Hub police lieutenant accused of assault
A Boston police lieutenant has been placed on paid administrative leave after being arrested late last month in Baltimore after allegedly punching his girlfriend in the face as the couple sat in a pub.
Department spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll said Internal Affairs is investigating the matter involving David C. Murphy, 49, a 21-year veteran of the department. Driscoll said Murphy has no prior sustained complaints related to domestic violence, though she said it is possible he was the subject of a complaint that Internal Affairs did not substantiate.
According to court documents, Murphy and his girlfriend, who asked not to be identified, were in Baltimore April 27 for a Red Sox series against the Baltimore Orioles. The couple were sitting in the James Joyce Pub after a game and not speaking to one another when Murphy "arched his right hand back and punched the white female in the face," a police report said . "She fell to the ground after falling off the stool at the bar."
The report states that a bar employee called police, who found the woman with a "busted bottom lip."
Murphy fled to a nearby Marriott hotel, where police arrested him, the report says. The alleged victim refused medical attention and said she did not want to press charges.
Joseph Sviatko, a spokesman for the Baltimore state's attorney's office, said yesterday that Murphy was charged with second-degree assault. He was released on $5,000 bond the day of the arrest and is due back in court for trial on May 29, Sviatko said.
Murphy could not be reached for comment, but the alleged victim defended him. "The police report is wrong . . . It was all a big misunderstanding. It didn't happen the way the Baltimore police said it did."
The arrest in Baltimore is the second time Murphy has been accused of beating the woman. A Weymouth police official who asked not to be named said yesterday that police responded to the couple's home on Rosement Road Oct. 28 after Murphy allegedly threw an object at the woman, causing lacerations on her forehead.
Murphy was charged with assault and battery, the official said, but the charges were dismissed over prosecutors' objections because the victim did not want to pursue charges, said David Traub, spokesman for the Norfolk district attorney's office. 