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Man stabbed repeatedly at Park and Tremont
By adamg on Thu, 10/08/2015 - 3:40pm
Scene of the crime. Photo by Josh.
Around 3:30 p.m. Police are looking for a white woman with pulled-back black hair in a black sweatshirt and blue jeans, carrying a large bag, last seen disappearing into the crowds on Winter Street. She was accompanied by a white man, 5'8" to 5'10" and about 170 lbs with a scruffy beard, wearing a black zip-up jacket and a black and green Celtics cap.
Another view of the scene, by Tom McLaughlin:
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Comments
Odds that this involves junkies?
I'm guessing sky-high.
Its crazy how many homeless
Its crazy how many homeless people and people dealing with heavy drug issues are out there on a daily basis.
Sadly, once weed is legalized
Sadly, once weed is legalized, it will only become worse. It will become too expensive for people who want to get high and they will switch to cheaper drugs like heroin. The worst thing that can happen for pre-addicts is for recreational weed to become legalized, more expensive and taxed. While I realized that it's not a gateway drug for everyone, it is for too many. Seen it happen too many times.
Lolwut. It is not a gateway
Lolwut. It is not a gateway drug anymore than alcohol or nicotine. You also realize if it is legalized the price would significantly drop, right, since it would no longer be imported on the black market? People could just grow it in their backyard... cause ya know it grows basically like a weed?
If you say so
n/t
Thank You,
Funniest thing I've heard all day.
No, just no.
You have really don't know what you are talking about whatsoever to be frank. "It will become too expensive for people who want to get high and they will switch to cheaper drugs like heroin." Incorrect in many ways. How does one reach this conclusion? Using supply and demand in economics we are able to figure that with the large increase in supply in a newly competitive market that prices will be going downward not upward lol. I do agree with the dact that heroin is cheaper, but don't you think that its a tad dramatic of a jump from weed to heroin, one of the least addictive and potent drugs to the very most?
Next up on the chopping block; "The worst thing that can happen for pre-addicts is for recreational weed to become legalized, more expensive and taxed. While I realized that it's not a gateway drug for everyone, it is for too many. Seen it happen too many times." What is this pre-addicts demographic and how would we find out and identify them. By definition, "a person who is addicted to a particular substance" an addiction could theoretically happen to anyone so we might all just be "pre-addicts". Have you also seen preaddiction happen many times as well? LOL. I do agree that some individuals do have addictive personalities and do get involved with abuses of substances and I also believe you are correct in identifying that it is an issue.
This issue though will not be solved with A): assuming this preconceived notion that everyone who is stabbed or stabbing on the street it automatically a drug addict, B): identifying weed anywhere near heroin on the drug spectrum, and last but not least C): believing there is a demographic in world who are pre-addicts which is very demeaning term to be used for individuals that have no yet done something wrong. Thank you for your time.
Couldn't agree more. So many
Couldn't agree more. So many studies on this show that people get on heroin after first getting addicted to perscription pain meds, often perscribed (or over perscribed) for some legitimate reason. It's once people don't get addequate treatment while weening off the scripts, or if they decide the like it and look for illegal perscription meds for as long as they can, that the next step is often heroin. Going from pot to heroin is just not the usual story.
Mounting evidence that medical marijuana = less opiates
This is from a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, found here: http://www.nber.org/papers/w21345
In other words, states with medical marijuana dispensaries have fewer problems with addictions and overdoses involving oxycodone, heroin, vicodin, etc.
This makes some sense, as many people will try the medicinal marijuana, find it effective, and never require opioids. You can't become addicted to something that you don't have and don't use. It also can't be stolen and/or sold into the black market.
For Christ sake did you just
For Christ sake did you just watch "Refer Madness?" People that smoke pot don't start doing heroin b/c they can't get their hands on weed. Your prehistoric thoughts on the legalization of marijuana is part of the problem with this county and why we lag behind in legalizing this recreational drug and also why we lag behind in drug treatment. You do realize it was legal in this country at one point, don't you? Do you get that Regan's "Just Say No" was one of the worst things that could have happened to this country? As well as the Controlled Substance Act when they put marijuana as a Schedule 1 drug?
Do you drink, smoke cigarettes, drink coffee? Take the pills that your pusher; oops, I mean doctor prescribes to you? Are ok with all these energy drinks that are marketed to young people as well as kids going to Starbucks and enjoying their triple shot espresso mocha frappes? Aren't all of these gateway drugs? WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE?
Seriously it is time for to do some history research and learn actual facts about the plant and what it does.
Sincerely,
Your tax paying, charity giving, 4x a week runner, home owning pot smoking neighbor.
How on earth...
Does that get 10 thumbs up?
Gullible old people who
Gullible old people who bought into Reefer Madness as youths but aren't smart enough to have spent 2 minutes researching marijuana in the decades since. But these olds vote so politicians who themselves have smoked weed have to continue to demonize it.
Kill 'em all
Absolutely. We should kill 'em all after they hit 60, they're nothing but a burden to young, intelligent people like you who contribute greatly to society simply by breathing Yup, old people suck.
Oy.
I'm glad the machine gunners opened up on this the moment it tried to take the beach, but let me just expand a little bit on what everyone else has already mocked you for, anon.
I'm quite interested to hear about this world where heroin is cheaper than marijuana. Or the world where opiates and cannabinoids are in any way interchangeable.
This is a silly thing to say. All existing research suggests that legal substances trade for much less than illicit ones. The closest analogy I can find is Prohibition, during which the price of alcohol skyrocketed 300%, where it stayed until the repeal of Prohibition brought it back down to the same inflation-adjusted price as before 1920.
Also, "pre-addicts" is a completely meaningless term. You, me, Nancy Reagan, the Pope--we're all "pre-addicts."
Reefer Madness was way better when MST3K did it.
You are misinformed
The biggest gateway drug for Heroin addicts are over-the-counter painkillers*, not weed.
Also, to accurately call weed a "gateway drug," you don't look only at people who started smoking weed who went on to harder drugs. You have to look at EVERYONE (or a significant sample) who has smoked weed and then find out the percentage who moved on to harder drugs. If you do that, you see that it's not a gateway drug.
And if you want to rely on anecdotal evidence, almost everyone I know has partaken in recreational marijuana. And I don't know one hard drug user.
* Edit that. I meant prescription painkillers.
I disagree. So many people
I disagree. So many people during the day hang out on the common and smoke weed (While I waste the day in the office).
If you walk through downtown crossing, you see people crouched in doorways, thin and dirty, sitting on piles of their stuff and these are clearly NOT pot heads. These are people who, in larger numbers than before, are making their way to the city. The uptick of homelessness and people who appear to also have addictions around DTX, Copley and the South End is quite noticable in the past year. There has been a heroine epidemic in Massachusetts for a long time and the people effected are finally getting pushed to the city, where everyone can see them.
If anything, legalization may help people who are weening off a pill dependency from going straight to heroin. In addition to legalizing pot, better controls on opiod perscriptions and more rehab facilitiies for people already addicted is the only thing that will help this problem.
Yes, people with chronic pain
Yes, people with chronic pain should definitely have even *more* problems getting their medication so that the purse-clutchers feel a little more safe.
Do you really think the majority of the drug addicted criminals on the street in boston got their start with legally prescribed pain killers? How about compared to, oh I don't know.. alcohol?
Most if not all pharmacies no longer even carry oxycontin (but they do sell alcohol!) and you want even more restrictions? There is nobody with legitimate chronic pain that hasn't been caught up in this dragnet in some way or another. How much more "additional control" is going to be enough for you?
If you're sincerely concerned about the problem of homelessness and crime, I do hope that you are also lobbying for additional controls on alcohol. It is, of course, one of the most harmful drugs to our society, possibly the most harmful, and with little to no legitimate medical use.
If you're not lobbying for more restrictions on alcohol, I think you should be. It would be a much more effective strategy to combat the problem without causing unnecessary suffering to old, crippled people in relentlessly agonizing pain. Might have some effect on you, though... so maybe it's better to go with the pain pills thing.
How the f does anyone
"Disappear into the crowd" at this location? I mean--first thing, it's mobbed with people and it's daylight. Second, there are security cameras everywhere so it should be pretty easy to track them. And yeah--what Jack said. DTX and this part of the common haven't been this scuzzy since I was in middle school. Can we get a few cops around, please?
Depending on the time of day..
"disappearing into the crowd" doesn't sound at all unlikely to me. It is a crowded area and you wouldn't have to go far to be surrounded by people who have no idea what happened, so why would they notice you? I'm sure it doesn't mean "disappeared forever", just that they left the vicinity walking past people who had no special reason to notice them.
Well I'm sure they won't "disappear forever"
Given the cameras, but still...I know people can be oblivious but usually scraps like this are hard to miss. Idk--maybe we've just gotten to used to screaming fights or scuffles between the substance addled but I still find it strange.
not to be a grumpy old jerk...
...but crowds don't really pay attention to much beyond their smartphones. I listen to music when I'm out and about, but I always keep my phone in my bag or my pocket. As such, I'm usually looking around - and noticing that I'm one of a very few doing so. I see it on the T, I see it on sidewalks, I see it at the gym, I see it even when people are crossing the street: they almost never look up from their phones.
It would beggar belief to think that these two could have escaped without anyone noticing them...but I can't say it would surprise me if the obliviousness of the teeming masses worked to the criminals' advantage.
What's going on with DTX?
I work near there and yes, it does feel like it's gotten much sketchier over the past few years despite the many claims that building new apartments there would lead to a more safe residential feeling due to the increase of people living in the neighborhood. Everyone I know has a different theory as to why there are so many more junkies taking up residence there, but I haven't heard anything definitive yet. Some people say DTX and the Freedom Trail have a higher concentration of tourists who are not as likely to have heard "My car ran out of gas and I just need cash for a ticket back to Worcester for my girl and me!" and therefore are more likely to actually give panhandlers money, but that's pretty hard to substantiate.
Before last year I never saw so many alcoves filled with homeless people sleeping there overnight in the dead of winter. I'd get into work early in the morning and there would be cleaning staff throwing hot water mixed with bleach on these spots as soon as people started packing up. Every day. On other threads people have said there isn't a correlation between this and the closing of the Long Island shelter, but the timing certainly coincided nicely. Does anyone who works with the homeless population in the city have any insights into what's been happening over the past two years? Is it an uptick in hard drug addiction? Is it a lack of beds or is it possible that these people are being turned away from shelters due to intoxication?
Long Island for Sure
I definitely thing the uptick in homeless has everything to do with Long Island closing. I don't, however, think that DTX being a sketchy area is a new thing. Perhaps the level of sketch has increased, or the sketchiness has taken a skeevier turn.
Honestly the other thing is
Honestly the other thing is that they have closed the hill/Soldiers and Sailors. I think a lot of people hung out up there under the cover of trees doing drugs and now they're just all around.
Yeah, I don't know
I remember being nervous about going there in the dark on an errand as a college freshman in winter 2004, and then I remember having spending a good chunk of time in the Jeweler's Building in 2012 trying to hide the bag containing my wedding rings because it said FINE JEWELRY in giant letters across the side, prior to running the gauntlet of empty storefronts between DSW and the Orange Line entrance to get back to the Green Line.
It did get markedly scarier along there as the storefronts emptied out from the recession/Filene's Hole debacle, around the time the Theatre District section by Emerson started improving a bit, but I can remember DTX being full of junkies, homeless, dubious charitable canvasers, and rowdy teenagers going back into the early 2000s.
Filenes
I remember the area south of Filenes on Washington being really sketchy after dark in 2005, and in fact, I would take the T to Chinatown instead of walking when I was going to the Y. I also agree with your point about the empty storefronts and then the The Hole.
I also remember people in the early aughts complaining about dubious characters hanging around the Dunkin Donuts on Tremont Street, across from Park Street T. I simply avoided that block altogether.
may be both Long Island closing
increase in drug use and the lack of affordable housing or lack of imagination in using resources to create housing. I'm running into more people who were once middle class home owners, well educated people who are temporarily living in shelters because of layoffs or rip offs, foreclosure etc...
They're people who once lived the dream but were one paycheck, medical bill away from losing it all..sad to see.
I think that there used to be
I think that there used to be many vacant buildings and many sketchy-friendly areas in Chinatown and all the new development there and the police crack-down at the South Station bus terminal, which also used to be far more sketchy, has pushed people further into downtown crossing and Copley and the Common. Coming in from NYC on the night bus or train used to be alot more dodgy than it is now, so South Station is no longer a good place to congregate without being controlled.
What shape is he in?
Will he be okay?
Haven't heard a summons for the homicide unit
So that's a good sign. He was alert and conscious when police arrived.
There was an awful lot of
There was an awful lot of blood on the pavement when I walked past the scene. I hope the victim got medical attention quickly.
It's inexcusable
that the heart of city has so little obvious police presence (as opposed to undercover/plainclothes). This is true in other areas of the city, true. Ditto the MBTA. Consistent uniformed presence deters crime. And this is a city that makes it very difficult for law abiding citizens to defend themselves, in particular to own firearms. Yet, there's a serious lack of law enforcement presence on the street.
It's also inexcusable on the part of both city hall and the state (Boston is the capital city of MA, the most important economic engine for both MA and New England as a whole)to have allowed the situation in DTX to have deteriorated to the extent it did since the closing of Filenes, then the empty hole. The large real estate interests that own most of the property raised rents through the roof, then sat on empty property for years, in the heart of the city, causing major social and economic problems. The financial collapse of course played a major role, but more could have been done.
And the situation surrounding the closing of Long Island is pathetic. There appears to be no end in sight on this issue and what comes out of city hall is not encouraging.
And this is a city that makes
Just what DTX needs to fully rebound; civilians shooting wildly into crowds!
To be fair
I don't think that's the poster's main point and the rest of it is completely valid. I'm a fan of the DTX "ambassadors" but I miss a more active police presence--especially the near-constant presence of a couple of mounted police on their calm, handsome horses-- and of course the lively central bustle of Filene's and the Basement. I don't think anyone wants to see it turn into a free for all.
It's sad that there is
It's sad that there is usually a gaggle of MBTA police in that exact spot shooting the shit over coffee except for when crime happens. They are always around until needed and then never to be found. Same with Back Bay Station.
You realize that the majority
You realize that the majority of the state (93% of cities & towns in MA) and majority of the country now allows concealed carry and NONE of the predictions of wild west bloodbaths from Samaritans have come to pass?
You don't call 30,000 gun
You don't call 30,000 gun deaths in the US every year a blood bath? How sick do you have to be to find that amount of death acceptable? Japan had 9 gun homicides in 2008. NINE! Guess which country has strict gun laws and which one doesn't?
I really don't think strict gun laws have much to do with it.
They might help a little, but at this point, they will be too little/too late.
Many Latin American countries have some of the strictest gun laws in the world, but their gun violence rates dwarf the US rates, sometimes by 5-10X.
The guns are already here by the millions, restricting their ownership helps a little, but probably isn't the overall solution since the guns are already here.
Many Latin American countries
The only thing you're saying is that countries with dysfunctional governments and limited economic opportunity have a hard time enforcing their gun laws. Which is hardly a mind blowing realization.
MattL
many of the people in this country who are victims/aggressors of gun violence are those with limited economic opportunity, and this government we have is far from functional. and would need to really step up seeing we have that many more guns.
Pete Nice
If you can't tell the difference between El Salvador and the US, then I don't know what to tell you.
MattL
If you can't tell the difference between Chicago and Stockholm, I don't know what to tell you.
I mean you can't have it both ways. You just can't compare the US to certain countries and not others just to fit your agenda/argument. The US isn't Sweden, and it isn't El Salvador.
I'm not comparing anything to
I'm not comparing anything to anything else, Pete Nice. You're the one who brought up the idiotic comparison to Latin American countries.
It isn't an idiotic comparison.
If you look at it in the larger context of this conversation (I wasn't talking to "you") People say things like "Germany does this, so the US should be able to do that". And then they forget the fact that the US is like Germany as much as it is like El Salvador. In fact, the US has more ties to El Salvador in terms of culture, trade, transportation, etc.
You can compare German gun policies to French gun policies, but comparing either to US gun policies simply because they are "first world" countries, isn't really statistically reliable. Hell, Switzerland has the 3rd highest gun ownership per capita rate in the world (behind Yemen and the US of course), and it's murder rate isn't even close to the US or other Latin American countries.
http://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2015/sep/30/viral-image/...
I would also argue that the US is also not like Switzerland, even though we might be similar in per capita income and other economic factors. But everyone thinks they can compare the US to this standard on every variable like gun violence, drug use, drinking laws, etc.
(Also El Salvador has 10X the amount of gun violence that the US does, and 100X more than Massachusetts)
And then they forget the fact
That's quite a claim you've made there!
It is, especially when we are talking about gun deaths
Which involve Central and South American drug trades.
Last I checked it was a good
Last I checked it was a good thing that The Bill of Rights is not The Bill of Polite Requests to Be Ignored at Government Convenience!
Why not try it, even if it
Why not try it, even if it only helps a little? If it saves 1000 lives per year that seems pretty good to me! I'm sure those families would be happy to have their loved ones back in exchange for Joe Gun having to pass a background check. Australia had a lot of guns and they enacted strict gun laws after a massacre in the 90's and they haven't had a similar massacre since. There is more proof like this all over the world that gun control works.
I think we should strive to be better than 3rd world countries, but gun nuts seem to be happy with America being the poster child for gun deaths and zero responsibility.
If you feel like amending the
If you feel like amending the Bill of Rights go right ahead. Just don't be surprised if other rights get amended out until there are none.
Australia's crime rate dropped at the same rate as the US over the past decade. The ban had no effect on criminals and most recently doesn't seem to be stopping terrorists there from going on armed rampages.
Aussie Aussie Aussie, oi oi oi
I count four "terrorist attacks" in 'Straya since Port Arthur. But you let me know if you're aware of more than that, matey.
P.S. The Constitution, which contains the Bill of Rights, has been amended many times throughout American history. That's sort of the point.
I agree Kinopio
I'm just saying that instead of having 10.7 gun homicides per 100,000 a year, you might have 10.5 gun homicides per 100K. Venezuela has enacted one of the strictest gun control laws in the world and gun crime has increased since it was enacted.
I don't think saying things like "If this EU country can do it, we can do it."
Australia, Germany, Japan, England, etc are not the United States. They have less guns already. They have different demographics. They have different distributions of wealth. I know we want to strive to be better than 3rd world countries, but there are reasons why we are like those 3rd world countries in many ways.
All in all, attacking poverty will probably effect gun violence rates much more than gun laws will in my opinion.
(I really don't care about guns, and I think they should be banned completely and it would be great to have a world without any guns.)
since we're talking about laws here
We do have background checks in MA. You get one when you apply for a permit, and it's run by a dealer every time you buy a gun. Private sales must be reported to the records bureau and be conducted between two licensed individuals, so there's no loophole. That seems prudent and reasonable to me. Determining someone's eligibility for concealed carry based on their zip code doesn't.
Whose Gun Is It Anyway?
Funny you should mention this, because guess where a lot, if not the majority, of the guns present in Central American countries originate from.
Absoutely.
And part of the problem is that it is a lot easier to bring guns to Columbia and El Salvador, than it is to bring guns to Japan or England.
Actually, they do
Look at the gun death rates in states with strict laws and gun death rates in states with lax gun laws.
Heck, here's a map for you! See those dark blue areas? Notice that MA and NY contain a lot of them, as do areas of the midwest with strict laws? Funny how major cities like Chicago get a bad rap, but that isn't where such a high number of people are dying.
Interactive version here: http://projects.oregonlive.com/ucc-shooting/gun-de...
This is developing - stay tuned: http://www.oregonlive.com/data/2015/10/where_do_am...
Gun violence vs. gun deaths are different.
I think the issue was gun violence, not gun deaths, which would include suicides and accidental shootings, which are problems, but aren't dealt with in the same way that gun violence is.
If words on paper were all it
If words on paper were all it took to make a perfect world we'd be living in one. But laws are only as good as the people that follow them and the ability to enforce them.
2/3rds of that 30k are suicides which sadly will happen regardless of the means available. Look at violent crime rates and suicide rates worldwide to really get a realistic picture of what regulation really does. It tends to punish people after the fact, not prevent crime from happening.
Japan despite being the closest thing to a gun free country imaginable dwarfs the US in suicides by a large margin. It is harder to compare their crime stats as they economically and sociologically a nearly homogeneous country compared to the US.
Now the UK is a better example because of their demographics. Their suicide rate is not much different than the US, with the preference being prescription drugs which is the #2 killer in the US. Despite a gun ban, confiscation, and playing games with their crime stats (only a conviction counts as a recorded crime, so a city with a 25% clearance rate on murders is going to count the other 75% of murders as "deaths") they have a much higher violent crime rate than the US. So much so that there is now a lame campaign to ban and restrict even kitchen knives.
Comparatively look at the effect of banning drugs on the level of drug use. Barely a dent.
People that are violent, suicidal, or apt to use addictive substances are going to do what their nature wills them to do. All society can do is attempt to create a system of consequences and support to discourage such behavior. Banning this or that does nothing but push them towards another vice at the cost of everyone else's freedom.
Think about it:
Did requiring an ID to buy cough syrup, cigarettes, or liquor really do anything to deter abuse of those products? Why the Hell is 99% of the responsible public put through such nonsense? It's no different.
Restrictions on licensing have no negligible effect on crime. This is why the rest of the state besides the immediate neighbors of Boston and the city of Lowell (which is changing their policy slightly at the behest of public outcry to the city council and facing civil rights lawsuits) doesn't bother with it. There's also the whole racial and economic bigotry angle. Most of the laws were passed in this and other states to keep minorities and immigrants disarmed. The fees and additional paperwork requirements some cities and towns still require over what is in the MGLs for licensure are relics of that and slowly being eliminated by challenges in federal court.
You do know that the hundreds of thousands of visitors and commuters to Boston each week don't face the same restrictions city residents do? Why is it that the people that live in the city have to settle for less rights than visitors?
Did requiring an ID to buy
Are you talking about the cigarettes that the overwhelming majority of the population used to smoke all day, every day? The same cigarettes that only a tiny minority of the population now smoke? Those cigarettes?
Carding people buying
Carding people buying cigarettes didn't stop sales.
And wearing a seatbelt doesn
And wearing a seatbelt doesn't guarantee you won't die in a car crash, so what?
They are building a large
They are building a large homeless shelter between Andrew and South End's Harrison Ave on Southhampton, so hopefully this will provide all the people turning up downtown a place to go.
Hopefully, they can get some part of it open by December.
homeless addicts
Boston needs to get serious about getting rid of these vagrants that terrorize the hard working people of the city and surrounding towns.
My young daughter was just jumped by three monsters that nearly beat her to death near the park street T stop and robbed her.
She was on her way home from work and was detained later than usual and there was no one around to walk with her this time.
They didn't have to do that to her. She would have handed them her wallet. They just enjoyed beating a small girl as she lay unconscious and helpless.
The city still does nothing to stop this. She wasn't their first victim and she won't be their last.
Everyone must beware of these lunatics waiting to jump any hard working person and beat them, steal their cash to use for drugs.
They don't deserve to breathe our air.
When was this?
And why wasn't it getting the kind of press that lesser incidents are getting?
You know they were homeless people - how?