In the Mary Ellen McCormack Housing Development in South Boston, Alfred Fisher, a 71-year-old resident, spent the evening of July 27, 1998, on the phone with a friend. The conversation halted abruptly as an intruder, Jody Oleson, entered Fisher’s apartment. Oleson, then 27, was on parole after serving four years in prison for prior convictions of armed robbery and assault and battery with a deadly weapon.
Oleson struck Fisher repeatedly with his fists, targeting his head, nose, cheeks, chin, lip, neck, arms, and legs. Fisher’s friend on the line heard the blows and Fisher’s desperate calls for help before alerting police.
Officers arrived to find Oleson with blood on his hands and Fisher unconscious on the kitchen floor in a pool of blood. Oleson claimed to police that Fisher had been stalking his pregnant girlfriend and that Fisher struck first, prompting a self-defense response. In a taped statement, Oleson admitted to punching Fisher once and holding him in a chokehold. The attack ended Fisher’s life through strangulation…