Articles by Asher Klein and Jeff Saperstone

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Final report on MBTA Green Line train derailment cites operator as probable cause

A hearing is scheduled on Thursday afternoon in the ongoing legal battle involving several Norfolk County defendants’ push to access evidence from Michael Proctor’s cellphone from the Karen Read case.The hearing is scheduled for 2 p.m. in Norfolk Superior Court in Dedham, Massachusetts.Last week, prosecutors said in court that some grand jury material involving Michael Proctor, the former Massachusetts State Police trooper who led the Karen Read investigation, can now be turned over in other cases he investigated, as defense lawyers had been pushing for.A federal judge issued an order allowing the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office to produce that evidence, under seal, to lawyers for murder suspects Myles King and Brian Walshe and others, and an assistant district attorney said in Norfolk Superior Court that she’d brought them with her for Monday’s hearing.It came shortly after an attorney for Proctor said he is no longer appealing to be reinstated to the Massachusetts State Police.Thursday’s hearing was scheduled to handle any potential attorney requests to preserve additional documents that lawyers think could be exculpatory in their clients’ cases.“I am concerned by these so-called other materials being destroyed on Oct. 31,” defense attorney Joseph Krowski Jr. said last week, arguing that prosecutors wouldn’t have reviewed the documents with a knowledge of the defenses’ theories of their cases and asking for those files to be set aside and not destroyed for now.The defendants in the cases in question want to see if Proctor exhibited similar behavior while investigating their alleged crimes as he did in the Read investigation, as was revealed in her blockbuster trials, leading to his termination from the state police. That effort is being led by attorney Rosemary Scapicchio, who is representing 25-year-old Milton murder suspect King, with attorneys representing other clients, including Larry Tipton for Brian Walshe, cosigning the effort.The attorneys had been waiting for months waiting months for the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office to release critical evidence, including between 3,000 to 5,000 pieces of communication stored in Proctor’s cloud account. Similar evidence led to Proctor being fired for misconduct in the high-profile murder case of Read, who in June was found not guilty on the most serious charges she faced and guilty of the lowest form of a drunken driving charge.The Read trial evidence was given to the Norfolk District Attorney’s Office on condition that it would only be used in the Read trial and then destroyed. But the defense attorneys were pushing to see the evidence, in case any may prove exculpatory in their cases — with a looming evidence destruction deadline.More Michael Proctor newsMichael ProctorOct 20Federal evidence involving Karen Read investigator cleared for sharing in other casesKaren ReadOct 20Karen Read investigator Michael Proctor drops Mass. State Police firing appealMichael ProctorOct 21As Proctor drops firing appeal, his police work could be scrutinized for years