Fmr. State Sen. Brian Joyce Charged In Federal Indictment

Brian A. Joyce (Twitter)

BOSTON (WBZ-AM/AP) -- A former Massachusetts state senator has pleaded not guilty to collecting up to $1 million in bribes and kickbacks.

 Joyce was released on $250,000 bond Friday after pleading not guilty in Worcester's federal court. He was also ordered to hand over his passport and is barred from traveling outside of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. 

Joyce was arrested early Friday, hours before authorities unsealed a 113-count indictment charging him with racketeering, extortion, wire fraud and money laundering.

Joyce is also accused of taking a jeep and hundreds of pounds of Dunkin Donuts coffee in exchange for favors.

The FBI and US Attorney's Office announced Joyce's arrest Friday morning.

"It's definitely not a surprise," said WBZ political analyst Jon Keller. "Joyce has been under scrutiny for some time now. When you look at the  allegations against him that have been made in the press ... it's a laundry list of alleged bad behavior that covers just about every base of bad behavior a politician can cover."

Joyce served nine terms representing the Norfolk, Bristol, and Plymouth district from 1998 to 2017.

Scott Allen, Investigative Editor for the Boston Globe told WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Kendall Buhl that the Globe had run somewhere around a dozen stories looking at different aspects of Joyce's political career and business interests.

"We've known for a very long time that a federal grand jury was hearing evidence from prosecutors about whether senator Joyce used his public position to get personal benefits for him and his family," Allen said. "We've been expecting for some time that there would be charges."

Joyce had been under investigation for personal use of campaign funds.

"They go to a pattern of behavior, it wasn't a one-off opportunity," Allen said of the charges against Joyce. "It was a person who appeared to, at every turn, find ways to get free things for himself or get legal work steered toward his law practice from the people he was doing business with as a legislator."

His law office in Canton was raided by the FBI in February 2016 in what was then described as "court authorized activity in connection with an ongoing federal investigation."

That raid resulted in Joyce's decision not to run for reelection.

Allen gave one example of misuse of campaign funds: He said Joyce hosted a graduation party for his son at his house, and charged his campaign fund for that party, saying it was legitimate because a lot of the people there were constituents.

Allen also said there were many cases where companies hired Joyce as their lawyer "even when it looked as though they didn't really need a lawyer--but then he would go to the regulators and help them to get what they wanted from the state government."

He said Joyce's law firm grew considerably in the last year, and that he was making calls about his law business while he was supposed to be doing the public's business in the state senate.

"That kind of co-mingling of public and private was just very common and very widely known," Allen said.

Allen said Joyce consistently refused to speak to the Globe, and believes he did nothing wrong.

(The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

WBZ NewsRadio 1030's Kendall Buhl reports


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