WORCESTER, Mass. (WWLP) – A former State Senator was charged Friday in connection to allegedly stealing a firearm from an elderly woman and then misleading investigators about the incident.
Attorney General Maura Healey said 46-year-old Dean Tran of Fitchburg was indicted Friday on the following charges:
- Larceny of a Firearm
- Larceny Over $250 from Person +60/Disabled
- Filing an Application for a License to Carry Containing False Information
- Obtaining a Signature by False Pretenses with Intent to Defraud
- Misleading a Police Investigation
- Stealing by Confining or Putting in Fear
According to the Attorney General’s office, Tran allegedly visited the elderly constituent in June of 2019 and used his position as a public official to intimidate the woman into parting with her late husband’s firearms by making her sign a pre-prepared contract and giving her $1,500 in cash for eight firearms.
The Senator was asked to return them the following day. He returned them but then allegedly came back the next morning and forced his way into the woman’s home while she was alone and demanded the key’s to her husband’s gun safe. It is alleged that Tran then stole a Colt .45 that was hidden in the bedroom. The gun was later returned to the woman.
When being interviewed by police about the incident, Tran gave conflicting stories and reasons about the guns including denying any sale, then later producing a sales contract for the weapons, and disparaging the elderly woman’s mental capacity before demanding a written apology.
Tran was a Republican State Senator that served Worcester and Middlesex Counties from 2017 to 2020.