A Plymouth woman claimed that she died of brain cancer in an attempt to beat multiple criminal charges against her pending in Massachusetts courts, according to prosecutors.
Shannon E. Wilson, 44, was indicted by a Plymouth County grand jury on charges of furnishing false identifying information, obstruction of justice, forgery, uttering of a public record, and failure to appear after release on bail. She is being held in jail pending a future arraignment date.
“The indictments allege that at critical stages of court proceedings — including arraignments, bail determinations, continuances, dismissals, and returns of bail — Wilson knowingly made false representations that she was terminally ill or deceased, and that courts relied on those representations in taking judicial action,” per a statement from the Plymouth District Attorney’s office.
Prosecutors allege a conspiracy carried out by Wilson and her defense attorney, who is not named in a statement, dating at least as far back as Aug. 15, 2022, when at an arraignment in Hingham District Court her attorney told the court that she was terminally ill. She was released on $400 bail.
Wilson then failed to appear for court hearings and generally disregarded her release conditions, according to prosecutors. She would cite hospitalization but the court informed her that medical conditions are no excuse for a complete lack of communication.
Then came the alleged forgeries. First, in September 2022, was a letter purportedly from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston indicating that she suffered from terminal brain cancer and was in hospice care. Then came a screenshot of a death certificate in which a Rhode Island physician listed brain cancer as the cause of death. But investigations found that both documents were phonies, according to the Plymouth DA.
“Further investigation established that no death certificate was registered in Massachusetts or Rhode Island and that no hospice, palliative care, or funeral services had been provided for Wilson,” according to a DA statement.
The person who had posted the $400 bail for Wilson was told of her death and got the money back, but then Wilson “unexpectedly appeared at the acquaintance’s residence and admitted she had fabricated her death.”
Her alleged conspiracy was revealed to officials when a Massachusetts State Police trooper pulled her over for erratic driving in Wareham in July 2023. She purported during this stop to be from Ireland, denied her real identity, and claimed she was terminally ill, prosecutors say, but identifying documents in her possession stated otherwise.
Shootout in Southie
Police responded to a mid-day shots-fired call around the Mary Ellen McCormack housing complex in South Boston on Saturday.
After arriving on scene in the area of Logan Way and McDonough Way at around 2:40 pm, police found ballistic evidence on scene and saw bullet damage to a motor vehicle, but no injuries were reported. A concerned resident in the area told the Herald that some 20 shots were fired.
There have been no arrests and it remains under investigation, a Boston Police spokesperson told the Herald Thursday.
The Mary Ellen McCormack was built in 1938 and is the largest housing development in Boston, with more than 1,000 subsidized public housing apartments in 18 mid-rise buildings and 16 townhomes. The complex is now undergoing a redesign and construction project slated to last 20 years that broke ground last June. The city says the project will be done in two phases, city officials said, in which more than 2,000 new units will be added, along with a YMCA, veterans park and more.
Incident Summary
BPD responded to 196 incidents in the 24-hour period ending at 10 a.m. Thursday, according to the department’s incident log. Those included three aggravated assaults, two thefts from vehicles, and 17 instances of miscellaneous larceny.
Arrests
All of the below-named defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty.
—Alexis Amador, 60 Thoreau Road, Quincy. Assault and battery on ambulance personnel.
— Sarabjit Saini, 37 Colberg Ave., Roslindale. Operating a motor vehicle with a suspended license.
— James Wheeler, 14 Calumet Road, Fairhaven. External warrant arrest.
— David Long, 16 Magdala St., Dorchester. Operating a motor vehicle with a suspended license.
—Jonathan Roman-Falcon, 133 Draper St., Dorchester. Shoplifting more than $250.
— Kimberly Tillery, 90 Capen St., Dorchester. Larceny less than $1,200.
—Donald Garden, 42 Harrison Archway, Boston. Distributing cocaine.
— Patrick LaChance, 17 Draper St., Brockton. Shoplifting, second offense.
— Dante Brown, 55 Esmond St., Boston. Shoplifting.
—Christopher Pierce, 9 Virginia St., Dorchester. Possession of Class B drugs.
— Maylin Rutherford, no address listed. Uttering a false check.
— Lindsay Ellis, 97 Mount Ida Road, Dorchester. Shoplifting.
— Kaijae Williams, 383 Dudley St., Roxbury. Possession of ammunition without a firearms identification card.
—Jaquan Sims, 95 Whitefield St., Boston. Shoplifting.
Nancy Lane/Boston Herald
Construction seen last June for the Mary-Ellen McCormack redevelopment project. (Nancy Lane/Boston Herald)
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