Guardian Angels get mixed reception

The Guardian Angels landed in Boston yesterday, welcomed by some residents hopeful they could make the city safer, but received with a cold shoulder from skeptical police and city officials.

About 80 residents gathered at a Dorchester church last night to find out first-hand how the New York-based group will help patrol neighborhoods starting today.

Curtis Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels, told residents his group will reach out to youths, work with victims, and encourage witnesses to come forward.

"We are here to help, not to hurt," he said at a gathering organized by the Rev. Bruce Wall, pastor of Global Ministries Christian Church in Codman Square. "We carry no weapons. . . . We're just average citizens just like all of you."

Some residents at the meeting said they are so scared and desperate that they will take help from wherever it comes.

Carlos Henriquez, a 30-year-old Roxbury resident, said he is happy the Guardian Angels have arrived. "I wish it was Boston residents doing it, but every little bit helps," he said.

Sliwa said he has recruited eight volunteers from Washington, D.C., most of them African-American, and all of them used to confronting street crime. They will go home once Sliwa has trained what he hopes will be dozens of Boston volunteers. Sliwa said he hopes to ultimately have about 60 volunteers patrolling Roxbury, Mattapan, Dorchester, and Jamaica Plain "to create a new movement in the street to counteract what the gangs are doing."

Sliwa said the city needs the Angels, especially when many residents either distrust police or are afraid to cooperate.

"Obviously there's always been a problem in the streets getting information, but now it's really terminal," Sliwa said in an earlier telephone interview. "We say, 'You know what? We're outsiders. . . . You're not going to have to wake up in the middle of the night worried someone's going to put a .44 upside your head.' "

While overall shootings are down 23 percent this year through Sunday, homicides are up to 14, from 10 at this time last year.

Many killers are getting more brazen, too. On Wednesday afternoon, a 25-year-old man was shot to death in front of a popular pizzeria in Mattapan.

Sliwa said that, given the violence, he is surprised by the reception he has received from Mayor Thomas M. Menino and Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis.

Sliwa said he called Menino's office this week and was referred to the police, who did not return his calls.

"I would think the police chief would pick up the phone and call [Chief] Ray Kelly in New York, and he would hear nothing but praises," Sliwa said. "It's been 72 hours, and I can't even get a phone call returned. And that's somewhat disappointing."

Elaine Driscoll, a spokeswoman for Davis, said the commissioner spent yesterday meeting with clergy and elected officials about violence prevention and the need for more state funding. "That was his priority," she said.

Dorothy Joyce, a spokeswoman for Menino, said the mayor would try to make time to greet Sliwa, if he asks.

Police Superintendent John Gallagher, who attended last night's meeting, said police are going to encourage cooperation. "We want to make sure all rules and procedures that Boston police officers are bound by are also followed here," he said.

Officials are wary in part because of what happened the last time the Guardian Angels were in town. They arrived in 1981 and, at their height, boasted about 200 members, who patrolled Mission Hill, Roxbury, and the South End.

But after a series of administrative problems, violent episodes, and growing resentment from residents, the Guardian Angels disbanded their Boston chapter in 1992.

Jack McDevitt, a Northeastern University criminologist who works on anticrime initiatives with the Police Department, said Davis might also be worried about a reputation Sliwa's group has for making trouble and working too independently of the police.

"The commissioner is probably reacting to police chiefs around the country who feel they are more vigilantes than they are help," he said.

"They may in fact be exacerbating problems the police are dealing with."

Suzanne Smalley can be reached at ssmalley@globe.com.