Police in Boston and Chelsea yesterday seized more than 100 pounds of cocaine in two unrelated busts - one of which also yielded a hefty amount of heroin, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

A Providence man stopped around 6:15 p.m. for a minor traffic violation on Columbia Road near the Southeast Expressway turned out to have 18 kilograms (40 pounds) of cocaine and 13 kilograms (29 pounds) of heroin in his rented SUV, the DA's office says.

When police stopped Santo Gonzalez, also known as Orlando Lopez, a license check showed the Suburban was an overdue rental; a routine search before it was towed back to Thrifty Rental uncovered the drugs, prosecutors say. A Dorchester District Court judge ordered Gonzalez held in lieu of $500,000 bail, the DA's office reports.

Meanwhile, police in Chelsea seized 30 kilograms (66 pounds) of cocaine from a tractor trailer yesterday evneing. Miguel Agular, 43, of Long Beach, CA, and Jose Cubais, 38, of San Bernardino, CA, were charged with trafficking in cocaine and conspiracy to violate the state's drug laws as part of an ongoing investigation, the DA's office reports. They were each ordered held in lieu of $950,000 bail, the DA's office says.

Innocent, etc.

Boston University and Brookline police say they captured two of three men suspected in stealing a ski-shop worker's cell phone this afternoon - but not without a struggle.

BU Police report officers used pepper spray to subdue one of the captured men and he was taken to Beth Israel Hospital for treatment. A Brookline officer also wound up in the hospital with a minor leg injury, while a BU cop was treated at the college health center for a minor injury.

BU Police say the three stole an employee's cell phone from a counter at East Coast Alpine, 860 Comm. Ave., on the Boston/Brookline line, then ran out and toward Kenmore Square:

Officers in the area located the 3 suspects at the Radio Shack at 730 Commonwealth Ave. approximately 10 minutes later. When officers approached the suspects, two fled from that location. One was stopped by Boston University police at the rear of 705 Commonwealth Ave.

One of the three eluded police.

The chase attracted the attention of large numbers of BU students and other passersby, including Channel 7 reporter Tim Caputo, who took this photo even though he had the day off.

Boston Police report arresting a South Boston man for an attempted bank robbery yesterday afternoon.

Police say witnesses identified Jason Sylvia, 27, in part because of a sore on his lip.

Police report Sylvia fled the Mt. Washington Bank branch on Southampton Street without any money after the teller to whom he handed a demand note spent about 20 seconds reading it, a manager came out to see what was up and Sylvia chickened out.

Innocent, etc.

Peter McStravick looked out his window this morning, wondered if David Copperfield was in town.

Readville Post Office: Residents aren't licked yet.

Postal officials come to Hyde Park on Tuesday to explain their proposal to stamp out the Readville post office. The Readville and Camp Meigs neighborhood watches, however, are planning a little special delivery of their own: A large turnout to show that residents don't want to or can't travel all the way up to Cleary Square for their postal needs.

The session begins at 6 p.m. at the Hyde Park Community Center, 1179 River St.

The new Ashmont T stop will be formally dedicated at 3 p.m. tomorrow. The Dorchester Reporter reviews the struggle to get the state to do something about Ashmont-line stations, once the worst in the entire T system.

And bite a guy in a penguin suit at the Aquarium (NSFW unless you work at a morgue or maybe IParty):

BU Today recalls the halcyon days when car dealerships dotted the avenue from Kenmore Square to Packard's Corner. Many of the showroom buildings still stand - repurposed as retail stores, condos and, of course, BU classrooms. And Presidents' Day car sales? They started as Washington's Birthday car sales right in Packard's Corner.

UPDATE: Authorities make ID.

Officials shut the Massachusetts Avenue Bridge this morning after a woman jumped into the river from the Boston side shortly before 6:45 a.m. Emergency workers in a boat recovered her body about an hour later near the bridge.

State Police reported state troopers and the State Police marine unit, along with the Boston Fire Department raced to the bridge after witnesses reported seeing the woman jump. Massport also sent a team and boat.

The Suffolk County District Attorney's office identified the woman only as "young" - she was not carrying any identification.

The bridge was re-opened after her body was recovered, but delays from the closure apparently radiated outward to the BU Bridge, which became completely gridlocked by 8 a.m. At 8:20, Laurie tweeted:

On the 47 [bus], in the rotary at the BU bridge. Driver letting people off he bus because, well, we're going to be stuck here a while.

David Bernstein reports on the battle between Frank Baker and John O'Toole to replace Maureen Feeney:

Defaced campaign offices, character-assassination calls to voters, destroyed lawn signs, intimidation, name-calling - the campaign has seen it all, just in the past couple of weeks.

Ron Newman gets e-mail from the Forest Hills Educational Trust that the cemetery has put the kibosh on the trust's once annual Nov. 2 celebration of the Mexican ritual.

JP fans of the mystical will instead have to content themselves with this coming weekend's Lantern Festival at Jamaica Pond.

Abdul Jabar Mohamed, 28, was arraigned today in his bed in the Mass. General burn unit, where he is being treated for serious burns authorities say he suffered when he tampered with the gas line in a Roxbury apartment in an attempt to kill himself, sparking a six-alarm fire that damaged apartments in seven connected buildings.

Roxbury District Court Judge David Weingarten set bail at $100,000 on charges of assault with intent to murder, arson of a dwelling, igniting a destructive device or substance, malicious destruction of property, and causing injury to a firefighter, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports. Prosecutors had sought bail of $500,000.

Assistant District Attorney Dana Pierce said Mohamed went to some effort to start the fire that burned dozens out of their apartments - and led to a dramatic rescue when a woman dropped her six-year-old grandson to fall into the arms of a firefighter three stories below. In a statement, the DA's office said:

Mohamed pulled the relative's gas stove away from the wall, then reached behind it and wrenched away a pipe leading from the stove to the building's gas main. When the pipe was "twisted, mangled, and broken away" from the stove, he allegedly set it alight with an open flame. The power of the explosion knocked away part of the building’s exterior facing Wardman Road and Westminster Avenue.

"The fire extended vertically and engulfed all three floors," Pierce said at the arraignment. "It spread horizontally about 100 feet, encompassing most of the roof."

The Boston Business Journal reports that Urban Edge, which develops low and moderate-income housing, is trying to find new places to live for the 70 residents currently without homes.

Innocent, etc.

The Taiwanese have made a cartoon about it:

Thanks, Kaz!

Jim Lafond-Lewis turns to poetry to describe the two.

Outrage at Boston University after officials order floor-length mirrors removed from one dorm's hallways as potential fire hazards (that's what she said):

"I feel that taking off the mirrors was completely unnecessary," said Allie Orlando, a freshman in the College of Communication. "When you are going to class, it's convenient that the mirrors are right there by the elevators in case you to need to correct something."

Students are warning they'll show up in class looking like a meat-covered pop diva unless those mirrors are returned, pronto, buster.

At-large councilors Ayanna Pressley and John Connolly say a ban might have prevented the death of Gabriel Josh-Cazir Pierre, who died locked in an unattended van for several hours last month.

"It's very possible that someone might have seen Gabriel in that van and intervened," Pressley said at a council meeting today at which she held up a T-shirt emblazoned with Gabriel's photo. The ban is part of "Gabriel's Law," a series of proposals by his mother, Virginie Cazir, who lives in the same building as Pressley.

All other councilors signed up as co-sponsors of the proposal, which now goes before the council's committee on government operations for a formal hearing.

City Councilor Charles Yancey (Dorchester) said he hopes the hearing will expand to cover more general issues of day-care van safety.

• Motion for a hearing

These stats just in from the T for the South Boston end of the Silver Line for January through August:

• Total annual year-to-date ridership up 7.0% from 3,148,612 in 2010 to 3,368,580 in 2011.
• Average weekday ridership up 5.7% from 15,015 in 2010 to 15,877 in 2011.
• Average Saturday ridership up 67.3% from 5,550 in 2010 to 9,285 in 2011.
• Average Sunday ridership up 8.0% from 8,422 in 2010 to 9,098 in 2011.

Last night, an alert citizen checked in from W. 3 Street in South Boston:

The block on W 3rd St. between A St. and B St. is very dark at night. There is no street lighting making it a safety concern.

The very next report came from E. Brookline Street in the South End:

Excessively bright floodlights installed today in the alley behind BMC's 85 E. Newton St Pavilion are shining into the residences on E. Brookline Street. No one on E. Brookline St was notified that we were going to be floodlit.