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The dance floor was so slick with blood, it was like a skating rink

A Boston Police sergeant and officer today described an out-of-control brawl at a Fenway bar that left three people stabbed, and one officer seriously injured took and which officers from across the city - along with intense use of pepper spray - to quell.

Sgt. John Wright said he had just finished inspecting Who's on First early on the morning of Sept. 5 - at the urging of an off-duty gang officer who called to report several possible troublemakers from the city's Cape Verdean community - and all seemed relatively quiet when a riot erupted.

People started swinging their fists, chairs and knives, Officer Daniel McMorrow said. One guy in particular began swinging a chair at everybody around him - and police. When McMorrow managed to subdue him, another man, shirtless, ran up to him and punched him repeatedly until he was finally subdued.

With just three officers initially on scene and 300 people desperately trying to get up a single set of stairs to the exit, Wright said, he issued an "officer in trouble" call, which brought police racing to the scene from as far away as West Roxbury.

Wright said he and three other officers were forced to use copious amounts of pepper spray, both to ward off attackers and to keep more people from jumping into the fray. He estimated that at one point, 50 people were slugging it out on the dance floor, on the stairs and outside - where officers chased one guy wielding a knife.

"There was blood all over the floor, the floor was like a skating rink," Wright said. "I didn't realize how much blood I had on me until I went home to get changed."

One officer was injured so severely he is only now coming back to work, Wright said.

The chair swinger, Rey Fulcar, had charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon dismissed two weeks ago when a witness against him failed to show up in court. Fulcar is, however, now behind bars following his arrest last week on charges he helped somebody who shot a man in Jamaica Plain.

Bar managers said the melee caught them completely by surprise. They said they had decided to stay open late that night because it was Labor Day weekend and they thought they would get some business from returning students. Instead, the night was fairly quiet until around 11 p.m., when a large influx of people, many Cape Verdean, many dressed in black, arrived en masse. About an hour later, an off-duty gang officer showed up with some friends to enjoy the music. When he noticed some known troublemakers in the crowd, bar officials and Wright said, he called in to suggest police station some units outside just in case something went on.

Among other steps, they said security staff are being issued shirts that say "STAFF" on both the front and back. Wright had said that during the riot, police often couldn't tell who were security guards and who were brawlers, because many of the security guards wore only black, just like the fighters.

The board decides Thursday what action, if any, to take.

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Comments

Surely the Board will outlaw chairs from establishments in our fine city... to make sure this albatross never can happen again.

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That'd be like suggesting they ban glass mugs when people use THOSE as weap....oh...oh ho, I see what you did there.

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last year or maybe two years ago ban glass mugs when a kid was killed when a glass chard from a mug thrown by some idiot stabbed him in the neck? I for one don't think it's such a bad idea to ban glasses in the downtown clubs where rowdy crowds gather - especially near Fenway and The Garden. Won't happen probably by city ordinance, but if I were a bar owner, I'd consider imposing it in my place.

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I'm all about finding solutions.

Blood-slicked floor made it like a skating rink...Frog Pond unable to open due to warm weather...

Boom. Solution.

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Who is "McMorrow"? Why are you so bad at this?

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He's a cop. First name added to post.

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