Police arrived, discovered a gas leak, and evacuated Oun and Mean Choun, their 7-year-old daughter, two 9-year-old nieces and a 3-year-old nephew they were babysitting.

Oun Choun said she was watching a movie with her husband while the kids were running around and playing.

“We heard something hit, like an earthquake, with cracking,” Oun Choun said. She said the children jumped and screamed.

The Chouns went outside to find their neighbor’s car smashed backward into the home, with a roughly 3-foot hole in the cinderblocks of the foundation.

“I couldn’t believe it,” said Oun Choun. “Kids were playing outside a few hours ago. I’m glad it happened once they came in.”

Police told me tonight that the accident occurred while a 16-year-old neighbor girl was getting her first driving lesson from her mother. It “went horribly wrong,” police said.

No charges have been filed so far, but police continue to investigate exactly how this happened.

Firefighters got the gas shut off by 5:44 p.m., according to radio broadcasts.

Deputy Fire Chief Mike Ralls told me there will be no heat or hot water in the home tonight since the gas line was damaged, but that the structural damage wasn’t so bad that the family stay in the home tonight. A building inspector will conduct a further inspection in the morning.

I feel for the poor girl who was driving. I hope she learns from this and becomes a better driver as a result. In the long run, it might be a good thing if one more teenage driver actually understands just how quickly things can go wrong while you’re driving.

Thank God.

The fact that it’s school vacation week and the complex is empty at night is reportedly why a drug dealer suggested a meeting with would-be customers in the complex on Tuesday night.

The drug dealer met the boys in the Englesby parking lot, ended up pulling a gun, firing a gunshot into the air, and then carjacking the two teenage Dracut boys who wanted to buy some weed from him.

I first blogged about this last night only moments after it was reported, but I’m swamped tonight, so here is my story on the matter now that I’ve talked to the Deputy Chief about it.

By Robert Mills
rmills@lowellsun.com
DRACUT — A single gunshot was fired into the air in the parking lot of the Englesby Intermediate School on Tuesday night as two teenagers were carjacked during a drug deal gone bad, police said.
Police said a 17-year-old Dracut boy and a 19-year-old Dracut boy told police they arranged to buy marijuana from a drug dealer they had met in Lowell, and that they met the dealer in the parking lot of Family Pizza, 1595 Lakeview Ave., about 9:10 p.m.
The drug dealer arrived in a dark-colored Buick, accompanied by two other men and a woman.
The drug dealer suggested everyone move to the Englesby parking lot within the school complex across the street, since it was dark and secluded during school vacation week, according to Deputy Chief David Chartrand.
The drug dealer and another man got into the back of a red Jeep Grand Cherokee driven by the would-be teenage customers.
The teenagers told police there was an argument over the price of the marijuana, the drug dealer pulled out a silver revolver with a black handle, and demanded the teenage boys hand over their wallets.
Police said the dealer then ordered the teenagers out of the Jeep, told them the gun was real, and fired a single gunshot into the air to prove it. The dealer then got into the Jeep and drove away from the scene with the Buick he arrived in following close behind.
Dracut Police were called to the school complex about 9:30 p.m., and immediately asked surrounding towns to be on the lookout for the Jeep.
The red Jeep was found abandoned on Patricia Lane, near New Boston Road, about 10:30 p.m. It was empty. Police are still searching for the Buick.
Chartrand said neither of the teenage victims is a Dracut High School student. He said the 17-year-old is a high school student, but he declined to identify what school that boy attends.
The drug dealer is described as a Hispanic male, 20 to 23-years-old, 6’2 to 6’3, about 200 pounds, with short, black hair.
The man who got into the Jeep with the drug dealer was a black male, 5’5 to 5’7, about 150 pounds.
The two people who stayed in the Buick were described as a Hispanic male, 19 to 20-years-old, 5’10 to 6 feet tall, about 175 pounds; and a white female, about 5’7, heavyset, with dirty blonde shoulder length hair.
Anyone with information on those individuals is asked to call Dracut Police at 978-957-2123.

Al-Zubaydi, who owns Babylon, the Iraqi restaurant at 25 Merrimack Street, in Lowell, hasn’t had the easiest of years. On Jan. 4, around 3 a.m., someone threw a 20-pound rock through the plate glass window at the front of her restaurant.

She, and many other people in Lowell, feared this was a hate crime since the restaurant is clearly labelled in signage as Iraqi.

Photo by Tory Germann

Immediately after the incident, veterans and a local church organized to show support. Occupy Lowell did as well.

Today, the Student Government Association at UMass Lowell rented the restaurant for two hours to make a similar show of support. Among the students who turned out was Mike Hubbard, a 26-year-old freshman from Methuen who served with the 82nd Airborne in Iraq.

Lowell yet again made me really proud of where I live.

Lowell Police have identified a suspect. He is being summonsed to court, and will make his first court appearance in May. He is not being named in public prior to that, which is standard in cases in which people are summonsed.

Leyla said business has been good even when people aren’t holding eat-in events to show support. Many of those who came to the eat-in have been back, a good sign for any restaurant.

“We are doing much better,” Leyla told me. “It’s really amazing how bad things can convert to good things. It’s beautiful. It’s amazing.”

About five minutes later, police radio broadcasts revealed the Jeep wasn’t just stolen – it was stolen at gunpoint.

Police are now searching for the red Jeep, with Massachusetts License Plate 581GK1. It was last seen heading inbound on Lakeview Avenue, toward Lowell, immediately after the theft.

Police radio broadcasts indicate there are two Hispanic males, a Hispanic female, and a black male involved in the theft. Police have been warned that there should be a firearm in the vehicle.

That’s all I have now. Officers and the shift commander are working on the investigation. I have a call into the deputy chief, but it’s very early in the investigation so I don’t expect much information quite yet. I’ll update as soon as I know more.

UPDATE: Police just recovered the Jeep in the area of 20 Patricia Lane at 10:30 p.m.

UPDATE: From what I’m hearing the victim here was not injured, and was probably not a student. It’s school vacation week, for one thing, and Deputy Chartrand told me police are investigating whether this was a drug deal gone bad. All details are preliminary.

The deputy is going to send me an upate on this on Wednesday.

Anyone who spots the vehicle should call your local police department immediately. If you have other information regarding this incident call Dracut Police at 978.957.2123.

She looks very remorseful, which is something that usually makes me think a little more of the accused. Ms. Metcalf was arrested Sunday night and charged with third-offense drunken driving.

Was she remorseful the first two times?

Police say Sgt. Brett Pelley was patrolling on Massachusetts Avenue a little before 9 p.m., when he saw an eastbound Ford Escape cross into the westbound lane.

The escape had a broken headlight and a broken taillight, according to police, and it slowed to about 15 mph before quickly turning into the parking lot of a closed business, and then back out onto the road. Police say Metcalf failed to lower the Escape’s high beams as several other vehicles passed, and that the car continued to cross the road’s center line.

Sgt. Pelley finally activated the siren and blue lights on his cruiser, but police say Metcalf didn’t stop for about a half mile. When she did stop, police say, she stopped the Escape in the middle of the travel lane on Massachusetts Avenue in front of the police station.

Police say Metcalf smelled of alcohol, had glassy, bloodshot eyes, and failed field sobriety tests.

She was charged with operating under the influence of alcohol (third offense), defective equipment, failure to stay in marked lanes, failure to dim high beams, operating with a revoked license after being deemed a habitual traffic offender, failure to stop for police, and OUI-drugs, because police say Metcalf had taken Gabatentin.

Police say Metcalf also admitted she was driving even though her license was suspended due to a prior OUI conviction, and that could be her biggest problem.

Under Melanie’s Law, passed in 2005, you face a mandatory minimum one-year in jail if you’re caught driving drunk while your license is suspended for a prior drunken driving conviction.

Witnesses told officers two men fled the lot moments before officers arrived, and that one of them had fired a single gunshot from a handgun.

Officers got information regarding a suspect, and where that suspect was possibly heading, and at 2:06 a.m., they arrested Kenneth Dufresne, 28, of 64 Flint Rock Road, in Hollis, N.H.

No one was hurt.

Dufresne, who is pictured, is charged with a felony count of reckless conduct, and a misdemeanor count of possession of a controlled substance. He couldn’t make his $2,500 cash or surety bail, so he’s spending the weekend at teh Hillborough County House of Correction, in Manchester.

He’ll be arraigned Tuesday in Nashua District Court.

I didn’t think much of this accident at first because I figured there was little chance anyone would be going very fast on either one of those residential streets. That changed about a minute later when police reported possible entrapment.

The GMC Sierra pickup, pictured above after being pulled back by a tow truck, collided with a Honda Odyssey, pushing the Odyssey into another minivan that was parked on Grove Street.

A man in his 20′s was driving the Sierra. A woman in her 30′s was driving the Odyssey. Below is the Odyssey driver being taken to an ambulance.

Airbags deployed in both vehicles, and a passenger in the minivan was also taken to the hospital. None of the injuries were life-threatening. Police closed Grove Street at School Street and Coral Street at Branch Street while they responded.

I got no immediate word on charges.

Also, to answer the question of the extremely self-righteous EMT at the scene: No, I wouldn’t mind if I was ever in an accident and someone took my picture. I encourage you all to do so if I ever crash in Lowell.

There are times in this job when I have to put good taste and decency ahead of my duty to document things, but a guy with minor injuries being fitted with a neck brace is not one of those times.

Accidents happen; injuries happen; and I haven’t been doing this job for 10 years without ever stopping to think about whether or not I believe it’s moral to document injury, pain, and life.

I thought I might be on my way to a pretty good meeting tonight. Kevin Hayhurst, co-owner of Brian’s Ivy Hall, a place that has come up a lot in the discussion about issues downtown, tried to host a meeting tonight between residents and bar owners.

Here’s what he said in his invitation.

Kevin and co-owner Eric Finn; Nick Petrakos, from the Blue Shamrock; the co-owners of the Village Smokehouse, and the owner of the Amae Asian Fusion Restaurant all came to the meeting. So did one Lowell resident from South Lowell. So did Lowell attorney Michael Zaim.

No one else did.

The guy from South Lowell left pretty quickly since the meeting was clearly going nowhere.

Hayhurst, Petrakos and the guys from the Smokehouse have been mainstays at the meetings between bar owners and residents that Police Superintendent Kenneth Lavallee has held quarterly over the course of the last two or three years. They’ve held discussions with residents before, listened to complaints, and responded, so I thought this discussion might be productive.

Residents, bar owners and Lavallee haven’t met since last Summer, though, and they certainly didn’t meet tonight. The Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association even rebroadcast the invitation via the association’s Facebook page, but not a single downtown resident came.

I did get to ask Hayhurst for some of his ideas for curbing violence and disorder.

1. This first came up during discussions held between Hayhurst, other bar owners, and residents. It is for bar owners to start maintaining a sort of “black list” of people who cause trouble downtown.

When this idea came up at a meeting between residents and bar owners this Summer, Lavallee questioned whether it would be legal and suggested looking into the matter and how it could be achieved in a legal manner.

I hadn’t heard anything about it since, but last night Hayhurst said bar owners have been talking amongst themselves and may try to organize this on their own. If people get thrown out of bars or arrested for disorder offenses, the bar owners could seek no trespassing orders that would prevent these people from entering any downtown bars participating in the program.

The idea would be to keep the trouble makers from coming downtown to drink.

2. Hayhurst thinks one of the issues that makes crowds more aggressive at the end of the night is the way they’re pushed out of bars. Everyone has to be out of the bar at 2 a.m., which means if last call is at 1:45, everyone is rushed out the door at the last minute.

See above for an example of people being dispersed from a bar at the end of the night.

Hayhurst thinks it might solve a lot of problems to just have last call, shut off all the music, stop all entertainment, and let people wander out of the bar at their own pace, instead of being pushed out.

“I think it would make for a less aggressive crowd,” he said.

3. Hayhurst also agrees with a suggestion made by Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association president Kathleen Marcin several months ago, that lighting be improved around Lee Street, Paige Street and John Street, where there have been several violent incidents.

I haven’t spoken to anyone who disagrees with this suggestion, and City Manager Lynch told me tonight that the city is looking to work with private property owners in that area to implement the suggestion, since most of the lights are on private property. He said the city is also looking to help by adding more lights.

Police say the guy pictured in this entry stole a “large amount” of jewelry from an undisclosed store on Valentines Day, and they’re asking for the public’s help with figuring out who he is.

Police say the man is believed to be 35 to 45 years old, and about 230 pounds. He left in Hyundai Elentra GT from the early 2000′s.

Police aren’t releasing the name or address of the store, or any further details. Anyone who thinks they know this guy is asked to call Billerica detectives at 978.667.1212.

This one is bright red, and says the building is UNSAFE.

The sign says the building is unsafe due to “inadequate working means of egress.” It’s signed by a building inspector, and dated this morning, as you can see.

We’ve heard previously that a back door to the club was closed during the brawl that occurred on early Friday morning, and I’ve heard further that it may have been padlocked. I’m not sure if this is all because there’s still a padlock on a door, or if this concerns an actual structural issue that could take serious time to remedy.

This sign is in addition to the white sign from the Board of Health that was put up Friday morning when the Board of Health closed the restaurant.

I have a call into City Manager Bernie Lynch about this, so hopefully I’ll hear back tonight. I’ll also be calling George Eliades, who is the attorney of building owner Nick Sarris.

I’ll update as soon as I hear more.