Investigation finds no evidence of affair between New Bedford judge, prosecutor

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An investigation authorized by the state’s highest court has determined that a New Bedford judge and prosecutor did not have an inappropriate relationship or coordinate on cases. The alleged affair had the potential to impact thousands of criminal cases.

The report, released on Thursday, cleared then-New Bedford District Court Judge Douglas Darnbrough and Bristol County Assistant District Attorney Karlyn Butler of the accusations, finding no evidence to conclude that they were true. But the report also noted gaps in evidence and inconsistencies in Darnbrough and Butler’s testimony around text messages they may have exchanged.

This investigation was part of an appeal filed by Gerson Pascual-Santana, who was convicted of molesting a child under 14 in a case that was prosecuted by Butler with Darnbrough presiding as the judge. He was sentenced to 3½ years in prison in 2023.

James McKenna, who is representing Pascual-Santana and another client in a similar position, appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court.

He argued that the Bristol County District Attorney’s Office didn’t do enough to investigate a series of anonymous letters alleging the affair. He argued his clients’ rights to potentially exculpatory evidence were violated because the prosecutor and court did not release records showing how they investigated the alleged affair. He asked the Supreme Judicial Court for new trials because of those alleged failures.

The court appointed retired Boston Municipal Court Judge Ernest Sarason Jr. as special master last May to investigate whether there had been an inappropriate relationship.

The investigation was similar to the discovery process for a criminal trial — the special master issued subpoenas, witnesses were called and cross examined, and evidence was entered into the record. The report listed 21 witnesses, including court staff, judges, probation officers, and lawyers. The 70 pieces of evidence in the case included the anonymous letters, interview notes, and court records. 

Sarason’s findings were unequivocal.

“Other than rumors and the anonymous letters, there is no evidence establishing any dating, romantic, sexual, or otherwise inappropriate relationship between Judge Darnbrough and ADA Butler,” he wrote.

Sarason also dismissed the anonymous accusations that Darnbrough and Butler were inappropriately coordinating on cases. He found Darnbrough showed no bias or favoritism toward Butler and did not intentionally try to assign himself to sessions where she was the prosecutor. There was “nothing improper” about meetings they had in the judge’s office, the special master wrote.

Darnbrough and Butler have denied the anonymous allegations.

McKenna isn’t done appealing. He filed a 12-page objection to the special master’s findings on Thursday and said he plans to seek more cell phone evidence.

“The cell phone materials are key,” he told reporters after the hearing.

The special master’s report is the first and only public investigation into the alleged affair.

It includes detailed, thorough findings on the rumors and how the Trial Court and prosecutors initially investigated them.

Special master finds no evidence of romance 

Rumors of the alleged affair were “widespread and talked about throughout the courthouse,” Sarason wrote, but none of the witnesses testified that they personally knew about any inappropriate behavior between Darnbrough and Butler.

Anonymous letters accusing Darnbrough and Butler of an inappropriate relationship started to circulate in September 2023. They were sent to defense attorneys, the DA’s office, the state bar, a top court official, and one member of the Governor’s Council.

“For many years, ADA Butler, among others, received anonymous letters, all of which appear to have been written by the same person,” Sarason wrote. “These letters largely took aim at ADA Butler’s romantic relationships.”

The DA’s office has said the letters are part of a targeted harassment campaign. Butler testified in the investigation that she reported the letters to Dartmouth police in 2018, but “nothing came” of it. 

The Trial Court, the agency that includes New Bedford District Court, conducted an internal investigation in late 2023.

It found that “Judge Darnbrough exhibited poor judgment regarding his relationship with ADA Butler and that the relationship created the appearance of impropriety,” leading to the judge’s reassignment to Plymouth District Court in October 2023, Sarason wrote. Darnbrough resigned one month later, citing “ongoing health issues.”

Lawyers in the appeal had repeatedly clashed over whether the anonymous letters deserved any attention from the courts. McKenna had argued that the alarming nature of the allegations made them worth investigating, while the DA’s office argued that allegations were unreliable because they were anonymous and uncorroborated.

Sarason grappled with this in his report.

“​​In these unique circumstances, there does not appear to be any direct precedent for how to analyze what weight, if any, I should give the anonymous letters generally,” the special master wrote.

He compared the letters to “information provided by an anonymous tipster” and noted that they included accurate, specific details. But he didn’t have enough evidence to determine that the anonymous writer was credible, so the special master decided to consider the letters only as context in situations where other evidence could confirm their allegations.

The report didn’t determine who the anonymous writer was, but Sarason did consider at least one suspect.

At least three witnesses testified that they believed attorney Tara George had authored the letters, according to the report. George testified that she didn’t write the letters and “invoked her right against self-incrimination with respect to any face-to-face confrontations with ADA Butler or any other employee of the Bristol County District Attorney’s Office.”

“While I find much of Attorney George’s testimony not to be credible, there is insufficient evidence for me to conclusively find that she indeed wrote the anonymous letters,” Sarason wrote.

George testified that she didn’t personally know of the affair, but she heard about the rumors from her fiancé, attorney Frank Ribeiro. Ribeiro testified that he heard from other lawyers around New Bedford that Darnbrough and Butler were “cuddled up at the bar” at a Recovery Court party. But the lawyers Ribeiro named testified in the inquiry denying that they had personally seen any inappropriate behavior.

George did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday. Ribeiro could not immediately be reached for comment.

Judge and prosecutor met outside formal court proceedings, but not improperly

The anonymous letters accused Darnbrough and Butler of inappropriately coordinating on cases.

They portrayed a cozy relationship between the judge and prosecutor, with Darnbrough assigning himself to court sessions where Butler was working, and deferring to Butler rather than acting as an independent adjudicator. The allegations, if true, could have tainted thousands of criminal cases.

Sarason systematically evaluated eight different allegations about Butler and Darnbrough’s interactions, both in and out of court. He found none suggested the existence of an inappropriate relationship.

There was “insufficient evidence” that Darnbrough was intentionally assigning himself to sessions with Butler, the special master found. He evaluated court records showing they were in the same court session between seven and eleven days each month from March to August 2023.

“While eleven days a month in a four-courtroom courthouse may seem excessive, this fact standing alone is not enough for me to find any impropriety,” Sarason wrote.

He found no evidence to support that Darnbrough and Butler coordinated on cases that hadn’t yet gone to trial. The judge and prosecutor denied the allegation in their testimony. 

Several witnesses, including court staff and a defense attorney, said they did not notice Darnbrough “favoring” Butler. One probation officer said Darnbrough showed a “particular bias” toward Butler, but also “somewhat inconsistently” testified that she saw no favoritism.

Darnbrough provided court records showing he ruled against Butler “in a number of cases.”

The letters alleged that Butler was in Darnbrough’s office “with the door closed, more frequently than other attorneys, and after official courthouse hours.” Sarason found that some court staff did believe Butler was meeting with Darnbrough “too frequently.”

It’s common for prosecutors to meet with judges in their office, which lawyers call the judge’s “lobby,” the report said. Sarason found no evidence that the door was ever closed during any of Darnbrough’s meetings with Butler or other prosecutors. 

Court secretary Lisa Amaral, whose desk was close to Darnbrough’s lobby, testified that she noticed Butler was there more often than other prosecutors. She said she could hear some of their conversations, including personal topics like their weekend plans.

When Amaral told Darnbrough about the rumors of an affair, he responded with “something to the effect of ‘don’t be silly,’” the secretary testified. Darnbrough said he remembered the conversation differently, but Sarason credited Amaral’s retelling.

Amaral told District Court Judge Teresa Lamarre, who then spoke to Darnbrough.

“After this conversation, it seemed that ADA Butler spent less time in Judge Darnbrough’s lobby,” Sarason wrote. “Judge Darnbrough explained that ‘[e]verbody spent less time’ in his lobby, not just ADA Butler.”

As for meetings outside of court, Sarason found that Darnbrough and Butler were both at events described in the anonymous letters.

They went out for drinks with participants of a mock trial program. Darnbrough took the Recovery Court team out to dinner at the now-closed Carmine’s restaurant for the holidays. The special master found no evidence of inappropriate behavior at either event.

Darnbrough attended Butler’s surprise 30th birthday party, but Butler did not personally invite him and didn’t even know he was there, Sarason found.

Darnbrough and Butler did have drinks together at “the 222 bar,” an apparent reference to the bar on the ground floor of the Harbor Hotel on Union Street in New Bedford. But the judge apparently “showed up unexpectedly,” according to Darnbrough and Butler’s testimony. 

Darnbrough testified that Butler had mentioned she was planning to meet with another prosecutor for drinks after work that day, and Darnbrough said he might “pass by” to see how that other prosecutor was doing. A court officer was there at the bar and took a picture of the three.

Sarason wrote that it was “​​surprising” that Darnbrough would show up to these events uninvited, but those two instances alone weren’t evidence of an inappropriate relationship. 

Appellant’s lawyer objects to findings about bar encounter

McKenna, the lawyer representing the appellant Pascual-Santana, disputed the special master’s findings about the meeting at the 222 bar. He raised doubts about whether the other prosecutor was actually present.

In his written objection, McKenna pointed to testimony about a photo of the encounter that a court officer sent to his supervisor, which was allegedly taken in secret and which they both deleted.

The court officers testified that the photo showed “several people” at the bar with Darnbrough and Butler, but neither officer could identify any other court employees in the photo, McKenna wrote — none said the other prosecutor was in the picture.

McKenna called part of one officer’s testimony a “credibility-free tale” because the officer said he had taken the picture not because of the alleged affair, but out of concern for Darnbrough’s safety in that part of the city. The bar is on Union Street, an area that Darnbrough testified is not a “rough part of town.”

According to the objection, New Bedford District Court Clerk Magistrate Peter J. Thomas testified that he saw a photo of Darnbrough, “casually dressed, sitting at a bar” alone with Butler — not with a second prosecutor. This testimony wasn’t in the special master’s report.

“Clerk Thomas’ credible testimony thus strongly supported the conclusion that, by sitting alone together at a bar, Judge Darnbrough and the prosecutor created the appearance of impropriety,” McKenna wrote.

McKenna wrote that Butler told investigators in the Trial Court investigation that Darnbrough was not at the bar, contradicting her testimony during the special master’s investigation.

Text message evidence and inconsistent testimony leaves gaps in inquiry

Sarason did not find evidence that the judge and prosecutor texted each other regularly. But he found that Darnbrough and Butler gave inconsistent answers about how and when they texted each other.

According to notes from the Trial Court investigation, Darnbrough said he did text with Butler. But Darnbrough denied this during the special master’s investigation. 

“I do not find Judge Darnbrough’s explanation persuasive,” Sarason wrote. 

The special master cited the judge’s evolving testimony, from a “fervent denial” to “claiming that he had no memory of texting ADA Butler but if he had done so, it would have been administrative in nature and not personal.”

When Trial Court investigators asked to see Darnbrough’s texts in 2023, the judge told them he had deleted all his messages “because he was ‘so pissed off,’” according to investigative notes. Darnbrough denied this during the special master’s inquiry, saying he “routinely delete[s] text messages from people, and that’s it.”

Sarason found inconsistencies in how the judge described his deletion habits.

“He testified that he did not have a regular routine for deleting text messages, but then later testified that he in fact deleted text messages every other day,” the special master wrote.

Darnbrough and Butler were the sole judge and prosecutor assigned to New Bedford’s Recovery Court, a special court session for defendants struggling with substance abuse.

There was a group text that included at least some members of the Recovery Court team, and the report found that “texting was the established system for members of the Recovery Court Team to communicate with one another.”

Darnbrough testified he left the group text after a few weeks because he found it annoying. Sarason wrote that this was inconsistent with notes from the Trial Court investigation, which said the judge was not in the thread. Darnbrough’s testimony was also inconsistent with testimony from a court staffer who said the thread included the entire Recovery Court team.

Butler testified that she “never” texted with Darnbrough. But “when confronted with the notes from the Trial Court’s investigation, she conceded that she ‘might occasionally text him, and . . . it might have been through the group message,’” Sarason wrote.

Cell phone data from the judge and prosecutor was entered as evidence. Darnbrough’s phone showed at least two texts exchanged between him and Butler by October 25, 2023. Butler’s phone showed no texts.

“It is concerning that the evaluations of Judge Darnbrough’s and ADA Butler’s phones are inconsistent, and nothing in the testimony or the posthearing briefing explains the inconsistency,” Sarason wrote.

Still, Sarason said there wasn’t enough evidence to conclude that Darnbrough and Butler were texting to inappropriately coordinate on cases as the anonymous letters alleged.

What was said at the hearing

Thursday’s hearing at the Supreme Judicial Court in Boston was lighthearted at times. There was a sense of relief in the courtroom among the lawyers and Justice Serge Georges Jr., who had appointed the special master.

They thanked Sarason for his diligent work as they talked about next steps.

McKenna wanted to call experts to testify on discrepancies in the cell phone data extracted from Darnbrough and Butler’s phones and their testimony about their texts. He pointed to records from the Trial Court’s investigation that mentioned Darnbrough’s “admissions of texting with ADA on personal cell.”

In his written objection, McKenna said the discrepancies cut into Darnbrough and Butler’s credibility, undermining the special master’s smaller findings resulting in the major finding that there was no inappropriate relationship.

“Rather, at best, the subsidiary findings would support the conclusion that there was insufficient evidence to support the conclusion that there was such a relationship,” he wrote.

Lawyers for the DA’s office, Butler, and Darnbrough pushed back. They said the special master’s report should be the end of the extensive inquiry.

Michelle Peirce, representing Butler, said the phones had already been analyzed by experts, though she didn’t go into detail. She said the differences between the extracted data were “inevitable” because the data was harvested a year apart.

“We have different settings on our phones, and one year later it would be freakish, frankly, that there would be the same information on separate phones,” she said.

Justice Georges sounded sympathetic to the arguments pushing back on the need for more evidence.

“We would be here until next year if we let you run [the investigation] how you wanted it to go,” he said, half jokingly, to McKenna.

“Truer words have never been spoken,” McKenna responded.

The justice denied McKenna’s motion that would have allowed him to call the cell phone experts in the appeal, relying on the special master’s “thorough and exhaustive” investigation finding that there was no inappropriate relationship.

“We don’t care whether judges and ADAs who see each other five days a week have a cordial relationship,” Justice Georges said. “Who cares about that? What we’re all here for is to find whether something crossed the line.”

The justice left the door open for McKenna to file for expert testimony and other fact-finding evidence in the trial court where Pascual-Santana’s case was originally heard. McKenna said he plans to do just that before pressing on with his appeal in the higher court.

What evidence will and won’t be public is still to be determined by court

Butler’s lawyers filed a motion before the hearing to have everyone in the case destroy copies of the anonymous letters they received as part of the investigation. They asked the court and special master to hold onto their copies, but keep “those vile and false letters” impounded so the public couldn’t see them.

“There is no reason to allow these repulsive and false letters to be disseminated to the public in this closely watched matter when they are anonymous, lack veracity, and are immaterial to the Court’s findings,” the filing argued.

Peirce went further at the hearing, saying that the special master’s conclusions that the letters lack credibility means no valuable information would be kept from the public by impounding or destroying the letters.

Jennifer Sowa, on behalf of the DA’s office, said prosecutors couldn’t destroy the letters because they are part of an ongoing criminal investigation into their dissemination. But Sowa backed Butler’s request to keep the letters out of public view.

Justice Georges said he plans to make the evidence gathered in the investigation public and gave lawyers 60 days to request redactions to protect sensitive portions of the evidence. 

“It was always intended to have the public know what we’re doing and why,” he said.

Until the redactions are finalized, a protective order on the evidence in the proceeding will stay in place.

Email Grace Ferguson at gferguson@newbedfordlight.org

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