Alleged pipe-bomb bank robber has violent record dating to the 1980s

DeVincenzi?

William DeVincenzi, one of two men arrested yesterday by machine-gun-toting, armor-wearing FBI agents and state troopers, already had a lengthy record by the time he turned 22 - and agreed to testify against two other men charged with gunning down a store security guard in East Boston.

In exchange for his testimony about the 1983 murder, DeVincenzi got a manslaughter sentence, while the two other men were convicted of first-degree murder - only to have their sentences overturned in 1989 due to questions about DeVincenzi's testimony (they eventually pleaded guilty to manslaughter). In its 1989 decision on the verdicts, the Supreme Judicial Court noted his testimony:

DeVincenzi then proceeded to describe the robbery of the Tello's store in East Boston during which, according to him, the defendant Orlandella drove a stolen brown Chrysler automobile, DeVincenzi sat in the front passenger seat, and the defendant Ciampa sat in the back seat with a sawed-off shotgun. In the course of the confrontation with the manager of the store and the security guard, who were crossing a parking lot to make a bank deposit, Ciampa shot the security guard and killed him.

DeVincenzi also turned state's evidence in a number of other cases, involving drug trafficking, armed robbery and arson.

He was sent to a Midwestern prison to protect him from his former pals in East Boston, but apparently couldn't stay away from his hometown when he got out. Last April, he was arrested on a shoplifting charge in East Boston.

Yesterday, officials searched his Saratoga Street home for evidence that might tie him to two bank robberies, one in Everett and one in Winthrop, in which a man threatened tellers with what appeared to be a pipe bomb.

Innocent, etc.