Former Donovan employee recalls being asked to put dead son's signature on document

Apr. 20—SALEM — Benjamin Coole was a few years out of college when he was offered a job at a startup called "Send It Later," or SIL, in late spring of 2015.

For most of the time he worked for the firm, it was based in a barn in Hamilton, where John Donovan Sr. lived in a residence on the second story.

The company was working to develop a novel concept: A way that someone could continue to send emails or gifts well into the future — even after their own death.

"We were promised bonuses and stock incentives that would vest after two years," Coole, of Malden, told a Salem Superior Court jury during the fifth day of testimony in the trial of Donovan Sr., 80, who is charged with forgery, attempted larceny and witness intimidation.

But Coole didn't stick around SIL long enough to claim any of those benefits. Several things about the job had started to bother him, he would testify.

There was an audio recording of his boss' late son, John Donovan III, he was transcribing, during which Donovan Sr. asked him to add things to the transcript that were not on the audio recording, he said.

And there was something else — an external hard drive with a database of signatures. One of them, Coole told the jury, was that of Donovan III.

Prosecutor Jack Dawley showed him the will codicil Donovan Sr. is charged with forging. He didn't recall it specifically but said he "wouldn't be surprised" if he had handled it — or another document that bore Donovan III's signature.

"Did you affix John III's signature after his death?" Dawley asked Coole. "I think so, yes," Coole responded.

"Did you know that was wrong?" Dawley asked.

"Yes," Coole testified. "I wasn't comfortable with it."

Coole testified under a grant of immunity, something defense lawyer Robert Strasnick sought to highlight during his cross-examination.

But he also focused on the strains in the relationship between Donovan Sr. and the Vermont man who came up with the original concept for Send It Later, Romano Formichella, and Formichella's son Mark — and the open concept nature of the office, where anyone might have had access to company computers.

And the signature database had other purposes, Strasnick suggested. Coole acknowledged "probably" using a similar image of Donovan Sr.'s saved signature on a termination letter to Mark Formichella.

"Mr. Formichella despised my client, didn't he?" Strasnick asked.

"There was definitely some animosity," Coole said.

Earlier in the morning, jurors heard from New York financier Jason Konidaris, who was Donovan III's best friend. The two first met in their sophomore year at Yale in 1990.

In 2012, he testified, Donovan III turned to him for help after his diagnosis with a rare type of adrenal cancer. Konidaris recalled being by Donovan III's side throughout the course of his illness; when Donovan III spent 50 days at Brigham and Women's, Konidaris was there for 35 of those nights. Donovan III's brother James and sister Rebecca Brown spelled for him on the nights he wasn't there.

Konidaris had been designated as Donovan III's health care proxy, and as his friend rested, Konidaris would look at the medical chart, "just to understand if he was moving forward or backward, anything I should know."

"Did you notice something that caused you alarm?" asked Dawley.

"The health care proxy page had been changed," Konidaris responded.

Donovan Sr.'s name had been added.

"I understood him not to want his father's name on there," Konidaris testified. "He didn't even want his father visiting him," he continued, before Strasnick objected.

Moments later, Konidaris was asked what he did. He told jurors he had taken the issue to the medical staff.

The next time he looked at the paperwork, Donovan Sr.'s name had been crossed out.

Konidaris was shown some of the documents that the prosecution alleges were forged. He testified he'd never seen any of them.

He appeared to grow increasingly frustrated during cross-examination as Strasnick showed him the documents.

"I can't get past the first paragraph," Konidaris responded when he was asked to read passages from the paperwork to the jury. "The address is wrong."

"Yes or no, does it say in the third paragraph, 'I appoint my father ... as additional personal representative?"

"Yes," Konidaris responded.

But moments later, Konidaris turned to Judge Salim Tabit. "I'm being asked to comment on consistencies or inconsistencies and the very first paragraph of this document is wrong," he said.

"Please answer the questions as asked," Tabit responded. "There is a method to this madness."

The court session began with a hastily-called sidebar conference with the judge after Donovan Sr. used his cell phone to take at least one photo of an attorney who has been observing the trial on behalf of the estate.

Neither the judge nor the jury had entered the courtroom when Donovan took the photo.

As Donovan turned toward the gallery and held up his phone, the lawyer asked, "Are you taking a photo of me? Please don't."

Donovan responded, "It's a public place."

But under the rules in place in Massachusetts courts, photographs are allowed to be taken in court with a judge's permission — generally only by members of the news media, who must both register with the court's administrative office and then obtain permission from the judge in that session.

Later in the morning, Strasnick told the judge that he had inspected his client's phone and found one photo taken in the courtroom, "and it was deleted."

Left unanswered was the intended purpose of the photo.

Courts reporter Julie Manganis can be reached at 978-338-2521, by email at jmanganis@salemnews.com or on Twitter at @SNJulieManganis.

Courts reporter Julie Manganis can be reached at 978-338-2521, by email at jmanganis@salemnews.com or on Twitter at @SNJulieManganis