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‘Need to get more information’: Healey declines to call for Sheriff Tompkins’s resignation
“The allegations are certainly serious, and no one in elected positions should ever use or abuse their power in an unlawful way,” Healey told reporters.
In the wake of the Suffolk County sheriff’s arrest on extortion charges, Governor Maura Healey reportedly declined to call for her fellow Democrat’s resignation.
Sheriff Steven Tompkins was arrested Friday in Florida after a federal grand jury indicted him on two counts of extortion under color of official right. He’s accused of extorting $50,000 from an executive with an unnamed national cannabis retailer that was seeking to open a dispensary in Boston.
Healey said Monday that she hadn’t “gotten all the information” about Tompkins’s arrest and indictment, according to The Boston Globe. As attorney general, she endorsed Tompkins for the sheriff’s role in 2022.
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“The allegations are certainly serious, and no one in elected positions should ever use or abuse their power in an unlawful way,” Healey told reporters, per the Globe. “I need to know more about this. I need to get more information.”
Her office did not return a request for clarification on her comments Tuesday evening.
Tompkins has been sheriff in Suffolk County since 2013, where he oversees the correctional facilities. He’s his own political powerhouse in Boston, giving Boston’s Mayor Michelle Wu an endorsement as a top Black elected official and law enforcement leader. He was elected to a six-year term in 2022.
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Attorney General Andrea Campbell, who with Healey could file a petition with the Supreme Judicial Court for his removal, did not return a request for comment Tuesday evening. An SJC decision from 1994 indicates that the governor can’t suspend an indicted county sheriff, but the court has “broad authority” to remove a sheriff.
Company extorted is likely Ascend, reports say
The cannabis company involved is Ascend Mass, part of Ascend Cannabis, according to multiple reports, including the Globe. When seeking to open a retail dispensary in Boston in 2019, the company worked with Tompkins’s office to help screen and refer graduates of its re-entry program to apply to work there, according to prosecutors.
As the company’s license was being processed, federal prosecutors allege, Tompkins began pressuring the executive to sell him stock before the company went public. He allegedly told the executive that he “wanted to get in on the stock so [he] could make some cannabis money.”
“After being initially rebuffed in his request to buy (the company’s) stock before the IPO, Tompkins increased his pressure” reminding the executive that he had helped him acquire the license and would need his help for subsequent renewals, according to charging documents.
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Prosecutors said his $50,000 purchase of shares appreciated to about $138,403. When the value of his shares later decreased and his stake dipped below his initial investment, Tompkins allegedly demanded — and received — a full refund of $50,000, Boston.com previously reported. He allegedly disguised the refund with memos like “loan repayment” and “(company) expense.”
Previously, Tompkins paid a $12,300 civil penalty in 2023 after officials said he created a paid position in his department for his niece so she could live in-state and help him with childcare. He also paid a $2,500 fine in 2015 for invoking his position when he asked store owners to remove his political opponent’s campaign signs.
No attorney information for Tompkins was filed in federal court.
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