Plan to Kill Witnesses Called for Blowing Up Roslindale Apartment Building

Ed "Butchie" Corliss, while awaiting trial for the murder of JP Tedeschi clerk, asked a jailhouse buddy to kill witnesses — including his own wife.

"He was looking for me to murder her," convicted thief John Witt told jurors Tuesday. Corliss is on trial for the murder of Tedeschi clerk Surendra Dangol, who was mortally wounded during a robbery of the Monument convenience store in 2009.

Witt claims Corliss gave him hand-drawn maps to the would-be witnesses he was supposed to rub out.

Instead, the day after Witt got out of jail, he told police about Corliss' alleged plots.

Corliss and Witt had crossed paths at MCI-Cedar Junction in spring 2010.

According to Witt, Corliss instructed him to cause an explosion at the small Roslindale apartment building where Corliss' wife, Jacqueline, lived on the third floor. The blast would also have killed a man who lived on the bottom floor and who had testified to a grand jury against Corliss.

"He wanted me to come to the door, open the door with a credit card, smash [the man on the bottom floor] in the face with an object, turn the burners on and light a candle, blowing up the house with his wife in it," testified Witt.

The apartment is on Hyde Park Avenue just south of JP in Roslindale.

According to Witt, Corliss also tried to get Witt's help escaping. One plan had Witt gunning down guards when Corliss was brought to for treatment; another involved a courthouse break-out, Witt said.

And what would Witt get out of this? Witt said Corliss promised him one-third of a planned robbery of a Dunbar armored car carrying $3 million.

"He wanted me to kill certain people and in return he was going to put me onto a bank robbery," Witt told jurors.

On cross-examination, Corliss' attorney had Witt own up to nearly a dozen convictions for larceny, break-ins and receiving stolen property. Witt, who lives in Florida, gave conflicting testimony about his history of cocaine use.

The Dec. 26, 2009 murder, at the , shocked JP. At the time, Corliss was on parole for killing a Salisbury convenience store clerk in 1971.

Witt also testified that Corliss told him about throwing a gun into the water at Revere Beach. Prosecutors say a gun police found on the beach fired the bullet that mortally wounded Dangol, an immigrant from Nepal.

The defense says a man seen in a surveillance video gunning Dangol down is not Corliss. The defense may start it's case on Thursday.