Jan. 03--A barefoot desperado pounded on doors, vaulted fences, busted into apartments and crossed South End rooftops in a bid to flee from cops Sunday night, but he gave up rather than face a police dog.
Jake Garrow told the Herald he was home relaxing with his girlfriend in their Dwight Street brownstone about 8:20 p.m. on New Year's Day when he heard an urgent pounding on the back door.
"It was not a knock. It was like somebody trying to get in," Garrow said. "I went downstairs with my dog Bourbon, who was barking and growling, and there's a mid-20s kid trying to get into the door. He claimed he was running from someone and was trying to get in. He asked if he could come in. I said, 'No.' "
Garrow's quick-thinking girlfriend already had dialed 911. He said the barefoot man turned and leaped the fence into his neighbor's yard. Cops said the nogoodnik broke into the building and ran through one apartment, bowling over the occupant as he raced to the third floor.
"I'm not going to hurt you," police said the suspect told the terrified resident. "But the police are chasing me and I need to get on your roof, so unlock your skylight so I can get up there."
He got through the skylight "and ran from rooftop to rooftop," banging on more windows trying to get in, before he finally broke into an empty apartment down the block, police said. Cops cornered him there and called a K-9 unit.
"I have a drug problem," the suspect told police. "Please don't send the police dog in here with me."
Stanley Zalewski, 27, of Boston was charged with breaking and entering, home invasion, malicious destruction of property and kidnapping, police said. Zalewski was treated for cuts on his hands and feet.
After the arrest, Garrow said, the street was filled with smiling cops, flashing blue lights and neighbors with dramatic tales: "Some neighbors said they'd seen him on the skylight. The guy that saw him in the skylight said, like, six cops came through his house with their guns drawn. There's a group next door, they were having friends over. They locked all the women in the bedroom."
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