A 53-year-old local man, Dante Mirabella has been arrested by District A1 police officers in connection with three possible armed robberies. One robbery took place in the North End at Bob’s Grocery on Endicott Street, at 10:52 p.m. on Wednesday, May 29.
Mirabella is a suspect in two other armed robberies near 450 Commercial Street and 37 Merrimack Street.
He was charged with the possible robberies and with multiple gun charges.
Based on the grocery store’s video and two witnesses’ police were looking for a man wearing a black mask and wielding a gun demanding the store’s cash. He even took money from a customer. No one was injured.
Mirabella was arrested on Friday, May 31 at 9:42 p.m. by officers on site at Charter Street and Jackson Avenue in the North End, where police recovered a hand loaded Highpoint .380 caliber firearm loaded with seven rounds of live ammunition.
Reportedly, as part of an ongoing investigation, officers were on patrol in the North End when they observed a male matching the description of a suspect in connection with the armed robbery on Salem Street, before getting on a bicycle and fleeing the area.
They followed the male to an area near where he was eventually arrested. They observed him entering the passenger’s seat of a parked motor vehicle.
The officers observed the suspect allegedly removing an item from his back waistband and placing it on his front waistband and immediately recognized the item to be a firearm. They quickly approached the suspect and ordered him to get out of the car, attempting to secure the gun.
However, during the process, the suspect allegedly grabbed a hold of the firearm’s handle in an apparent attempt to remove it but officers were able to take the gun from Mirabella before placing him under arrest.
All three robberies described the suspect removing a gun from his waistband before demanding cash and fleeing the area.
The local convenience stores are a popular place where residents often patronize for quick shopping, to play the lottery and purchase scratch tickets.
One of the store’s video cameras capture the entire hold up and depicted the suspect taking out a gun, receiving the money and even taking money away from a customer.