By Mac Daniel, The Boston Globe
Boston police shot the driver of a stolen sport utility vehicle at a Charlestown intersection near Bunker Hill yesterday morning, authorities said, striking him just below the right eye.
The suspect, Eric Paquin, 26, was in Massachusetts General Hospital last night with injuries that police said were not life-threatening. Neither police nor hospital officials would provide any more information on Paquin’s condition.
Police would not discuss details of the incident, including how many shots were fired or whether a chase preceded the shooting of Paquin, who did not have a gun. Authorities said the Land Rover Discovery was reported stolen from outside a Lexington Street home in Charlestown at about 9:30 a.m.
Police said Paquin was involved in a burglary at the home and took the keys to the SUV, which was parked outside. The vehicle was spotted a short time later leaving a
About an hour after the SUV was stolen, police said, officers saw it at the intersection of Polk Street and Bunker Hill Street, about two blocks from where the Land Rover was reported stolen.
Witnesses said two officers fired two or three shots at the vehicle, with one bullet piercing the windshield.
“We don’t know what transpired between the suspect and the officers,” Boston Police spokeswoman Mariellen Burns said at the scene, as officers inspected the Land Rover and a police cruiser.
Miriam Santiago, who said she was about 12 feet from Paquin after the shooting, said one of the bullets had struck Paquin’s face. “It looked like it was a direct shot, and the police were just standing around looking at him,” she said.
At least four witnesses to the shooting were taken to Boston police headquarters for questioning, according to Superintendent James Claiborne.
A Police Department source who asked not to be identified said later that the suspect may have tried to back up and strike officers who were trying to arrest him. After the shooting, the police cruiser was stopped in front of the Land Rover. The driver’s door on the SUV was sheered off; police would not say how that occurred.
Police said an unnamed officer involved in the incident was slightly injured after being knocked down, but would not say what happened.
Through a spokeswoman, Police Commissioner Kathleen O’Toole declined to discuss the shooting.
The commissioner will not comment “until we have a basic fact pattern of what we believe happened,” Burns said.
The two officers involved in the shooting, 13- and 18-year veterans of the department, were taken to Mass. General afterward to be monitored for stress, she said. They had not been interviewed about the shooting by late yesterday, said Burns, who added that police needed to gather more evidence and talk to more witnesses before releasing details.
Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley and Boston police have begun a formal joint investigation of the incident, which occurs whenever Boston police shoot a suspect.
“There’s a lot of work to be done, and it’s too early for us to speak with any full understanding of what happened,” Conley said.
He said the two officers involved in the shooting are expected to be interviewed today by members of the investigative team.
Paquin is the father of two girls, 10 and 7, and an infant son, according to Pam Hawkesworth, 39, who said she drives his daughters to school with her own children.
Hawkesworth, whose apartment building overlooks the intersection where Paquin was shot, said she has known him for more than a year. She said she was shocked to look out of her window after hearing gunshots to see Paquin slumped at the wheel of the stolen SUV.
“From what I know of him, he was very quiet and kept to himself,” Hawkesworth said. “He’s not a violent man. It wouldn’t be like he was resisting anything, because he’s not that type of person.”
Police said Paquin’s last known address was in Jamaica Plain. They said he has a criminal record, but would not provide details.
In 2002, eight fatal shootings by Boston police and one by a Boston Municipal Police officer within 22 months prompted former commissioner Paul Evans to issue Rule 303, a policy restricting officers from shooting at moving vehicles unless there are other imminent threats.
At the time, the change was met with praise from community groups and criticism from the patrol officers’ union, which said the policy could result in more officers being injured or killed by fleeing vehicles. The union was so angered by the proposal that it secured a no-confidence vote against Evans.
Evans said the new policy would protect officers by teaching them to avoid the danger of being hit by a vehicle. His policy was nearly identical to one enacted in Washington, D.C., in 1999 that barred officers from firing at unarmed fleeing drivers. Police shootings in the nation’s capital dropped by half in the year after the rule was imposed.
Boston police said that comparable figures were not readily available, but Conley said he could not recall a police shooting involving a moving vehicle since Rule 303 was enacted.