At a hearing in the ongoing wrongful death lawsuit filed in civil court by the estate of Sandra Birchmore, a lawyer for the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office revealed new details about a criminal investigation, sharing that it's still ongoing, three years after the woman's death.
"There is an ongoing investigation, it continues to be very active," said Lisa Maki, general counsel for the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office, in a video appearance in court Friday.
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Birchmore died in February 2021 when she was three months pregnant. Her death was ruled a suicide, with no foul play involved.
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But a year later, Stoughton's police chief announced that three former police officers had had inappropriate sexual relationships with Birchmore, one starting when she was underage. And while no criminal charges have been filed in the case, her estate has filed a civil lawsuit alleging "wrongful death, negligence, negligent supervision, negligent retention, pain and suffering, and emotional distress" over what it describes as a yearslong grooming scheme.
The lawsuit names the officers — they've denied the allegations — as well as the town and Stoughton police, and Friday's hearing in Norfolk Superior Court was in that case.
Resources for victims of sexual assault are available through the National Sexual Violence Resources Center and the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline at 800-656-4673, and Massachusetts provides this list of statewide and resources for sexual assault survivors.
Lawyers for the officers argued they would like access to files from the Attorney General's Office as they continue to wage a defense against the wrongful death suit.
"We are on track for trial, your honor. My client has one opportunity to prove his innocence here, and the Attorney General's Office could go on for years," said David Bae, an attorney for one of the officers.
Maki, the lawyer for the Attorney General's Office, argued that releasing any documents could compromise the ongoing investigation.
"To the extent there is a homicide investigation taking place that the Attorney General's Office is not handling, it would not do anything to interfere with an ongoing homicide investigation," she said.
The judge didn't rule after the roughly 40-minute hearing, instead asking Maki to provide more details about the files her office has within 30 days.
The case, which stunned the town of Stoughton when details were released in 2022, has attracted new attention in recent weeks, because of another case playing out in the same court, which involves allegations of police misconduct.
"People are upset, rightfully so. They see what happened in the Karen Read case, and they feel like the same thing is happening in Sandra's case, that there is a cover-up here," said Melissa Berry, who runs the Justice for Sandra Birchmore social media pages.
More on the Sandra Birchmore case
At the time of her death, Birchmore was living in Canton, the town where Read is accused of fatally striking her boyfriend, a Boston police officer, with an SUV in a snowstorm. Read denies the charges, and claims law enforcement framed her, which the Norfolk District Attorney's Office denies. Investigators have not announced any links between the Birchmore and Read cases.
"People are angry and they want this young woman to get justice, and that is all I want," Berry said.
Last month, Stoughton Police Chief Donna McNamara issued a statement saying that she was left "profoundly disturbed and troubled" by a forensic report about Birchmore's death that she said had been filed in the civil lawsuit.
NBC10 Boston has not reviewed the report, but The Boston Globe reported that, in it, a former New York City chief medical examiner found that Birchmore's death was a homicide, not a suicide. Without mentioning its findings, McNamara said that the report warrants further high-level examination.
"While I am not a trained medical examiner, and I am not qualified to draw any direct conclusions, the findings certainly warrant further examination at the highest level. As always, we will continue to assist with any effort to ensure that truth and justice prevail," McNamara wrote in her letter, in which she acknowledged her department's continued cooperation with investigators.
A representative for the Norfolk District Attorney's Office after the letter was released that multiple law enforcement agencies were still reviewing information involving's Birchmore's death.
The case has shined a light on allegations of abuse in the Explorers program, a police mentorship program through which Birchmore met the Stoughton officers accused of having sexual relationships with her. This year, The Marshall Project said it found at least 193 other allegations of inappropriate behavior from law enforcement, including grooming and sexual abuse, involving the Explorers program in the last 50 years.
The Boy Scouts, which created the program, told The Marshall Project at the time it has been committed to youth safety, and that "appropriate measures" are taken when "a leader in one of our programs has abused a position of trust" hold them accountable.
