Ex-officer accused of killing pregnant woman and staging her death as a suicide

 

A former Massachusetts police  operative is  indicted of killing a pregnant woman to  help her from revealing that he allegedly  prepped her as a teenager and  also presenting her death as a  self-murder.  

Former officer Matthew Farwell, 38, was charged Tuesday with strangling 23- time-old Sandra Birchmore in her Canton, Mass., apartment in 2021.An  original necropsy  inaptly ruled that Birchmore had killed herself after Farwell used her police information to expose him. His alleged crime, prosecutors wrote in court documents.

Farwell was arrested Wednesday and arraigned in Boston court after civil investigators reviewed the case. He  contended not  shamefaced, the Associated Press reported. An attorney representing Farwell did n't  incontinently respond to a communication from The Washington Post on Thursday.

Prosecutors  purport Farwell killed Birchmore a month after she told him she was pregnant with his child to  help him from  telling their relationship, which began when she was 15. Thi, from his associates in law enforcement.

Stephen Kelleher, Boston- grounded adjunct special agent in charge of the FBI, said at a news conference Wednesday that Farwell's  conduct were"  counterculturist and a grave  treason of his pledge of public trust."  " Matthew Farwell's gun and emblem did n't authorize him to violate the Constitution," Kelleher said."

And it  clearly did not give him the right to sexually abuse, abuse and rape a child before killing her and her  future child in an attempt to cover up his  contended crimes."

At the time of Birchmore's death, Farwell was an officer with the Stoughton Police Department. He reportedly met 12- time-old Birchmore when she attended the agency's Police Explorers education program for youth interested in law enforcement careers. 

Amusement U.S. Attorney Joshua Levy said at a news conference that Farwell, an  educator in the program, befriended Birchmore and  ultimately began nurturing her. Levy said Farwell committed statutory rape by having  coitus with Birchmore when he was 27 and she was 15.

" We  purport that Sandra Birchmore survived times of  fixing, statutory rape and  also sexual assault, all at the hands of Matthew Farwell," Levy said.

According to prosecutors, Farwell maintained a coercive and  occasionally violent relationship with Birchmore. Court documents  purport that he tracked her  position from his cell phone.

According to  textbook  exchanges described in court documents, the couple made an agreement around October 2020 Farwell would help Birchmore in her  thing of having a child, and in return, Birchmore would not  expose their relationship.

In December 2020, Birchmore told Farwell that she was pregnant with his child. She later told several friends that he reacted violently, pushing her and choking her, according to court documents.

On January 20, 2021, a friend of Birchmore disclosed information about his relationship with the Stoughton police. When a department employee told Farwell about the call, he angrily demanded that the man not be told anything, according to court documents.

Around this time, prosecutors believe Farwell  stressed that he was losing control over Birchmore, motivating him to allegedly  compass her murder.

“ When it came clear that he could no longer control Sandra Birchmore, he allegedly silenced her permanently, ” Levy said.

On Feb. 1, 2021, prosecutors  purport that Farwell strangled her to death in her apartment and  also tied her body to a door handle to make it look like she had killed herself. 

 The date was  profitable to Farwell because an approaching blizzard meant Birchmore’s absence from work would be unnoticed for days, court documents say. Farwell’s  woman  was also hours down from delivering her third child.

"He used his knowledge and experience as a law enforcement officer to treat her death as a suicide," Levy said. "He allegedly tried to cover his tracks to avoid murder."

As part of the civil  disquisition, forensic pathologist William Smoakre-examined  substantiation from the scene and the necropsy report. Smock  set up other  substantiation of blunt force trauma and violent struggle from the attack on Birchmore's body, which contradicted the  original order to kill himself. 

At the news conference, tax declined to  note on the findings of the original  disquisition by the Massachusetts medical monitor.  

Farwell continued to serve as a Stoughton police officer for 14 months after Birchmore's death, until he  abnegated on April 1, 2022, according to court documents. Months  latterly, original media- citing Police Chief Donna McNamara- reported that two other officers also had  unhappy  connections with Birchmore.

On Wednesday, McNamara said he had ordered a "lengthy and aggressive" internal investigation the day after Birchmore was found dead.

McNamara said in a statement that Sandra's alleged payoff was a"  terrible injustice." “ The charges against the suspect, a former Stoughton police officer, represent not only professional misconduct but indeed the single worst act of  mortal  indelicateness I've ever witnessed.