Massachusetts
This former state employee is still fighting for his pension benefits — five years after retiring – The Boston Globe
This information “sent me over the edge,” Sorrentino said.
So in April, his attorney filed a complaint in federal court, claiming the delays are depriving Sorrentino of his due process rights guaranteed under the 14th Amendment.
Protracted delays like this are common in state retirement disputes, according to lawyers who have appeared before the appeals board. Some cases have dragged on for nearly a decade before they were decided — and can’t be challenged in court until then. Many retirees count on these benefits to get by, the lawyers say, and waiting years to receive them can be an incredible hardship.
Sorrentino estimates he’s spent more than 1,000 hours of his “golden years” trying to get the benefits he’s owed — and shed light on a broken system.
“A long time ago it stopped being about me. It’s much bigger,” he said. “Retirement benefits by their nature are time limited. Retirement’s the last chapter of life.”
And nobody should spend it fighting to get the benefits they’ve been promised, he said.
For Sorrentino, the dispute revolves around the administration of the New England Newborn Screening Program, which he was part of for more than 18 years at what is currently called the Massachusetts State Public Health Laboratory in Jamaica Plain. The program, which he ran for more than eight years, tests for treatable conditions in about 500 newborns a day in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, and Rhode Island. When Sorrentino started at the lab in 1980, he was paid by the Department of Public Health. But in 1990, the administration of the program was transferred to the Massachusetts Health Research Institute, which was incorporated in 1959 by the Massachusetts governor and health commissioner, among other founders, to assist the public health department.
In 1997, after the state Inspector General revealed financial improprieties involving MHRI, the newborn screening lab and other programs were transferred to UMass Chan Medical School.
Sorrentino hadn’t been allowed to make contributions to the state pension fund during his time under MHRI and withdrew what he had previously put in. But once under the umbrella of the state medical school, he started making contributions again, and later repaid all the funds in order to maximize his benefits.
This entire time, Sorrentino said, his job remained the same: He worked in the same lab, with the same people, using the same state ID badge.
Less than a year after the change to UMass Medical, he left the Jamaica Plain lab to work for a newborn screening company in Pittsburgh, and received regular letters over the next 20 years confirming his eligibility for retirement benefits. But when he applied for his roughly $1,400-a-month pension in late 2018, the retirement board informed him that employees who leave public service must return for at least two consecutive years in order to retire with benefits, rendering him ineligible.
Sorrentino was incredulous. He simply wanted the benefits he had been investing in. “It’s not like I’m asking for something that I didn’t contribute to,” he said.
He’s been fighting the denial ever since.
The Department of Public Health wouldn’t comment on why Sorrentino wasn’t considered a state employee for his entire tenure, despite working for the same program in the same lab the whole time, noting that he “resigned in 1990 and began working for MHRI” — a characterization Sorrentino disputes. The State Retirement Board would not provide details about why returning employees have to be on the job for two years in order to collect pensions they had previously earned.
The Contributory Retirement Appeal Board, known as CRAB, also declined to provide information about its caseload or wait times.
If CRAB rules against him, Sorrentino will get back the roughly $57,000 he contributed, including interest, according to the State Board of Retirement, but not any additional money he would have received through monthly payments for the rest of his life. Many public employees without the time or the means to fight the retirement board probably just give up and agree to these terms, Sorrentino said.
But considering the thousands of dollars in investments and interest his contributions have likely generated for the state over the past several decades, Sorrentino said, this outcome would be highly unfair. And if he were to die before the case is resolved, his survivors wouldn’t benefit from those gains.
“The pensioners are left out in the cold,” said Richard Glovsky, Sorrentino’s attorney.
The state’s employee retirement agencies move so slowly in part because they are vastly underresourced, said Leigh Panettiere, a Woburn-based attorney who represents public employees seeking disability retirement funds. During the appeal process, retirees’ contributions continue to generate interest and investment income for the overall pension plan — which in 2021 was only 69 percent funded, one of the lowest levels in the country, according to The Pew Charitable Trusts.
“There is no incentive to speed up the process,” said Panettiere, who currently has four CRAB cases that have been pending for more than four years.
But retirees get their full benefit amount, including retroactive payments, if the board decides in their favor. And given the fact that there are hundreds of thousands of members across the 104 public retirement systems in Massachusetts and less than 1,000 cases estimated to be in dispute — including many brought by retirees already receiving a pension — the impact of the money the pension funds stands to gain during the appeals process is insignificant, said Bill Keefe, executive director of the Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission. The status of the state employees’ pension system is improving, he added, and on track to be fully funded by 2036.
One of Panettiere’s clients, a police officer, has been waiting for more than seven years for his case to be resolved. The officer had a heart attack on the job at the age of 50 that left him disabled, but due to a dispute over whether the incident was work related, he was granted a smaller pension than what he applied for. His current income is about half what it used to be, Panettiere said, forcing him to turn to family members to help pay his mortgage.
“In addition to feeling like a failure because he cannot work anymore, he is even more depressed by not being able to financially care for his family,” Panettiere said.
Another client, a public employee who suffered a head injury at work and has been trying to collect his pension since 2017, has cancer.
“He may die before his appeal is over,” she said.
Katie Johnston can be reached at katie.johnston@globe.com. Follow her @ktkjohnston.
The number of opioid-related overdose fatalities fell below 1,000 for the first time in more than a decade in 2025, state health officials said Friday, marking a significant improvement since Massachusetts broke a devastating record a few years ago.
There were 978 confirmed and estimated opioid-related overdose deaths among Massachusetts residents last year, the Department of Public Health said. That represents a nearly 27% decrease over the 1,336 deaths in 2024, which also saw a sharp drop in fatal overdoses.
DPH says the declining trend mirrors data unfolding nationally.
“This progress, experienced by families across the Commonwealth as years of extra joy and life, is the result of a comprehensive and collaborative public health response that has prioritized evidence-based care, community partnership, and compassion,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kiame Mahaniah said. “Data show us that providing access to housing, harm reduction, treatment options, and supportive peer communities works to prevent overdose — and the Commonwealth will continue its commitment to supporting and expanding access to these tools and services.”
A 2024 law expanded access to overdose-reversal drugs like naloxone, installed liability protections for providers and organizations offering drug checking services, and established licensure for recovery coaches. The law did not include a Senate-backed provision to legalize supervised injection sites, and proposals to do so this session are before the House and Senate Ways and Means committees.
Overdose deaths, which claimed more 2,000 lives annually between 2016 and 2023, reached a record high of 2,364 in 2022. The last time Massachusetts recorded less than 1,000 overdose fatalities was in 2013, when the opioid epidemic claimed the lives of 992 Bay Staters.
“While a 27 percent decrease in opioid overdose deaths is encouraging and reflects the impact of sustained investments in prevention, harm reduction, treatment, and recovery support, we must never lose sight of the fact that behind every data point is a person — a loved one, a family member, a friend, a neighbor,” Deirdre Calvert, director of DPH’s Bureau of Substance Addiction Services, saidDPH said it is still analyzing the latest data and will release more insights later this summer about how the decrease is reflected across Massachusetts communities.
In its recent report on overdoses in 2024, DPH offered three hypotheses for that year’s decrease, including a potentially safer street drug supply, fewer people at risk of overdoses, and expanded overdose prevention resources and services. DPH says overdose deaths rose from 2013 to 2022 due to the “increasing and erratic fentanyl concentrations in the drug supply.”
But xylazine, a sedative approved for veterinary use, has become increasingly common in the state’s drug supply between 2020 and 2024.
“One hypothesis is that using drugs containing xylazine may protect from fatal overdose by increasing the length of time that people are sedated after using, therefore decreasing the total number of use events,” the report says. “Another hypothesis is that due to the sedative effects of xylazine, suppliers may reduce the amount of fentanyl in their product.”
Alison Kuznitz is a reporter for State House News Service and State Affairs Pro Massachusetts. Reach her at akuznitz@stateaffairs.com.
Massachusetts
Massachusetts man, 70, accused of trying to drown jet skier, 21, in chaotic lake fight
A 70-year-old Massachusetts man allegedly tried to drown an injured 21-year-old during a violent clash over a jet ski at a community lake boat ramp in a chaotic, caught-on-camera brawl.
Steven Dana is accused of attempted murder, strangulation, and assault and battery on a disabled person for the alleged attack on Matthew Duffy at Lake Maspenock’s Sandy Beach in Hopkinton, Mass., on Wednesday.
Duffy and his friends were using the boat ramp with their jet ski when Dana, a resident on the lake, became agitated by the noise coming from the motorized craft and attempted to kick the group out of the water, according to a police report viewed by WCVB.
Duffy has been using crutches to get around after he was severely injured in an accident a few months ago.
The group of friends had been recording the interaction with Dana on a GoPro when the older man became increasingly upset during the confrontation with Duffy, according to the video obtained by the outlet.
“Let me have fun with my jetski,” Duffy told Dana, who told the younger man to take the craft to another lake.
Duffy refused and claimed he lived nearby and was allowed to use the lake. Some of the younger lake users began to egg Dana on, saying, “You’re not going to do s–t.”
Dana threatened to call the police “again” before asking if Duffy wanted “me to shoot you.”
The older man walked down to Duffy, who had been standing at the lakeside, and got into the 21-year-old’s face.
“Are you going to beat up a cripple?” one of Duffy’s friends asked the heated man.
“I don’t care, I’ll take a cripple.” Dana said, according to the video.
Dana slapped Duffy across the face before the two grappled each other and fell into the lake, as one of Duffy’s friends drove off with the jet ski.
Dana was filmed allegedly holding Duffy under the water as three other men showed up and separated the pair.
“I was so scared for my life because I can’t fight back, I broke practically everything and this guy’s on top of me under the water, I can’t see what’s going on, I can’t fight back,” Duffy told WCVB.
Both men refused medical attention after the scuffle.
Dana was arraigned in Framingham District Court on Thursday and initially held without bail, but a judge on Friday released him on a $7,500 cash bond, according to NBC 10 Boston.
“I’m fuming that he’s out now. This is insane. He just tried killing me two days ago, and then it’s like, apparently you can just pay bond, and it’s wiped clean,” Duffy told the outlet. “When he toppled on me in the water, there was nothing I could do.”
“He literally came up to me and my friends, and was instantly being aggressive and rude for no reason, in trying to kick us out of a public space,” Duffy said. “We weren’t having it, so we weren’t moving, and then he eventually came down after we were arguing with each other, and then more arguing led to him attacking me and then shoving me in the water, and I needed my friends to help me get up.”
The number of annual opioid-related overdose fatalities fell below 1,000 for the first time in more than a decade in 2025, state health officials said Friday, marking a significant improvement since Massachusetts broke a devastating record a few years ago.
There were 978 confirmed and estimated opioid-related overdose deaths among Massachusetts residents last year, the Department of Public Health said. That represents a nearly 27% decrease over the 1,336 deaths in 2024, which also saw a sharp drop in fatal overdoses.
DPH says the declining trend mirrors data unfolding nationally.
“This progress, experienced by families across the Commonwealth as years of extra joy and life, is the result of a comprehensive and collaborative public health response that has prioritized evidence-based care, community partnership, and compassion,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kiame Mahaniah said. “Data show us that providing access to housing, harm reduction, treatment options, and supportive peer communities works to prevent overdose—and the Commonwealth will continue its commitment to supporting and expanding access to these tools and services.”
Narcan is an easy-to-use nasal spray that can reverse an opioid overdose. Here’s what you need to know about this life-saving drug.
A 2024 law expanded access to overdose-reversal drugs like naloxone, installed liability protections for providers and organizations offering drug checking services, and established licensure for recovery coaches. The law did not include a Senate-backed provision to legalize supervised injection sites, and proposals to do so this session are before the House and Senate Ways and Means committees.
Overdose deaths, which claimed more 2,000 lives annually between 2016 and 2023, reached a record high of 2,364 in 2022. The last time Massachusetts recorded less than 1,000 overdose fatalities was in 2013, when the opioid epidemic claimed the lives of 992 Bay Staters.
“While a 27 percent decrease in opioid overdose deaths is encouraging and reflects the impact of sustained investments in prevention, harm reduction, treatment, and recovery support, we must never lose sight of the fact that behind every data point is a person — a loved one, a family member, a friend, a neighbor,” Deirdre Calvert, director of DPH’s Bureau of Substance Addiction Services, said.
DPH said it is still analyzing the latest data and will release more insights later this summer about how the decrease is reflected across Massachusetts communities.
In its recent report on overdoses in 2024, DPH offered three hypotheses for that year’s decrease, including a potentially safer street drug supply, fewer people at risk of overdoses, and expanded overdose prevention resources and services. DPH says overdose deaths rose from 2013 to 2022 due to the “increasing and erratic fentanyl concentrations in the drug supply.”
But xylazine, a sedative approved for veterinary use, has become increasingly common in the state’s drug supply between 2020 and 2024.
“One hypothesis is that using drugs containing xylazine may protect from fatal overdose by increasing the length of time that people are sedated after using, therefore decreasing the total number of use events,” the report says. “Another hypothesis is that due to the sedative effects of xylazine, suppliers may reduce the amount of fentanyl in their product.”
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