Overview
- Jury selection began Monday at the John J. Moakley Federal Courthouse as the case moves from indictment and motions into a live trial that is expected to run into early September.
- Federal prosecutors say Tompkins leveraged a 2019 partnership between his office and a cannabis retailer to force an executive to let him buy $50,000 of stock in November 2020 and later demand repayment when the shares fell in value.
- Prosecutors will rely heavily on the testimony of Ascend executive Frank Perullo and on transaction details in court filings showing the $50,000 wire, the share counts and five refund checks issued between May 2022 and July 2023.
- Tompkins’s defense says the purchase was a legitimate private deal with a longtime friend, argues there was no quid pro quo for an official act, and has pointed to recent Supreme Court guidance as central to its case; a pretrial motion to dismiss was rejected.
- If convicted on two counts of extortion under color of official right, Tompkins faces up to 20 years in prison on each count, he remains on leave from the sheriff’s office, and the proceeding is intensifying scrutiny of the department after other recent controversies.