Jury Convicts in Double Stabbing Near Grateful Dead Rally

Boston, April 20, 2012—A double stabbing defendant won’t be Truckin’ anytime soon after a Suffolk Superior Court jury convicted him of attacking two people last year as a rally for the Grateful Dead was under way nearby, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said.

MIGUEL MORALES (D.O.B. 1/20/82), who had no fixed address at the time of the incident, was convicted of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and aggravated assault and battery with a dangerous weapon for using a butterfly knife with a six-inch blade to stab two men on the evening of March 6, 2011. He faces sentencing next week.

Assistant District Attorney Dana Pierce of Conley’s Senior Trial Unit proved during the two-day trial that Morales flipped a table set up near the entrance to Park Street station on the Boston Common, prompting a confrontation with fans of the band at about 8:30 p.m.

MBTA Transit Police officers separated the parties, but moments later watched as Morales became involved in another altercation. Evidence showed that Morales extended his arm toward a 22-year-old California man, striking him in the chest; it soon became apparent that Morales had stabbed him.

Additional officers converged on the scene as Morales began to flee. He made it as far as nearby Winter Street when they ordered him to the ground. The officer who took Morales into custody recovered the knife on the ground near him.

The stabbing victim collapsed and was treated at the scene by Boston Emergency Medical Services personnel before being transported to Massachusetts General Hospital. Before being transported, the victim said of Morales, “That’s him. He stabbed me.”

As the officers and EMTs were on scene, a second victim, this one a 24-year-old Fitchburg man, approached them and said, “He stabbed me, too.” That victim raised his shirt and showed authorities a stab wound to his stomach. He was treated and taken to Tufts Medical Center.

Both victims made full recoveries and were able to testify at trial.

Rebecca Harris was the DA’s assigned victim-witness advocate. Morales was represented by attorney Robert Zanello. Judge Linda Giles will sentence him Monday at 9:00 in courtroom 817.

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All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.