Late last Friday night, while I was sleeping off my six rain-out Guinness’s half a mile away, a drunk Cambridge teenager was stabbed to death by a drunk Harvard graduate student.

Apparently, though the exact circumstances are in dispute, two drunks exchanged words, exchanged blows, then one pulled a knife. One life is over, another ruined, all as a result of drunken posturing. Both sides see themselves as the victim:

‘’Alexander [the Harvard student] defended himself. He did not instigate this, he did not pursue it, but in fact he was victim in this case,'’ said Jeffrey A. Denner, Pring-Wilson’s attorney. ‘’This is a 25-year-old Harvard student who has accomplished a lot.'’ …

‘’Everyone’s talking about Harvard and all of his accomplishments,'’ Colono [the victim’s brother] said. ‘’It’s irrelevant because human nature will tell you smart people still do stupid things. Plain and simple. . . . [Pring-Wilson] was walking around drunk, carrying a knife. He should have used better judgment. He didn’t. He committed murder and he needs to pay for what he’s done.'’

This is going to be ugly; tensions have long simmered between the students and the townies. If you were going to devise an event guaranteed to ignite a class war, you could scarcely do better than this. These men, crossing paths in Central Square, come from very different worlds.

Pring-Wilson earned a bachelor’s degree in classics from prestigious Colorado College.

Colono didn’t go to college.

Pring-Wilson was a second-year grad student in Russia, Eastern Europe and Central Asia studies. He planned to attend law school.

Colono worked full time as a hotel maintenance worker.

Pring-Wilson’s mother, who traveled here yesterday from Colorado, is a former assistant district attorney. His father is a criminal defense attorney. His stepfather is a businessman.

Colono’s father was recently laid off from his manufacturing job at a chocolate factory. His mother is a homemaker.

Now Marcos Colono is left to wonder about what could have become of his brother’s life. Michael Colono, the father of a 3-year-old girls, was the youngest of five. He contributed part of his weekly salary for groceries.

Meanwhile, Pring-Wilson, who was to earn his master’s degree this spring, is in a jail cell awaiting arraignment on murder charges. Denner said they may defer a bail argument to a later date. ‘’We all feel very badly about what has happened,'’ Denner said.

More later, but I do have this question for Pring-Wilson: Why the hell were you carrying a knife? You can’t kill someone with your fists; you can with your Leatherman.

Because he’s an avid outdoorsman, Pring-Wilson was carrying a pocketknife, [Pring-Wilson’s attorney] Denner said.

For those of you unfamiliar with the area, there are no woods in Central Square.

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