In the news

■ Oliver Joswig, a Protestant pastor in Schleiden, Germany, said “we are indeed laying to rest a member of the school community” as high school students buried a classroom skeleton that served as an educational specimen for generations before being replaced by a plastic model.

■ Bill Gates, Microsoft co- founder and billionaire philanthropist, whose foundation is spending millions of dollars fighting the covid-19 pandemic, is isolating after testing positive.

■ Anutin Charnvirakul, Thailand’s public health minister who spearheaded a drive to decriminalize cannabis, says the government will distribute 1 million of the plants free when most legal restrictions on production and possession are soon lifted.

■ Skye Tiedemann, a yearbook staffer at Lyman High School in Longwood, Fla, says the lesson is “Don’t be afraid to speak up” as an outcry over censorship ended with the School Board overruling the superintendent’s plan to cover up a page showing students waving rainbow flags and a sign declaring “Love is love.”

■ Herman Felton Jr., president of Wiley College in Marshall, Texas, said “we are constantly communicating with donors,” and this time it paid off big as more than 100 students at the historically Black school learned at graduation that all their debt had been paid off anonymously.

■ Florin Vaduva of Dania Beach, Fla., awaits sentencing after pleading guilty in the theft of more than 2,600 checks intended for religious institutions by way of fake bank accounts, with a plea deal calling for $1 million restitution.

■ Kenneth Parker, a U.S. attorney in Ohio, vowed to continue fighting “the opioid scourge plaguing the region” as 14 health care professionals were charged with illegally distributing prescriptions for more than 5 million pain pills.

■ Claude Garrett, who served 30 years of a life sentence for the fire that killed his girlfriend, was freed in Nashville, Tenn., as a judge vacated his conviction and a prosecutor dismissed the charges after improved fire science ruled out arson.

■ Robert Morgan, an air traffic controller, got credit for the assist, but it was an unidentified passenger with no flying experience who saved the day when the pilot of a small plane suddenly fell ill and the man began with the radio message, “I have no idea; I can see the coast of Florida in front of me, and I have no idea.”