Crime

Police: 11 arrested with firearms at Boston’s Caribbean festival, no shots fired

No one was injured, and no shots were fired, police said, a year after eight people were shot at the Caribbean Carnival Festival in Dorchester.

The annual Caribbean Carnival Parade was held Saturday afternoon as participants made their way down MLK Blvd. and Warren Streets to the final destination of Franklin Park. A costumed man walks on stilts down MLK Blvd. John Tlumacki/The Boston Globe

By Molly Farrar

August 25, 2024

1 minute to read

Eleven people were arrested with firearms around the Caribbean Carnival Festival in Dorchester Saturday, police announced, a year after eight people were shot on the outskirts of the parade.

From 2 a.m. to after 7 p.m. on Saturday, police recovered nine firearms, Boston police announced Sunday. Four of the 11 people facing charges are juveniles, the department said, and four guns were large capacity.

Last year, eight people were injured, including one seriously, in a shooting before 8 a.m. at the festival’s J’ouvert Parade near Blue Hill and Talbot Avenues in Dorchester. Four men were charged in connection with the shooting.

Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox told reporters before the carnival that the shooting last year was an outlier.

“This is a positive event in our community,” Cox said, according to WHDH. “You have an incident that happens and it kind of mars the events in general but the fact is, overwhelmingly, the people come, they enjoy themselves, they go home, and that’s it. We expect the same thing this year.”

The Caribbean Carnival Festival this weekend came after a shooting at the Dominican Festival in Franklin Park last week. Five people suffered non-life threatening injuries; the investigation is ongoing.

11 arrested on firearm charges

Police said they arrested 11 people, aged 15 to 34, on Saturday for possessing firearms. No shots were fired, and no officers or suspects were injured, Boston police said.

Four teens were arrested for firearm possession, Boston police said, including one who allegedly had a gun with an extended magazine. A 16-year-old was also allegedly found with a loaded gun with a scratched off serial number after police responded to a fight where a person was knocked unconscious.

One of the people arrested allegedly had 11 small bags of crack cocaine, police said. One man was found with a Glock switch, making the firearm fully automatic, and another was found with a large capacity magazine, according to the department.

During a traffic stop, an officer felt “an unknown liquid substance hit him in the face and arms,” and later confiscated a loaded gun and a squirt gun.