Plymouth District Attorney waited to act on allegations against top prosecutor
Plymouth District Attorney Timothy Cruz waited for six months to take action after an allegation was made that his chief deputy, Assistant District Attorney Frank Middleton Jr., groped a female subordinate during a 2014 conference, The Boston Globe reports.
Documents filed in a federal lawsuit obtained by the Globe revealed that Cruz first learned of the incident from his secretary a week or two after it allegedly occurred. According to the Globe, Cruz said in sworn testimony that he could not explain why he waited six months before asking Middleton about the incident.
Around that time, Cruz hired an outside attorney to investigate the alleged incident, according to the Globe. The investigator learned of a second allegation and informed Cruz over the phone in March 2015. But according to the Globe, in his testimony, Cruz admitted he did not read the report from the investigator.
“I haven’t read the report,” Cruz said. “It’s still in the envelope.”
Middleton resigned in April 2015, nearly a year after Cruz learned of the first allegation. According to the Globe, it is unclear whether his resignation was directly related to the allegations of sexual misconduct.
Read the full report at the Globe.
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