East Boston

A Puerto Rican man was arrested at Logan Airport Friday after State Police found more than eight pounds of cocaine in the wheelchair on which he rolled into the terminal, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

Emannuelli Rojas-Moraza, 33, of Carolina, PR, was detained at Terminal E by state troopers at the request of Homeland Security and US Customs agents. According to prosecutors:

Seized weapons. Photo by BPD.

Boston Police report officers who followed the plaintive pings of a stolen MacBook to a repair shop on Meridian Street last week found a cache of weaponry in the pickup truck of the guy who'd allegedly brought the laptop in.

Peter Hilliard, 48, of Halifax, now faces a magazine's worth of charges related to the guns, which include a Bushmaster rifle and a Sig Sauer pistol, police say. A judge in East Boston District Court set bail at $50,000.

Police say Hilliard stole the laptop in a housebreak somewhere outside of Boston, then brought it to a wireless store at 247 Meridian St. Police say thanks to the tracking software on the laptop, officers were waiting when Hilliard returned to pick the computer up. They then got a search warrant for his pickup.

Innocent, etc.

The MBTA forwards this photo from the Blue Line repair facility in Orient Heights, where workers have made a Christmas tree out of a "bolster rack" of trucks used to hold the axles of Blue Line cars.

Another indignity for Bostonians on the other side of the harbor.

East Boston News posts a complaint from Meridian Street about all the Logan cabs that scurry along it now:

We residents of East Boston that live on and around Meridian Street, East Boston get to hear, see, smell, breath and dodge the steady stream of hundreds of empty Logan taxis that bless our streets again this morning and all day long. But that's O.K. as the multi-million dollar Coughlin Bypass Road that these Logan taxis are supposed to be using gets to rest so us East Boston resident taxpayers can have a nice quiet Sunday morning. Not!

An aggrieved citizen reports from Princeton Street in East Boston:

Pile of trash on street including a dirty thong.

With a photo of said pile of trash and said dirty thong.

Meanwhile, a disgusted citizen on Beacon Hill rats out one of his fellow nobs, whose building's trash in flimsy bags is now attracting not just rats but a raccoon as well.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that the call history on a simple flip phone is no different than any other evidence police might find on a person under arrest and that they can look at it without first obtaining a search warrant.

The state's highest court, however, said it was withholding judgment on the matter of more complex smartphones.

As other courts have noted ... today's cellular telephones are essentially computers, capable of storing enormous quantities of information, personal, private, and otherwise, in many different forms. They present novel and important questions about the relationship between the modern doctrine of search incident to arrest and individual privacy rights. Although an individual's reasonable expectation of privacy is diminished concerning his or her physical person when subject to a lawful arrest and taken into custody, the same may not necessarily be true with respect to the privacy of the myriad types of information stored in a cellular telephone that he or she is carrying at the time of arrest.

WHDH reports the Coast Guard is letting Boston Harbor Tent Guy keep his floating encampment - a canoe, raft and tent - although the Guard and the Boston Police harbor unit will keep an eye out for him.

Firefighters gearing up to go in. Photo by Steven Klise. A fire reported shortly after 10 p.m. at 358 Meridian St., went to two alarms as it spread from the second to the third floor and roof. The Boston Fire Department reports nine adults and four children were displaced by the fire, but that no residents were injured. The department estimates damage at $250,000. The cause is under investigation.

The Boston Business Journal has the latest on the DeNormandie Wharf project.

Boston firefighters are at 36 New St., dealing with a fire that apparently started in the third floor of a building being torn down.

Boston Police have released a sketch of the main they say jumped a woman walking on Meridian Street early on Oct. 24.

Police say he's about 5'2" and in his late 20s. At the time, he wore a black sweater with a white shirt and bluejeans. He spoke to the victim in Spanish.

Police say a good Samaritan heard the commotion after the guy jumped the woman and managed to scare him off.

If he looks familiar, contact A-7 detectives at 617-343-4234 or the anonymous tip line by calling 800-494-TIPS or texting TIP to CRIME (27463).

Chris Devers watched the sun go down from East Boston yesterday.

Posted under this Creative Commons license.

AlertNewEngland reports somebody was stabbed around 6:30 p.m. at the Maverick Square Burger King and that the suspect, a Hispanic teen, fled into the Maverick T stop.

Wilmer Velazquez, who lists East Boston and South Boston addresses, was arraigned on a charge of armed robbery after he allegedly stole a 15-year-old teen's phone at knifepoint, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

Velazquez, 19, was ordered held in lieu of $5,000 bail at his arraignment in East Boston District Court, the DA's office says.

Prosecutors say his victim was playing with her yournger brother in the playground at Bremen Street Park in East Boston around 5:30 p.m. on Oct. 18 when two guys came up to her:

Miguel Antonio Rivera, 35, of Chelsea and Santa Cruz, 49, of Norwalk, CT, face arraignment in East Boston District Court today following their arrests yesterday afternoon on Sumner Street, where Boston and State Police seized more than 42 pounds of heroin, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

The feds have gotten involved - DEA took possession of the substance for analysis and followup investigation, while ICE has asked that Rivera be put on ice as they investigate his immigration status, the DA's office says. Police estimate the street value of the heroin at $5 million, but the DA's office says that could change depending on the purity value set by DEA.

Innocent, etc.

EastBoston.com reports the Friends of the Greenway and the Boston Natural Areas Network will be planting day-lily bulbs along the East Boston Greenway on Thursday, between 1 and 4 p.m.

Earlier:
At last minute, North End group gets permission to plant 10,000 daffodil bulbs on Greenway.

Jen braved the storm to video planes landing at Logan during the storm yesterday. Around 11 a.m., she captured a Virgin 747 coming in. The Patriots took a Virgin charter back from London. Could that have been them?

Boston Police report a woman says she was attacked while walking on Meridian Street near Lexington Street in East Boston shortly after 1 a.m. today.

According to the victim, she was walking along Meridian Street after exiting the Maverick MBTA Station when a male suspect approached from behind and pushed her to the ground. According to the victim, as she was fighting with the suspect, a Good Samaritan, hearing the commotion from across the street, came to her aid and frightened the suspect off. The suspect was last seen fleeing the area towards Border Street.

He's described as a dark-skinned Hispanic male in his 20s, about 5'2" with a birthmark on his face. He spoke to the victim in Spanish and was wearing a black sweater with a white shirt and bluejeans, police say.

A man who allegedly fled to Texas after gunning a man down in the South End last year and a man convicted of torturing a cat and then tossing its flaming carcass into an East Boston apartment building have hearings today on requests to overturn their separate drug convictions because of possible evidence tampering by ex-state chemist Annie Dookhan.

The Boston Business Journal reports Boston Harbor Cruises wants to moor a barge near Piers Park and open it as a floating restaurant with 350 seats.

The Boston Fire Department reports a two-fire alarm that erupted this morning damaged a hangar under renovation at Logan Airport.

The fire started shortly before 9:30 a.m. in a third-floor office at Building 9, "a very large hangar structure," the department says, adding that because of the renovations, there were no airplanes inside. No injuries were reported.

Boston Police report East Boston Variety, 3 Gladstone St., was held up around 6:45 this morning by a pack of knife-wielding robbers - one of whom gave the clerk a dollar, then pulled out a knife and yelled "Gimme the money!"

A second suspect was described as black male in his late teens early twenties, wearing a black hoodie with red lettering "Lazy But Talented" with the hood pulled up, black hat with 3 stickers visible on the brim, black pants, and black and white sneakers.

The Herald reports on a man intent on robbing a Maverick Square bank who couldn't understand why the doors weren't open at 9 a.m. yesterday.

WBZ interviews the owner of the two pit bulls that went berserk in East Boston and says the kid who got bit was taunting the dogs beforehand.

Meanwhile, Mayor Menino and City Councilor Rob Consalvo say they're going to try to figure out how to get around a state law that would overrule a city ordinance that requires pit-bull owners to muzzle their pets and post signs outside their houses.