Update, September 18, 2026. The charge itself contains the Giles element. Count One alleges Farwell killed Birchmore to prevent communication to law enforcement, which is the same intent the forfeiture doctrine requires. Full preview in our trial report.
Sandra Birchmore will testify at the trial of the man accused of killing her. Not in person, but through her journals, her text messages and her social media posts, which United States District Judge Denise Casper ruled admissible on Wednesday at a pretrial hearing in the federal murder case against former Stoughton police officer Matthew Farwell. Jury selection begins in the first week of October and the trial is expected to run about three weeks.
Her cousin, Barbara Wright, standing outside the South Boston courthouse, said what the ruling means in plain terms: “It is justice for somebody who can’t speak, and I’m trying to be her voice as best I can.”
The legal path by which a dead woman’s private writings reach a jury is narrow, and it contains a genuine oddity that is worth understanding. In some circumstances a judge can admit a murder victim’s out-of-court statements only after finding that the defendant killed her, which is the question the jury has not yet answered. This piece explains the hearsay rules at work, the doctrine that makes the finding possible, and what the defense was arguing against.
The case
Birchmore was 23 and pregnant when she was found dead in her Canton apartment in February 2021. Her death was initially treated as a suicide. Farwell, who had been a Stoughton police officer, was indicted federally in 2024 on charges that he killed her and staged the scene. Prosecutors allege he groomed her for sex beginning when she was 15 and involved in the Stoughton police mentorship program. He has pleaded not guilty and is presumed innocent.
We track the case and its dates in our trial tracker.
Why her own words are a legal problem at all
Because of the rule against hearsay. A statement made outside of court, offered to prove the truth of what it asserts, is generally inadmissible, and the reason is the inability to cross-examine the person who said it. A journal entry cannot be questioned. Its author cannot be asked whether she was exaggerating, misremembering or writing for an audience.
That rule is why the defense argued, according to reporting on the earlier round of this fight, that admitting the material would be tantamount to admitting hearsay, and that allowing it would stretch existing law and suggest to the jury that Farwell killed her to silence her. That last objection is the sharp one, and it identifies precisely what is unusual here.
There are ordinarily two ways such material gets in.
The first route: state of mind
Federal Rule of Evidence 803(3) admits a statement of the declarant’s then-existing state of mind, including intent, plan, motive, design, mental feeling, pain or bodily health. It excludes a statement of memory or belief offered to prove the fact remembered or believed, which is the limit that does most of the work.
The distinction matters enormously in a case where the defense theory is suicide. A journal entry in which Birchmore describes how she felt, what she planned, or what she feared is admissible under 803(3) to show her state of mind. An entry in which she recounts something Farwell did is a statement of memory offered to prove the thing happened, and 803(3) does not reach it.
Where a victim’s mental state is itself contested, as it is when the government says homicide and the defense says suicide, her contemporaneous descriptions of her own feelings and intentions become central rather than peripheral. Reporting indicates the judge is also allowing discussion of Birchmore’s mental health history, which is the other side of that coin and which the defense will use.
The second route: forfeiture by wrongdoing
This is the doctrine the defense was fighting, and it is the one with the strange shape.
Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(6) admits a statement offered against a party that wrongfully caused, or acquiesced in wrongfully causing, the declarant’s unavailability as a witness, and did so intending that result. The principle is older than the rule: a defendant who silences a witness cannot then object that the witness cannot be cross-examined. The Supreme Court described it in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004), as a doctrine that extinguishes confrontation claims on equitable grounds.
There is a limit, and it is the key to this case. In Giles v. California, 554 U.S. 353 (2008), the Court held that forfeiture applies only where the defendant intended to prevent the witness from testifying. A defendant who kills someone does not automatically forfeit the objection. The government must show the killing was designed, at least in part, to keep her from talking.
That is why a prosecution alleging a staged suicide fits the doctrine better than most homicides do. Staging is itself evidence of an intent to prevent an investigation, and an allegation that a police officer killed a pregnant woman and arranged the scene to look self-inflicted carries the silencing purpose within it. It is also why the defense argued the theory is prejudicial, since the doctrine’s premise, once the jury senses it, is the conclusion the trial is supposed to reach.
The judge resolves that preliminary question under Rule 104(a) by a preponderance of the evidence, and she is not bound by the rules of evidence in doing so. The jury is never told the finding was made. It simply hears the journals.
What the government still has to do with them
Admissibility is not weight. Prosecutor Brian A. Fogerty told the court at the earlier hearing that Birchmore’s statements would be supported by other evidence including medical records and witness testimony, and that is the necessary work. Journals are powerful and also vulnerable: they are one-sided, they were written without any expectation of scrutiny, and they cannot be tested.
The defense will attack them exactly there. Expect argument that entries reflect a young woman’s distress rather than a factual record, that the mental health history the judge is allowing explains the writing, and that the absence of any legal action by Birchmore against Farwell during her life cuts against the government’s reading. Reporting indicates the defense made a version of that last point in opposing admission.
Why this is in federal court
A killing is ordinarily a state crime. Farwell was indicted federally, which reflects a charging theory built on his position: a killing committed by a person acting under color of law, or in connection with the sexual exploitation alleged to have begun when Birchmore was a minor, reaches federal jurisdiction in ways an ordinary homicide does not. Federal court also brings the Federal Rules of Evidence, which is why this ruling is governed by 803(3) and 804(b)(6) rather than their Massachusetts counterparts. Massachusetts recognizes both doctrines, with its own formulations.
What to watch
Jury selection in the first week of October before Judge Casper. Whether the defense seeks interlocutory relief on the evidentiary rulings, which is difficult before judgment. How the court instructs the jury on the limited purpose of state-of-mind evidence, since an instruction that the jury may consider a journal for her feelings but not for the truth of what it describes is among the harder limiting instructions to give and to follow. And the hundreds of exhibits the parties listed at Wednesday’s hearing, which is a signal of how long three weeks will feel.
Common questions
Can a murder victim’s journal be used as evidence?
Yes, through recognized hearsay exceptions. Federal Rule of Evidence 803(3) admits statements of the writer’s then-existing state of mind, and Rule 804(b)(6) admits statements against a party who wrongfully made the declarant unavailable, intending that result.
What is forfeiture by wrongdoing?
A rule that a defendant who wrongfully prevents a witness from testifying forfeits the right to object that the statements cannot be cross-examined. Under Giles v. California, 554 U.S. 353 (2008), it applies only where the defendant intended to prevent the testimony.
Does the judge have to decide he killed her to admit the journals?
For the forfeiture route, the judge makes a preliminary finding by a preponderance of the evidence under Rule 104(a). It is not a verdict, the jury is not told of it, and the jury decides guilt independently under the beyond a reasonable doubt standard.
When does the trial start?
Jury selection is set for the first week of October 2026, with the trial expected to last about three weeks.
Why is this case in federal court?
The charges are federal, which brings the Federal Rules of Evidence. Massachusetts recognizes comparable hearsay doctrines but this ruling was made under the federal rules.
The September 17, 2026 rulings and the hearing account as reported by WHDH, MassLive and WCVB; Barbara Wright’s quotation from WHDH. The earlier hearing, the defense hearsay argument and prosecutor Brian A. Fogerty’s response as reported by the Boston Globe, September 1, 2026. Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004), and Giles v. California, 554 U.S. 353 (2008), verified against CourtListener. Federal Rules of Evidence 104(a), 803(3) and 804(b)(6) described from the rules themselves. The court’s written rulings were not obtained, and the specific rule relied on for each category of evidence has not been publicly stated. Matthew Farwell has pleaded not guilty and is presumed innocent. General information, not legal advice.