanship with lenders from the eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund resulted in Greece defaulting on its debts this week and shutting down its banks to avoid their collapse. He called the referendum last weekend, giving both sides just a week to campaign.

"Today, democracy is defeating fear ... I am very optimistic," Tsipras said earlier in the day after voting in in Athens.

European officials had openly urged Greeks to vote against the government's recommendation. The leaders of Germany and France called for a European Union summit Tuesday to discuss the situation.

"I hope people say 'yes,'" European Parliament President Martin Schulz told German public radio. "If after the referendum, the majority is a 'no,' they will have to introduce another currency because the euro will no longer be available for a means of payment."

Belgian Finance Minister Johan Van Overtveldt was one of the first eurozone ministers to react to the initial results.

"This likely 'no' complicates matters," he told Belgium's VRT network, but insisted the door remained open to resume talks with the Greek government within hours.

The vote was held amid banking restrictions imposed last Monday to halt a bank run, with Greeks queuing up at ATMs across the country to withdraw a maximum 60 euros per day. Banks have been shut all week, and it is uncertain when they will reopen. Large lines once again formed at ATMs on Sunday.

Daniel Tsangaridis, a 35-year-old Athens resident, said he didn't expect banks to reopen soon, despite a government pledge that they would do so Tuesday.

"It's not going to happen in the next 48 hours," he said. "If the situation improves and we can have a deal, then the banks will open."

The Syriza party came to power in January after a six-year recession. Since then, the standoff between Athens and its international lenders has grown more bitter, and early signs of some economic growth and recovering employment in Greece have disappeared.

The debt-wracked nation also suffered repeated ratings downgrades and lost access to billions of euros after its existing bailout deal expired last week.

Polls published Friday showed the two sides in a dead heat with an overwhelming majority -- about 75 percent -- wanting Greece to remain in the euro currency.

"Today, we Greeks decide on the fate of our country," conservative opposition leader Antonis Samaras said. "We vote 'yes' to Greece. We vote 'yes' to Europe."

The sense of urgency was palpable as Greeks struggled to decipher a convoluted referendum question after being bombarded with frenzied messages warning of the country's swiftly approaching financial collapse.

Neither result on Sunday, however, would lead to a clear answer on what Greece should do about its overstretched finances.

Greece is no longer in a bailout program since its previous package expired last Tuesday. It now has to negotiate a new one with its creditors that involves even more money for the government and banks and new economic austerity measures.

Despite the Greek government's assertion that a "no" vote will not lead to a euro exit, most experts agree it would open up more uncertain financial outcomes.

A number of European politicians, including Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the top eurozone official, have said a "no" vote would jeopardize Greece's place in the 19-nation eurozone. Investors are also likely to believe a "no" win increases the chance of a so-called "Grexit," where Greece returns to its own old currency.

Police have not released any information about the stabbing yet.

SPRINGFIELD - City police are currently investigating a Sunday evening stabbing which has left at least two injured.

The crime was reported shortly before 6 p.m. on Massasoit Place, a short street that runs between Massasoit and Bartlett streets.

One man, wearing a blood-stained white t-shirt, was escorted into an ambulance. His hands were cuffed behind his back. A second ambulance sat nearby.

Police led one woman in handcuffs out of the home at 14-16 Massasoit Place and into a waiting cruiser, while she screamed obscenities.

At the scene officers searched a maroon Toyota parked at the curb.

Neighbors gathered outside in front of nearby homes, while police cruisers filled the street.

Several said the stabbings happened outside. Blood could be seen staining a part of the street.

"They are always fighting in this area," said one resident who declined to give her name.

She said she worries about the children who live on the street, saying a stray bullet could hit anyone.

Police do patrol the area often and she said she hopes they can stop the recent violence.

Police have not released any information about the crime yet. Western Mass News, media partners for Masslive and the Republican, is reporting the stabbing was domestic related.

The stabbings happened six days and a block away from where Chris Calvente, 20, of Springfield, was shot to death. A second man was also injured in the daytime shooting Tuesday on Prospect Street.

Police quickly arrested Erik Rivera, 25, of Osgood Street, and Yeyson Rivera, 27, of Tyler Street. Both men were formally charged with murder in Wednesday arraignments in Springfield District Court.

Masslive will update this story as more information becomes available.