John Black Tibbs

John Black Tibbs a jury that spent six weeks listening to the story of John Tibbs’ days as an enforcer for one of the biggest drug merchants in Boston deadlocked on whether he killed 17-year-old Tennyson Drakes and seriously wounded two of Drakes’ friends.
In a better world, justice might have had more to do with what a street assassin like John Tibbs truly deserved. But in Courtroom 907 yesterday, it had everything to do with the few minutes that Anna Worrell and her aunt, Maureen Worrell, were given to remember a good and decent boy who had been reduced to memory.
Two months ago, a jury that spent six weeks listening to the story of John Tibbs’ days as an enforcer for one of the biggest drug merchants in Boston deadlocked on whether he killed 17-year-old Tennyson Drakes and seriously wounded two of Drakes’ friends.
Monday morning, as a new jury was being selected, Tibbs decided to cop to manslaughter. It wasn’t so much a matter of conscience as convenience. Tibbs already is doing 27 years on a federal murder and racketeering charge.
As a result of that federal sweep of prominent Boston gangbangers, Marlon Passley, the man who was initially convicted of gunning down Tennyson Drakes, was set free on the brokered testimony of John Tibbs’ drug boss.
Eddie Mills told the feds how he and Tibbs had cruised down Nelson Street on a motorcycle one night in August 1995, looking to kill members of the rival RSO/Corbett Street crew. Tennyson Drakes, an honor roll student at Dorchester High and bound for Wentworth, had the misfortune of standing on the corner of Nelson and Corbett streets when the duo came looking for blood.