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6 more people facing charges after South Boston St. Patrick’s Day parade

Nineteen people were either arrested or given court summons at Sunday's St. Patrick's Day parade, according to the Boston Police Department and MBTA Transit Police.

Six more people were charged for incidents related to Sunday's South Boston St. Patrick's Day parade.
Six more people were charged for incidents related to Sunday's South Boston St. Patrick's Day parade. Courtesy Boston Police Department

By Darin Zullo

2 minutes to read

Six more people are facing charges related to incidents from Sunday’s St. Patrick’s Day parade in South Boston, according to MBTA Transit Police.

The six people, some of whom were arrested and some of whom received court summons, face a range of charges including disorderly conduct, assault and battery, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, unarmed robbery, and malicious destruction of property, transit police said.

Boston.com previously reported nine arrests and four summonses to South Boston District Court by the Boston Police Department.

The charges that those 12 adults and one juvenile face include drinking in public, disorderly conduct, being a minor in possession of alcohol, destruction of property, assault and battery, affray, resisting arrest, assault and battery on a police officer, and disturbing the peace, Officer Michael Torigian said Sunday.

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This year’s parade kicked off at 11:30 a.m., an hour and a half earlier than previous years, in an effort to avoid the violence and drunkenness of last year’s celebration, which saw 11 arrests.

“The Evacuation Day Parade is not about green beer and leprechauns. It’s about the respect we show for our veterans and military families,” City Councilor Ed Flynn said on X. “Additionally, for someone to come to South Boston and assault a police officer is unconscionable. We can’t normalize that conduct!”

31 parade revelers transported to hospitals, many for excessive drinking

“The security changes we implemented were effective. However, we still saw significant underage drinking and violence throughout the neighborhood,” Flynn, state Sen. Nick Collins, and state Rep. David Biele, who all represent South Boston, said in a joint statement. “Many young people had to be transported to hospitals due to excessive drinking.”

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Emergency responders had to transport 31 people from the parade, according to Boston EMS.

“We had extra personnel stationed along the St. Patrick’s Day parade route, in ambulances, medical stations, and on bicycles and gators,” Boston EMS said on X.

Boston police and transit police also confiscated large quantities of alcohol, including numerous “blackout rage gallons,” or “borgs,” due to public and underage drinking.

“Some folks refuse to listen and follow simple rules,” transit police said in an X post showing some of the confiscated “borgs.” “This is a small sampling of what Transit Police officers seized from people coming into the parade.”

Parade organizers ask out-of-state firefighters to leave

The South Boston Allied War Veterans Council, which organizes the parade, also asked some out-of-state firefighters who were allegedly not adhering to the council’s code of conduct to leave the parade.

“As we could not identify the specific department these individuals represented, we asked the entire group to depart the parade route,” the council said in a press release. “They complied without incident.”

Parade organizers did not specify the way in which the firefighters were violating the council’s code of conduct.

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