Rachael Rollins to be sworn in as US Attorney for Massachusetts on Monday

Rachael Rollins will be sworn in as U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts on Monday and is bringing over a well-known area lawyer who’d previously sought the top job to serve as her number two.

Rollins, currently the Suffolk County district attorney, sent Gov. Charlie Baker a letter today, informing him of her intent to be sworn in then and immediately take the new office.

In the letter, Rollins wrote that serving as Suffolk County DA was “the greatest honor of my professional career.” She wrote to Baker that he has an “important and impactful decision to make” in choosing an interim replacement to serve out her term.

She’s been Suffolk DA since 2019, when she became the first Black woman to be the top prosecutor in the county, which covers Boston, Revere, Winthrop and Chelsea. She’ll be the first Black woman to be the U.S. attorney, which is the top federal law-enforcement position in the state. Her office will move across downtown, from One Bulfinch Place near Government Center to the top of the Moakley federal courthouse in the Seaport.

Baker hasn’t said who he’ll name as her replacement. The letter says her first assistant DA, Danny Mulhern, will also resign on Monday.

Joshua Levy, who’s been working for Ropes & Gray, will become Rollins’ first assistant U.S. attorney, her top deputy.

He’s a former local and federal prosecutor, having started as a prosecutor in the Middlesex County District Attorney’s Office and then worked for the U.S. attorney’s economic crimes unit.

Rollins, the current Suffolk County district attorney, confirmed to the Herald that Levy would be her first assistant, calling him “supremely qualified and highly regarded.” He couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

The Herald first reported a year ago that Levy, an involved Democrat, would be seeking the appointment to U.S. Attorney under new President Biden. Biden, with input from both U.S. senators from Massachusetts, eventually chose Rollins, though Levy was seen as a finalist, too.

Rollins faced an unusually fraught confirmation. U.S. attorney appointments usually sail right through the Senate, but Republicans sought to make an example out of the progressive and sometimes controversial Rollins. The Senate ultimately confirmed her on Dec. 8.

The outspoken Rollins is no stranger to a mixed bag of headlines. She began with the list of charges that her office generally wouldn’t prosecute, including trespassing, shoplifting and resisting arrest — crimes she said just criminalize poverty and mental illness.

In her nomination push, Rollins did get support from local police chiefs and some Republican former U.S. attorneys. She’s also mixed it up with cop unions, who have been critical both about her rhetoric and the do-not-prosecute list. Rollins also has taken some flak from the left for seeking to keep violent criminals in jail during the pandemic, when some activists wanted to let most people out.

She also faced — and was ultimately cleared in — an ethics complaint a year ago after she got into an alleged road-rage incident with another driver in a parking lot, and then ranted at reporters in her driveway afterward.

In her letter to Baker, Rollins wrote, “My two primary objectives as District Attorney have always been to keep Suffolk County safe and to improve the relationship between communities most impacted by crime and members of law enforcement.”

This is a developing story … 

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/3JVM6dA