By Bill Forry
Managing Editor

Back-to-back weekend murders and a flurry of non-fatal shootings are again raising alarms about gun violence spinning out of control in and around Dorchester. As neighborhood peace activists prepare to hit the streets this weekend for an annual Mother's Day march and Boston Police cope with a sudden change at the top, there is a real sense of foreboding in neighborhoods already shell-shocked by escalating shootings and murders in recent months.

In Uphams Corner this week, mourners continued to flock to the Groom Street home of Isaura Mendes, a well-known peace activist whose son Alex Matthew Mendes, 25, was gunned down on nearby Wendover Street on Saturday night.

Mendes' murder followed just hours after a Saturday morning incident on Hamilton Street, in which 25 year-old Luis DoSouto was shot and killed. Two men were arrested at the scene of the Hamilton Street murder on Saturday morning. William Badgett, 19, of Mattapan was ordered held without bail on Monday on charges that he fired the shot that killed DoSouto. A second teenager, 18-year-old Darnell Ricks of Dorchester, was charged as an accessory after the fact.

A longtime feud between rival gangs from Uphams Corner and the Bowdoin-Geneva area has been linked to several of homicides over the last decade. However, police sources doubted that there is any connection between the two homicides.

Isaura Mendes, who leads a summertime peace walk in the Uphams-Dudley area and is active in the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute's Mothers' Walk this Sunday, lost her first son, Bobby Mendes, in a stabbing in 1995, just two blocks from the scene of Alex's murder last weekend.

Tina Chery, who has worked with Mendes and scores of other homicide survivors, says that the mother and son had recently visited England, where they spoke publicly about their anti-violence efforts in Boston. Chery and her Fields Corner based Peace Institute have spent the week helping Mendes arrange for Alex's funeral this Saturday and a memorial vigil that will be held on Groom Street this Thursday at 7 p.m.

"I can't speak for others, but it has really challenged me even more. I get so frustrated because it can feel like a waste of time and sometimes I just want to quit. But somehow, seeing (Isaura) and hearing that this happened to Matthew, there's a force of energy that says its not over yet. We have to work even harder for peace."

Chery is also organizing this weekend's Mothers' Walk for Peace, which begins Sunday at 8 a.m. at Town Field. Chery, whose son Louis D. Brown, was killed in 1993, started the walk ten years ago to help fund anti-violence programs in Boston schools.

The two homicides this weekend were part of a rash of violence that claimed seven victims in seven days and pushed the 2006 murder toll citywide to 21. Meanwhile, newly released police statistics show that the total number of shooting incidents so far this year are nearly double what they were in 2005. Firearm arrests are also well above last year's pace, which was itself fast and furious.

Since May 1, gunfire has been reported on the following Dorchester streets in Area C-11: Washington, Evans, Melbourne, Greenbrier, Arcadia Park, Mather, Topliff, Adams, Claybourne, Leroy, and Geneva Avenue. On the adjacent B-3 district- which includes Mattapan and Dorchester- shootings were reported on Harvard, Dyer Street, Lorne, Fessenden, Kingsdale streets, Pemberton Sq., Winston Road and Blue Hill Ave. Some of the gunfire found targets.

Last Friday night at about 10 p.m., three victims were shot and wounded outside 26 Melbourne Street. No one has been arrested in connection to that incident. On Sunday evening at about 7 p.m., a 26 year-old man was found shot in the chest at Walton and Washington streets. The victim is expected to survive. Last Wednesday, a 32 year-old man was stabbed at School street and Champlain Circle on the B-3 police district. The victim, Marcus Heard of Roxbury, died later at Carney Hospital.

Boston Police Detectives urge anyone with information to call them at 617-343-4330 or the Crime Stopper's anonymous tip line at 800-494-TIPS.