2 possible drownings in Tiverton

TIVERTON — The police are investigating two unrelated deaths as possible drownings.

The police found the body of Alfreena Blanchette, 83, of Tiverton, in the Fogland Beach area yesterday morning. She had been reported missing Sunday afternoon. Her car, the police said, had rolled past the end of Fogland Road, down a boat ramp and into the Sakonnet River.

On Sunday afternoon, the police said, the body of Alexander Rothman, 23, of Newton, Mass., was found on the Sakonnet shoreline near Driftwood Drive. Rothman’s family owns a summer home in the area, the police said.

The police said both deaths appeared accidental. Results of autopsies were being awaited.

— Staff report

Fire heavily damages Providence house

PROVIDENCE — A three-story wood-frame apartment building is uninhabitable after a heavy fire broke out early yesterday at 55-57 Woodmont St. in the Reservoir neighborhood.

No one was in the building when firefighters responded shortly after 5 a.m., according to Battalion Chief Joseph Desmarais. The building sustained extensive fire, smoke and water damage throughout, he said. No one was injured.

Battling not only the fire, but also the cold and overnight snowfall of several inches, the firefighters “did an outstanding job in the adverse conditions” and their “quick work” prevented the fire from spreading to two nearby buildings that were occupied, Desmarais said.

The fire probably began on the first floor at the rear of the building, Desmarais said. The fire remains under investigation.

Only the second-floor apartment contained furniture, Desmarais said. Although fire officials learned that two people “reside there at different intervals” throughout the year, they were not home at the time of the fire, he said.

— Kate Bramson

8 are displaced in Silver Lake tenement fire

PROVIDENCE — Four adults and four children are looking for long-term housing after they were routed from their apartment in a three-story tenement at 124 Eastwood Ave. in Silver Lake, according to the Fire Department.

Battalion Fire Chief Joseph R. Desmarais said that a fire that was reported at 2:30 a.m. Saturday began in the ceiling of a first-floor closet and spread into the walls of the second floor. Flames damaged the first-floor ceiling and the second floor and there was smoke and water damage throughout the house, he said.

Nobody was hurt, and the Rhode Island chapter of the American Red Cross helped those displaced with overnight lodging, Desmarais said.

In another fire, late Friday afternoon, flames caused moderate damage to a building that houses Joy restaurant at 320 Branch Ave. in the North End, reported Deputy Assistant Fire Chief Daniel J. Crowley.

— Gregory Smith

Loaded gun leads to man’s arrest

PROVIDENCE — The police say they have a loaded 9mm pistol that was stolen in North Carolina in their evidence locker at headquarters. And they have a suspect, Roger Garcia, 56, of 56 What Cheer Ave., Silver Lake, in custody.

Those are the results of a foray late Friday afternoon by the Providence police gun task force, which has been reconstituted recently and renamed the violent crime task force, Maj. Thomas F. Oates III, commander of the Investigative Division, said Sunday.

Patrolmen Leonel Pichs III and Jonathan A. Primiano went to Garcia’s apartment because they had reason to believe that there was a gun in the house, according to Oates.

“They did what we call a ‘knock and talk,’ and they asked to speak to the subject,” Oates said.

Apparently caught off-guard, according to Oates, Garcia let the officers inside even as he scrambled to get rid of a bag of heroin. Garcia allegedly tossed a plastic bag containing smaller glassine bags of heroin into a bathroom, but the officers were close enough to see the contents, Oates said.

After the bag was confiscated, Pichs and Primiano were given permission to look elsewhere in the house, and they recovered a Jennings brand 9mm pistol manufactured by Bryco Arms in a bedroom closet, Oates alleged. The Charlotte-Mecklenberg Police Department in South Carolina had reported the gun stolen.

Garcia was charged with possession of a firearm after having committed a crime of violence, receiving stolen goods and possession of heroin.

— Gregory Smith

3 teens arrested in robbery of delivery man

PROVIDENCE — Three teenage males lured a Domino’s pizza delivery man to a robbery near an abandoned house in South Providence, but the police say that they caught the trio.

Police Maj. Thomas F. Oates III said the incident began at about 8:30 p.m. Saturday, when Juan Capellan, 39, who works as a delivery man for the Domino’s shop at 526 Broad St., took pizza to 167 Briggs St. after an order was phoned in.

When Capellan reached the area, he realized that the house appeared to be abandoned. A teen approached him, and then two more, and Capellan ran to the intersection of Briggs and Ocean Street, where one of his assailants hit him in the head with a staircase spindle apparently removed from the house at 167 Briggs, Oates related.

They stole the order, Capellan told the police, but it was not immediately clear if they got any money from him. Capellan declined medical attention.

Detective Patricia Cornell from the police Bureau of Criminal Identification managed to raise a fingerprint from one of two spindles that were recovered from the back yard at 167 Briggs, according to Oates, and it was matched to a teenager with a police record.

Robbery squad Detectives Robert DiCarlo and Robert Melaragno brought in two teenagers, both of whom admitted their involvement, and the detectives obtained the name of a third suspect, who lives on Oxford Street. They arrested the third suspect, at whose home they recovered two pizza boxes bearing the written address of 167 Briggs.

All three suspects were charged with first-degree robbery and sent to the Rhode Island Training School.

–– Gregory Smith

Man wanted in August slaying captured

Jorge Cartagena, a 22-year-old man wanted by the Providence police in the slaying last summer of Junior Sanchez, has been captured by federal marshals in Birmingham, Ala. The police said Cartagena was taken into custody Wednesday by members of the U.S. Marshals Gulf Coast Fugitive Task Force.

Sanchez, 32, was fatally shot in front of 71 Superior St. in Providence on Aug. 10. Witnesses said they heard at least five shots and that they heard a woman crying hysterically after the shooting. Major Thomas F. Oates III said that after a lengthy investigation it was learned that the alleged assailant, Cartagena, had fled to the Birmingham area.

Another Providence fugitive was located as well. Gabriel Payamps, who was wanted on a charge of felony assault in connection with the shooting and wounding of Pedro Sanchez on Sayles Street in Providence, in April 2007, was apprehended in Norcross, Ga., by the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force in Atlanta.

— Richard C. Dujardin