| Biography | Brad is a Partner and Chief of the Criminal Division at Denner Pellegrino LLP in Boston. Brad specializes in high-end state and federal and white-collar criminal defense and has defended some of the highest profile cases in New England. He routinely defends clients in cases alleging murder, rape, robbery, home invasion, larceny, theft/embezzlement, white collar offenses, fraud, narcotics distribution/trafficking, child sexual assault, child pornography, felony assault, DUI and all types of federal crimes and charges. Brad has also defended numerous cases in New Hampshire and Connecticut on a pro hac basis, and has also been admitted pro hac vice in either federal or state courts in CA, AZ, MD, WI, and NJ. Brad also has extensive appellate experience having filed and/or argued cases in the 1st Circuit, Supreme Judicial Court, and Massachusetts Court of Appeals. He also appears before regulatory agencies including the SEC and the NASD. Brad is a repeat Massachusetts Super Lawyer and has also been recognized as a New England Super Lawyer. A former Harvard Football Player, with four children, all of whom were accomplished high school athletes and three of whom participated at the inter-collegiate level, Brad is also well-versed in MIAA rules and regulations as well as their governing code of discipline. He remains active in his local community. Brad was named one of Boston Magazine's "Super Lawyers" for 2004, 2006 and 2007 and a "New England Super Lawyer" for 2007. He has been profiled by Dan Rather in CBS Television's "Eye On America" and was rated "Outstanding Prosecutor" while working as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Boston where he never lost a single case. He began his legal career working for the New York County (Manhattan) D.A. as an Assistant District Attorney in the Nation's largest and busiest D.A.'s Office. While there, he prosecuted serious street level felonies, including armed robberies, burglaries, attempted murders, felony weapons charges and felonious assaults. He achieved a conviction rate of 94% and handled thousands of cases during his tenure. From there, he returned home to Massachusetts and joined the Middlesex County D.A.'s Office, where he resumed his career as an Assistant District Attorney. A Senior Trial Attorney assigned to Superior Court in both Cambridge and Lowell, Brad prosecuted some of the most serious cases in the D.A.'s Office including murders, rapes, attempted murders, armed robberies, child sexual assaults, and cocaine and heroin trafficking. In a mere 22 months, he tried 26 felony cases to verdict in the Superior Court (an Office record at the time). Losing only twice, Brad achieved an overall conviction rate of over 96%. Brad moved on from the Middlesex D.A.'s Office to the prestigious United States Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts, where he served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Boston, first with the Organized Crime Strike Force and later with the Drug Task Force (OCDETF). While in the Strike Force, Brad directly participated in the prosecution of a number of members and factions of the Patriarca Crime Family of La Cosa Nostra (LCN) including reputed Underboss Charles Quintina, Capos Biagio DiGiacomo and Sonny-Boy Rizzo, and Soldiers Spucky Spagnuolo, Vincent "Dee Dee" Giachinni, Pryce Quintina and Freddy Chiampa. He also authored and oversaw numerous court authorized wire-taps. When in the Drug Task Force, Brad prosecuted numerous local, regional, national and international drug conspiracies, principally involving Columbian and Dominican distribution cells and Syrian and Lebanese drug traffickers. Also the co-lead prosecutor in a case involving the then largest marijuana smuggling ring in New England history, Brad never lost a trial as a federal prosecutor and achieved the Office's highest ranking: "Outstanding Prosecutor." Brad also served as Sheriff of Middlesex County for two years from 1995-1996. In that role, he was responsible for the daily care, housing and transportation of close to 2,000 inmates and detainees at correctional facilities in Cambridge, Framingham and Billerica and oversaw a staff of more than 750 county employees. He was also responsible for courthouse security and the service of civil process throughout Middlesex County. Brad ran for the Office of Attorney General in 1998, and has since settled into the private practice of law as a criminal defense attorney. Assistant District Attorney, New York County, 1983-1986. Assistant District Attorney, Middlesex County, 1987-1989. Assistant U.S. Attorney (Boston), 1989-1994. Sheriff, Middlesex County, 1995-1996. Executive Director, Governor's Alliance Against Drugs, 1997-1998. |
| Reported Cases | Among Brad's more notable cases are Commonwealth v. Urban, an appellate case where he successfully argued for, and won, a new trial for his client at both the Appeals Court and Supreme Judicial Court. His client was serving a 6 year prison sentence and was subsequently released from state prison; N.H. v. Sheila LaBarre, a double murder insanity trial in which he served as co-lead counsel, United States v. David LaFleur, a police corruption case in which he and his partner obtained not guilty verdicts; United States v. Michael Vaccaro, where, as lead counsel, he obtained another jury acquittal on a case in which the client was facing a mandatory minimum thirty year prison sentence; and Commonwealth v. John Doe, in which he won a not guilty verdict in a case of a twenty-one year-old Division I lacrosse player accused of rape. He also represented clients in United States v. Angela Buckborough, the state's largest private embezzlement prosecution; United States v. James Dorman, a Staples Executive accused of fraud/theft; United States v. Justin Ficken, a financial advisor accused of participation in large scale market-timing related fraud; and United States v. Carlos Pizarro, a Boston police corruption case. He also currently represents a young man accused of killing his grandmother in Commonwealth v. James Clark. Brad successfully challenged the aggravated sexual assault convictions and won the immediate release of his client from state prison, as well as the reversal of his guilty verdicts, in State of New Hampshire v. Earl Knipfer by demonstrating that trial counsel's failure to call an expert witness familiar with the complaining witnesses little known cognitive disorder deprived the client of effective assistance of counsel at trial. Brad recently used an overlooked procedural rule to preserve evidence via video-deposition, and new case law pursuant to the SJC's decision in Commonwealth v. Adjutant, to establish that the deceased was actually the first aggressor in Commonwealth v. Ericson, a western MA murder case. |