Senate panel taps firm for Rosenberg probe
The state Senate is turning to the international firm Hogan Lovells, including a former prosecutor who helped convict ex-Speaker of the House Salvatore F. DiMasi, to lead its probe into former Senate President Stanley C. Rosenberg.
The Senate’s Committee on Ethics yesterday announced it had tapped the firm, which is based in Washington, D.C., and London, a day ahead of its self-imposed two-week deadline to find an outside investigator to conduct the investigation into Rosenberg in the wake of sexual assault allegations against his husband.
Three attorneys will head the investigation: Anthony E. Fuller, Jody L. Newman and Natashia Tidwell. Fuller, a former prosecutor in Boston’s U.S. Attorney’s Office, was part of the team that scored a conviction of DiMasi in his 2011 bribery trial.
Tidwell, also a former prosecutor, is a former internal investigations detective for the Cambridge Police Department, where she was the first female lieutenant in the department’s history, according to her biography.
Lawmakers did not offer a concrete timeline for when the firm expects to finish its investigation, nor did they immediately say how much they expect it to cost. Senators on the six-person committee, including chairman Michael Rodrigues, either declined further comment or did not return calls last night.
“We have asked that the special investigator submit that report as soon as practicable, without sacrificing thoroughness or attention to detail,” the committee said in a joint statement.
The outside probe will hone in on whether Rosenberg violated any Senate rules in connection with allegations published by the Boston Globe that his husband, Bryon Hefner, sexually assaulted or harassed four men while boasting of his influence.
Rosenberg, who stepped down from his post earlier this month, had claimed nearly three years ago when he assumed the presidency that he had placed a “firewall” between his husband and the Senate after Hefner bragged about the sway he held over the body’s business.