BOSTON (WHDH) - A former Massachusetts State Police trooper who collected overtime for hours he did not work will spend three months in prison, officials announced Tuesday.
Gregory Raftery, 47, of Westwood, appeared in Boston federal court after pleading guilty in July of 2018 to one count of embezzling funds from a state agency receiving federal funds, according to United States Attorney Andrew E. Lelling.
Along with the three-month prison term, Judge William G. Young also sentenced Raftery to one year supervised release and ordered him to pay $51,377 in restitution.
Raftery admitted that in 2015 and 2016, he falsely reported that he worked hundreds of hours in overtime shifts, adding that he frequently left overtime shifts early and on multiple occasions did not work the shifts at all, Lelling said.
Raftery would submit bogus motor vehicle citations that were never issued to operators and then claimed on the citations and internal state police paperwork that they had been written during the overtime shifts he never actually worked.
He acknowledged that in 2015 he was paid over $24,000, and in 2016, he was paid almost $30,000 for overtime hours that he did not work.
Raftery is the second trooper to be sentenced as a result of the ongoing investigation. Former state trooper Eric Chin was not ordered to serve prison time during his Monday sentencing and instead was ordered to one year of supervised release with three months of that to be served at his home, and he must pay back the $7,000 he admitted to stealing.
So far, eight state troopers have been charged and pleaded guilty in the overtime scandal.
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