Two park rangers stabbed on Boston Common

[cali]

Source: Boston Globe

A homeless man with a “violent criminal past” allegedly stabbed two Boston park rangers who approached him on Boston Common Tuesday, lunging at them in an unprovoked and wild attack that left one ranger in critical condition at Massachusetts General Hospital, police officials said.

Boston police chased Bodio Hutchinson, 34, into the Public Garden, where they arrested him and fished a knife out of a nearby pond, officials said. Before officers tackled him to the pavement, witnesses said, Hutchinson told the officers to shoot him.

“Our prayers are with both of the rangers,” said Boston Police Commissioner William Evans at a press conference Tuesday night. “We have good witnesses and good video, and we’re confident in the suspect we have that’s responsible for this.”

Authorities did not name the two men wounded but said the ranger who was critically hurt and taken to Mass. General is a 46-year-old sergeant who has been on the job for 20 years. He was stabbed in the abdomen and was in surgery on Tuesday night. The other ranger, authorities said, is 23 and had just joined the force. He suffered several wounds and was taken to Tufts Medical Center.

Read more: http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/10/14/two-park-rangers-stabbed-boston-common/7Z2WEwbTj7qZqsbphPjLdP/story.html

[mopinko]

1. and somehow they managed to subdue him without shooting him.

how the blue do it.

[geek tragedy]

8. At too high a risk of their own personal safety

This would have been a good shoot had cops done it.

[Brigid]

2. Attempted suicide by cop?

[ManiacJoe]

3. Certainly suggested by the article.

Once the cops figure that out, protocols change.
Being unarmed at the time of the capture probably helped him not get shot, too.

[greatlaurel]

4. This is what happens when mental health care funding is slashed.

Shuttering public mental health care facilities and using the prisons to warehouse the mentally ill has allowed these tragedies to happen over and over. The privatization of mental health care is a disaster for the mentally ill, their families and anyone who has to interact with the mentally ill.

Here in Ohio, there are thousands of the mentally ill living in rural areas in pathetic conditions after almost all the public mental institutions were closed down. Care was supposed to given in group homes and in privatized settings. The money has disappeared into the pockets of a few and the ill receive little or no care and end up in prison or living in desperate conditions. Unless, you interact with these folks, they are invisible, living in trailers up some dark hollow of southeastern Ohio or under a bridge as a homeless person in an urban area.

May both officers fully recover very quickly. My best wishes to these brave men and their families. I hope the homeless man gets the help he needs, but he will most likely be locked away to rot in a prison some where making lots of money for a private prison outfit.

This tragedy was brought to you by Grover Norquist.

[KingCharlemagne]

5. The tableau you depict is near-Dickensian. One wonders what a perceptive

and compassionate soul like Dickens would make of our mental health services in this country.

[greatlaurel]

6. You are right, it is Dickensian. Very perceptive.

There are many who are speaking about this, but the media ignores the realities of what is going on. As long as people think they are paying less in taxes here in Ohio and are convinced the nasty people are not getting a free ride, the middle class continues to vote GOP who are making it a living hell for the poor, the mentally ill and anyone who does not have a well off relative to take care of them or help them navigate the system.

[KingCharlemagne]

7. Have a brother who's manic-depressive (preceded by my Mom who was

also probably bi-polar, although diagnosed at the time as paranoid-schizophrenic).

So the situation you depict just breaks my heart. There's just way too much unnecessary human suffering in this country.

[greatlaurel]

9. You are spot on, just way too much unnecessary suffering.

Thank you for your post, that is a phrase I will use again if you do not mind.

I had an uncle who was manic-depressive. He was treated several times at a state institution. He was a very nice man. The treatment was no fun, but he had a decent life, got married, bought a house and worked at another state hospital. It was a lot better life than being homeless under a bridge somewhere.