What to Know
- Sandra Birchmore was three months pregnant when she was found dead in her Canton apartment in 2021. Her death was initially ruled a suicide
- Three former Stoughton police officers are accused of having inappropriate relationships with Birchmore
- One of those officers, Matthew Farwell, has been accused by federal investigators of killing Birchmore and then staging the scene to make it appear she committed suicide
The Massachusetts POST Commission has revoked the certification of former Stoughton police William Farwell, one of three officers accused of having an inappropriate relationship with Sandra Birchmore.
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Former Stoughton Police officer William Farwell is one of three officers accused of having an inappropriate relationship with Birchmore. One of those officers, William Farwell's twin brother Matthew Farwell, is accused of grooming Birchmore from the time she was a teenager, then killing Birchmore when she became pregnant with his baby. Matthew Farwell faces a federal charge.
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.
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Birchmore, who was three months pregnant, was found dead in 2021. While her death was originally ruled a suicide, according to the Boston Globe, a pathologist hired by her family found Birchmore's death was in fact a homicide. Federal investigators allege that Matthew Farwell killed her and then staged her body and apartment to make it appear she had committed suicide.
William Farwell is accused of sexting with Birchmore while he was on duty, inappropriately using the Department of Criminal Justice Information Services (DCJIS) database and lying to state police about the last time he saw Birchmore.
The POST Commission order laid out details from investigators in the case, stating that there were sexually explicit text messages exchanged between Birchmore and William Farwell in 2020, when she was 22 years old. Some of them were sent when William Farwell was on duty, investigators say.
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Also according to the order, William Farwell was accused of making unauthorized searches in the DCJIS database 26 times between 2017 and 2021. Two of those searches were for Birchmore, despite William Farwell having no law enforcement reason to do so. The other 24 searches were for himself, investigators allege.
William Farwell admitted in police interviews that he had a sexual relationship with Birchmore for about two years when she was an adult and had sexual encounters with her in 2020 before her death, according to the document. William Farwell told investigators the last time he saw Birchmore was in December 2020, when he learned she was pregnant with his brother's baby, but authorities allege that text messages between William Farwell and Birchmore showed that they met up for a sexual encounter in January 2021.
William Farwell agreed to the permanent revocation of his certification as a law enforcement officer without admitting to any truth to the allegations against him in the report.
Stoughton Police chief Donna McNamara said she was in agreement with the decision.
"William Farwell is unfit to be a police officer. I hoped the POST Commission would decertify him. He should never hold the Honorable title of Police Officer anywhere," she wrote to NBC10 Boston.
Birchmore's family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit. A federal case against Matthew Farwell is ongoing.
