The Mass State Police trooper seen allegedly pummeling a fellow statie at a local bar will have a public court hearing after the Herald requested it.
Christopher Regan, whose identity was confirmed by a Quincy District Court official on Tuesday, is accused of assaulting a fellow trooper at ReelHouse brewpub in Marina Bay last month.
Regan has been suspended with pay by Mass State Police. Quincy Police have applied for a criminal complaint in the case.
That criminal complaint will be heading to a clerk magistrate hearing, which is usually held behind closed doors. However, the Herald requested that Regan’s hearing be public, as he’s a state law enforcement employee and there’s intense interest in the case.
“After researching the relevant case law and applying Criminal Complaint Standard 3:15, which governs public access to show cause hearings, I have made the determination to open this matter to the public,” Jaclyn Burke, the acting clerk magistrate at Quincy District Court, wrote to the Herald on Tuesday.
“This incident involves the conduct of a public official and has already attracted significant public attention,” Burke added.
A show-cause hearing is held before a District Court clerk magistrate to determine if there’s probable cause that the person committed a crime. The magistrate will determine whether there’s sufficient evidence to issue the complaint.
Regan’s hearing will be on Aug. 27 — two months after the viral incident at the bar.
“The public will have access to the courtroom but will be limited to seating availability,” Burke wrote. “There will be no standing allowed unless for the purposes of operating a camera.”
Regan and the fellow statie were both working in the Suffolk DA’s office in the elite SPDU unit, but they were taken off that duty following the incident.
The State Police Detective Unit is the investigative arm of the MSP, where the officers probe cases ranging from murder to drug trafficking under the control of the district attorney’s office to which they are assigned.
Both MSP troopers after the incident were reassigned to the Division of Field Services, which is responsible for the state’s roadways.
Regan last year made more than $200,000, according to state payroll records. The most he made in a year was $277,000 in 2023 — including $81,000 in overtime that year.
In the viral bar incident, the two troopers are seen sitting at the end of the bar. One of them, wearing a black shirt, walks over to the other man, who is wearing a white shirt. The seated man in the white shirt reaches out his arm in what appears to be an attempt to keep the black-shirt man away, but then the man wearing the black shirt throws a punch followed by four or five more and then grabs the man’s head in his hands.
The man in the white shirt appears limp as fellow bar patrons walk in to check on him, and the bartender covers her mouth in apparent shock.
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