How did Sandra Birchmore Die? The Lady from Massachusetts Died by Homicide, not Suicide

According to a recent revelation, Sandra Birchmore, a lady from Massachusetts, was killed, not suicide, as previously determined by an inquiry. Her estate has filed a lawsuit accusing three police officers of being involved in her murder and claiming that she was sexually molested and groomed by them as a teenager.

What Caused Sandra Birchmore’s Death?

A well-known pathologist hired by the lady’s family has indicated that the pregnant Massachusetts woman who accused three police officers of grooming and sexually abusing her as a teenager did not commit herself and may have been slain.

When Sandra Birchmore, then 23 years old, was discovered hanging in her Canton apartment in February 2021, a state medical examiner determined that her death was a suicide.

At the time, the autopsy of the young woman revealed she was three months pregnant, but the medical examiner and detectives declared there was no indication of foul play.

However, those conclusions have subsequently been disputed by former New York City chief medical examiner Dr. Michael Baden, who was recruited by her family amid a continuing civil lawsuit against the three police officers, according to the Boston Globe.

Baden replied, “I must disagree,” to a Birchmore’s estate attorney in a letter dated June 18.

“Ms. Birchmore did not hang herself to death… “Strangulation” was the reason for Ms. Birchmore’s death, and “homicide” was the mode of death.

Among the factors that led Baden to his conclusion were the severity of Birchmore’s wounds and the location of a ligature that was discovered on her body.

According to him, Birchmore had broken the hyoid bone, a little U-shaped bone in the neck that breaks “rarely, if at all, in suicidal hanging” but did so in “half of the homicidal strangulation of women.”

The shocking revelations are the most recent in a protracted case that has afflicted the region and prompted several investigations by the FBI, state agencies, and local law enforcement since the accusations of grooming and abuse first arose.

Accused are Stoughton Police Officers:

Three Stoughton police officers, Robert Devine, William Farwell, and Matthew Farwell, are accused of abusing and taking advantage of Birchmore for ten years after first meeting her in 2010 when she was thirteen and engaged in the department’s Explorer juvenile program.

Following Birchmore’s passing, an internal investigation conducted by the Stoughton Police Department revealed that Matthew Farwell had sexually abused her since she was fifteen years old.

The inquiry revealed that the other two police officers were also charged with having improper connections with the girl in the years that followed.

The police have refuted Birchmore’s allegation that she informed acquaintances Matthew Farwell was her baby’s father before her apparent suicide.

The three police officers left the department in 2022 despite their long-standing denials of the accusations. They have never been the subject of criminal charges.

In late 2022, Birchmore’s family filed a wrongful death case against each of them, claiming that her death was caused by a “near decade-long scheme of grooming and repeated assaults.”

As part of the lawsuit, the family engaged Baden to reexamine the young woman’s autopsy report.

The wrongful death accusations have been refuted by the cops, who have also refrained from commenting publicly on the forensic pathologist’s latest findings.

However, Donna McNamara, the chief of Stoughton Police, expressed her “profound dismay” at the new allegations. McNamara expressed her extreme disquiet and distress upon reading Baden’s conclusions.

Even though I’m not a medical examiner by training, I can’t make any firm conclusions, but the results merit more investigation at the highest level. As usual, we’ll support your efforts to guarantee justice and the truth win.

Due to continuing investigations, representatives of the Massachusetts State Police and the medical examiner who provided the first suicide autopsy finding chose not to comment.

Throughout his five-decade career, Baden has been involved in several high-profile cases. He led a US House committee that conducted a reexamination of the killings of Dr. Martin Luther King and President John F. Kennedy. In addition, George Floyd’s family asked him to do an autopsy upon his passing in 2020.