Many who followed the case were outraged that its defendants were awarded a new trial.
Joe Kross `79, one of Puopolo’s teammates, said at the time, “Andy never had a second chance.”
Easterling was eventually convicted of manslaughter and given 18-20 years in the Massachusetts State Penitentiary at Walpole. The other men were found innocent.
Lincoln says about 10 years after the incident he ran into one of the men on a bus going to the airport.
“He said, ‘I’m sorry’,” Lincoln says. “We let it go. It was weird.”
Puopolo has not been forgotten within the Boston community.
There is a park in the North End named for him, a number of charity events have been held in his honor and scholarships have been established in his name at both the Boston Latin school and Harvard.
Every year Harvard football alums play a game of touch football against Yale and then donate money to his scholarships.
—Staff writer Zachary R. Heineman can be reached at heineman@fas.harvard.edu.