Police Seek Suspect's Link To Webster

Authorities said yesterday that they are continuing their investigation for definitive links between a murder suspect and the disappearance of Joan L. Webster, a 25-year-old Graduate School of Design student missing for more than 14 months.

But State Police Sgt. Carmine Tammaro added yesterday that police have not uncovered any concrete evidence connecting Webster with 41-year-old Leonard Paradise, currently being held in Boston's Charles St. Jail awaiting trial in an unrelated murder case.

Officials at the State Police and the Suffolk District Attorney's office last week said that they had received "reliable" information from a "source close to Paradiso" implicating the Revere incident in the Webster disappearance.

"Technically, it's the only lead we've worked on for awhile," said Tamarro, who coordinates work on the investigation by the State Police, the Boston Police and the Saugus, Mass, Police "Everything else was innuendo, and now we have something we can really investigate."

Tammaro denied recent reports that authorities doubted their informant's statement that Paradiso had sunk Webster's body in both proposals would have required new housing construction, with a certain number of units reserved for low and moderate-income residents.

This housing requirement was a principal point of contention in Monday's debate. In two roll-call votes, the three Independents voted down an attempt by Councillor Saundra Graham to raise the number of low and moderate-income units required to 300 and a subsequent move by Mayor Alfred E. Vellucci to raise the figure to 70.

Clinton said that his neighborhood already had the largest percentage of public housing of any section in Cambridge, adding that his constituents have expressed concern about adding more. "Let everyone accept a little bit in the spirit of doing things together," he said.

Simplex Steering Committee members repeated their concerns about unrestricted development after the Monday session, and called the councillor's move to substitute a compromise plan for their own petition "a slap in the face.