Youth denies blocking 911 messages

To his parents, Paul M. Lydon Jr. is an "awesome kid," an honor roll student at a Boston high school who reads the Bible regularly and whose lifelong wish is to become a police officer.

But to Boston police, 17-year-old Lydon is a danger to public safety who deliberately blocked 911 radio transmissions between dispatchers and officers on the street numerous times over the past several weeks.

Yesterday, Lydon was arraigned in West Roxbury Municipal Court on charges of receiving stolen property and disturbing the peace. He pleaded not guilty, and bail was set at $500 cash, an amount his family expected to post.

"Interfering with an officer's ability to communicate with dispatchers is a very serious offense," said Boston police spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll. "If an individual aspires to a career in law enforcement, looking into the [police] cadet program would be the appropriate choice, as opposed to disrupting police communications."

But Lydon's parents said there was nothing malicious in their son's actions. They said he has not missed a day of school in the last 2 1/2 years and is taking college-level courses at the Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology in Boston. An institute spokeswoman confirmed that Lydon has been taking classes since the summer.

"He gets on the scanner, and he listens to the police and what's going on in his neighborhood," said his father, Paul M. Lydon Sr., outside the courthouse. "Honest to God, he's an awesome kid."

Added Diane Genovese, his mother: "His dream is to be a cop. That's why he plays with radios. But he doesn't think before he acts."

Driscoll said police radio experts used signal repeating stations to track the interruptions to Lydon's home on Child Street in Jamaica Plain. He was arrested Wednesday night in his bedroom after a two-way radio Lydon gave detectives produced feedback on the radios of officers standing nearby, according to police.

Police told Lydon's mother they were concerned that "her son may be responsible for sabotaging the Boston police communicaton system," according to a police report.

With the consent of his mother and Lydon, police searched the teenager's bedroom and found about a dozen calculators marked "BFA" that police allege were stolen from the Brook Farm Business and Service Career Academy at the former West Roxbury High School.

The father said his son reads the Bible regularly and is the person to whom staff at the West Roxbury campus staff turn when they have a problem with electronic gear in the facility. He also said his son draws up classroom assignments for the entire building.

The father also denied that his son stole the calculators. He said they were obsolete equipment staff was going to throw away, but because Lydon had helped clean the school, staffers gave them to his son because of his interest in electronic equipment.

"Paulie's never stolen anything in his life," Lydon said. "This was all junk they were going to throw away."

In court, Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Jennifer O'Keeffe said Lydon was previously convicted as a juvenile of impersonating a police officer and calling in a false fire alarm.

His father said police have previously caught his son using radio equipment on their frequency. Both parents attributed their son's actions to his fascination with becoming a police officer.

Police said they found two safes in Lydon's bedroom and were planning to search them, but the outcome of that search was not available yesterday, a police spokeswoman said.

Police said they referred the issue to the Federal Communications Commission. An FCC official said the agency will neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation.

Lydon was issued an entry-level ham radio operator's license in April, according to FCC records.

Allen Pitts, spokesman for the nonprofit American Radio Relay League, said Lydon's alleged actions are repugnant to ham radio operators.

"The idea that a ham radio operator, however new, would intentionally cause problems in an emergency call is anathema to hams," he said.