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North Andover officer shot by colleague argues judge is biased and should be removed
Lawyers for Kelsey Fitzsimmons allege that Judge Kathleen McCarthy-Neyman has “unclean hands.”
Kelsey Fitzsimmons, the North Andover police officer who was shot by a colleague last June, filed a motion Monday in the hopes of getting the judge overseeing her trial to step aside.
Judge Kathleen McCarthy-Neyman has shown that she is biased against Fitzsimmons, lawyers for the North Andover officer wrote in a recusal motion that was filed in Essex Superior Court.
McCarthy-Neyman made a “subjective personal” finding that Fitzsimmons is dangerous and has a vested interest in the outcome of the case, Fitzsimmons’s lawyers argue. They also point to alleged interactions between McCarthy-Neyman and an assistant probation officer.
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McCarthy-Neyman came to the probation officer’s office in September, a day before a hearing regarding the case, to ask about Fitzsimmons’s compliance with the terms of her probation. The officer told McCarthy-Neyman that Fitzsimmons had not violated the terms of her release and that he had had email correspondence with Fitzsimmons’s lawyers. These emails are “favorable to the defense,” and the officer said that they were likely to be attached to a motion for relief. McCarthy-Neyman grew upset and abruptly left the office, according to the motion.
“There was no legal justification for the court visiting his office and conducting its own investigation outside the presence of defense counsel, off the record, and without subsequent disclosure to the defense,” Fitzsimmons’s lawyers wrote.
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Fitzsimmons was briefly released during this time on conditions including that she submit to regular alcohol testing. But the injuries Fitzsimmons sustained in the shooting prevented her from safely breathing into the testing device, and McCarthy-Neyman ruled that Fitzsimmons had to return to jail because she could not comply.
During this hearing, McCarthy-Neyman “vilified” the probation officer, walked off the bench when Fitzsimmons’s lawyers were addressing the court, and was “visibly shaking and angry,” according to the recusal motion.
McCarthy-Neyman has declined comment on the allegations, a court spokesperson told The Boston Globe.
Fitzsimmons was shot during an incident that occurred in late June, when three other North Andover police officers arrived at her home to serve her a restraining order. She was on leave at the time after giving birth earlier in 2025. She has issued public comments about struggling with postpartum depression.
The restraining order was filed by Fitzsimmons’s former fiancé, the father of her child. Her erratic behavior caused him to fear that she could be a danger to herself, him, and the baby, he wrote in an affidavit.
There are two contradicting accounts of what led to the shooting. The NAPD officer who shot Fitzsimmons said that he did so while fearing for his life after she abruptly pulled a gun from a hidden location and tried to shoot him. Fitzsimmons maintains that she never aimed the weapon at the other officer, but instead made a “halfhearted attempt” to take her own life.
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She was hospitalized for 53 days as she recovered from the shooting. After McCarthy-Neyman ordered that she return to jail in September, Fitzsimmons remained in custody until late December. By then, her injuries had healed to the point where she could comply with alcohol testing.
In the motion, Fitzsimmons’s lawyers allege that McCarthy-Neyman improperly ordered her held without bail under the state’s dangerousness law. They also said that McCarthy-Neyman was wrong to prohibit Fitzsimmons from seeing her child.
As a North Andover homeowner, McCarthy-Neyman has a “vested interest in the financial security of the town and its reputation,” Fitzsimmons’s lawyers said. The town could be exposed to “substantial financial liability” if Fitzsimmons pursues civil litigation against it. Since any payments could lead to property tax increases, McCarthy-Neyman therefore has “an economic interest” that could be affected by the outcome of the trial and creates a reasonable question of impartiality, they wrote in the motion.
Fitzsimmons faces one charge of assault with a dangerous weapon. A hearing on the recusal motion is set for March 9, and her jury trial is scheduled to begin on March 23.
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