BOSTON (AP) - A retired Massachusetts State Police trooper convicted in a widespread overtime fraud scheme has been stripped of his pension by the state Retirement Board.
The five-member board voted to take away former trooper Paul Cesan’s pension, which would have paid him nearly $80,000 a year for the rest of his life, The Boston Globe reports. He is the first trooper implicated in the scandal to lose his pension.
Cesan, 52, of Southwick, gets to keep $180,000 he contributed to the state pension plan.
He was arrested in June 2018 and pleaded guilty in federal court to collecting more than $29,000 for overtime hours he did not work in 2016. He was sentenced to serve a year of supervised release and ordered to pay restitution. He apologized at his sentencing hearing.
Cesan’s attorney, Nick Poser, said the ruling would be appealed. “The forfeiture of this pension violates the excessive fines prohibitions in the federal and Massachusetts constitutions,” Poser wrote in an email to the Globe.
State police declined to comment.
A total of 46 troopers were implicated in the scandal, and 10 were charged criminally. The scheme led to reforms within the agency.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.