A Boston police officer accused of drunkenly smashing into a fellow officer in April isn’t allowed to drive for the next month and a half and has stepped down from the police force.
Stephen P. O’Connell Jr., 38, of Hanover, admitted to sufficient facts on July 2 in Quincy District Court. He had been scheduled to appear for a pretrial hearing on the case on July 8 but entered his change of plea six days prior.
The admission of sufficient facts allows defendants to continue their case without a guilty finding or a criminal conviction if they complete the terms of the conditions set by a judge.
O’Connell faced charges of operating under the influence (OUI) in connection with the April 1 crash, along with negligent operation of a motor vehicle, marked lanes violation, failure to signal and possession of an open container of alcohol in a motor vehicle.
As part of the case’s resolution, O’Connell will lose his driver’s license for 45 days. Judge Sarah Jubinville also ordered him to pay $600 in fees, which will include driver alcohol abuse prevention education.
O’Connell “recently resigned” from his position as a Boston police officer, a spokesperson for the department told MassLive on Tuesday. He had been placed on administrative leave following the incident.
O’Connell is not the first law enforcement official to receive a 45-day suspension of driver’s license as a result of an OUI charge. Hampden County Sheriff Nick Cocchi was placed on probation with the same license suspension following an OUI incident in Springfield in September 2024, after his own admission to sufficient facts from the incident.
An attorney for O’Connell could not be reached for comment.
What happened?
The incident happened on a wet and chilly night on Route 3 in Weymouth, just after 12 a.m. on April 1.
O’Connell, who was off-duty at the time, was driving southbound in the middle lane on the highway in his personal vehicle — a black 2023 Nissan Frontier pickup truck, according to court documents on the case.
Surveillance footage from the dash cam of a trooper who witnessed the crash showed O’Connell swerve “suddenly and erratically” into the right lane with no turn signal, nearly colliding with another car in front of him.
O’Connell then lost control of the pickup truck and veered all the way over to the left lane, the filings read. He smashed into an unmarked Boston police cruiser, driven by Ofc. Michael McDougall, 41. The police car was a silver 2025 Nissan Rogue SUV.
The collision caused the unmarked police cruiser to spin out across all three lanes of traffic and into the tree line, the report read.
O’Connell tried to flee the scene at first, the footage showed, as he accelerated his pickup truck about 50 yards into the right travel lane before a witnessing trooper pulled him over.
Ofc. McDougall was found in his police SUV, which was “nearly perpendicular” to the highway in the trees with heavy damage on its passenger side, front end and deployed airbags. He told the responding troopers that he didn’t see O’Connell before he was hit, and had been on his way home after his shift.
McDougall was flung forward into the windshield from the impact of the crash and his head hit the glass, the report read. He was brought to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
The aftermath
At the scene of the crash, O’Connell was seen swaying from side to side as he stood in the breakdown lane, the report read. His eyes were red and glossy, his speech was slurred and he smelled like alcohol, but he told the first responders he had “nothing” to drink that night.
He told officers he was heading home to Hanover from his mother’s house in South Boston, and repeatedly said he’d been hit by another car that “came out of nowhere.”
O’Connell was not injured and was identified as an off-duty Boston police officer during the conversation. A trooper’s body cam footage showed O’Connell leaning against his truck to maintain his balance and, at one point, grabbing a tube of toothpaste from the cab, and then putting it in his pocket.
O’Connell agreed to perform a series of sobriety tests, but became frustrated at times and asked, “Can we just let it go?” the filings read.
He could not stand on one foot — “That’s hard,” he complained, as he swayed and put his other foot down — and he stopped and began to cry when he tried to walk in a straight line for the troopers, the report read.
The troopers then told O’Connell he was under arrest for operating under the influence of liquor, the filings read.
“He began to ask me for a break, stating he has a six-year-old son, that he was going to lose his job unless I help him, and asked me multiple times to just let him go home, and he’ll have someone pick him up,” a trooper wrote in his report.
“He began to cry, stating ‘Let me go home’ and told me ‘You’re ruining my life,’ ‘I need a break, give me a break,’ the report read. O’Connell was put into the rear of a police cruiser and brought for booking in Norwood.
In the passenger side of O’Connell’s truck, troopers found an eight-pack of Natural Light Beer with seven empty cans and one full and an 18-pack of Michelob Ultra. Five of the Michelob cans were full and no empties were found, the report read.
O’Connell refused to take a breath test at the barracks and was informed his driver’s license was immediately suspended. He called his wife while in custody, told her he was arrested for operating under the influence, and said, “I’m drunk,” the report read. He then looked up at the troopers from the phone and said, “They accuse me of being drunk.”
O’Connell was “up and down with emotions” during his booking, crying again at times, then would get “confrontational and loud,” the report read. He asked for medical attention at a certain point and was brought to the hospital around 2 a.m. before he appeared in court on Tuesday.
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