Defense attorney accused of witness intimidation in Brockton, Wareham cases
Maureen Boyle
A Fall River defense attorney is accused of posing as a district attorney's office employee then calling witnesses, including police officers, and telling them not to come to court.
Edward G. Kelly, 51, of Mansfield, pleaded innocent Friday afternoon in Brockton Superior Court before Judge Maureen B. Hogan to three counts of witness intimidation and one count of disruption to the court. He was released in lieu of $500 bail.
He surrendered at the court after learning he had been indicted by a Plymouth County grand jury.
The charges stem from operating while under the influence cases in Brockton and Wareham district courts this year.
He is accused of calling witnesses, saying he was a victim-witness advocate for the Plymouth County District Attorney's Office and telling them they weren't needed to testify in cases. In all of the cases, he was the attorney for the defendant.
The indictment comes a month after Kelly won an acquittal in a Fall River gang murder trial. In that case, Leonard Gonsalves was acquitted of shooting a rival gang member to death on a Fall River street three years ago.
A special prosecutor from the Bristol County District Attorney's Office, William McCauley, is handling the case for Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz to avoid the appearance of conflict.
McCauley declined to discuss the case, noting it was an ongoing matter.
Kelly's attorney, Robert Galibois, said his client pled not guilty to the charges "and he looks forward to addressing the matter in court."
The state Board of Bar Overseers will be keeping track of the case as it moves through the courts, said Constance Vecchione, bar counsel.
"An indictment is not a conviction," she said. "We will monitor the court case."
Kelly has received two public reprimands from the board since 2001.
In 2001, he was given a public reprimand for crossing out an entry on a court docket sheet so his client wouldn't be found in default and the client's mother wouldn't forfeit the $1,000 bail posted.
The district attorney at the time had agreed to postpone the case to another date where the bail issue would be discussed. However, the docket didn't reflect that when he went to court so Kelly crossed out the "default/warrant" notation, according to the reprimand order.
"He was not motivated by personal gain and no ultimate harm resulted," the board noted in its decision at the time.
A second public reprimand order was entered in 2005 for failure to investigate a claim of employment discrimination property, failure to handle the claim and not letting the client know about filing deadlines in the case.