Ex-Massachusetts police officer convicted of murdering pregnant woman in staged suicide

Former Massachusetts police detective Matthew Farwell was convicted of murdering Sandra Birchmore, a pregnant woman found dead in her Canton apartment in February 2021. Prosecutors said he staged her death to look like suicide after she became pregnant and threatened to reveal their relationship; the verdict also found him responsible for the death of her unborn child.

Prosecutors said Farwell began grooming Birchmore when she was a teenager and used his role in a police youth programme to gain her trust. Her death was first ruled a suicide, then changed to undetermined; investigators later reopened the case and found about 40,000 text messages between them. Farwell’s defence argued she died by suicide, and his lawyers acknowledged their relationship but denied he killed her. He faces mandatory life imprisonment without parole.