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Pack attacks woman on Orange Line; one alleged member arrested at police HQ when he shows up to bail out the others

Six teens were arraigned today on charges they attacked a woman on an Orange Line train yesterday evening and made off with her cell phone. And after they were done, they exchanged high fives, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

The DA's office adds that one of the teens, Eric Thompson, 18, of Dorchester, was arrested at Transit Police headquarters in Roxbury when he showed up to help bail out the other teens - still wearing the same sweatshirt he allegedly wore during the attack.

According to the DA's office and Transit Police, the six went after a woman on an outbound train approaching Tufts Medical Center around 6:40 p.m.:

The teens allegedly grabbed the woman's hair and slammed her face into a metal railing as they pried a cell phone from her hand before fleeing as the train pulled into the station.

An MBTA employee observed the teens high-fiving after exiting the station but was unable to catch up to the group, prosecutors said. An MBTA Transit Police officer spotted them a short time later, however, and recognized their clothing from a broadcast of the suspects’ descriptions. As a result, Smith, Barber, and the juvenile defendants were arrested near the intersection of Washington Street and Union Park.

Thompson arrived at Transit Police headquarters on Southampton Street with a new group of friends and was nabbed when a transit officer recognized him from surveillance video at the station.

In addition to Thompson, Demario Barber, 17 and Kernisha Smith, 18, were arraigned in Boston Municipal Court as adults. The remaining three were arraigned in juvenile court and their names were not released due to their ages.

Judge Sally A. Kelly set bail for Thompson and Smith at $2,000. Barber had his bail set at $5,000, but he won't be going anywhere for awhile because he was already facing assault-and-battery charges in East Boston and Kelly revoked his bail for that, the DA's office says.

Judge Paul D. Lewis released two of the younger teens to their parents' custody - prosecutors had sought bail of $10,000 for them. The third teen had his arraignment continued.

Innocent, etc.

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Comments

Lock these Sh**Bgs up for a LONG time.

Waiting for the PC-huggy "not their fault" UH crew to chime in defending these animals.

BTW, I don't read the Herald, so no, I don't need to go back there.

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how do you know it's not worth going back there?

Signed,
A non-pc,non-huggy member of the UH crew.

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Sorry if I got your panties bunched up.

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Sir reporting for duty sir!

I recommend waiting until they are convicted in a court of law and sentenced according to the laws of the commonwealth! Rather than disregarding due process so that dickbag conservatives such as yourself can project your impotent rage onto the lower class!

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And how do you know I am a conservative?

It's conservative to want people who commit crimes like this punished harshly? What if it was your mother or wife/gf who had their head bashed against a pole because some kid wanted their phone?

FYI, I probably do more than 90% of the people on this board to help the "lower class."

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Now why would anyone think you were a conservative?
Also, I'm one of the "lower class" and you haven't done shit for me lately...

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Where were the men in the area? Any guys seeing this happen should have grabbed one of these twerps and beat the bag out of em.

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they didn't want to risk their life for a stranger's phone.

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The people in the area likely wanted to help but realized that,as with all alleged crimes, it is better to let due process run its course; following due process is the best way to achieve justice for all involved.

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six guys? It would take a pretty confident superhero to intervene quickly against six guys, especially if you don't know whether they have weapons of some kind. This is pretty shocking--6:40pm? Yeesh.

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That kind of incident can happen so quickly that no one has time to react. If they waited until the train was just about stopped, it was probably a matter of seconds from the initial attack to them hitting the stairs out of the station and the people around the victim were probably stunned and when they recovered enough to act, they tended to her first.

In hindsight, it would have been more efficient for a couple to stay with the injured woman and others to run after the thugs while still others found a T employee to contact the cops and give a description, but I can say from personal experience that when you see something shocking like that, your brain takes a minute to catch up.

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mbta & T police get on this,

ban anyone convicted/ arrested for violence/robbery on mbta property or vehicles, if they get back on, charge em with trespassing. Its not like we dont have facial recn

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MBTA police too busy being undercover trying to catch butt pinchers. Ever seen a uniformed MBTA police officer? It's a rare thing, rarer still when there is a crime going on.

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I see Transit cops at least daily on my commute. Perhaps you aren't paying attention.

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I see them as well Then again, I'm using major stops.

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I noticed Adam did not add his usual "Innocent, etc..." at the end of the post.

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That's what happens when you try to do too many things at once.

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Is someone going to tell all the criminals and pervs that there are multiple cameras in every station on the MBTA and most vehicles?? YOU'RE GONNA GET CAUGHT!

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Not so loud.

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As I've said before make the trash pick up the trash in the tunnels to save us all from track fire delays. Then when their sentences are almost up, let the CHUDS and rats get them.

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Here's Thompson's Facebook.

Love that he follows a page called "F*** Bitches Get Money."
Class act. The police should see this.

https://www.facebook.com/ebthompson3

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A member of the "Wolf Pack Gang." Someone ought to look into that, too.

And he's "allegic" to bullshit. I hope they note that on his intake file in prison so he doesn't go into anaphylaxis.

Also, he likes Colgate, Axe, and Madison Park High School.

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It's a common one to have.

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Prison.

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One would think he was already dead of an auto-immune disorder were that true.

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Here's Demario Barber's Facebook.
Wish there was a way to message his "new girlfriend" and warn her that her man's a woman beater/thief.

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000686291765&fref=ts

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If some of these kids were arraigned as adults then why was bail so laughably low?

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No one came to this women's aid? All the tough young guys and ladies I see everyday with their hard looks and tattoos, the hard ass suits with their hard ass white collar jobs, nobody?

I'll tell you straight up right now that if the train had more construction workers and other so-called blue collar types on it than suits and college kids, this story would have turned out differently.

Amazing. If I witnessed this assault I would have slammed the nearest punks head into a metal rail, just for starters. People [men and women] need to, pardon the expression, man-up.

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Those tats and muscles is just for looking at in the mirror.

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That can lead to lawsuits. I don't know all of the ins and outs of the law, I can just imagine physically restraining someone under 18 as not looking so good. Especially if they have a good lawyer.

I'm with you though, I'd like to have seen a group of people intervene and stop this attack.

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As much as these punks make my blood boil, it's a tough call. 5 or 6 male teens that probably know how to fight is not something the average guy can take on. Add that they probably are armed with knives and you have a good recipe for getting yourself maimed or killed. Not to mention that if you do dole out the beating they so richly deserve, you're likely going to jail too and will definitely get sued. They're low-life scumbags so they are going to see a payday from a mile away. Even if you win, you're still out thousands of dollars to defend yourself in court.

It's awful decision to have to make on the spot. I think most people would attempt to step in if the circumstances are really bad such as attempted rape, serious assault, etc. A sucker punch phone grab, maybe not.

As someone mentioned above, doing this at 6:40 PM is brazen. This sort of thing will lead to a Bernie Goetz situation if the powers that be don't step up. F*&% these punks for beating and robbing a woman and props to the police for catching them.

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That incidents like this seem to be on the rise is really depressing. It's this kind of stuff that makes people afraid to ride the train, live in the city, etc. and frankly, it gives too many people an excuse to write off every black male under the age of thirty as a potential criminal.

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This is one of the reasons why I knit on the T. I always tell folks that I'll totally use my knitting needles as a shiv if need be.

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This is why you should always carry pepper spray. You never know when anything like this could happen. I mean 6:40pm on a week night, I'd normally feel safe but you just never know. ~Mea www.hertrainstories.blogspot.com

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By the time you got your mace out or even reacted, they ran off.

We all like to say "I would have done THIS or I have weapons so this wouldn't happen to me". The fact is, they slammed, grabbed, and fled before anyone could react.

As for why didn't people help, well, how many could see what happened and then move to grab someone? Crowd + fast moves = no way to intervene. Somebody might have had a slight chance to grab or trip one of them. Maybe.

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This can't be said enough. And the MBTA has POAs and big signs all around warning folks to be careful when using their smartphones. This is especially true if you're sitting or standing near a train door, for obvious reasons if you think about it. Most of these assaults involve 'droids and Iphones, so be aware [this means especially you, ladies] that your phone attracts characters with bad intent like flies to you know what. I think for many people their smartphone is like a security blanket or something, and having it glued to their hands with their heads permanently bowed down is akin to a nervous habit.

Not to sound like a loudmouth, but they can try and jump me, but given even the remotest chance, I'll fight back. The fact I have a dumbphone and my physical looks and attitude seems to make these violent predators uninterested in me. I haven't been jumped since I was a kid, and have been in MANY very sketchy environments in that time and still am today. The biggest way to avoid a potentially dangerous situation is to avoid it all together. If you get bad vibes then don't hesitate to follow your instinct. I myself don't generally feel threatened by individual people, but will and do avoid groups, and am always surveying my environment for potential threats. I see too many people not paying attention to what's going on around them, including subtle stuff that can be a red flag to potential danger.

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Lotta comments here so I may have missed. Looking for how she is? Was she hospitalized? Treated and released? I hope not too badly injured.

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Willing to bet they took the phone to CEX right after... where else would that punk get bail money from?

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i think ppl should mind there business exspecially when not knowing the situation or the outcome some of these kids was not involved... but was at the scene give it a break mbta needs to focus onthe boy who died on the bus over stepping on another kids sneaker were talking about robbing a phone not a death on a bus.. fyi need better mbta workers let work on making our community better by teaching r young adults to be wiser instead beaten in there heads..

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Should learn THEIR proper grammar and spelling and punctuation before posting screeds about how other people should behave. Then again, being able to properly construct coherent sentences might have saved you from having to be in a position where you feel that you have to defend the actions of people who attack and rob other people, (possibly yourself or some other illiterate scumbag).

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