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“It refocuses the hearing away from officer Devine’s actions and onto her,” she said. Devine’s defense also had echoes of a case from a decade ago when he accused his mistress of harassment and said his email had been hacked. Devine and his attorney, Robert Stowe, did not respond to requests for comment. Devine is fighting efforts by the Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission to strip him of his authority to work in law enforcement. The hearing officer, Kenneth J. Fishman, a retired Superior Court judge, issued his recommendations on Oct. 10, but the standards commission has so far kept them secret, saying commissioners need to vote on them first. Devine, who is now a lawyer, figured prominently into a Stoughton police internal affairs investigation launched after a pregnant Birchmore, 23, was found dead in her Canton apartment on Feb. 4, 2021. Birchmore grew up in Stoughton, and participated in a police department youth program known as Explorers that was directed by Devine. Birchmore joined the program in 2010 when she was 12 years old and participated for six years, including four years during which Devine was in charge. Through the program, Birchmore met Matthew and William Farwell, twins about a dozen years older than her who had participated in Stoughton police Explorers under Devine and later served as volunteer instructors. Birchmore’s death was initially declared a suicide by Norfolk District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey and the state medical examiner’s office; no criminal charges were filed. Then last August, the FBI arrested Matthew Farwell, a former Stoughton police detective. Federal prosecutors allege Farwell, 40, a married father and former patrol officers union president, groomed and sexually exploited Birchmore when she was a minor and then continued to have sex with her during her adult years, sometimes when he was on duty. He is charged with strangling her and killing the unborn baby boy she was carrying when she died. Farwell has pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial at a detention facility in Rhode Island. DNA testing has excluded Farwell as the father of Bichmore’s unborn son, and it’s not clear whether investigators have established paternity. The Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission alleges Devine had a “sexual encounter” with Birchmore, then an adult, while he was on duty in December 2020. He is also accused of communicating with Birchmore on Facebook Messenger, using the alias of Marty Riggs, a character in the “Lethal Weapon” franchise. Testifying in July at his adjudicatory hearing, Devine said Birchmore propositioned him in 2020 for sex, but he turned her away. He said he never had sexual contact with her and never downloaded the Facebook messenger app that Birchmore used to communicate with the person identified as Marty Riggs. “He has a history, a real history of doing these kinds of things. Blaming other people. Blaming hacking. Not standing up and saying, ‘Yes, I did something,’” said attorney Steven Marullo, who represents Birchmore’s estate in its wrongful death lawsuit against Devine and the Farwell brothers. “Devine was in charge of that program at the time that Sandra joined,” Marullo said. “He brought in the Farwells.” Laura Palumbo, communications director for the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, said questioning the credibility of people who report being victims of sexual misconduct is a way to pit one person’s word against another’s. Further, Birchmore is dead and can’t defend herself, she said. “The main strategy is to try to make connections between victim-blaming beliefs and myths in our culture and push those to the forefront as a way of questioning the credibility of the victim,” Palumbo said. “It is intended to really frame something as ‘he said, she said.’ ” Facing cross examination, Devine was asked to describe Birchmore’s lies. Devine said Birchmore repeatedly lied about being pregnant and cited an affidavit from an ex-boyfriend who was granted a restraining order against her. Some of Devine’s comments about the affidavit were redacted by the Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission, which last week published recordings from Devine’s hearing on YouTube. The proceedings, held in June and July, were closed to the public. In 2014, when Devine was trying to end an extramarital affair, he described his mistress to police as unstable, saying she had threatened to kill herself if their relationship ended. Margo Lindauer, a professor at Vermont Law and Graduate School, said it is not surprising that Devine questioned the mental stability of his mistress and portrayed Birchmore as a liar who propositioned him. “This is a tactic commonly utilized by individuals trying to discredit abuse allegations,” she said. Devine got a court order in 2014 prohibiting the mistress from contacting him, and soon after he told police that he and his family began receiving harassing messages. He also reported to investigators that his email and Google accounts had been compromised, according to a State Police report. Devine directed a police subordinate to examine his phone, and a State Police investigation resulted in the woman’s arrest. (The Globe is not naming the woman because the charges were dropped.) Yet during that investigation, Devine continued seeing her, police later learned. Stoughton’s internal affairs investigator concluded Devine had been “untruthful by omission” and demonstrated “a distorted understanding of right and wrong.” He agreed to a 60-day unpaid suspension and demotion from deputy chief to patrol officer. “I didn’t help matters in 2015 myself. That’s on me,” Devine testified on July 15. He also testified that he and some of his family members have been targeted by computer hackers for years, requiring him to change his email address and phone number multiple times. In 2019, he said Brian Holmes, who succeeded Devine as deputy police chief, asked if he wanted Stoughton police’s help in investigating the hacking. “I told him absolutely not do I want the department to be near this,” Devine testified. “The last time that happened, I got triple demoted and nothing happened.”
