Former Stoughton Cop Charged In 2022 Killing Of Pregnant Woman

STOUGHTON, MA — A former Stoughton police officer has been arrested in connection with the killing of a pregnant woman thought to have taken her own life in 2022, the FBI Boston said Wednesday.

The man, Matthew Farwell, was taken into custody without incident, according to officials.

Farwell resigned in 2022 after a year-long investigation sparked by the alleged suicide of 23-year-old Sandra Birchmore, who told her friends she was pregnant with his baby, the Boston Globe first reported.

He had been put on administrative leave after the Feb. 4, 2021 incident when Sandra Birchmore was found dead inside her Canton apartment, town records show.

At the time, officials said that Birchmore's death had been ruled a suicide. However, Stoughton Police Chief Donna McNamara said Wednesday that an FBI investigation supported by the department "today resulted in a murder indictment that concluded that Sandra was killed."

According to the Globe, Birchmore told friends she met Farwell as a teenager when he was the instructor in a police explorers program. Three of Birchmore's friends then told the Globe that the two started a sexual relationship when she was just 15, continuing through his later marriage to another woman. The age of consent in Massachusetts is 16.

Birchmore also told her friends she had become pregnant with Farwell's child in late 2020, the Globe reported.

State troopers assigned to Norfolk District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey's office investigated the death, sharing findings with Stoughton police.

"During the death investigation, we uncovered allegations and circumstances that we explored and found sufficiently credible to refer to Stoughton police for further investigation and action," David Traub, a Morrissey spokesman told the Globe in April 2022.

McNamara said Wednesday that the day after Sandra Birchmore was found dead in her Canton apartment, he "ordered a lengthy and aggressive internal affairs investigation, the instructions of which made it clear that no stone should be left unturned."

Calling the alleged murder a "horrific injustice," McNamara said that the allegations against Farwell "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."

He continued: "It has been my life's work over these past three years to ensure that justice was served. As I have stated previously, Sandra Birchmore received no justice during her life. It is imperative that justice be served in her death, and today's actions appear to bring our society one step closer to justice."

Haley Cornell contributed reporting.

A free, 24/7, confidential service can provide people in suicidal crisis or emotional distress or those around them with support, information, and local resources. Call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-TALK (8255).