Mass law enforcement misconduct news, Oct. 5-11

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

State and local

• “Shacoby Kenny’s mother has carried the pain of losing her son for more than 10 months. The anguish has intensified since he was killed while being held on bail at the South Bay House of Correction, since the guards who caused his death are still working there, and state officials have indicated there is nothing anyone can do about it at this juncture.” (BINJ)

South Bay Guards Killed Shacoby Kenny Last December. Why Are They Still Working?

Ten months after Shacoby Kenny’s death was ruled a homicide, state officials claim they cannot force Suffolk County’s sheriff to suspend the guards involved. An investigation into institutional inaction and systemic failure.

BINJELIZA DEWEY

• “The lawyer for a high-ranking UMass Chan Medical School police officer claims there is no evidence to convict his client on a drunken driving charge. Lawyer Randall Power gave that assessment in an interview moments after Lt. Gregory Markiewicz was released on personal recognizance after his arraignment Monday, Oct. 5, in Central District Court.” (Telegram & Gazette; paywalled)
• “A deep dive into Fall River’s use of Flock license-plate cameras finds similar problems that have surfaced in New Bedford and elsewhere: lack of oversight as police officers used the technology thousands of times since 2021 while entering vague or nonsensical reasons for their searches. … Reasons officers entered included investigation, ‘inv,’ ‘invest,’ a period, single letters and, in a few instances, a combination of letters as if a person randomly hit computer keys (‘mnl;k’). For a few searches, no reason was inputted. And in most searches, officers did not enter an associated case number or call number, according to five years of use data reviewed by The Light.” (New Bedford Light)
• “The Massachusetts Appeals Court has thrown out a lawsuit filed by a man who was shot multiple times by Plymouth police officers during a 2018 gunfight outside his home. Michael Walsh, 45, sued the town, the Select Board and four officers for $2.5 million, alleging the officers used excessive force and violated his civil rights when they shot him after answering a 911 call from his wife.” (Plymouth Independent)
• “A former Lynn police officer pleaded not guilty to charges of assault and battery and a civil rights violation during a court appearance [on October 8]. Christopher Gomez was indicted [in September].” (WCVB)
• “Opening statements were delivered [October 9] in the trial of Matthew Farwell, the former Stoughton police detective accused of killing Sandra Birchmore. Farwell allegedly killed Birchmore while she was pregnant in early 2021 and staged the scene to appear as if it were a suicide. Federal prosecutors say he did so to cover up a lengthy sexual relationship with Birchmore that began when she was 15-years-old.” (Boston.com)

If you’re wondering why—unlike other recent high-profile criminal cases in Massachusetts—you can’t watch the Matthew Farwell trial, it’s because he’s being prosecuted in federal court. Unlike Massachusetts state courts, federal courts do not allow the media to record or even photograph the proceedings. I wrote about this policy, and why it should be changed, more than a decade ago when Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was on trial.

The Boston Marathon bombing: What you won’t see

Cameras weren’t allowed at Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s 2015 trial — and they remain banned in federal court to this day

The Mass DumpAndrew Quemere

• “A judge ordered former Fall River police officer Bryan Custadio to pay $1.5 million to his ex-wife after finding him liable for multiple assaults, including one while he was on duty. … Custadio was held in default in July 2024 after he never appeared or answered the suit in his individual capacity, the judge wrote. The ruling stated that he remains in ‘parts unknown’ and has not provided updated contact information since his release from prison.” (Fall River Reporter)
• “A corrections officer accused of assaulting an incarcerated man at the Billerica House of Correction appeared in Middlesex Superior Court on [September 8] after a grand jury indicted him on charges connected to the June incident. Alexander Tine was arraigned on two counts of assault and battery and one count of filing a false report, according to the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office.” (Lowell Sun)

Federal

• “The case of 20-year-old Any Lucia Lopez Belloza before the three-judge federal appeals panel [on October 5] could reach far beyond whether Lopez Belloza is allowed to fight to come home. Her attorneys and civil rights advocates say it could help determine where immigrants can turn to federal court when ICE detains them and moves them so quickly that their lawyers do not know where they are being held.” (MassLive)
• “An Ecuadorian mother of two children, including one with autism, has been detained at Burlington’s ICE processing center since last week after being arrested and charged with shoplifting. The woman’s family and attorneys say it was simply a misunderstanding at a Target store.” (GBH)
• “A 21-year-old Provincetown student and employee of the local police department who is an immigrant was released [October 8] after being held at Logan Airport’s Terminal E for 44 hours by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. … On [October 7], U.S. District Judge Julia E. Kobick issued an emergency order prohibiting federal authorities from removing him from the U.S. or transferring him outside Massachusetts for at least 72 hours after the order was docketed.” (GBH)
• “A Boston federal judge [on October 8] ordered the regime to provide details on how they got a grand jury to charge a Harvard Medical School biostatistician Kseniia Petrova with smuggling frozen frog embryos through Logan - which could mean a 20-year prison sentence -  so that her lawyers can build their case that she is a victim of vindictive prosecution by a regime that went after her because she combines three traits it hates: She’s associated with Harvard, she’s a foreigner and she dared to object to getting thrown out of the country.” (Universal Hub)

Other news

Springfield residents push city council to get rid of Flock Stalker Cameras (Republican)

While the civic group DeFlock Springfield and Holyoke is calling for an end of the cameras, which they say are installed in 50 locations in Springfield, the City Council has started researching and writing an ordinance that would have Springfield join some 30 other communities across the commonwealth that have dropped their contracts with the Atlanta-based company.

Protesters urged the City Council to take a vote [on September 5], but they said more research must be done.

Some police departments that dropped Flock are looking to other companies for Stalker Cameras (MassLive)

A review of nine local police departments that moved away from Flock found sharply different answers about what comes next. Some are already moving toward other license plate reader systems and others are leaving the door open to do so. Other departments say they have no plans to bring the technology back. …

To Maria Villegas Bravo, counsel at the nonprofit Electronic Privacy Information Center who regularly works on surveillance oversight, the answer is clear.

Switching surveillance vendors does little to resolve the underlying concerns of privacy sharing between law enforcement agencies, Villegas Bravo said. She believes there are “no meaningful differences” between the ALPR capabilities offered by Flock and competing vendors such as Axon or Motorola, she said.

Healey administration cabinet member says Stalker Cameras need “PR makeover” (State House News Service)

Automated license plate recognition technology may need a “PR makeover,” [Secretary of Public Safety Gina Kwon] said …, telling lawmakers [October 7] it would “be a shame” to lose the investigative tool due to privacy concerns.

Spouses of deceased Waltham police officers say relief association won’t pay them death benefits they are owed (NBC10 Boston)

More families of police officers in Waltham, Massachusetts, are voicing frustration to the NBC10 Boston Investigators about not receiving thousands of dollars in death benefits after their loved ones passed away.

It is money the families said they expected from the Waltham Police Relief Association, a nonprofit to which the officers paid membership dues over the course of their careers.

Question 1 would make legislature and governor’s office subject to Public Records Law (Boston.com)

Previously dubbed an “embarrassment” and a “black hole” for government transparency, Massachusetts public records law could be revamped next month as voters weigh whether the Legislature and the governor’s office should fall under the public’s right to know. 

Question 1 on the Nov. 3 ballot comes on the heels of a similar measure passed in 2024, which allowed State Auditor Diana DiZoglio to audit the Legislature. While DiZoglio is still fighting to actually enforce that audit two years later, she’s now spearheading the push to make records from the legislative and executive branches more transparent.

PETA files public records lawsuit against UMass (Greenfield Recorder)

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has sued the University of Massachusetts in Suffolk County Superior Court, seeking the names of those who serve on campus panels that review and approve laboratory experiments on animals.

The lawsuits, filed under the state public records law against UMass Amherst and UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester on [October 6], contend that the university is intentionally withholding the names and activities of members of its Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees. Federal rules require such committees at research institutions.

Massachusetts Doesn’t Have A Public Database Of Ethics Disclosures, So He Made One

In Massachusetts, we have what’s called the “travel loophole.” Normally a public official is prohibited from accepting a gift above $50 in value. The exception: they can accept a free trip worth thousands of dollars so long as it “promotes the interests of the Commonwealth.”

BINJCHRIS FARAONE

it really sucks how you can't just look up old Boston Globe articles using the library anymore thanks to all the Trump administration funding cuts

— Andrew Quemere (@andrewqmr.bsky.social) October 8, 2026 at 6:19 PM

The NYPD just released surveillance video of the ICE shooting (which occurred off camera). Two men in civilian clothes run up to a car with guns drawn. One second later, one man begins smashing the butt of his gun into the driver’s side window. The driver appears to panic and hit the gas.

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— Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (@reichlinmelnick.bsky.social) October 9, 2026 at 9:12 PM

The @houstonchronicle.com posted this video and it's pretty jarring. No matter that he was fleeing, law enforcement officers may not use deadly force on someone who poses no significant risk of death or serious injury to others. Deliberately hitting someone with a car is a use of deadly force.

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— Aaron Reichlin-Melnick (@reichlinmelnick.bsky.social) October 11, 2026 at 6:27 PM

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