The other side of that Roxbury party bust-up story

A couple of weeks ago, the Boston Police described an incident in which an officer chasing a possibly armed suspect was pummeled by partygoers who tried to help the perp escape.

The Phoenix gives the other side of the story, based on interviews with people actually at the party, in which the alleged suspect was not running because he was an invited guest at the party:

... When Goffigan refused to be frisked - saying Gero had no cause - Gero let loose a blast of pepper spray, not only incapacitating Goffigan, but also injuring a number of children and adults. (The baby's four-year-old brother, the birthday boy, demonstrated his sister’s reaction to the spray for this reporter.)

Unsurprisingly, the BPD public-relations writers left those injuries out of their blog account. What is surprising, however, is that the version they wrote for the blog differs significantly from the official police incident report - written by the only officer who was there, Gero - on which the blog was primarily based.

For starters, the blog entry appears to have added justifications for officer Gero's demand to frisk Goffigan, which do not appear in his own report. ...