BOSTON — A 24-year-old woman arrested at the scene of a homicide investigation is now a “person of interest” in the “suspicious” death of a father of three found on a houseboat in Boston over the weekend, a prosecutor said in court on Tuesday.
Nora Nelson 24, of Boston, was arraigned Tuesday in Boston Municipal Court on charges of charges of two counts of malicious destruction of property, assault and battery on a person over the age of 60, assault and battery with a television remote, and threat to commit a crime in connection with an incident at 343 Commonwealth Avenue in September 2023.
Officers responding to Shipway Place at the Charlestown Marina just before 11 p.m. on Sunday discovered a dead body on a houseboat and Nelson at the scene.
Nelson was then taken into custody on outstanding warrants in the Commonwealth Avenue assault case.
While Nelson is not yet charged in the man’s death, Assistant Suffolk District Attorney Amelia Singh urged the judge to hold her on $300,000 bail, noting that the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office still needs to conduct an autopsy to determine the cause and manner of death for the victim.
“It’s a suspicious death right now and we can’t rule anything out until that [autopsy] happens,” Singh told the court. “She was the only one on the scene. It is a suspicious death. It is a different victim, it’s not the same victim in this case, but again I can’t say that it’s a homicide as of right now.”
When the judge asked why he should consider such a high bail, Singh noted that Nelson was born in Tennessee and has two non-extraditable warrants out of McKinney, Texas, for failing to identify herself, providing a false ID, and resisting arrest.
“She might try to attempt to change her identity,” Singh warned the judge. “The warrants out of Texas are very recent too. There from Dec. 20, 2024. So there are very recent cases she didn’t appear on. It’s for those reasons that I’m asking for such high bail.”
Nelson’s attorney told the court that her client has worked as a contractor at Fort Mead in Maryland creating technology for missiles and is currently interning at Harvard University, while also stating she isn’t earning any money right now.
Nelson was ultimately ordered held on $7,500 bail with the condition she wear a GPS monitoring device if she can post that amount.
She is due back in court on March 3, 2025.
According to authorities, Nelson was also involved in a disturbance in Hull on Jan. 17, 2025. A police report states officers were called for a disturbance in a room at the Nantasket Beach Resort because Nelson allegedly refused to leave.
A distraught friend of the houseboat victim told Boston 25 News that the victim was a Boston lawyer and a divorced father of three. Sources say the victim’s dog was also found dead in the harbor, although it’s unclear how that came to be.
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Residents at the Charlestown Marina called the incident tragic and reaffirmed the houseboat community is a tight-knit one.
The Boston Police Department’s Homicide Unit is leading the death investigation.
Anyone with information is strongly urged to contact detectives at 617-343-4470.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.
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