On a clear mid-June morning last year, Springfield Police Narcotics Detective Luke Cournoyer walked into a grand jury room in the city’s federal courthouse.

He was there to undo a lie that had haunted him and his department for more than two years, he testified during an hour and 15 minutes of questioning by U.S. Department of Justice attorneys.

Protected by a promise of immunity from criminal prosecution, Cournoyer admitted that he had helped cover up one of the most damaging scandals in the Springfield Police Department’s modern history – the alleged assault of a juvenile suspect who stole an unmarked police car in February of 2016.

“At no time did I hear of anyone being kicked, nor did I witness somebody being kicked and I did not kick anyone. I did not learn that this was being alleged till a few weeks ago,” Cournoyer wrote in March 2016 to internal investigators, after a Wilbraham police officer reported that an unidentified Springfield detective had kicked a handcuffed juvenile in the head that night.

“Just so the record’s clear, what about that statement is false?” DOJ Trial Attorney Christopher Perras asked Cournoyer more than two years later.

“All of it,” Cournoyer responded, according to a transcript of his grand jury testimony.

MassLive has obtained records of federal grand jury testimony by Cournoyer and four of his colleagues in Springfield’s narcotics unit – Lt. Alberto Ayala, Capt. Steven Kent, Det. Jose Robles, and Det. Edward Kalish, all of whom received immunity from prosecution and were compelled to testify.

The transcripts provide an unprecedented look into a federal investigation that has already led to indictments against two officers: Det. Gregg Bigda, accused of threatening to frame, beat and kill the juvenile suspects during an abusive, off-books interrogation captured on video, and former Det. Steven Vigneault, accused of kicking one of the suspects in the head.

They also add another dimension to the thorny, and at times contradictory, body of evidence in the case.

In a Jan. 4 motion filed by federal prosecutors, the Department of Justice acknowledged that the alleged victim of the kicking had initially identified his attacker as one of the Springfield detectives who interrogated him later that night – neither of which were Vigneault.

“The government is aware of the following information that would, if true, tend directly to negate the defendant Steven Vigneault’s guilt concerning a count in the indictment: transcript of interview of [the alleged victim] pages 18, 28, stating that the officer who kicked him was yelling at him in the cell,” the motion said. “[The alleged victim]. stated later in the same interview that the officers who drove him to Springfield [Vigneault and L.C.] were the same officers in the cell at Palmer PD.”

Shawn Allyn, Vigneault’s defense attorney, declined to comment.

And the Springfield Police supervisor’s union, which represents Ayala and Kent, said that neither supervisor was under suspicion in the investigation.

“Members of Springfield Police Supervisors Association appeared before the federal grand jury and were forthcoming and truthful in their responses. They were not the targets of the grand jury investigation and provided honest testimony," Capt. Brian Keenan, president of the Supervisor’s Association, wrote in an email. “Our members are leaders in the Springfield Police Department who work extremely hard to protect the citizens of our city and they serve the community with distinction.”

In addition to the criminal investigation, the abusive interrogation and allegations of violence have cost the Hampden District Attorney’s Office multiple narcotics prosecutions and prompted a broad Department of Justice inquiry into whether there is a pattern of civil rights violations in the Springfield police department.

Springfield Police Det. Luke Cournoyer at an April 2017 Hampden Superior Court hearing.

‘The Palmer Nightmare’

On Feb. 26, 2016, Steven Kent finished his day shift supervising the Springfield Police narcotics unit, drove home and went to sleep.

He awoke later that evening to a phone call from Bigda, a longtime veteran of the unit and his personal friend. When Kent picked up, Bigda was laughing.

“He said something to the effect of ‘Beach Muscles just got the TrailBlazer stolen,’ Kent testified to the grand jury. “And I said ‘How the hell did he do that?’ He said ‘We sent him out for pizza and he left it running in front of Primo’s.’ And he was kind of giggling.’

“Beach Muscles” was a nickname for Steven Vigneault – a tattooed military veteran who had joined the close-knit narcotics unit less than a year earlier. Vigneault was quick with a handshake and gregarious to a degree that sometimes appeared performative, according to his colleagues’ testimony. It was a trait that won him some quick friendships on the unit but left others, including Kent and Cournoyer, suspicious of his intentions, they told the grand jury.

Bigda told Kent they did not need his assistance finding the vehicle, and Kent went back to sleep, he testified. But a mishap that appeared destined to become a unit in-joke would soon turn into a “nightmare,” Kent said – for both the Springfield Police Department and the Hispanic teens on the receiving end of Vigneault and Bigda’s alleged civil rights abuses.

As Vigneault’s unmarked cruiser was being stolen from in front of a pizza shop, the rest of his unit’s night crew was back in the station processing evidence and reports from a drug raid that afternoon, his Lt. Alberto Ayala testified.

After hearing about the stolen car, Ayala and other narcotics officers canvassed Springfield in their cruisers, looking for Vigneault’s TrailBlazer. After they returned, unsuccessful, Capt. Rupert Daniel told them the car had been spotted out of the city by another department and ordered the unit’s detectives to retrieve it, Ayala and Robles testified.

“He told the guys to go out there to get the car. And he said not to put in for overtime,” Ayala told the grand jury.

The narcotics detectives still had much work to do from that day’s drug raid. There were arrests to process, evidence to tag, cash to count and reports to write. Ayala stayed behind with Detective Edward Kalish and the detective who had led the raid, as six other detectives went out to the scene.

The three remaining narcotics officers went back to their paperwork, now short-staffed.

“At that point, it was some kids stole a car,” Ayala testified. “And I got stuck with all these arrests. And I wasn’t quite happy that night because I [was] stuck with all this stuff that should have been done by a full unit and it was done by three people.”

The other members of the unit’s night shift met up with Wilbraham and State Police officers who were searching for the four juveniles suspected of stealing the car. Cournoyer testified that he was assisting a K-9 officer with a foot search when he heard over the radio that three of the suspects had been taken into custody in Palmer.

When Cournoyer reached the scene he saw three juveniles sitting handcuffed on the roadside near some train tracks with a group of officers nearby, he testified.

Then Vigneault made a startling confession, Cournoyer told the grand jury.

“I’m kind of in the rear of the group and Steven Vigneault kind of just like comes up to me on my right side from my right and kind of ushers me off and says to me that he kicked one of the kids in the face,” Cournoyer said.

“Do you remember the words he used?” Perras, the DOJ trial attorney, asked.

“It was something to the effect of like dude or bro, I f---in’ kicked that kid in the face,” Cournoyer said.

Vigneault’s tone of voice was neutral, and Cournoyer did not think he appeared to be either remorseful or proud of himself at the time, Cournoyer testified. He said he initially thought Vigneault may have been posturing and was unsure if the kick actually took place.

“I think I said something to the effect of yeah, f---in’ good for you man, let’s get the hell out of here, let’s get this over with so we can leave, you know. I didn’t mean ‘good for you’ like condoning it. It was like, okay, buddy. I blew Steve off a lot,” Cournoyer told the grand jury.

The night – and its alleged misconduct – were not over yet. After the fourth suspect was found, the juveniles were taken to the Palmer Police lockup, where Bigda launched into his now-infamous interrogation.

In full of view security cameras, and with Cournoyer in the room, Bigda ranted at two of the teenagers, threatening to beat them, plant drugs on them or kill them.

"Motherf---er, I'll charge you with killing Kennedy and f---ing make it stick," Bigda told one of the boys. "So don't f---ing tell me what you're not going to get charged with. I'm not hampered by the f---ing truth because I don't give a f---. People like you belong in jail. ... I'll f---ing charge you with whatever I -- I'll stick a f---ing kilo of coke in your pocket and put you away for f---ing 15 years."

Bigda also told one of the juveniles “you probably don’t even know who your father is” after threatening to "crush his skull,” according to recordings of the interrogation obtained by The Republican and published in the paper and on MassLive in 2016.

Though the narcotics detectives who returned to Springfield bleary-eyed the next morning did not then know it, Bigda’s and Vigneault’s alleged actions that night would end up throwing their department into turmoil.

­­­Internal investigations would be launched. Video of Bigda’s interrogation would spread like a virus among local attorneys, costing the department drug cases. And a federal criminal investigation would land Cournoyer before a grand jury on that June morning, admitting that he had lied on an official report.

Former Springfield Detective Steven Vigneault on the grounds of the Veterans Affairs Central Western Massachusetts Healthcare System in Leeds, Oct. 19, 2016.

The cover-up

In the days after, Vigneault’s confession of kicking a handcuffed suspect stuck in Cournoyer’s mind, he testified. The next night, as he was reviewing and making corrections to Vigneault’s police report on the Palmer incident, Cournoyer told fellow narcotics Det. Edward Kalish about the kicking while venting about Vigneault’s conduct, he testified. Kalish confirmed to the grand jury that Cournoyer told him about Vigneault kicking the suspect at that time, though said he did not remember the specifics of the conversation.

“I’m like you know, as one of the guys, first [Vigneault] gets his car stolen, he’s out there, he’s got no gun, he’s out there with no radio, then all of a sudden he’s telling me he kicked this kid in the face, you know, we know he shouldn’t be here in the first place, what the hell is going on kind of thing, you know?,” Cournoyer testified.

But Cournoyer did not at first believe the kick took place and did not report it to a superior officer, he testified to the grand jury. And then Vigneault left the narcotics unit, after his affair with Bigda’s ex-girlfriend led to an altercation and criminal charges against Bigda.

That disbelief became less tenable after a Wilbraham police officer filed a report saying he had witnessed a Springfield detective kick a handcuffed suspect in the face that night – but that he could not identify which detective was responsible.

Both Kent and Ayala testified that they did not initially believe the Wilbraham officer’s report, questioning how he could fail to identify the officer who kicked his suspect. Kent wrote an email to Capt. Daniel suggesting the investigation was unlikely to go anywhere, and criticizing Wilbraham’s police chief for sending the report directly to Gulluni -- rather than to Springfield police first.

“It’s a matter of respect. I don’t know how you don’t contact Commissioner Barbieri and tell him this whole thing is going on, chief to chief,” Kent told the grand jury when asked about that email.

Cournoyer found himself as perhaps the only person, aside from Vigneault himself, who could identify the culprit, according to his testimony.

But he chose to say nothing. And then, when an internal investigation was launched and he was asked to submit a statement, he chose to lie.

“Somehow I found myself in the middle of essentially every aspect of it and I just sat there and I thought to myself, you know, if I just don’t say anything maybe it’ll go away, you know, with Steve,” Cournoyer testified to the grand jury. “He’s gone. The kid never made a complaint, to my knowledge, the juvenile. So there was this guy in – this cop in Wilbraham who was claiming he can’t see who did it, he didn’t see who did it, so, I just figure if I kept my mouth shut it would just go away.”

The decision weighed on him, he told the grand jury. Feeling guilty over his dishonesty, he told his wife, brothers and father what he had done. Cournoyer had been “shot at and blown up” as a military veteran, but the cover-up took an even greater toll on his mental health, he testified. He had panic attacks, stress and nightmares, he said.

“You’re in a spot, you said the wrong thing, and just compounds and gets worse and worse and it like snowballs as time goes on and then you get to the point where you don’t even know how to go take it back,” Cournoyer testified. “Like the whole time you knew you should have done the right thing yet for whatever reason you made the decision to do the wrong thing, but you’re not sure [how to fix it.]“

Cournoyer told the grand jury that the Palmer report, and a related statement to IIU on officers drinking in the police station, were the only two times he has made a false statement in a police report.

But there is still a separate ongoing disciplinary case involving allegations that he fabricated details in an arrest report.

In June of 2016, Cournoyer wrote the report on the arrest of drug suspect Shazam Suarez in a city package store.

"Once inside we approached Mr. Suarez with our police attire (badge, radio, firearm, handcuffs) in plain view and I identified myself and reason for being there," Cournoyer's report reads. "This was done by calling Mr. Suarez by name as I instructed him not to resist. As I reached out to secure Mr. Suarez he backed away and struck me in the face with a closed fist. I then struck Mr. Suarez in the face and upper body in an attempt to stop him from striking me again."

Security video of the arrest obtained by the Republican that year, however, tells a different story – showing Cournoyer and another narcotics officer appearing to take Suarez by surprise and bring him to the ground.

The Springfield Police Department opened an internal investigation into the arrest after being informed of the video by The Republican. That internal investigation remains unresolved, police spokesman Ryan Walsh told MassLive.

Shared reports

Aside from Cournoyer, the other narcotics officers whose testimony was obtained by MassLive said they had been honest in their internal investigation reports about the Palmer incident. All testified that they did not coordinate their stories to internal affairs and that they were not pressured into pleading the Fifth or altering their reports.

But several officers involved in the incident reviewed each other’s statements before they were submitted to internal investigators, according to grand jury testimony – a practice that drew scrutiny from federal prosecutors, but which the officers defended as standard procedure.

“It’s common for officers to share information about any type of report with other officers involved for accuracy and clarity,” Springfield Police spokesman Ryan Walsh told MassLive. “It is not prohibited.”

Prosecutors quizzed Robles about consulting with other officers when writing his report on the Palmer arrests to internal investigators. Robles testified that he allowed his supervisors, Ayala and Sgt. Christopher Hitas, to review his report, along with other detectives like Cournoyer who were in the office at that time.

“Whoever was there that night, I had them review it, too. Just in case I forget something, or you know – or in case I forgot to add something to it,” Robles testified. “It’s common practice for us to review our reports before sending them in.”

He said he did not receive any comments or suggested changes from the officers who reviewed his statement.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Deepika Shukla appeared skeptical, pressing Robles on why it was appropriate for officers involved in an internal investigation to share their reports with each other.

“So, you wanted to get on the same page as your other officers who were there?” Shukla asked.

“Not on the same page. Basically, the report is mine, my recollection. What I remember,” Robles replied.

“So why did you show it to other people?”

“Because that’s what we do when we write reports.”

“Even in the internal investigation reports?

“Even internal investigations.”

“You don’t see any problem with that?”

“I don’t. I mean, that’s how I was trained,” Robles said.

Ayala told the grand jury that he did not consult with any other officers about his statement to the Internal Investigations Unit, but said it is standard for officers to review each other’s official reports to avoid mistakes or accidental inconsistencies.

“We try to catch that, because the guy’s just writing based on his recollection. And he could be wrong, or he might have made – what do you call that. Assumptions,” Ayala said.

And Shukla questioned Kent on why Bigda emailed him his statement to IIU before submitting it. Kent said he did not remember how he responded to Bigda, and did not know why Bigda sent his statement to him rather than a supervisor on the night shift.

“In that unit, we review each other’s reports all the time,” Kent testified. “Usually the arrest reports or affidavits. If anybody that worked directly for me was going to write to Internal Investigations, I would review that report before they send it in, review it for grammatical errors and things of that nature.”

Separately, Kent emailed Daniel on April 1, 2016 suggesting he had inside information about the DA’s investigation.

“The Wilbraham incident is still hanging out there. But, I heard on the QT from Gulluni that the invest most likely is going nowhere,” he wrote, according to the grand jury transcript.

Asked about that conversation with Gulluni, Kent said he did not remember specifically but believed it had to do with a lack of identification in the case. At the time he sent the email, the video of Bigda’s interrogation had not yet been found by prosecutors.

William Andrew, a retired Springfield Police sergeant who conducted the internal investigation in the Palmer case, said in an interview that he was not surprised that officers shared their statements with each other before submitting them to him.

“I do believe that it does happen, even officers involved in the same incident will get together and talk about what they’re writing,” Andrew said.

The Springfield Police internal investigation process makes it impossible to prevent such coordination, Andrew said. Officers under investigation are interviewed and then submit written reports at a later time, allowing them to communicate with other officers involved in the same case about their testimony.

The federal court building in Springfield.

Testimony revealed

Ordinarily, the grand jury testimony of Cournoyer and his colleagues would have remained forever hidden.

Grand juries are the hidden engine of the federal justice system. Up to 23 jurors are convened, sometimes for months at a time, as Department of Justice prosecutors present evidence and attempt to secure indictments. Grand juries have broad powers to subpoena witnesses and compel testimony, and are guided entirely by prosecutors – no judge is present, and witnesses must testify without their attorneys in the jury room.

They also typically operate in secrecy and are not open to the public. With few exceptions, such as witnesses describing their own testimony, anyone officially involved in a grand jury proceeding who divulges what happens within it can face a criminal charge of contempt of court. Courts take that confidentiality seriously, seeing it as useful to ensure a fair trial and protect the privacy of witnesses and suspects who, at the time of the grand jury, have not been charged with any crime.

But the transcripts obtained by MassLive have already been widely distributed. According to a motion for a protective order filed by prosecutors, one of Vigneault’s attorneys emailed the transcripts to other counsel after receiving them during discovery.

The transcripts were then received by the city of Springfield’s law office and the Springfield Police Department, which launched an internal investigation and forwarded them to the office of Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni.

“The Springfield Police Department recently became aware of fresh information that gave rise to an internal investigation. This information was discovered by the city solicitor. The Springfield Police Department provided the District Attorney with this information," Springfield Police Commissioner John Barbieri said in a statement last month. "The Springfield Police Department will be cooperating with the District Attorney’s Office, labor relations and the law department in regards to following up on this matter and conducting a thorough review.”

The DA’s Office then notified defense attorneys that they had obtained information that could benefit defendants in cases relying on testimony from Cournoyer, Kalish, Robes, Ayala or Kent. Prosecutors are required by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling to disclose potentially exculpatory information to defendants – including information that damages the credibility of police testimony.

“The potentially exculpatory material was immediately reviewed and subsequently provided to defense counsel in order fulfill the district attorney’s duty in upholding the integrity of the justice system and to protect individual’s rights," DA’s Office spokesman James Leydon said in a statement.

Since then, Gulluni’s office has distributed the transcripts to a number of defense attorneys without any explicit confidentiality agreement, placing it in circulation among the Hampden County legal community. It is currently unknown how many cases may be affected or whether prosecutions will be dropped because of the testimony.

If prosecutions are lost, it will not be the first time that the Palmer incident has cost the Springfield Police narcotics unit cases. Multiple drug cases were dropped or charges reduced after the DA’s office released the video of Bigda’s interrogation to defense attorneys in 2016.