My prediction is that MA state trooper Michael Proctor will be filing his retirement papers in… three… two… one.
I don’t care how much time he’s got in on the job. This is the hackerama. There are all kinds of work-arounds. Just ask the Foxboro Flasher – still just 35 years old, and already collecting for four years.
Proctor is, or was, the “lead investigator” in the Karen Read murder case in Canton, which seems to unraveling at the speed of sound, much like Proctor’s reputation, if not his career.
At a pre-trial hearing Tuesday, Read’s defense attorneys put into the record what they said was sealed information from the US Attorney’s office.
With no disputing of the facts from the district attorney, Read’s lawyers recited that the DA’s own trooper Proctor had admitted to a federal grand jury in Boston that he had “misled” other investigators about the extent of his relationship with some of what the prosecutors call witnesses, and what Read’s attorney call suspects in the murder.
Read is charged with killing her boyfriend, BPD Officer John O’Keefe, with her SUV in January 2022.
But her defense attorney also told the judge that as part of their investigation into this rancid case, the feds hired three accident-reconstruction investigators. All of them agreed that O’Keefe could not have been killed by a car, the lawyer said.
Proctor, it turns out, was thisclose to the people who owned the house outside of which O’Keefe was found dead of injuries and hypothermia.
It’s a very involved case, made to order for Netflix or Hulu. For one thing, Karen Read is hot. And Proctor’s pals are not – the McAlberts, as they are called, all look like extras from a remake of “Deliverance,” even the women.
Despite the box-office potential, for two years, state-run media in Boston have been giving this murder case a good leaving-alone.
The biggest problem is who’s been poking holes in the prosecution’s case, an ex-teacher from Holden named Aidan Kearney, who blogs under the name “Turtleboy.”
The Democrat stenographers with press passes hate Turtleboy, because of, well, you know. He’s from around here and he’s white. Which is more than reason enough.
As for the State Police, the brass hate Turtleboy because he took out one of the earlier corrupt MSP dynasties. Do the names Ali Bibaud and Leigha Genduso ring a bell?
Anyway, the case against Read was unraveling before Tuesday. But that day, parts of the sealed feds’ report concerning possible prosecutorial abuse were put into the record. It was put together by the US attorney and the local FBI office.
Think about that fact – how corrupt do cops have to be to get busted by the most corrupt cops of all, the FBI?
The MSP has got to be thinking – Et tu, G-men. Whatever happened to professional courtesy?
And March had started out so well – 12 whole days into the month without a single trooper getting lugged off a cruise ship in Florida in handcuffs, and no Northern Ave perp walks of just-arraigned fat-slob, bloodshot staties in filthy sweatshirts. That was the MSP’s February, but somehow March seemed better, right up until….
On Wednesday, about 24 hours after the feds’ report was read into the record – with no denials from the prosecutors in the courtroom — the MSP brass confirmed that Proctor was indeed the subject of an internal affairs investigation.
Can somebody say “fall guy?”
“That’s my fear,” Turtleboy told me on my show Wednesday night. “Proctor’s bad, but he wasn’t the only one in this. But I’m afraid this could end up like Leigha Genduso – they threw her under the bus. But the rest of the troopers and prosecutors walked away with their big pensions, or didn’t get fired, period.”
Of course an MSP Internal Affairs investigation doesn’t necessarily mean you’re all done. I’ve seen troopers survive, say, pushing their wives’ heads into unflushed toilets, or illegally running more than a dozen license plates in a bitter domestic dispute.
You know why they survived? Because nobody was looking, until the cases were long over.
Proctor’s problem is, too many eyes are on Karen Read now. Even the Globe, after snoozing for more than two years, finally weighed in yesterday with a story that didn’t read like a handout from the press office of Norfolk County District Attorney Michael “Pass the Gravy” Morrissey.
What’s making everyone think that Proctor is the patsy is how quickly the brass moved against him. Usually it takes months, or even years, to get confirmation that any trooper, no matter how bent, is getting even a slap on the wrist.
I remember one case a couple of years ago, a trooper in the gang unit made a big bust, went home and overdosed. We got the story into the paper, but then Framingham dummied up.
The only way we ever found out that druggie trooper was gone was in a footnote to a court filing made in an obscure case two counties away.
But man, the brass couldn’t throw Proctor under the bus any more quickly.
You know, the State Police aren’t like the Texas Rangers – one riot, one Ranger. They move in packs. Proctor made $146,050 last year. He worked with, among others, Sgt. Yuri Bukhenik, who made $211,080, and Det. Lt. Brian Tully, who made $214,640.
Tully, in fact, took part in the arrest of Turtleboy a couple of months ago on trumped-up nonsense charges. Turtleboy did 60 days in the Norfolk County House of Correction.
Proctor was the junior guy on the DA’s team. I wonder if any of his superiors were giving him orders about what to say (or not say) about how tight he was with the McAlberts. And did any of his bosses ever work any of the bad actors that Turtleboy brought down during his earlier MSP probes?
Askin’ for a friend…
I hope I’m wrong, but I doubt anyone other than Proctor goes down in this scandal. That’s the way it works in the MSP. Consider the Foxboro Flasher, Andrew Patterson, who was busted drunkenly flashing young kids and grabbing women’s rear ends at a country-music concert in 2019.
He was with another state trooper who, according to police reports, told the victims not to report the Flasher to stadium security. The other cop flashed his badge and told the civilians that if they did, they’d be in big trouble.
Internal Affairs’ verdict on the Flasher’s pal? “EXONERATED.”
The Flasher’s pal is still on the job. Last year he made $237,360. And the Flasher is out on “disability,” age 35, for $5,557.32 a month, for life. For life!
Some kiss in the mail will be worked out for Proctor, count on it. Surely no one in the district attorney’s office in Quincy is going down. If Joe Early could survive the Ali Bibaud scandal, Pass the Gravy will get a pass on this botched Karen Read frame-up.
Morrissey makes $191,000 a year, but he’s got a lot of expenses, and I don’t just mean running tabs at Alba and Café Pacific. How about that boat of his – is it still called “Class Action?”
As for Proctor, see ya later Trooper, or should I say sooner rather than later. When the story broke Wednesday night, one of my listeners texted me that his sordid tale could make a second Canton-based Netflix true-crime documentary. The listener suggested a title:
“Procter’s Gamble.”
Turns out, it was a bad bet.
