Cops up Mass and Cass patrols after stabbings
Police are increasing patrols in the still-troubled Mass and Cass area after a spate of stabbings, including at the Boston Public Health Commission-run Engagement Center, that again has roiled the South End neighborhood.
Five different apparent non-life-threatening stabbings took place in the area over just the past few days, according to police reports.
The seeming unrelated slashings in and around the open-air drug market in the South End area started just before 5:30 p.m. Sunday, when someone stabbed a man “over thirty dollars,” the victim eventually told police after originally claiming the gash on his thigh came from falling off a guardrail on a nearby bridge.
Monday then saw two stabbings in the BPHC-run Engagement Center on Atkinston Street.
Cops were called around 2:21 p.m. for reports of a stabbing in the smoking area. Police arrested John Hammersley on charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and drug possession after, according to the police report, he went looking for “his gram” of drugs he’d hidden near the trash can of the center, realized it wasn’t there, and then knifed the man who he suspected of swiping it.
According to the report, he said he’d just punched the man who stole his stash.
As cops were at the Engagement Center for that call, they were told there actually had been another stabbing there earlier in the same smoking area a couple of hours earlier. There was scant information available about that.
Mayor Michelle Wu’s office said in a statement that the “safety of Engagement Center clients and staff is our top priority.”
“The Boston Public Health Commission is working closely with the Boston Police Department to enhance safety procedures,” a Wu spokeswoman said. “We continuously monitor and evaluate our safety and security protocols to ensure they meet our current needs.”
Two more people were stabbed Tuesday morning, according to police reports. In the first, a man said he was minding his own business shortly before 9 a.m. and walking across Southampton Street near Atkinson “when someone walked up to him and ‘stuck him,’ ” the police report says, quoting the apparent victim. Cops found a blood trail down the block from Atkinson to nearby Topeka Street.
Less than an hour later, a man walked into the Victoria Diner on Massachusetts Avenue and said his friend had been stabbed on the nearby Newmarket Commuter Rail platform. The victim was gone when Boston cops showed up, but a trail of blood remained there, too.
Boston Police spokesman John Boyle said the department plans on “increasing patrols in the area” in response to the uptick in violence.