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Boston cop gets six months of home confinement for role in Hyde Park overtime scandal
By adamg on Sat, 08/03/2024 - 10:44am
A federal judge this week sentenced a former sergeant at the Boston Police evidence warehouse to six months of home confinement and nearly $31,000 in restitution and fines for the overtime pay he got for hours he didn't work over a three-year period, the US Attorney's office reports.
After he's freed from home confinement, Gerard O’Brien, 66, of Braintree, will spend 1 1/2 years on probation, under the sentence ordered by US District Court Judge Nathaniel Gorton, the US Attorney's office says. O'Brien actually pleaded guilty to to one count of conspiracy to commit theft concerning programs receiving federal funds and one count of embezzlement from an agency receiving federal funds in 2021.
O'Brien is that latest in a series of Boston cops to plead or be found guilty for their role in the OT abuse at the BPD warehouse on Hyde Park Avenue. Three weeks ago, former patrolmen's union President Thomas Nee got two years probation for his role in the scandal.
According to the US Attorney's office:
From at least December 2016 through February 2019, O'Brien submitted false and fraudulent overtime slips for overtime shifts that he did not work at the evidence warehouse. The "purge" overtime was a 4 - 8 p.m. weekday shift intended to dispose of old, unneeded evidence. "Kiosk" overtime involved driving to each police district in Boston one Saturday a month to collect old prescription drugs to be burned.
For the "purge" shift, O'Brien claimed to have worked from 4 - 8 p.m., but he and other members of the unit, routinely left at 6 p.m., or earlier. For the "kiosk" shift, O'Brien submitted overtime slips claiming to have worked eight-and-one-half hours, when in fact he and other members of the unit, only worked three-to-four hours of those shifts. As a supervisor, O'Brien endorsed fraudulent overtime slips submitted by the officers at the warehouse for those shifts.
Between December 2016 and February 2019, O'Brien personally collected approximately $25,930 for overtime hours he did not work.
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Comments
Does he lose his pension?
.
He won't lose what he put in
Although he might need the refund to pay us back. But he hopefully won't get a lifetime of retirement support on the taxpayers he defrauded.
But these were federal charges - firing him and revoking pension benefits will require state level action.
State law that probably
State law that probably applies to this situation. Like most laws unnecessarily wordy, deficiently concise. But how else are lawyers to add their billings?
https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleIV/Chapter32/Secti...
The conviction is related to a crime he committed as part of his duties. The following taken from the law is, thankfully, pretty clear.
That state law
Does not apply to the MBTA which is a private pension.
Non-sequitor
This is about a man who was a Boston cop, not an employee of the MBTA.
could be a rough retirement
since he might not have worked enough years paying FICA to qualify for Social Security.
There should be some option to reduce a pension for misconduct. It appears to be either total forfeiture or no pension penalty.
Anyways, there's always the possibility of SSDI/SSI.
Or he could get a job. 66 is
Or he could get a job. 66 is pretty early to retire especially if you were a criminal stealing for years from your last employer.
SSDI/SSI for what disability?
SSDI/SSI for what disability? Loss of use of one hand because it's stuck in the cookie jar?
Surely for both hands and the snout?
But i like your thinking.
Pigs get fed and hogs get slaughtered.
Quite apropos, I believe..
the same disability
elderly Soviet emigres in Brighton had back in the 1980s when they were collecting SSDI/SSI - old age.
Does UHub police get paid for
Nevermind.
Do you ever get tired?
I mean, of being the constant victim of judgement cast on you for your own actions.
Adam : How much would it cost . . . .
to add a "BLOCK USER" function to the software?
A GoFundMe page would raise a considerable amount, Fer shur.
ps: Your IT gnomes need bigger hammers.
Oh man!
I’d make a very large donation to block out a couple of specific users.
So the punishment for
So the punishment for stealing $26,000 in MA is a $5,000 fine and staying at home for 6 months?? Well I’m sure this will really scare cops from stealing from us in the future.
And having to pay it back
But I agree, far too lenient.
Well giving back what you
Well giving back what you stole is not really punishment, that’s always true when you are caught stealing that you have to relinquish what you stole.
And loosing his pension
The other way of looking at this is how much it would cost to incarcerate a 66 year old man? He would enjoy food, shelter, clothing and medical care based on what is paid in Federal taxes since his would be a Federal penitentiary where he would live. The cost is in the neighborhood of $40K per year.
Better that he should spend the rest of life struggling to make ends meet than get his food for free for a year.
Add that he has to report to his Probation officer probably once a week. There might even be urine tests.
The rest of his life will be very, very hard.
Present actuarial value of pension
is in the millions.
Seems like a very harsh penalty to me, unless he was a real PoS who never served honorably or put himself in danger. I don't know how many years he was in BPD, what he did, what complaints and Internal Affairs discipline he had.
Why I think there should be an intermediate sanction between keeping the pension and complete loss of pension.