OT trial: Trooper who admitted fraud in 2020 still on paid leave from state police
WORCESTER - A state trooper who admitted to stealing federal overtime three years ago is still being paid by Massachusetts taxpayers while on suspension, testimony Friday in U.S. District Court shows.
Timothy Weldon, a state trooper from Taunton, told a federal jury Friday that he’s been on paid leave since November 2020, around the time he received a target letter from federal prosecutors regarding overtime theft.
Weldon is one of several troopers granted immunity to testify against their supervisors, Lt. Daniel J. Griffin and Sgt. William R. Robertson, in connection with allegations they coordinated the theft of $135,000 in federal overtime programs from 2015 to 2017.
Griffin and Robertson have been on trial the past two weeks in Worcester regarding the alleged thefts.
While all the other troopers accused of fraud retired, Weldon — who testified he was too junior to be eligible for a pension in 2020 — was placed on paid suspension.
Weldon testified Friday that he told a grand jury in December 2020 that he, at Griffin’s direction, improperly accepted overtime for hours he did not work.
State payroll records show Weldon has been paid $297,000 while on paid leave. According to a repository of state police disciplinary records compiled by independent journalist Andrew Quemere, state police opened an internal affairs investigation into Weldon in November 2020.
The Telegram & Gazette asked state police Friday why the internal investigation has not concluded, why Weldon is on paid leave rather than unpaid leave, when state police learned of his admissions to federal prosecutors and whether his statements concerned Interim Col. John E. Mawn Jr.
David Procopio, communications director for state police, responded in an email that the department has open internal affairs probes into all the troopers involved and is waiting until the criminal proceedings close “so we may consider evidence elicited at trial when reaching our findings.”
Procopio said state police have “instituted widespread reforms” to its time and attendance monitoring systems in recent years to “safeguard against misconduct, including the type alleged against the two former members currently on trial.”
Procopio did not say when state police learned of Weldon’s admissions, or what Mawn thought of them.
“Due to the ongoing federal prosecution and open Internal Affairs cases, the Department cannot comment further on the allegations at this time,” he wrote.
Final day of evidence
Weldon’s testimony capped the ninth and final day of evidence against Griffin and Robertson, both of whom face charges of conspiracy to steal federal funds, aiding and abetting theft of federal funds and aiding and abetting wire fraud.
Federal prosecutors have alleged the pair directed their small traffic troop to start late and end early a number of federal traffic programs in violation of federal law. Defense lawyers have argued their clients’ actions were in line with agency culture, and that nothing in collective bargaining agreements prevented what they did.
After prosecutors rested their case Friday morning, Griffin elected not to put on a defense, and Robertson called Weldon as his sole witness.
Under questioning from defense lawyers, Weldon confirmed testimony from former State Police Col. Kerry Gilpin Thursday regarding many state troopers leaving headquarters early.
But Weldon also, under questioning from both the defense and prosecution, made clear that he was aware he was not entitled to the overtime he claimed.
Weldon testified that Griffin was the person who told him to claim the time. He said that, after sobriety checkpoints wrapped up earlier than expected, Griffin directed them to “take a slow ride home” — code for improperly reporting he worked the whole shift.
As Assistant U.S. Attorney Dustin Chao, chief of the Massachusetts DOJ office’s Public Corruption Unit, displayed cruiser tracking information on screen for jurors, Weldon confirmed getting home hours before he reported wrapping up on paperwork that determined his paycheck.
Weldon recalled that the order came when television reports started about investigations into overtime fraud from now-disbanded State Police Troop E.
Inflated number of tickets alleged
Earlier in the day Friday, Robertson’s lawyer, Stanley W. Norkunas, was allowed to recall a special agent who testified Wednesday regarding allegations that Robertson inflated the number of tickets he reported issuing on federally funded overtime shifts.
Robertson had, the morning after the agent’s testimony, given prosecutors citations he said contradicted the claim. U.S. District Court Judge Margaret R. Guzman, out of earshot of the jury, agreed with Chao that the disclosure amounted to a discovery violation, because the materials should have been turned over long ago.
“Surprise evidence … doesn’t happen,” the judge said. She issued a finding that Robertson, but not Norkunas, had violated the court’s rules of discovery.
Guzman said it appeared that the evidence Robertson was now offering should have been disclosed years ago, when it became clear to Robertson that citations issued during his federal overtime shifts were at issue.
She said it appeared that Robertson was now, on the eve of jury deliberations, offering up the tickets as “personal property” that wasn’t his to withhold.
“This evidence didn’t belong to him,” Guzman said of the newly offered citations, adding that Robertson, while allowed the presumption of innocence, isn’t allowed “tomfoolery.”
Guzman on Friday allowed Norkunas some line of questioning in front of jurors regarding the citations with the special agent, though the purported evidence Robertson had brought to court Thursday was not allowed.
The agent, Tanya Chavez of the U.S. Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General, agreed that some of the documents her office acquired indicated Robertson reported issuing tickets that she’d noted Wednesday were missing from other records state police had turned over.
Chavez noted the documents Norkunas referenced only showed that Robertson had reported issuing the tickets, however, and did not contain copies of the tickets themselves.
After the close of evidence Friday, Guzman denied standard defense motions asking for the charges to be dismissed prior to deliberations.
Guzman ruled the government had met its required legal burden and that the case was ripe for jury deliberations.
Deliberations are expected to begin Monday after closing statements and jury instructions.
This article originally appeared on Telegram & Gazette: Trooper who admitted OT fraud in 2020 on paid leave from state police
