Ex-detective Matthew Farwell accused of killing Sandra Birchmore in 2021
The former police detective is accused of killing the pregnant 23-year-old, with whom he was having a sexual relationship, and making it look like a suicide.
FBI agents arrested former Stoughton Police Officer Matthew Farwell on Wednesday on federal charges that he killed Sandra Birchmore in 2021, after which he staged the crime scene to look like the 23-year-old had committed suicide. The 38-year-old ex-detective is also accused of having had a year’s-long sexual relationship with Birchmore which began before she was 16 years old.
Her death was originally deemed a suicide, but a pathologist hired by the family concluded that she had been strangled to death. A federal investigation into the case found “critical new evidence,” according to the US Attorney’s office, which led to the indictment of Farwell.
Ex-detective Matthew Farwell accused of killing Sandra Birchmore in 2021
In late January 2021, the Stoughton Police Department alleged received a call from a friend of the 23-year-old who reported that Farwell had been having sex with Birchmore. At the time of her death in February 2021, Birchmore was three months pregnant. According to court documents she had told Farwell that he was the father of the child sometime prior to her being found dead.
Prosecutors claim that he committed the homicide to cover up his inappropriate relationship with her which began when they met while she was a member of the Stoughton Police Explorers Academy. Birchmore began attending the vocational program designed for youth interested in law enforcement careers when she was 12 in the spring of 2010.
While she was still underage, Farwell, who was volunteer instructor, began a sexual relationship with Birchmore. Some of those encounters allegedly took place while he was on duty.
The indictment alleges that Farwell told Birchmore to delete evidence of their sexual encounters while she was underage. Furthermore, that he had researched how to delete evidence from his own phone.
“The alleged murder of Sandra is a horrific injustice,” said Stoughton Police Chief Donna McNamara in a statement on Wednesday addressing the indictment.
“The allegations against the suspect, a former Stoughton Police Officer, represent the single worst act of not just professional misconduct but indeed human indecency that I have observed in a nearly three-decade career in law enforcement.”