Boston councilor arrested by feds on corruption charges; mayor urges her to resign

BOSTON — Boston City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson was arrested Friday by the feds on public corruption charges that saw her allegedly “embrace a culture of cashing in” by stealing thousands from taxpayers in an “egregious” kickback scheme at City Hall — allegations that have the mayor calling for her resignation.

Fernandes Anderson, 45, was indicted on five counts of aiding and abetting wire fraud and one count of aiding and abetting theft concerning a program receiving federal funds, according to court records and a publicly available indictment. She is to be arraigned at the Boston federal courthouse on Friday at 3 p.m.

“It’s like deja-vu all over again: Another Boston city councilor is accused of embracing a culture of cashing in at the expense of the public good,” Stephen Kelleher, assistant special agent in charge, FBI Boston, said at a Friday morning press conference at the Boston federal courthouse.

Kelleher was referencing the late Chuck Turner, the last Boston city councilor to be probed by the feds and later convicted in 2010 and sentenced to three years in jail in 2018 for pocketing a $1,000 bribe from an informant who claimed to be seeking a liquor license.

In this instance, Fernandes Anderson, a second-term city councilor whose district includes Roxbury, Dorchester, Fenway and part of the South End, is alleged to have pocketed $7,000 from a $13,000 bonus she doled out to a relative, but “not an immediate family member” she had hired in late 2022 as a paid member of her Council staff, according to the indictment.

The handoff was coordinated by text between Fernandes Anderson and the relative, identified as “Staff Member A” which carried via interstate wire communications, and made in a City Hall bathroom in June 2023, according to the indictment.

Fernandes Anderson had “falsely told her staff that ‘Staff Member A’ would be getting a larger bonus than her other staff members” — more than twice as large as the total amount of all bonus payments to Fernandes Anderson’s other staff combined” — due to Staff Member A’s “prior volunteer work.”

“Basically, what we have here is an elected official pretending her motives were purely civic-minded,” Kelleher said. “In fact, we believe she was unlawfully conspiring to enrich herself. This city councilor is accused of stealing thousands of dollars from the city, through not just creative, but criminal accounting.

“Using public office for personal gain is a crime, plain and simple,” Kelleher added. “The behavior we allege in today’s indictment is a slap in the face of the hardworking taxpayers in the city of Boston, who have every right to expect that the city’s coffers are in good honest hands.

He added, “Nobody is picking on Tania Fernandes Anderson and her inner circle. We believe this is a a situation of her own making.”

Footage captured by WCVB shows Fernandes Anderson’s Dorchester home surrounded Friday morning by FBI agents. The video shows Fernandes Anderson walk out of her home, briefly put her hands up, and FBI agents detaining her. The arrest took place shortly after 6 a.m., Kelleher said, adding that she “absolutely” did not receive any special accommodations due to her position as a city councilor.

While Fernandes Anderson vowed Wednesday, a day after the federal probe was revealed, that she had no intention to resign, the revelation of the corruption charges Friday quickly left the mayor calling for her resignation.

“Like any member of the community, Councilor Fernandes Anderson has the right to a fair legal process,” Mayor Michelle Wu said in a statement. “But the serious nature of these charges undermine the public trust and will prevent her from effectively serving the city. I urge Councilor Fernandes Anderson to resign.”

The kickback scheme was motivated, in part, Kelleher said, by the “personal financial difficulty” Fernandes Anderson is believed to have been facing in early to mid-2023 — including missing monthly rent and car payments, an impending $5,000 fine from the State Ethics Commission connected to hiring immediate family members, and incurring bank overdraft fees, court records show.

The councilor saw her salary, along with the rest of the Council, rise to $115,000 in January, and was making $103,500 at the time.

U.S. Attorney Joshua Levy said Fernandes Anderson violated her fiduciary duty and defrauded the City of Boston rather “than find a legal means to pay off” her financial difficulties.

“When her constituents elected Ms. Fernandes Anderson, she had a fundamental obligation to act with the utmost integrity,” Levy said. “Public officials who line their pockets with taxpayer money erode the trust and confidence of the public and the officials who serve them. Public service is a privilege, and all of us in public service service have a duty to act with integrity and fairness in all that we do.”

In November 2022, Fernandes Anderson emailed a City of Boston employee to inform them of the hiring of “Staff Member A,” in which the councilor “falsely” told the employee that she and Staff Member A” were not related, prosecutors allege.

“For the record (redacted) is not related to me,” Fernandes Anderson wrote in the email, according to court documents.

Fernandes Anderson told “Staff Member A” around May 2023 that she would give the person a “large bonus” but that the staff member “would have to give a portion of the bonus back to Fernandes Anderson,” prosecutors said.

“Fernandes Anderson did not disclose the kickback arrangement with Staff Member A,” according to the indictment.

Staff bonus information is publicly available, according to the court documents.

Fernandes Anderson then sent an email to a City of Boston employee to process the $13,000 bonus payment for “Staff Member A,” court records show.

After the money was deposited into the bank account of “Staff Member A,” Fernandes Anderson instructed the staff member to make separate cash withdrawals of the bonus check, prosecutors alleged in court documents.

The staff member made two separate cash withdrawals of $3,000 from two different bank locations in Boston on May 31, 2023 and June 5, 2023, according to court documents. The person then withdrew $4,000 from a third Boston bank on June 9, 2023, court documents said.

The indictment also said Fernandes Anderson demanded that staffers sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) in order to work for her, which Levy said “stuck out to us as unusual.”

The charges of wire fraud each carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000. The charge of theft concerning programs carries a prison sentence of up to 10 years, three years of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000.

The investigation is still active, the feds said, but wouldn’t comment as to whether the involved staff member or others may face charges. As far as sentencing, Levy said the the fact that the alleged actions were carried out by a public official “makes the conduct more egregious” and would factor into any potential sentencing.

Fernandes Anderson has faced a series of controversies since taking office roughly three years ago.

She purged $1,750 from her campaign account to the state after facing campaign finance violations related to failing to report in a timely fashion thousands in contributions over an 11-month period and taking in excess contributions.

Fernandes Anderson was also ordered to pay campaign finance regulators $5,000 last year for hiring her sister and son to paid positions on her city council staff.

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