A single line in a protection submitting within the Brian Walshe homicide case has Karen Learn case fanatics reeling: Was Trooper Michael Proctor, the case officer for each, fired from the Massachusetts State Police?
“There is a court filing in the (Walshe) case that is not correct. Trooper Proctor remains on unpaid leave as he awaits the outcome of an internal affairs investigation,” MSP spokesman Timothy McGuirk advised the Herald right now.
The confusion comes from a submitting by Walshe protection lawyer Larry Tipton, who made an error in his abstract of the profession trajectory of Proctor. Proctor was virtually instantly positioned on depart when the Learn trial earlier this yr resulted in mistrial as conduct that he admitted was extraordinarily unprofessional got here to mild when he took the stand in that case. He was later suspended with out pay, however has not been outright fired from the group.
“The Proctor debacle resulted in Proctor being first suspended and then terminated from the State Police, but only after defense counsel exposed the serious issues,” Tipton wrote in a submitting.
The submitting, as the Herald reported, requests that the Walshe protection group be supplied with the contents of Proctor’s work cellphone and cloud account that might present some exculpatory proof for Walshe. Norfolk County prosecutors filed notices earlier this yr on this and different circumstances Proctor labored that the DA’s workplace had acquired an extraction from Proctor’s cellphone and cloud account and that the supplies may affect these circumstances.
Walshe, 49, is charged with the homicide of his spouse, Ana Walshe, who the prosecutors say he slayed after which reduce up on the primary day of 2023 after which hid her physique elements in dumpsters round Better Boston. Since being indicted for her homicide, he was sentenced in federal court docket to an unrelated worldwide artwork fraud case, which he has appealed. He has been detained on the Norfolk Home of Correction since his preliminary arrest.
Learn, 44, of Mansfield, is charged with second-degree homicide, motorized vehicle manslaughter and leaving the scene of a collision inflicting the demise of John O’Keefe, a 16-year member of the Boston police power and Learn’s boyfriend of two years, within the early morning of Jan. 29, 2022.
Herald and Pool photographs
Brian Walshe and Karen Learn each have Trooper Michael Proctor on their circumstances. (Herald and Pool photographs)
