The Paradiso Files: Boston's Unknown Serial Killer by Timothy M. Burke

Author:Timothy M. Burke [Burke, Timothy M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: True Crime, Murder, Serial Killers, General
ISBN: 9781586421540
Google: k3U4P61CIdQC
Publisher: Steerforth Press
Published: 2008-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

59: Faneuil Hall

It was late spring.

The Celtics had been swept 4–0 in the Eastern Conference semifinals, and the Red Sox were off to another slow start in what was to be Yaz’s eighteenth and final year with the team. It was the end of an era as the “Ole Towne Team” struggled just to play .500 baseball.

The lawyer and the trooper made it from his office at the courthouse to the statue of Sam Adams in front of Faneuil Hall in less than the standard eight minutes of walking.

Built in 1742 by French merchant Peter Faneuil, the four-story brick structure would later become known as America’s “Cradle of Liberty.” For more than twenty years the building served as the site of Boston’s town meetings, providing a forum for fiery speeches by patriot Sam Adams in protest of British rule. Surrounded on four sides by a cobblestone garden, and separated from Boston Harbor by Quincy Marketplace, Faneuil Hall was a hotbed of historical clues to the nation’s past.

“Did you know Sam Adams was the first cousin of John Adams, the second president of the United States?” the lawyer asked his friend as they passed beneath the larger-than-life statue.

“Yeah, I think I knew that,” Drew responded, wondering where the conversation was headed.

“Yeah, but did you know John Adams was a lawyer?”

“Yeah, I think I knew that, too,” Drew nodded.

“Okay, but did you know John Adams represented one of the British soldiers tried for murder in the Boston Massacre?” the lawyer continued.

“Are you sure it was John Adams, the president?”

“Yeah, he defended a captain by the name of Thomas Preston, who was in charge of the British troops that fired into a crowd of civilians throwing sticks and snowballs at the soldiers. The British troops shot and killed five people that day. One of them was Crispus Attucks, the first black man to die in the cause of the Revolution,” the lawyer said.

“Wait a minute. John Adams is defending this British captain after his troops shot and killed some of our guys here in Boston?” Drew said in amazement.

“Yeah, turns out the captain told his troops ‘Don’t fire’ as the crowd was goin’ wild, taunting ’em and daring ’em to shoot. Preston’s troops thought he gave them the go-ahead to shoot. So they started firing at the crowd,” the lawyer explained as they walked toward the North Market building for lunch.

“What’d the jury do?” Drew asked.

“They found the captain not guilty.”

The larger man briefly paused and then walked on in silence.

The DA could tell Drew was thinking. They were inside the restaurant before they began to speak again. The lawyer decided it was a good time to change the subject.

“The Department of Corrections sent over the rest of their file on Paradiso today. I went through it all and found this letter Candy sent to Norfolk prison when Lenny was serving time for the Connie Porter case. Let me read some of this to ya,” the lawyer said as he and Drew sat on the second floor of Durgin Park restaurant surveying a lunch menu they could recite from memory.

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