Woman screwed by police, court mistakes now has a permanent record

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that the state probation department can continue to maintain a file - even if "sealed" - on a woman charged with leaving the scene of an accident she was not at.

The justices said they are sympathetic to the plight of "Tina Boe," but that current state law gives them no discretion: A lower-court judge erred in ordering the department to completely destroy all records related to the incident. Instead, the state's highest court ruled, her records can remain within the probation system, even if under the proviso they not affect her chances at getting a state job or be shown to anybody.

Boston Police cited the woman for leaving the scene of an accident with personal injury in Roslindale in 2006 after an officer traced the registration of the car to her - even though the driver of the car that was hit told police the operator was a man.

To compound the problem, when the woman went to West Roxbury District Court for a show-cause hearing, a court employee sent her to the wrong courtroom. By the time she went to ask why her name had never been called, a judge in another courtroom heard her case and issued a formal criminal complaint against her.

The Suffolk County District Attorney's office agreed with her lawyer to drop the case and, at a pre-trial hearing a month later, also asked the judge to order the probation department to "expunge" her record. The judge agreed, saying merely sealing her file "would be an 'inadequate' remedy when balanced against the wrongful basis and misleading circumstances on which the complaint was issued, and that Boe should not have to live under a 'cloud of prosecution' with a sealed record."

But the probation department appealed, saying that state law does not let judges tell it to permanently delete records. The Massachusetts Appeals Court disagreed, but the Supreme Judicial Court ruled today its hands are tied: The legislature was clear in saying that records cannot be expunged in cases like this:

[T]here is no evidence that Boe's probation record is inaccurate or false such that expungement would be permissible under the court's inherent authority to "correct" the record. Boe was charged with a particular offense on a particular date, a show cause hearing was held, a complaint issued, and the matter ultimately was dismissed. That Boe should not have been charged with a crime in the first place does not render the information in the record inaccurate or misleading, and, in such circumstances, the Legislature has concluded that the appropriate remedy is the sealing of her record.

Complete ruling.