By Laura Crimaldi and Richard Weir
The Boston Herald
BOSTON — Yesterday’s federal indictment of two jakes and a clerk on charges they attempted to pump up pensions fired up the mayor and fire commissioner, who warned the ax is going to fall on other corrupt firefighters.
“I’m glad that the federal government has joined the fight,” said Fire Commissioner Rod Fraser.
Mayor Thomas M. Menino told the Herald that more cases will follow. “I don’t know how widespread it is,” he added, but the U.S. Attorney is probing “several cases.”
Yesterday, bodybuilder Albert Arroyo, 47, and former district chief James Famolare, 65, were hit with multiple charges of mail fraud for accusations they sought to bilk the city by claiming career-ending injuries to obtain accidental disability retirement pensions, acting United States Attorney Michael K. Loucks said.
A third Boston Fire Department employee, head clerk Erika Boylan, 31, has been charged with one count of perjury on allegations she lied to a federal grand jury investigating the matter, Loucks said.
Arroyo, a former BFD fire prevention officer, is accused of falsely claiming that he was permanently disabled by a March 2008 fall at a Jamaica Plain fire station, Loucks said.
Two months later, Arroyo was training for a bodybuilding competition, in which he competed on May 3, 2008. He faces two counts of mail fraud.
Famolare, of Billerica, is accused of falsely claiming he suffered a career-ending injury while moving a file box while he was acting as a deputy chief of personnel in June 2006.
Boylan, who was placed on paid leave yesterday, is accused of lying to a federal grand jury about delaying the submission of accidental disability retirement forms at the request of firefighters, Loucks said.
Copyright 2009 Boston Herald Inc.