Federal prosecutors called on their star witness to testify Tuesday in the trial of a Fall River police officer accused of covering up excessive force with false reports.
In the trial’s opening arguments, delivered shortly before the witness took the stand, a prosecutor from the U.S. Attorney’s Office said the case would hinge on proving what happened over the course of a single minute inside a holding cell at the Fall River Police Station in December 2020.
Nicholas M. Hoar, a fifth-generation police officer with a lengthy internal affairs file, is accused of striking an uncooperative suspect on the head with a steel baton, opening up a gash that required five stitches to close. The incident unfolded as four police officers moved the suspect, William Harvey, into a holding cell.
“Now there are no videos inside of cell 2, so you won’t get to see for yourself Mr. Harvey getting hit on the head,” Assistant U.S. Attorney John J. Reynolds told the jury, as he set the stage for the prosecution’s key witness, a fellow Fall River police officer willing to pierce what Reynolds called “the blue wall of silence.”
“Jeffrey Maher will take you into that cell,” Reynolds said, “and he will tell you what he saw and tell you what he heard.”
Maher — pronounced “mayor” — initially filed a report claiming the glare on the cell’s transparent door prevented him from seeing what happened inside. He recanted his statements about three weeks later.
“He’ll tell you why he lied,” Reynolds said. “Loyalty to other officers. Loyalty to Officer Hoar’s father. Not wanting to be labeled a rat.”
On the witness stand, Maher told the jury that he had a direct view of Hoar standing near the cell door as Harvey kicked him. Despite Harvey’s aggression, Maher said he and the three other police officers still had the situation under control.
“Harvey was in the cell, Hoar was outside the cell,” Maher said. “They were engaged in this verbal back and forth. All he had to do was slide the door shut.”
Instead, Maher said Hoar grabbed another officer’s baton and walked into the cell to strike Harvey on the head. Maher said the impact sounded like “an aluminum bat hitting a baseball.”
One of the officers standing nearby turned and looked away “as if to unsee what he had seen,” Maher said.
In Maher’s estimation, the incident was a clear violation of the department’s use of force policies, which prohibit baton strikes to parts of the body identified as “red zones”: the head, neck, sternum and spine.
“Red zones are reserved for life and death circumstances,” Maher said, “and all other contact with it is forbidden.”
But Maher was the last of the four police officers to file a report about Harvey’s injuries. He said officers Brendan McNerney and Zachary Vorce had already corroborated Hoar’s account, which made it difficult for him to tell the truth.
“It would be a very bad position for all of us,” Maher said, “and they were brand new officers — good officers — and to save their reputation and their jobs, I lied.”
Defense attorney Leonardo A. Angiulo presented a conflicting account of Harvey’s booking process, consistent with the reports Hoar filed shortly after the incident.
In Hoar’s account, Harvey never received a strike on the head from a baton. Hoar’s reports at the time said he only used the baton to keep Harvey’s arms in place as he guided him into a holding cell. After Harvey kicked him, Hoar said he pushed Harvey away to create a safe distance, causing Harvey to fall and injure his head on the wall.
Prosecutors will continue calling witnesses on Wednesday before the defense gets the chance to introduce its own. Judge Allison D. Burroughs said the jury may begin deliberating as soon as Friday.
