Police: Photo taker arrested in the North End

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:12pm

A Canton man who claimed he was trying to "protect the North End" was arrested early this morning when he started taking photos of a woman sitting in car and then proceeded to start cursing her out, Boston Police report.

Police say the woman was double parked outside 266 Commercial St. around 2:43 a.m. waiting for AAA when the man came up to her and started snapping away. She yelled at him, which only made him start taking photos of her license plate, police say:

At this point, the suspect began swearing at the victim. When a bystander intervened, the suspect yelled, "I'm trying to protect the North End."

John McGinnis, 44, of Canton, was arrested on a charge of disturbing the peace.

Innocent, etc.

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Comments

Triple A

By Michael on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:25pm.

The American Automobile Association, or more specifically one of the tow trucks they work with, probably, though it could have been the PawSox. :)

Doy!

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:27pm.

Of course! I guess I was thrown off by the way BPDNews wrote

Triple 'A'

as if it were a wrestler or something, rather than, oh,

AAA

like everybody else would.

Triple A = AAA = auto club = towing service

By Ron Newman on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:27pm.

You're not a member, I take it?

Loyal member since 1992

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:27pm.

As explained above, I just wasn't used to seeing it written Triple A.

AAA

By SwirlyGrrl on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:37pm.

Always Assholes and unAvailable.

We gave up on them a long time ago. If you are lucky, they might be able to send somebody out in three hours. Maybe.

They don't even carry metric lug wrenches, either.

Oh, and if you complain about their service, prepare to have your tires slashed in the coming weeks, just like a couple of coworkers of mine have had (one ancient, one recent).

Is Medford a black hole of suckage or something?

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:37pm.

We've never had any problems with AAA. A wait sometimes, sure, but otherwise, it's been very good (especially given the mechanical/computer destructo rays my wife claims I give off whenever I get within 10 feet of anything more complicated than a mop).

AAA was good to me

By Ron Newman on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:44pm.

the few times I had to use their services. The only reason I'm no longer a member is that I'm no longer a car owner.

Ditto

By Michael on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:50pm.

Cambridge a few times, Central Mass a couple of times, once in GodKnowsWhere, Virginia - never a complaint. And hotel discounts!

Thank you AAA

By NotWhitey on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 5:50pm.

I've never had a problem with them. In the middle of a snow storm, you'll have to wait. In any case, AAA just farms the work out to service stations. In over 30 years I've never had a problem with them.

Riding the AAA gratis wagon

By Kaz on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 6:03pm.

When I had a car, I had AAA. They not only towed my car to the dealership when I couldn't get it out of my driveway (a pretty good feat since I live on a 1 lane street with parked cars), but they also then met me at the dealership and towed it to a recommended mechanic after the dealership quoted me a repair worth more than the whole car and said that I couldn't bring them cheaper parts to bring the cost down (another pretty impressive towing feat considering how you get into and out of the 2nd floor service area in Herb Chambers Toyota in Packard's Corner).

Custom route maps prior to Mapquest, discounted hotel rates, movie tickets, and theme park tickets were all just awesome bonuses to boot.

Sadly

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 7:29pm.

Papa Gino's no longer gives you a kid's meal for free when you buy a regular meal and show your AAA card. Man, did that save us a lot of money over the years.

Not Medford, the entire north area

By SwirlyGrrl on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:50pm.

Twenty plus years of suckage - I dumped them early on when I was stuck in near-nowhere and told "that's not in our service area so it will cost $$$", but others continue with the AAA horror stories.

No Metric Lugwrench was down by South Bay.
Slashed tires for coworkers who had bad encounters: 1987 Somerville, 2007 Charlestown
"Can't Help you tonight" was Cambridge, multiple times (most not readily explained by weather, etc.)

My guess is that whoever set up the contracts north of Boston - Cambridge, Somerville, etc. - has never enforced the rules of service.

I also hate their organization's guts for their extremely aggressive lobbying to get cycling amenities removed from transportation bills and taxpayer-funded projects and totally bogus "advice" to motorists on how to properly run down cyclists. Jerks.

So Mr. McGinnis is not unknown to police

By adamg on Mon, 09/29/2008 - 4:31pm.

According to the Canton Journal, he has a bit of a temper:

McGinnis allegedly threw burning candles at the victim, threw a computer monitor at the victim's head, poured bleach onto the victim's head, and tried to run the victim over with his vehicle.

The victim was, at the time, McGinnis's roommate, the paper wrote in its description of the alleged July attack, which it named one of Canton's top 10 news stories for 2007.

A couple of months after that incident, the paper reports, he was charged with going after a couple of guys with a knife.

Also, car dealerships are an abortion. There's only one shop - North Beacon Auto.