JUST weeks before Sandra Birchmore’s body was found, she had informed a close friend of odd behavior from a now-disgraced police detective accused of murdering her after grooming her for years.
Matthew Farwell, 38, stands accused of murdering Birchmore, 23, and having a sexual relationship with her since she was 15 years old.
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Falwell, a former police detective for the Stoughton Police Department, was arrested and charged on Wednesday, over three years after Birchmore’s body was found in her Canton, Massachusetts apartment, reportedly pregnant with his child.
At the time, local investigators had ruled her death a suicide.
However, in the last year, federal investigators re-examined the case, pointing to new evidence they say indicated she had been murdered.
Prosecutors claim that Birchmore and Farwell had a years-long relationship that began when she was just 15 and he was 27.
Read More on Sandra Birchmore
This relationship is said to have begun after the then-teenager had enrolled in a police youth program in 2010, where Farwell worked as an instructor.
The federal indictment alleges the two had sexual relations starting when Birchmore was under 16 and unable to legally consent.
ALARMING TEXTS
The Department of Justice has claimed Birchmore was exploited for sex as a child and would occasionally have sex with Farwell while he was on duty.
Farwell, who is married with children to another woman, has denied these allegations, claiming they did not have sex until 2020.
Investigators have accused Farwell of lying about the extent of the relationship, pointing to text messages sent between the two parties going back as far as 2013.
They have also reportedly pointed to other text messages sent from Birchmore to a friend as reason to believe Farwell planned to kill the 23-year-old.
By January 2021, Birchmore was believed to be pregnant with Farwell’s child.
Court records allege that the pregnancy was planned by the two in order to keep Birchmore quiet about their relationship.
However, when she informed him that she was pregnant, the then-police detective allegedly became angry, according to the affidavit.
Disturbing Relationship Timeline
Sandra Birchmore had a decade-long relationship with the Stoughton Police Department before her death in February 2021.
2010: Birchmore, then 13 years old, enrolls in the Stoughton police youth program, known as Police Explorers.
She eventually meets twin brothers Matthew and William Farwell, who had both been police explorers as teenagers, through the program.
March 27, 2012: Matthew Farwell becomes a Stoughton police officer after working with the Wellesley police force for several years.
April 10, 2013: Farwell, then 27 years old, allegedly begins a sexual relationship with Birchmore, who had recently turned 15.
The age of consent in Massachusetts is 16.
Farwell and Birchmore continue their relationship through at least 2020.
2015: Birchmore graduates from Stoughton High School, spends two months in the US Army Reserve, and enrolls in Massasoit Community College in Brockton.
2016: Birchmore’s mother and grandmother both pass away just over a month apart from each other.
The Stoughton police department ends its explorers program.
Robert C. Devine, the director of the program, is demoted from deputy chief to patrol officer after he’s investigated for allegedly harassing a woman he was having an affair with, according to an investigative report.
March 21, 2017: William Farwell, Matthew’s twin brother, becomes a Stoughton police officer.
September 1, 2019: Birchmore takes the statewide civil service exam in the hopes of becoming a police officer in Stoughton.
January 2021: Birchmore tells Falwell she is pregnant, and expecting her first child.
She tells her friends the baby’s father will not be involved in their lives, but is still excited to be a mother, prosecutors allege.
Farwell is reported to be the father by a call made to the police department, and he allegedly becomes enraged with Birchmore.
He then gets physically abusive with her, and plots her murder, prosecutors allege.
February 1, 2021: Matthew Farwell visits Birchmore’s apartment in Canton.
Surveillance footage allegedly shows him entering her building, and leaving 28 minutes later.
February 4, 2021: Birchmore, then 10 weeks pregnant, is found dead in her apartment by Canton police officers.
February 6, 2021: Farwell is interviewed by police officers.
He tells them he told Birchmore that he wasn’t the father of her unborn child, that their relationship was “over,” and that he was “blocking her from all forms of communication.”
February 24, 2021: Farwell is placed on paid administrative leave.
May 21, 2021: A state medical examiner rules Birchmore died by suicide.
April 1, 2022: Farwell resigns from the Stoughton police department.
He got a commercial driver’s license and started his own trucking business, DMJ Transportation LLC, while on leave.
August 15, 2022: Devine retires from the Stoughton police department.
He denies having a relationship with Birchmore outside of the program.
September 23, 2022: The Stoughton police department concluded a 19-month investigation, finding misconduct by Devine and the Farwell brothers.
December 29, 2022: Birchmore’s estate files a wrongful death lawsuit against the Farwell brothers, Devine, and the town of Stoughton, including its police department.
November 28, 2023: A search warrant affidavit reveals that Birchmore and Matthew Farwell exchanged 32,709 text messages between December 2019 and February 2021.
March 21, 2024: Matthew Farwell agrees to no longer work in law enforcement in Massachusetts.
June 18, 2024: A former New York City chief medical examiner rules Birchmore’s death a homicide.
August 28, 2024: Federal authorities indict Matthew Farwell on charges that he killed Birchmore, then 23 years old, in February 2021.
The affidavit claims that Birchmore confided in a friend at the time, saying Farwell “wished [she] just would die and he wants nothing to do with the baby.”
Birchmore later told her friend that Farwell appeared to be more accepting of the pregnancy, as he arrived at her apartment with a ginger ale one night that January.
Though at the same time, he began acting “weird.”
Specifically, Birchmore said Farwell made an odd request, asking for a key to her apartment, according to court records reviewed by The Marshall Project.
Additionally, when arriving at her apartment, Birchmore said Farwell opened her closet and looked into her bathroom.
“That’s weird,” Birchmore’s friend said of the behavior, per court records.
“Yeah, it was really weird,” Birchmore replied.
Just 12 days later on February 4, 2021, Birchmore was found dead.
Her body was discovered hanging from the door handle of her bedroom closet.
Prosecutors are now alleging that on this night, Farwell had begun planning to kill Birchmore and looked for places to stage a suicide.
“We allege that Sanda Birchmore survived years of grooming, statutory rape and then sexual violence, all at the hands of Matthew Farwell,” Joshua Levy, acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts, said Wednesday.
Prosecutors allege Farwell murdered Birchmore when he was unable to control her, saying the former-cop “silenced her, permanently.”
Falwell has pleaded not guilty and faces a minimum of life in prison if convicted.
TURN IN THE CASE
Falwell worked as a detective in Stoughton – around 20 miles south of Boston – from 2012 to 2022.
He resigned from his post in April 2022, after having been on paid administrative leave for weeks.
Just days later, his brother William Farwell and another officer Robert Devine were both put on administrative leave.
In September 2022, all three officers were revealed to have been fired for having “inappropriate” relationships with Birchmore.
“Through a sustained and deliberate combination of lies, deceit, and treachery, they violated the policies and core values of the Stoughton Police Department, not to mention human decency,” Chief Donna McNamara said at the time.
By December of that year, Birchmore’s family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Farwell brothers, Devine, the city of Stoughton as well as the police department.
If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673.
