Jumping DA’s ship
Multiple top staffers have departed, sources say
Suffolk District Attorney Kevin Hayden has lost multiple top staffers over the past month, with his general counsel, first assistant and chief of staff all departing, according to sources.
The exodus began with General Counsel Spencer Lord, whose actual employment status remains unclear as he’s still on the payroll, two sources with direct knowledge of the situation told the Herald.
But Lord, whose job effectively was to be the lawyer for the office, hasn’t been doing work since a Feb. 14 meeting with Hayden and the DA’s department of human resources, and he’s only been back since to pick up items from his office, sources said.
The next day, First Assistant DA Kevin Mullen resigned. The first assistant, essentially the No. 2 in the office and in charge of day-to-day operations, had begun to butt heads with Hayden — and was frustrated with what went down with Lord the previous day, sources said.
They were followed by Padraic Lydon, Hayden’s chief of staff, resigning not long after, per sources.
Contacted for this story, Mullen acknowledged he’s no longer with the office but declined to comment further. Lord also declined to comment, and Lydon couldn’t be reached.
Hayden’s spokesman Jim Borghesani declined to comment at all on the trio or any “personnel matters,” including questions about whether they’re currently employed.
As for the operations of the office, Borghesani said, “Everything is being handled.”
The office put out a press release Feb. 15 — the day Mullen resigned — touting a raft of new hires, including a new 2nd Assistant DA and a new “chief legal counsel.”
Hayden at the time said in an accompanying statement, “I’m extremely fortunate to have such an accomplished group of professionals helping me to achieve the many objectives I have for the office, including greater community engagement, continued emphasis on firearm crimes and juvenile and young adult alternative resolution initiatives, databased prevention and intervention strategies, and conviction and sentencing integrity.”
Sources said there’s nothing catastrophic going on in the office — this isn’t to do with any shoe about to drop in a federal look into the way the office, specifically Hayden and Mullen, handled a Transit Police case, for instance. Hayden’s office said it hasn’t received anything from the feds on that matter.
But rather the shakeup involved several slow-burn issues that have generally caused strife among the upper management and the office writ large.
Chief among them is the case of Robert Foxworth, a wrongly convicted man who had his conviction vacated in 2021. Complaints from Foxworth, who was freed in 2020, have led to Hayden, at the suggestion of Lord and Mullen, suspending longtime homicide prosecutor Mark Lee as the office commissions an outside investigation — a move that’s led to tension in an office where Lee still has many supporters.
By the time of the departures, Hayden and Mullen — “the Kevins,” as some call them — had been increasingly at loggerheads over an assortment of issues and management decisions. And Lord, as is typical for general counsels, was the person who had to deliver bad news to Hayden and nix ideas that didn’t pass legal muster, sources said.
“Sometimes he — anybody — has to be told ‘no,’ and he doesn’t like that,” one source directly familiar said of Hayden.
“He’s got some management problems,” another source said, adding that Hayden, in good faith, tried to get involved in every issue and was loathe to delegate. “That Jimmy Carter management style just doesn’t work.”
Hayden’s office declined to comment further on the state of the office or the DA’s management abilities.
Hayden was inaugurated in January for his first full term as DA, though he’d been in the position already for a year following his appointment. Formerly the head of the Sex Offender Registry Board, Hayden received the appointment from then-Gov. Charlie Baker after then-DA Rachael Rollins took the position of U.S. Attorney for
Massachusetts.
Hayden, a first-time candidate for elected office, quickly announced his intentions to run for a full term, with Boston City Councilor Ricardo Arroyo also jumping in, setting up a dynamic of the more politically left Arroyo versus the more centrist Hayden.
After a sleepy spring, the DA contest then devolved into as nasty a race as the area’s seen in recent memory, with both candidates hurling accusations of wrongdoing at the other. Hayden took flak over the aforementioned Transit Police case, where he was accused of brooming an investigation against an officer who Transit Police department heads wanted prosecuted. Hayden has said the case was never closed and that he never acted inappropriately.
And Arroyo came under fire for the fact that he as a teen was investigated following an allegation of sexual assault.
Arroyo, who was never charged and maintains that he did nothing wrong, fired back allegations that Hayden illegally leaked sealed juvenile records to the Boston Globe for political gain.
Eventually, Hayden emerged victorious in the September primary and didn’t face an opponent in the November general election, winning a fouryear term that started two months ago.
The sources who were critical of Hayden did have good things to say about the office overall — particularly work under Hayden to build up sexual violence and other special-victims units.
“It’s a good place to be a lawyer,” one source said. “Hell, if you’re going to be prosecuted, it’s as good and fair a place as any for that.”