BABYLON, NEW YORK – While a day-long manhunt for alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev paralyzed the city, tips in neighboring states led authorities to search ferry docks, trains and even a man in Orient Point, New York, who resembled the suspect.
Two trains in Connecticut were searched in separate incidents on Friday, and Amtrak service between New York and Boston was suspended for much of the day.
In South Norwalk, Connecticut, police boarded an Amtrak Acela train and in nearby Darien, local police brought bomb-sniffing dogs to a suburban railroad that services coastal Connecticut and New York’s northern suburbs.
Connecticut State Police were also on notice after an alert that Tsarnaev drove off in a Honda CR-V and may have headed to Connecticut.
Meanwhile in New London, police descended on and cleared the Cross Sound Ferry Terminal before searching the ferry.
Police there said nobody was in danger. In a separate incident on the same ferry line, a boat captain called in a tip to Long Island authorities that one of his crew spotted someone who resembled Tsarnaev on the ferry.
Local and county police met the ferry at the dock and took the individual, who had walked over to the terminal snack bar, into custody. He was searched, his bags were x-rayed and he was fingerprinted before cops determined he wasn’t the bombing suspect.
“We don’t have any reason to believe he’s not who he says he is,” said Martin Flatley, the police chief for Southold Town on Long Island. “But he does bear a fairly close resemblance.”