Federal prosecutors trying a former Stoughton police officer accused of killing Sandra Birchmore and staging it as a suicide shared new evidence as they seek to keep him locked up.
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Sandra Birchmore case: Feds cite explicit new evidence in push to keep Farwell detained
Federal prosecutors trying a former Massachusetts police officer accused of
killing Sandra Birchmore and staging it as a suicide have shared new evidence in their continued bid to keep Matthew Farwell behind bars before trial.
The U.S. Attorney's Office and Farwell's defense team have submitted dueling filings ahead of an upcoming court hearing, with the prosecutors citing
evidence tied to the alleged murder weapon as they argue for Farwell to stay in detention, while the
defense has sought to throw evidence out.
In the latest filing, on Wednesday, prosecutors said they've found new evidence that suggests Farwell might flee or obstruct matters if he's let out of prison, including pornographic videos he allegedly watched after Birchmore died, the way he looked up information on the woman's death and a note he allegedly wrote to a friend after a medical expert determined that Birchmore had been killed.
Prosecutors say they found evidence he accessed pornographic videos on his video, which demonstrate an "enduring sexual interest in teenage girls, even after Ms. Birchmore’s murder."
When looking up Birchmore on his phone, prosecutors said, Farwell used a different, more secure search browser than he did otherwise, including for looking at pornography.
"Farwell’s affirmative efforts to hide his internet activity related to Sandra Birchmore underscores the difficulty of finding conditions that will ensure that Farwell—a somewhat tech-savvy former police officer—does not take steps to further obstruct the investigation and trial," prosecutors wrote.
And when reports were published about a former New York City chief medical examiner hired by Birchmore's family concluding that she'd been strangled to death, rather than dying by suicide, Farwell allegedly wrote a note to a friend asking them "not to forget his wife and to step in and raise his children." The messages, according to prosecutors, suggest that the news of an expert arguing that Birchmore had been killed "reveals that that is when his relevant state of mind changed."
Prosecutors noted that more than 80,000 communications of Farwell's were withheld from prosecutors; they didn't share more detail about what they suspect might be in those messages and other data.
