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English High counselor who recruited students to sell pot and shot one was member of a national gang, feds say

Shaun Harrison's Latin Kings tattoos

Harrison's tattoos - 100 is a gang symbol, feds say.

Shaun Harrison

The US Attorney's office in Boston today announced the indictments of 62 alleged members of Massachusetts chapters of the national Latin Kings gang on racketeering charges. Among them: Shaun "Rev" Harrison, sentenced to 23 to 26 years in prison last year for shooting an English High School student in the head because the kid owed him money for the marijuana Harrison was having him sell.

Harrison, indicted on a single RICO charge, had recruited the student as part of an effort to increase drug sales for the Devon Street Kings chapter of the Latin Kings, the larger of Boston's two Latin Kings chapters, according to an affidavit by an FBI agent whose work helped lead to today's indictments after a four-year investigation. At the time of the 2015 shooting, he was dean of students at English High School, after having worked at several other BPS schools in prior years.

And after he was settled into his new home in a state prison, he spent part of his time scheming with a Latin Kings member on the outside to discover - and possibly have attacked - the snitch he blamed for helping detectives investigating the student's shooting on Magazine Street in Roxbury.

The affidavit devotes a fair amount of space to the teen's shooting and Harrison's post-conviction life in prison, but first establishes the criminal bona fides of the Devon Street Kings, named for a Dorchester street and Harrison's alleged home gang: a group devoted to drug dealing and a violent war on rivals, in particular Dominicans Don't Play.

The affidavit says members of the chapter, also known as D5K, may have been responsible for the murder of Mario Oveido, 18, on Homestead Street in Roxbury in 2009 and a 2014 stabbing at Tremont and Coventry streets in Roxbury, in which video showed one indicted Kings member punching the victim in the face and then another, unindicted member, stabbing him in the stomach.

One alleged Latin Kings member in from Fitchburg was shot to death in a botched home invasion on Northampton Street in Roxbury on Feb. 4 of this year. He was allegedly accompanied on the home-invasion attempt by two other members, including Marlon "King Pluto" Rivera, who helped found D5K after spending time as leader of the Fitchburg Latin Kings chapter.

According to the affidavit, the Devon Street gang members spent considerable time this spring plotting how to kill an alleged renegade Kings member. The affidavit states the man finally got shot in Mary Hannon Park in Uphams Corner on July 4; however, the two men who were arrested several days later are not among the people indicted today, and the FBI agent says he does not know if they have any Latin Kings connections. In addition to the man, a child was also shot; both the man and the child survived.

When not busy selling drugs - from marijuana to fentanyl - or trying to kill people with their cache of guns, D5k members made YouTube rap videos in which they declare their love of money and guns and hurl insults and threats at the rival Dominicans Don't Play gang.

The teen is shot

The shooting of the teen who'd been recruited by Harrison is included in the section of the affidavit related to Harrison, and includes information from interviews conducted by Boston Police detectives with the teen, identified in the affidavit as "Victim 18:"

Victim 18 stated that HARRISON recruited Victim 18 to deal drugs for him after he got into an altercation with another student. Victim 18 stated that HARRISON was a member of the LATIN KINGS who was responsible for recruiting new drug dealers in the school to sell on behalf of the D5K Chapter of the LATIN KINGS. Victim 18 identified "Rev" as HARRISON, and stated that HARRISON had the word "Rev" posted on his office door at the school. According to Victim 18, he met with HARRISON on 3/3/15 and they walked around looking to "smoke weed and fuck girls." When they reached Magazine Street, HARRISON shot Victim 18 in the back of the head. School police confirmed that HARRISON was also referred to as "Rev" and had the name posted on his office door.

Detectives located video footage of the shooting. According to reports, the video shows two individuals walking single file down the sidewalk on Magazine Street due to the narrow sidewalks as a result of excessive snowfall. The individual in the rear is dressed in a black hooded jacket and pulled out a firearm and shot the person in front of him. The shooter then ran back to 18 Pompeii Street.

Surveillance video showing Harrison walking behind the student moments before the shooting:

Surveillance photo before the shooting

18 Pompeii St. is where Harrison lived.

After viewing the video, detectives went to 18 Pompeii Street, Apartment 2 and asked HARRISON if he would come to the station to answer questions about the shooting. HARRISON agreed and gave a post-Miranda interview on tape denying any knowledge about the shooting. When detectives asked HARRISON what he would say if he knew the shooting was caught on video, HARRISON replied, "I respectfully request an attorney."

While HARRISON was being interviewed, a detective conducted surveillance of 18 Pompeii Street and observed D. LARA, W. PEGUERO, and Oscar PENA exit. The detective approached them while they waited at a bus stop on Massachusetts Avenue. The detective told D. LARA, W. PEGUERO, and Oscar PENA that he was investigating the shooting and wanted to speak with them. They agreed. The detective then stated that he was going to conduct a pat frisk prior to their conversation. The detective asked D. LARA if he had anything he shouldn't have and D. LARA replied that he had a firearm. The detective lifted the front of D. LARA's shirt, observed the handle of a firearm protruding, and recovered a silver Bryco Arms 9mm semiautomatic firearm from his waistband. D. LARA, Oscar PENA, and W. PEGUERO were placed under arrest. A black backpack was removed from Oscar PENA and contained a Smith and Wesson .45 caliber semi-automatic firearm and a large amount of marijuana. During booking it was noted that HARRISON, D. LARA and W. PEGUERO all have the same "100" gang tattoo.

A search warrant was executed at HARRISON's apartment and a large LATIN KINGS mural was observed on his wall.

The mural:

Latin Kings mural

Gang leader rallies to Harrison's aid

Harrison was sentenced for the shooting in June, 2018. In October, 2018, a gang member cooperating with the FBI recorded a D5k meeting in which a Massachusetts Latin Kings leader, Angel Roldan, called in and castigated the local chapter for not donating any money to Harrison, beyond their regular payment into the chapter "fundo," which was a general kitty for paying unexpected chapter expenses, such as bail and buying new guns:

ROLDAN expresses his displeasure that the D5K members are not sending money to members in the DOC. ROLDAN states, "Oh yeah that's another thing. I don't care what ya'll be doing with the fundo, but you guys need to like Rev, Rev. I ain't even mentioning Fruity, I ain't even mentioning Fruity. I'm mentioning Rev first. Because if it wasn't for Rev being locked up doing whatever time he is doing, he could've been had the twins locked up, he could've had Nasty locked up, he could've had Nene locked up, he could've had Stevie locked up, he could've had me ... he could've had the whole hood locked up for like twenty plus years. Niggas don't even send that nigga one fifty ($150). You know what I'm saying my nigga?"

Harrison tries to find out who snitched

Harrison really wanted to find out who provided information to police in their investigation - the person was dropped as a witness at his trial so as to not reveal his identity.

On Aug. 6, 2018, investigators monitored a call between Fruitos "Fruity" Barros, the "supreme regional officer" of the Latin Kings prison chapter, and Sandra "Queen Dream" Correa, who coordinated communications between imprisoned members and the Massachusetts branch, in which Barros seemed to give his OK for violence against the "confidential informant" if he could be found:

During the conversation BARROS is captured saying, "Tell Rev when he calls, I forgot to tell him this – this is important – listen to me because he is who he is to me he can’t say he's on P (probation with the LATIN KINGS) – he's down, he's got MY blessing, you heard? If they ask who gave his Blessing, who his GF (godfather) is, it’s ME. You heard?"

Harrison, who was caught in a phone conversation saying he had long ago dropped the ministry he started in 2012, was also captured in phone conversations in July and August of this year with fellow alleged gang member Dante "King Nasty" Lara trying to figure out the informant's identity, the affidavit states.

At first, they focused on a fellow gang member whom Harrison had noticed talking to detectives while both of them were at the Nashua Street jail, but they ruled him out because he had heard a mention of a 2010 case, and the guy would have been too young in 2010 to have anything to do with that case.

Pena pressed him for other possibilities, but Harrison said he didn't want to say on the phone, that he would write them down. In a later call, they discussed a "bald-headed" man as the possible informant.

If convicted, Harrison faces 20 years in federal prison.

Innocent, etc.

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Comments

To be a review of what level of nepotism landing this asshole a job at a local HS.

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For not attributing to malice what can be attributed to stupidity. It eludes me on five hours of sleep and a couple of hearty pints.

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Who knows how he got hired. Could be there was nothing that would lead anyone to believe this was his lifestyle. Regardless, that's an extremely rare case in terms of teacher hires.

Police departments on the other hand...somehow keep hiring the same racist white guy over and over again (talk about nepotism). See Brookline PD vs. Brookline Public Schools. Which has a history of hiring despicable characters?

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Matters a great deal. There's more 'youth outreach' workers like him on the public dime. Who is responsible for hiring? What needs to change?

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How could a school let a guy like that be allowed on the property, let alone goes through Human Resources? I wander how shorty the principal and super intendant have to be to fail to supervise this hire? Why not hire Whitey Bulger as the head of the English department?

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How does a superintendant allow a hire who is a gang member, with visible gang tattoo, who has inappropriate relationships with the students. I’m sure kids in the school knew who sells weed and who the counselor is. A McDonalds would not hire this guy, why did the BPS? Were they so afraid of being sued for discrimination or the teachers union? You know it’s probably because the teachers get paid 20k a year and only gang trash will take these jobs now?

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But its Dominicans Dont Play not Dominicans Dont Party.

They were founded in NYC in the early 1990s around 91/92

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Stupid mistake fixed.

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.. used in the article. In the singular.

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This time for real, thanks.

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Don't know how to party

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When there is a murder, what the public hears is that it wasn't random, nothing to fear.

No details from the court documents, if any. It takes a major takedown by feds to get many details in new court documents, But again, seldom any details broadcast. Does the mass media want the public ignorant of all the gang activity? Would it be called racist to report it?

Adam, where can I get the court filings you get to pull information from? Do I have to subscribe to a service?

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First, thanks!

PACER is the federal court system's document database and it has everything. Can be clunky to use and the 10-cents-a-page charge can add up (but judges' rulings are free to read and they cap the total charge to $3 for long documents, which helped me yesterday, since the affidavit in this case ran 191 pages; also the RECAP browser plugin will let you grab documents for free if somebody before you has already downloaded them). You can even sign up for (free) notification of rulings and filings from specific courts - which is how I got that au-pair decision last week.

https://pacer.login.uscourts.gov/csologin/login.jsf

Unfortunately, there is no equivalent for criminal cases in state courts in Massachusetts, the alleged high-tech mecca of the Universe. You can get docket info for civil and housing cases, but if you want to see anything related to criminal cases, you're going to have to get yourself to the court in question and request the actual paper files from the court clerk, which can really suck, and which puts us behind such supposedly unenlightened states such as Indiana. Well, unless the case gets into the appellate system. You can access SJC and Appeals Court rulings online (for free) and can listen to oral arguments before the two courts (and, at least with SJC decisions, download the opposing briefs), but in lower courts? Hah!

As for other media outlets, props to WCVB - they downloaded the same affidavit and used parts of it (including photos) in their report last night.

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Beware of anyone who ...

.... calls himself Rev.

I wonder how many English High students knew something was fishy about him?

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He also worked at Southie High - Excel when I was a student. My senior year we were all skeptical of him. All questioned what he actually did, wondered why he went by rev, and noticed his relationship with certain students. There were a few that were always with him. It is so alarming now as an adult to think he had access to all these students and their personal information.

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Or at least claimed he still was.

In 2013, while he was a counselor at Boston Green Academy, a BPS school in Brighton, he went on a cable-access show to complain about how the gays could hold meetings at the school but he wasn't allowed to bring a bible into the school. One of the other participants in the discussion was, at the time, a John Birch organizer in Boston.

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It's meaningless basically. Without real accreditation, reverend is just whatever the title holder wants it to be. Doctor, lawyer, CPA - these are real titles which have actual specific meaning. Reverend just means you think you are entitled to tell other people how to live their lives based on a misinterpretation of an ancient book.

The reliance of city orgs. on people who claim to hold religious leadership positions is lunacy. This guy is the worst by far but lots of other unqualified men out there using this crutch.

Funny, isn't it, how often you hear about the 'Roxbury ministers' as important figures which tidily eliminates all the women doing real, hard work to improve their communities.

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Says so on the certificate I got from the Universal Life Church in 1999. Cost me $8 plus postage, IIRC. I went a little crazy and sprung for a title from them, too: Universal Philosopher of Absolute Reality. Cost an extra $3, but definitely worth it.

Y'all can just abbreviate to "Rev. Erik G, UPOAR," though--I don't like to stand on formalities.

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.

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If you were a Universal Philosopher - Real or Absolute Reality, you could be the Rev. Erik G., UPROAR

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We still questioned why he wanted to go by rev at a public high school.

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So over the Italian and Irish mobster movies. The rapper gangster with a lisp, the teacher who’s Latin king, plotting murders from prison. It writes itself.

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