Kevin Hayden has declared victory within the Suffolk County district legal professional race, saying he’s earned 4 years as the highest prosecutor in Boston after a brutally nasty and scandal-plagued race in opposition to Boston metropolis Councilor Ricardo Arroyo.
“We did it,” Hayden stated, declaring victory round 11:50 p.m. Tuesday, shortly after The Associated Press referred to as it in his favor.
Hayden, who was appointed DA earlier this yr, made the announcement to cheering followers on the SoWa energy Station within the South End about two hours after his marketing campaign had begun telling reporters he deliberate to declare victory.
A tearful Arroyo, addressing supporters, didn’t concede shortly earlier than midnight, saying there’s simply “too much out” of the ballots for him to concede. The depend was stretching deep into the night time.
The Arroyo-Hayden race instantly turned one of many nastiest native races in latest reminiscence, and the vitriol billowing off of it has permeated many corners of Boston politics.
The turbulence of this race will be traced again to round January, when then-DA Rachael Rollins departed to develop into the U.S. legal professional within the state. Gov. Charlie Baker, himself not working for one more time period, appointed Hayden, a little-known state legal professional who’d run the sex-offender registry board for a number of years, to interchange her.
Soon, each Hayden and Arroyo, the Boston metropolis councilor from Hyde Park, leapt into the race, which remained out of the highlight till The Boston Globe wrote a few exposes on it: first one suggesting Hayden acted inappropriately in brooming an investigation into a pair transit cops who their very own division wished charged, after which one other into outdated sexual-assault investigations into Arroyo.
When the Hayden piece dropped in early August, Arroyo supporters pounced, with he and his allies together with a few fellow metropolis councilors shortly suggesting Hayden resign. The sitting DA didn’t, and insisted he had carried out nothing mistaken and was persevering with the investigation.
And then the Arroyo report hit the race like a ton of bricks two weeks in the past, unearthing two sexual-assault investigations in opposition to the now-34-year-old Arroyo in 2005 and 2007, although he wasn’t charged in both of them. He shortly misplaced some assist and noticed the council president transfer to strip his management assignments.
Then the remaining girl got here ahead, saying she continued to consider Arroyo assaulted her. Much of the remainder of his assist crumbled amongst electeds, with just a few diehard fellow councilors sticking by him.
The finish of final week noticed a fiery council assembly by which councilors exchanged barbs and members of the viewers even exchanged blows.
Arroyo additionally has continued to assert he’d by no means even been conscious of any investigation and solely employed a lawyer to cope with instructional points, which his then-lawyer backed up. All of that’s straight rebutted by police stories from the time, although, by which a detective wrote about speaking to Arroyo on the cellphone, and him telling the cops he’d gotten a lawyer, who cops additionally wrote about speaking to concerning the investigation.
But Arroyo additionally counterattacked, blaming Hayden with rising specificity for the leaks of what have been protected paperwork which might be unlawful to launch.
Both males insist they’ve carried out nothing mistaken this complete time.
In some methods, this contest for DA is the kid of final yr’s Boston mayoral bout — the race that by no means ends. Hayden has inherited a broad spectrum of the numerous anti-Wu forces, together with Annissa Essaibi George’s marketing campaign supervisor and the assist of the anti-vaccine-mandate demonstrators, the latter of whom confirmed up and — allegedly — threw down with some Arroyo supporters on the council assembly.
Hayden was seen because the reasonable within the race, rolling again a few of Rollins’ uber-progressive steps that she’d taken with the viewers. Hayden, a neighborhood minister, loved assist from centrist and conservative figures in Boston.
Arroyo, the son and brother of former Boston metropolis councilors, ran because the successor to Rollins, embracing her insurance policies and views. His progressive cred saved a few of native heavy hitters together with Mayor Michelle Wu and U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley in his nook for a time, although they ultimately pulled their assist.
The common election for DA is Nov. 8, and nobody else is on the poll. Arroyo informed reporters that he wasn’t planning on attempting to run a write-in marketing campaign if the truth is he does lose within the major.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”