SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – Former West Springfield Police captain, 54-year-old Daniel Spaulding of West Springfield, was sentenced Wednesday afternoon for using his official position for unwarranted privileges.
Spaulding was found guilty of taking more than $17,000 from the West Springfield Police Department’s evidence room and using it for personal purposes, including to pay his mortgage. That verdict came after a five-day trial overseen by Hampden Superior Court Judge Michael Callan.
Judge Callan sentenced Spaulding to one-year probation and waived the fees associated to probation because he has teenage children. Callan wants to see the money used towards getting the teens ready to be adults.
Authorities say Spaulding took the money between May 2016 and May 2017. According to the AG’s office, further investigation revealed Spaulding had replaced all of the missing cash at a later date. He plead not guilty in April of 2018. Spaulding had been suspended from police duty since 2017.
A timeline of Daniel Spaulding:
According to a statement released by Office of Attorney General Maura Healey, Spaulding oversaw the department’s detective bureau and the evidence room from 2011 to 2016. In October of 2016, Spaulding was promoted to administrative captain where he was able to maintain access to the evidence room. In March 2017, West Springfield police conducted an inventory of cash in the evidence room and discovered that $17,611 were missing. In May 2017 the Attorney General’s office interviewed Spaulding about the missing money and reports that he was “not forthcoming” about the missing bags of evidence.
Spaulding allegedly later turned over the missing bags to the Police Department saying that he took them for safekeeping. After conducting an investigation, it was determined that some of the bills in the returned bags were printed after the money had been originally taken by the department. This alerted investigators that the money had been replaced.
Follow the story:
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Spaulding’s case was prosecuted by Chief Trial Counsel Jim O’Brien and Special Assistant Attorney General Jane Tomic, both of AG Healey’s Criminal Bureau. They received assistance from Financial Investigator Jill Petruzziello, Senior Victim Witness Advocate Megan Murphy, and Senior Digital Evidence Analyst James McCoy from the Attorney General’s Digital Evidence Lab. The investigation was conducted by State Police assigned to the AG’s Office with assistance and full cooperation from the West Springfield Police Department and the City of West Springfield.