Mass law enforcement misconduct news, June 22-28

More racist texts by Michael Proctor released, public records lawsuits against police and sheriffs, and more

“Maura Healey’s Parole Board”

Over on X the Everything App, the Massachusetts Republican Party has recently been sharing screenshots of Boston Herald headlines about people with murder convictions who were released on parole. Each time, the person running the party’s social-media account writes “Maura Healey’s Parole Board.”

On March 14, the MassGOP account shared a story titled “Massachusetts man who killed 18-month-old boy, and put child’s body in dumpster, has been granted parole.” On March 25, the account shared a screenshot of the print edition of a story titled “Parole board continues release parade,” the online version of which is titled “Massachusetts Parole Board releases two more lifers, including man who killed 76-year-old.” And on June 23, the account shared a story titled “Massachusetts man who beat his 2-year-old son to death with Wiffle ball bat has been granted parole.”

A June 23, 2026 post by the MassGOP account on X that includes a screenshot of a Boston Herald article titled "Massachusetts man who beat his 2-year-old son to death with Wiffle ball bat has been granted parole." The Mass GOP writes "Maura Healey's Parole Board. #mapoli"

By connecting these grants of parole to Maura Healey—the MassGOP’s political rival—these posts are presumably supposed to imply that releasing these people from prison is wrong. But what exactly is the complaint here...? Why shouldn’t the people in these stories be released? The MassGOP’s posts don’t engage with this question in any substantive way—they’re just fishing for an emotional reaction.

Yes, it’s true that these parolees were convicted of terrible crimes. But that’s meaningless without additional context. Every story about someone who is released on parole will naturally involve someone who was convicted of a crime resulting in a jail or prison sentence because those are the only people who can be paroled in the first place. The Parole Board’s job isn’t to look solely at the details of the crime a person committed, however horrible they may be—it’s to look at the person as a whole. Parole represents the idea that people can change that and they sometimes deserve mercy.

Take, for example, the man in the most recent story shared by the MassGOP. Richard Mayes was convicted of killing his two-year-old son, Lawrence “Onaje” Jackson Ritchon. Mayes was found guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced to life with the possibility of parole. Mayes killed his son in 1983, more than 40 years ago. He has spent decades in prison and is now 78 years old, an age not associated with being particularly dangerous.

According to The Boston Herald story:

“He reports that has been sober for 30 years, and his last disciplinary report was 12 years ago,” the Parole Board wrote. “Mr. Mayes has remained employed. Не has strong family support. He has taken accountability for his offense and has addressed the concerns of the Board. Mr. Mayes’ support system testified (and via written submission) that they will assist him with his re-entry needs.

“The Board also considered Mr. Mayes’ current age and medical needs in rendering its decision,” the Parole Board added. “The Board also notes that Mr. Mayes states he has continued to mentor younger inmates, including assisting them with applying for Pell grants.”

…

The Parole Board ruled, “The Board concludes by unanimous decision that Richard Mayes has demonstrated a level of rehabilitation that would make his release compatible with the welfare of society.”

So why is the MassGOP opposed to Mayes getting parole? Is the party just against the concept of parole? If that’s the case, why not just say that instead of trying to insinuate that “Maura Healey’s Parole Board” is doing something wrong by fulfilling its purpose?

That descriptor—“Maura Healey’s Parole Board”—is quite misleading, perhaps intentionally so. It’s true that all six current members of the Parole Board were appointed by Healey. However, one of them, psychologist Charlene Bonner, has been serving since 2011 and was previously appointed by both former Democratic Governor Deval Patrick and former Republican Governor Charlie Baker. More importantly, while the governor appoints the members of the Parole Board, the eight-person Governor’s Council has the final say on whether to approve her appointments. The councilors are elected officials who do not answer to the governor. In fact, they recently rejected one of her appointees. Healey’s influence on the board is not unlimited.

It’s also worth noting what the MassGOP does not attribute to “Maura Healey’s Parole Board.” The board on June 22 denied parole to Jose Colon, the now-63-year-old man who was convicted of the 1983 murder of Massachusetts State Police trooper George Hanna. According to the Herald, the Parole Board “cited a lack of accountability in Colon’s statements at his parole hearing, sparse in-prison education and programing, and potential substance use in their reasoning for the denial.” The MassGOP account said nothing about this, probably because it shows that “Maura Healey’s Parole Board” isn’t a rubber stamp. The MassGOP doesn’t want its supporters thinking about the nuances of parole. It just wants them to get angry whenever someone is paroled—if a Democrat is in the Governor’s Office, anyway.

Recall when President Donald Trump issued a blanket pardon for conspirators and rioters involved in the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol—about 1,500 people, many of whom had admitted their own criminal responsibility in court. The MassGOP never criticized that historic grant of clemency, even after an Amherst, Massachusetts, man whom Trump pardoned later pleaded guilty in federal court to possessing more than 100,000 child sexual-abuse images and videos. He was one of at least 97 January 6 defendants who were arrested for, charged with, or convicted of crimes separate from the riot since their participation in it, according to a June report by Lawfare.

The MassGOP has been silent about all of that because they don’t really care about the merits of granting parole or clemency to particular people. They do not have a coherent theory about this. They are opportunists, and this is just politics to them.

I published a story on Friday. If you missed it, please check it out here:

After a failed legal fight to block the public from seeing the names of police officers who were charged with crimes, Northwestern District Attorney David Sullivan’s office is refusing to release communications with its private legal counsel that could shed light on prosecutors’ decision to keep the public in the dark.

Also, apparently when I set up Ghost, I neglected to enable comments. That oversight has been corrected—comment away!

Police misconduct news

Here are the reports of alleged law enforcement misconduct in Massachusetts that I’ve tracked during the last week.

State and local

The never-ending Michael Proctor saga

“A newly unsealed batch of messages from Michael Proctor’s cellphone shows the ex-[Massachusetts State Police] trooper casually tossing out racial slurs with the same nonchalance he used to describe his favorite Nirvana track or go-to Dunkin’ breakfast sandwich. … ‘I was planning on tying up a [n-word] and dragging him from my bumper through the streets of Randolph,’ Proctor wrote in one message.” (Boston.com)
“The Massachusetts State Police will begin disclosing records about the hiring and training of former trooper Michael Proctor to defense attorneys in three criminal cases he played a part in, as the scope of the scandal surrounding his bigoted text messages grows.” One of the defense attorneys is also “seeking records from the Massachusetts State Police crime lab about disciplinary actions … taken against technicians who worked on [her client’s] case. The lab has digitized those records dating back to 2013, but no searchable log exists for any discipline before that.” (MassLive)
“Fired Trooper Michael Proctor sat for at least the beginning of his deposition, but many more depositions are — tentatively — lined up in the wrongful death suit against Karen Read and a couple of Canton bars. … Read attorney Aaron Rosenberg reported in [June 26]’s [court] hearing that Proctor arrived two and a half hours late, forcing the deposition to begin at around 12:30 p.m., and then left by 5 o’clock.” (Boston Herald)

More misconduct allegations

“The Massachusetts Appeals Court on April 21 overturned a man’s drug-trafficking convictions after the lead investigator, a Brockton police detective who was later promoted to lieutenant, made ‘materially false’ statements when applying for a search warrant a decade ago.” (Mass Dump)

“A [Springfield] man is imploring a judge to compel the city to release body-camera footage from a car accident involving him and an off-duty police officer in August, court documents show. … A police report provided to [Aveary] Rudder said Benjamin Estrada, the off-duty [Springfield] officer, was at fault for the accident.” (Republican)
“A Middlesex Superior Court jury has awarded former Sherborn Police Chief Richard Thompson $1.2 million in a wrongful termination suit against former Town Administrator David Williams. Thompson was fired in 2020 by the Sherborn Select Board, which alleged abuse of power, harassment and creating a climate of fear within the Police Department. Thompson then filed suit against the board, as well as against Williams and David Bento, who became acting [Sherborn] police chief when Thompson was placed on leave. The jury, however, only found Williams to be responsible.” (MetroWest Daily News)
“Four Massachusetts sheriffs will be forced to turn over records about their collaboration with federal immigration actions to a youth justice non-profit, after a judge ruled the sheriffs could not legally shield the requested information. Citizens for Juvenile Justice, or CfJJ, sued the sheriffs’ offices for Barnstable, Berkshire, Essex and Middlesex counties after they failed to comply with a public records request first filed in August.” (MassLive)
“A [video-recorded] brawl between two [unidentified] off-duty Massachusetts State Police troopers at a Quincy brewpub has the purported aggressor relieved of duty. … The seated man in the white shirt reaches out his arm in what appears to be an attempt to keep the black-shirt man away but then the man wearing the black shirt throws a punch followed by four or five more and then grabs the man’s head in his hands. The man in the white shirt appears limp.” (Boston Herald) Video of the attack was posted on Instagram here.

I have not found any news articles about the following stories:

The Massachusetts Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) Commission on June 25 suspended the law-enforcement certification of former Swansea police officer Nicole R. Levesque “in light of evidence that [she] engaged or may have engaged in criminal conduct,” according to the suspension order. The order does not specify the nature of the alleged criminal conduct. According to the POST Commission’s online disciplinary database, Levesque retired from the Swansea Police Department while discipline was pending. The department determined that she “discussed pertinent issues related to an [internal affairs investigation] after receiving notice and directive to refrain from this,” “was rude and disrespectful to superior officers,” and “failed to cooperate with an internal investigation.” Swansea police officer Jason Monchique received a written reprimand for discussing an internal affairs investigation on the same date as Levesque, the records say. Entries for both officers say “Officer reports receiving text message from another officer discussing open IA investigation that they both are involved in,” but neither entry specifies who texted whom.

Federal

“A Boston federal judge [on June 25] ordered the immediate release of a Brazilian national from Framingham who has lived here for more than 30 years and has three American-citizen children after concluding the ‘immigration judge’ who denied him release on bond and left him locked up in the Plymouth County jail improperly tagged him as a flight risk with a disdain for the law, based on some traffic tickets he got.” (Universal Hub)

Here is your periodic reminder that Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey does not seem to care that the Plymouth County sheriff is illegally jailing people on behalf of ICE on a regular basis. In January, Healey was dismissive when asked why legislation she proposed would not ban this, calling it a “county issue.” There have been so many stories like the one above, many of which we only know about because of the tireless work by Adam Gaffin of Universal Hub. Unfortunately, Healey and the powers-that-be on Beacon Hill don’t seem to think immigrant lives are worth protecting.

Other News

Republican Supreme Court justices allow Trump to end legal protections for Haitians and Syrians (GBH)

The Supreme Court on [June 25] allowed the Trump administration to end legal protections for immigrants fleeing violence and natural disaster in Haiti and Syria, exposing hundreds of thousands more people to potential deportation. …

Massachusetts resident and TPS holder Marie Fleurival was making breakfast when GBH News called her on [June 25]. She hadn’t yet heard the news.

Fleurival turned off the stove and went silent for several seconds. “Oh my goodness,” she said. “What are we gonna do?”

Fleurival is a home care aide who was previously laid off by her employer due to confusion over the ongoing changes to TPS, and then rehired after a GBH News story. She owns her own home, has a son in middle school and is pursuing a nursing degree while she works.

“This is a disaster for the Haitian people. We work hard, we contribute to the economy,” she said. “We must stand firm, we must stick firm together. God can make a miracle.”

This is ethnic cleansing. Is there any other way to describe it?

Framingham to remove Flock license-plate readers, but police chief wants the surveillance devices back (MetroWest Daily News)

Days after a city councilor announced that the Framingham Police Department would not be renewing its contract with Flock Safety, Police Chief Lester Baker said he continued to support “the responsible use” of automated license plate reader technology, and that he supported the city's plans to develop a local ordinance that would allow for the return of a similar product. …

The automatic license plate reader company had come under fire from residents who are concerned about what it’s doing with the data it collects.

Sprinklers save lives (The Beverly Beat)

At The Beverly Beat, Paul Leighton writes about the Garden City Towers, a seven-story, publicly-owned building with 100 apartments for low-income people who are elderly or disabled. Built more than 50 years ago, the building will finally be upgraded with a sprinkler system in the near future:

I guess it should come as no surprise that the building does not have sprinklers. It was built in 1974, when sprinklers weren’t required. That’s always worried people, but apparently not enough to prompt a plan to install them at any time over the last half-century.

That changed last year when a fire at an assisted-living facility in Fall River in July killed 10 residents. The tragedy caught the attention of both the Beverly Housing Authority board of commissioners and Beverly Fire Chief Pete O’Connor.

“We’d been talking about the need for sprinkler systems in the individual rooms (at Garden City Towers) for some time,” said Nancy Marino, one of the commission members. “It was always kind of there. After that fire in Fall River it really brought it to the fore for us.”

…

In [a] letter, O’Connor said Garden City Towers was identified by the fire department as a “target hazard because of its size, population, and inherent challenges associated with quickly getting water on a fire in its incipient stages.”

While the Fall River fire is probably more prominent in people’s minds, reading this made me immediately think of a deadly inferno that occurred in Beverly itself: the 1984 Elliott Chambers rooming-house fire, which claimed 15 lives. I’ve written about the fire in my reporting about the James Carver case. Carver was convicted of setting the fire, but he has maintained his innocence and a judge threw out his arson and murder convictions in 2024, citing new scientific evidence about the blaze’s cause.

One thing I haven’t mentioned in my reporting is that the Elliott Chambers building did not have sprinklers. If it had, many if not all of those 15 lives could have been spared. It’s something I’ve thought about a lot. Public safety isn’t just about having guys with guns who can arrest people for committing crimes. It’s about people having safe, dignified places where they can live. It’s about access to food, water, medical care, work, and recreational opportunities. It’s about being free from discrimination. It’s about everything. I hope public officials everywhere understand that and take it seriously.

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