For thirty five years, Cindy Stumpo has been a female home builder with a
passion for design, a mastery of detail, and a commitment to her crack.
With daughter Samantha Stumpo by her side, I don't need my whole family
on a date with me. That's a good note. It's goddemn weird.
See. Stumpo Development is the only second generation female construction company in the country.
You're crazy, You're a wacko, You're insane. I mean, it
just doesn't end together. Cindy and Samantha welcome guests to explore the world of
construction, real estate, development, design and more. Here. I'm predictable.
Every time I think I know what you want, you switch it out.
But that's what makes your houses all your day. Discuss anything that happens
between the roof and the foundation. Nothing is off limits. You truly do
care about everybody. She can yell at chicken screen, but when you get
her alone, she's the best person on the planet. Cindy Stumpo is tough
as nails. Welcome to Cidy Stumpo Tough as Nails on WBZ News Radio ten
thirty and I'm here tonight with Samantha. Who's this lovely woman. I'm Marion
Ryan. I have the privilege to being the district attorney for a Middlesex county.
Is that a good thing? It's a great thing. You love your
Joe. I love my job. How long? Eleven years? Eleven years?
Eleven years and still get up and love what you do? I do
love it. Now that position is what how do you get into that position?
It's an elected position with a four year term and we're on what you
know, I am just coming to the middle of my second year of my
third term full term, so now this one we have to start going back.
I'm campaigning again and you've been there for eleven years. Yeah, so
why would we change a good thing? Well, I hope that won't happen.
I think we're doing some amazing things in this county. We've really made
an impact on people's lives. Go ahead and talk about it. So I
think one of the best parts of this job, and there are some very
hard parts, you know, usually when we're responding something terrible has happened.
But one of the great things about this is we are number one. We
help people moving forward after something terrible has happened. Very often we're the first
people they're meeting with the police. Can you cite some an example like the
listeners so they understand. So for instance, someone may lose somebody in a
terrible driving under the influence crash, So there's that awful knock at the door
being told that something's happened. Now you're then catapulted into sort of a whole
different world of somebody maybe has been arrested, charged with what happened, or
we're doing an investigation to figure out what happened, and our working with our
attorneys and our advocates, we're helping you to understand that process, keeping you
updated on what's happening, and then really partnering with families to help them get
through the trial if we ultimately apprehend somebody and get to a resolution. So
there's that piece. The other great piece is we are able to take things
that we learn from when something happens and turn that into prevention, because it's
always better if people never meet us, if the crime doesn't happened. You
know, we've this morning, I was doing work with senior citizens, talking
to them about how to avoid being scammed. So we've seen from people who've
lost literally hundreds of thousands of dollars. How they were trapped in that scam,
yeah, and how they're trying to prevent them. Ray's mother got the
grandmother scam where the grandson called it. And she's going, it doesn't really
sound like you. Yeah, my nose is brunque was broken. Yeah,
And she went and she bought gift cards like this is. She has passed
away now a few years ago from pancreatic cancer, but she was sick of
the time and she still left the house on chemo and everything else, and
went and bought these gift cards because they were a grandmother. They're going to
take care of what they think somebody needs something like she and he said,
don't don't call my father, please write And so she didn't call. And
then by like the third time they told her to go back, She's like,
I better call somebody. This this can't be right. And of course
she called Ray and then ways like, well would you do so yes,
I mean, so that's what you're doing. You're doing preventing what we learned
from what happens. Then we take that out into the community to say,
you know, we know people are doing this. So for instance, people
now don't ask you for the gift card because that takes too long. They
just ask you to rub the back of the gift card and give them the
number. So you know, the bad guys get ahead of us, and
we try to take that information and share it with people so that they can
avoid this because we literally see hundreds of thousands of dollars and we are these
bad guys in other countries or they not always sometimes they're here. Sometimes the
money goes out of the country. Sometimes you have people here who are channeling
the money to somebody else. Remember that crazy call about ever Source and you
called the guy out. I get a lot of crazy calls. Somebody said
he was ever Source and that we hadn't paid the bill. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, ever Saurce. That was another scam. I'm like, buddy,
you're calling the wrong person. We pay our bills there, Okay,
no, no, no, we're going to shut your power. Well,
then shut my power off. I'll be waiting. We'll be sitting here waiting
for you shut our power off. But see, that's exactly when you say
it's going to happen, like you'll often people will often get a phone call
saying you Social Security checks are not coming. Well, now they're in a
panic. What am I going to do? Or we Today when I was
doing the program, somebody said they had called and said, the state police
are going to arrest you because your credit card was used to buy guns.
They're coming. He was in a panic, like, the state police are
going to come and arrest me. What do I do? Well, the
way you can fix this is give me your social Security number and send us
some money. But that's what people get frightening, especially if you know.
And one of the things we in another piece of what we've been looking at
is we forget how lonely people are sometimes and they're in their house by themselves.
Maybe they don't have family that they That's why we should go back in
time and live in three deca families again in some of them okay, and
grandmother, your great grandmother and the kids, and then everybody lived longer because
everyone's happy, right, I think, I don't know, maybe not,
maybe maybe not. But so that's what you're doing out there. You're also
doing prevention. You're doing we're really doing education. We're doing the That seems
like a lot of work for your for you and your team to be dealing
with I have a wonderful team with all the crime that goes on also too,
because that's really what you are. We have what's coming in the door
immediately, we're working on our old uncharged cases, and then we're trying to
do the prevention and education piece as well. Lustress. How many city and
towns are in middles fifty four it's a lot, Yeah, just about one
point eight million people. We are the biggest county. I was gonna say
that the population is of the Mississippi. Okay, So how many counties do
we have? We have Norfolk. We've eleven in Middlesex. I mean in
Massachusetts. So what are they? Suffolk, Middlesex, Norfolk, Hampden,
Franklin, Worcester. Yeah, I can't vote North Suffolk. That's all I
hear. You probably live in Norfolk, she does, Yeah, you do
brooklines at Norfolk. Norfolk. Yeah, but you're Suffolk. I'm Middlesex,
Middlesex. Yeah, because RUSSI said she's not part of our but where where
where we grew up new and is part of Middlesex. Yeah I knew it
was Middlesex and Stuffolk is Boston, right, got it? What it's why
I ask, because most people don't know that. And then you run yours
the way you want to run, they run the way they want to run,
and then you all ever get together and run once a month, well,
once a month we meet to just kind of talk over issues that affect
all of us, that sort of thing, got it? What's the biggest
issue right now? And we don't want to talk about that because we've got
a lot of issues. I would say the biggest issue for everyone everywhere is
mental health. I'd have to agree with that. Yeah, I mean probably
eighty five percent of every case of the cases we see, there's some mental
health piece that's going on there. And now we have less psychiatrists and we
don't have enough to go around right now, right, So what do you
do? We are you going to do? People are just a little bit
off, right, Like I I've suffed from panic attacks since twenty six years
old, so I understand it. And people just go, Cindy Stumble's got
panic attacks, Yeah, she does, imagine that. Why, I don't
know. Ask my mother and my grandmother because they gave them to me,
because they have them. But back then at twenty six, they want to
blame it on PTSD. You know, no, no genetics, thank you
very much, nean orm. But well, genetics are a huge piece.
It's also you know, we have this whole everything we've been through, it
had a ketch up on this right, being locked down COVID working under the
conditions. I was working full time. We were essential as you know in
Massachusetts as builders. But that wasn't a good way to be working. Being
afraid. You're you're afraid, you're I mean, I don't know anybody that
wasn't besides my kids not being afraid because it's literally spring my body with liphole.
You were, but your brother was running around kissing everything in the world
like you could care less, like he was in his twenties. Like I'm
not going to get this. If I get it, I'll be strong enough.
And and then there's everybody else that we're going I'm i gonna end up
an event lator I'm gonna endup dead. I mean, it's that was a
tough time and now it's showing all. It's, you know, the ugliness
that comes out of that, especially for young people, for kids. I
don't know, I don't even want to be around big crowdsy would you,
No, I know. I think of that now in a way I never
did before. Like, what do I want to hold a Celtics game?
I love the Celtics, right, there's players let live in my homes.
But I love you guys. I'll see you guys when you come home.
Right, Like, I don't really need to go. I don't want to
be there. It's a different like energy Boston experience. When you're there,
you're good. And then I'll get home. I'll come home and I'll get
sick. But hold that thought you're down. In one second, I'm Sidy
stumbleing you listening Tough of Nails on WBZ News Radio ten thirty and We'll be
right back, sponsored by Flora Decor, National Lumber and Village Bank. Oh
and Welcome back City Stumpo Toughest Nails on WBZ News Radio ten thirty and I'm
in the studio with n Now you go. It's good, Sammy, she's
the guest. She can go for you go first. I'm sorry Mary and
Ryan the district attorney in Middlesex. I'm chopped liver today. Anyways, It's
OK. Yeah, I fought with her the Peter Brady Why don't my kids
ca learned financial literacy? Is that like so high to learn? It's easy
to be It's nice to be our kids. God, no, it's nice
to be my brother. Okay, that's what my daughter would say too,
it's nice to be her. What's wrong with these people? These kids like
aliens? Like do you remember you got up and old? Went to was
younger? Oh? Let me just ask them a very simple question. Have
you been working your whole life? Yes? Have you been working as a
teenager yes? Did you always have a job yes? Did you have to
be held responsible, reliable and dependable? And when your father and your mother
gave you an eyebrow, did you know to go stage left? That look?
That look we used to call it the look. The look, it's
the one eyebrow looking. You went, okay, I pushed it. What's
wrong with the concrete today that kids don't wait to democraticly? You know,
my son's favorite word is pre much editor. I'm the oldest, therefore I
should have that. That's say, okay, and I got all the rules,
so I was the oldest. Yeah, yeah, I'm the oldest.
I got all the rules. And by the time everyone's like, get with
everything. Sammy says when she has and they're going to be working by eight
because that's a good idea. I like that idea. No, I just
don't understand, like, come on, we had grit, we had grind,
we had we had like we want to go. I'm eighteen, I'm
out of here, Like mom and dad, I love you to death,
but it's time for me to move all my life, like these kids want
to come home. She didn't really want me to go. I didn't want
you to go because you're specially you're in erees. You're just a special.
Two minutes ago, she wanted to punch my face special. No. No,
I was going to beat her up earlier, but no, just told
me leave everything that I don't need you. Yeah, she would have pitic
attack if I left. But at the end of the day, I just
want her to understand that times have been good the last decade, right in
our business, in our world and a lot of businesses, and now we're
coming into some shaky waters on water waters, yeah, water, water,
water, water waters. I just want her to know that it doesn't always
last forever. And when you get into business when the market's great, and
she did. She came into a good market at twenty six, twenty six,
twenty seven. These kids haven't felt what a bad market feels like.
But see, we will take care of that for them, don't we.
We will make it all good. But we hope we can make it all
good. But here's the difference. I could vicariously live through older people when
they told me a story this generation can't. Like if my mother and grandmother
told me a story of my grandfather, I listened right, and I could
put myself in their shoes. For some reason, maybe that was just a
talent that some people have, but I believe them. They're my parents,
my grandparents. They don't want the best for me, not the worst for
us. Right. But to go back to what we're talking about priors again
to our personal life with our kids is mental illness. And that's that's a
big root of the problems going on right now. Big root of it is
in some cases that is because people didn't get care for a long time,
you know, for two or three years, they really didn't get care.
There also is just a real shortage of mental health professionals that are available to
and there's also just and people forget this. And we've been doing a lot
of work around. This is just loneliness. You know, people spend so
much time kind of in their own head and on their own devices, they're
really unable to interact. And I'll give you a couple of examples. We
started two programs. One we started in schools, in middle schools, which
is called Nobody Eats Alone, because kids are just left a lot of times
kids are just they're the kid who's left at the table by themselves. So
it's a program where kids really agree to reach out if they see somebody alone.
And the starting I think they are doing it. I mean the place
the schools we've started, kids seem to really respond to it. The schools
have been good about putting together groups of kids, like maybe it's the class
officers, maybe it's the sports teams. And I think when you really explain
to kids how important it is, kids have been good. I'm always impressed
with kids. I just did a group and a lot of the kids talked
about how they have had at some point been new in the school, so
they knew what it felt like to be kind of the new person or to
be the person who didn't have a friend. We've also been in a lot
of communities we've been buying benches and again I want to break in on that
one. Okay, yeah, with my own personal opinion experience, My mommy
didn't hold my hand. They moved me from the North Shore thirteen to new
and I had a culture shark walking through that school. I was like,
well, these kids are weird. This is all They bring me back to
where I came from, right, Like, I don't want to be here.
But no one held my hand and said, oh honey, it's gonna
be great. I just had to go do what I had to do,
Like I had to go and make new friends, and no one held my
hand and no one cuddled me, and oh, Cindy, will let me
walk you through the school. My mom dropped me off, went's a guns
councilor I checked in and from that point she stayed with me out the door.
She went out the door. I went and had to figure it out,
find the way around school, all of it. But so probably two
things. There. Certainly are kids, and you probably were one of those
kids who are more resilient and who can do that. Well, you had
to learn that, well you learn it, and some kids aren't is able
to do that sometimes and the other piece of it, I think is we
were all more engaged with each other because think about you walk through places,
people's heads are glued to their phone or their device, right, so they're
not reaching out to another kid. They're busy with whatever they in school.
Well, that's a whole difference. When did it become normal that you could
bring your phone to school? Right? Like? When? However, and
my grandmother said to her, my grandmother has been passed away now for eight
years, said to my kids ten years ago, when we were shooting Tapa's
nails, you see what you're holding. That's going to be the downfall of
this country. She was right. Do you remember Nana saying that to you
holding that Apple iPhone, like this is going to be the device that's what's
going to take this country down. But again, she's been waiting for the
depression. She was waiting for the depression to come back to her. Right,
so we can we wasn't my choice to have a phone at school?
That was yours because you were so scared, well, because I wanted to
be able to read. But back back then, you didn't have the Internet
on your phone. You had a phone number. I called you, you
answered it. That's it, not looking at TikTok and bomba bah. So
you're right, people's heads are in phones. I mean, we see an
incredible number of pedestrian accidents because people are busy with their phone. We have
driving situations where people are just they're watching a movie on their phone while they're
trying to drive. That's crazy. Yeah, but people are doing even even
and we're all addicted to this, right. We all use our ways or
our maps or whatever going how to use mind. I do the old fashioned
way. I put the window down. Hey, we as blah blah blah.
And people are just distracted by that stuff all the time, so that
connectedness. Nobody talks to strangers. Now you get on a fresh subway or
something, and everybody is just looking at their phone. It's a different way.
It's a very different. But it changed really drastically, like only that
will change and really that's it. Yea within ten years, yea, within
ten years, I saw the change only to maybe. But you're right,
people lonely. That's why audio devices are great. So if you are lonely,
there's place like xpace right, which is on Twitter. But I don't
like go on my Twitter because all I see is bad things happening in schools,
kids beating each other all you wants to send this in family group chat,
and our algorithm to be really negative. Yeah, my algorithm is very
bad. But then I watch one and I want to watch another, And
then I watch another and I don't understand why these kids are beating each other
up at school and hitting teachers, And come, I'm not like this little
like little lady with a cane, like I get life, right, but
we as parents, like you don't put your hands on teachers, Like this
is all crazy. That is what I'm watching. But again, that's where
my algorithm is pulling me to because the more you watch that, the more
you get right. So I don't see nice kids doing nice things in school
right now. And there's lots of that. There are really lots of that.
We put in a lot of loneliness benches, a lot of them located
between like schools and senior housing, so people sit and talk to people.
You know, that's really worked and it sounds like a real throwback idea,
but it's a place for some I like to just sit down. We put
a bench in in Lowell between a senior housing in a school. So if
you live at the senior housing and it's a nice day, you can go
sit out there. The kids go over and sit on the bench. It's
been a real back to what you said, sort of that community feeling of
people knowing people. But if you think about this, and this is what
kids don't understand, and I say it all the time, sit down with
an elderly person, talk to them, hear their life story. You learn
more from that one conversation than you might learn in one year in school because
you're learning somebody else's journey, what they've been through. And if you're empathetic
and you're cure enough, that's why older people need to talk to kids all
But maybe I shouldn't be talking to my kids. You talk to my kids.
I talk to your kids. Mister builder, I'll take your son.
I'll give you my son, because then there's a different respect factor. But
I think we've lost so much it's crazy. And then you have so much
to worry about with all the crime that goes on. Just we are we
up and crime we're down in crime. Crime is unfortunately, crime is down
in Middlesex County, really down. Fortunately it's down, yeah, so down,
meaning what the hard crime or the robberies, or like the shootings,
or because the hot crime seems to be down but the stealing is up.
I will say the only thing that is probably it's down, but it's not
down as much as we would like. Our younger people with guns. And
we're fortunate because in part because we live five minutes from great hospitals, so
we have lots of kids who survive things that if we live somewhere else.
Oh, I thought we could to go to break right now? Is thinking
that my face? I'm Sinny Stumbley. He looks a tough of his nails.
On w BZ News Radio ten theory Be right Back, sponsored by Pillow
Windows of Boston, Next Day Molding and Kennedy Carpet and Welcome back to Tums
Nails on w BZ News Radio ten thirty. And I'm here with the lovely
Marion Ryan, the District Attorney Middlesex County. There you go, and Samantha
the one that when we leave here with Ncarote. No, I love in
Knockarot. I like that, not growth the price what we say to you
know, we've had an uptick in those situations with people shooting at each other,
shooting at members of different groups, and those things are very scary,
even when no one gets hurt, because they're scary in a neighborhood. We
have a bill that became part of that. We filed a bill that became
part of the gun bill for people shooting at houses because we've had an incredible
number of cases where people are the age group of those kids, I'd say
old the people shooting at house eighteen to twenty seven, twenty eight, you
know that ten years, so it's not fourteen, fifteen year old. Now
we have that isn't true in some places, we haven't really seen that.
It's older kids, and you know is shooting it houses, whether I'm doing
it to scare you or One of the things that's very frightening now is people
have guns that can shoot a lot more. They're automatic, whether they've got
one of the little switches or their ghost guns. So we would use to
go to a crime scene and we might see seven or eight casings on the
ground. It's not unusual now to go and there might be thirty five or
forty on the ground. So that's how many shots have been fired. And
when you do that, especially in city areas, you end up with houses
that get hit. So if you think about what it's like for the people
in that neighborhood or people who live in those houses. We've had some really
terrifying things. Things have gone through people's windows, gone in the walls of
their houses. That's what ends in neighborhood because if you have any resources at
all, you think I'm getting my family out of here. I'm certainly not
leaving my kids out to play when something like that might happen. So that's
a big focus is really we take a very hard line on gun cases.
You know, you just can't be out there doing this random shooting. Do
we have enough cops to go around these areas? I would say short.
I would say the majority of cities and towns in Massachusetts right now would tell
you that they are low on enrollment. We do have great police departments across
our county, people who really partner with us when we make an effort to
say, you know, we're going to target this or that in certain communities,
and that is made an enormous difference. We've seen a lot of that
in our approach to drug overdoses and things. We've done a lot of partnerships
and push those numbers down pretty dramatically. I feel like in high school there
was like a waiting list for people to want to be a Newton cop.
Yeah there was, there was, But here you are like my friend's parents,
Those kids wanted to be cops, and they're like, I'd have to
be in a waiting list. I don't think i'd get in. And now
you know, we just turned over in Brookline that you don't have to live
in Brookline for a year, which is great, but I mean we've pushed
that so hard. Can kids, young guys and girls afford to live in
Brookline for a year and pay rent so then they can apply to the police
force? Right? Maybe get in then? Oh no, I mean we
need we need police officers. That's that's for sure. Look as far as
I'm concerned, I stick by this and we you know, and I put
all these about Brookline police to come to Brookline. You'll see about four hundred
and fifty signs near where I live. You know, we're backing the Brookline
police. We're proud, you know, the Brookline Police. What's the sign
actually say, spend five thousand dollars on these signs? We support the Brookline
Police. Yes, because I feel like a lot of these police offices have
just been so disrespected the last four years plus, right that the morale is
not there, and you've got to lift their morale too. Look, I'm
not going to say there's always a bad doctor, a bad lawyer, a
bad build financial advisor, a bad builder, a bad HVAC guy, bad
plumber, a bad cop. You're not going to stop that. I mean,
but the majority are not bad as far as I'm concerned, they're not.
And you know they're not theater. Look, when we were young and
a cop torch just we deserved it. That's the truth. We deserved it.
Okay, we're being punks, we're being jerks out there. I feel
like as a kid though, everyone was like I want to be a cop,
I want to be a fighter fighter. That's like all you ever heard.
I wonder if that's anything like that anymore. No, they want to
be influences. What's wrong with you? They're going to be influences. That's
what they think. They come to like the school fair or whatever and say
this is the day, the day that you decide what you want to be.
You're going to bring an influencer to school that day and be like,
this is what I want to do. Yeah. Do they just love that
way they bring parents into talk? I think so do they. So our
big, our big problem is, as you said, is guns on the
streets. And then people that can legally have a gun, they go and
they get a license to have a gun, and they're mentally and physically healthy
to have a gun. And then you got people that are going to be
illegal and do illegal things in criminal activity. They're going to find guns.
They're going to find it no matter what. It's not hard to find a
gun. You also have a lot of people who may be got a license
to have a gun, and over time, you know, a mental health
issue has arisen. I mean we've seen lots of those. You know,
somebody who might have been perfectly fine when they got their license, may we
need to renew us. Ten years has gone by or something, and things
have happened. And that's why, you know, some of the things that
we've passed to Massachusetts, like the red Flag law, really important because the
chief of police gives you a license. Now the chief of police is not
traveling around with you every day and maybe seeing what's going on with you.
That's why it's really so important, for instance, for families, when you
see somebody who's struggling to make that known so that they don't necessarily have their
gun. Well, what about renewing, Like you have to renew your driver's
license, why don't you have to renew your gun license? Well, even
when you do, though, the authorities, I see a snapshot of you.
You know, it's like when you go to renew your driver's license,
they see you for the ten minutes you're in the registry office. They don't
know that you drive in a very crazy way when you're out on the road.
And that's why we've really been encouraging people, or especially when people get
older. You know, there are people who maybe they get older, they're
physical and mental health has declined. Maybe they shouldn't have their guns anymore.
You lost your glasses already. I just handed them to you. No,
I did. I gave up. When I first went through a metopause,
I heard it ray I'm a licensed carrier. I said, lock this up.
Lock it up for two years. I want nothing to do with it,
because my menopause would make me feel like, oh it cockle crazy.
Right. So, but I think when you know that you're cucko crazy,
then you really not cuckoo crazy. But I just felt more comfortable here locked
this up because I could say I'm a little bit more emotional, and I
came out of it whatever, and then I went back to Cindy. But
you have to know when to lock something up and put it away and don't
carry it right and you got to no, you're But sometimes sick people don't
know. They don't know that. That's how you know the difference. I
once asked. I was interviewing a doctor and he said, I said,
do you think I'm crazy because I talked to myself? He goes, no,
are you answering yourself back? I go no, he goes, then
you're normal. It is when you're start answering yourself back and it comes to
another voice and you're crazy. Cindy, You're like, okay, good to
know that. So gun, what about what else do we have? Like
in our area a lot of our crime and break ins that's been our area.
Well, we just we just made arrests in that very large, long
term investigation where people who were Indian and Southeast Asian had been targeted. That
was a nine months investigation. Yeah, we arrested four people down in Kinnecticut
and Rhode Island for that, and that was that was frightening because you know,
if you've ever had your house broken into, you know, it's terrible.
Somebody's been in your house, They've been touching your things, they took
your things. This was compounded by the fact that not only was that happening,
but people realized that, you know, not every house on the street
was getting broken into. It was only primarily families that were Indian or Southeast
Asian. So then you wonder, like, who's targeting me? How do
people figure out that it's me? And we're still looking at that part of
the investigation. But for instance, one of the things we found during the
arrest were a membershipless for temples, so clearly there was they did have information
about who belonged to this temple, could probably predict, you know, when
they wouldn't be home, when they'd be at a service, that sort of
thing. So that was truly frightening for people. What's coming on us next,
I would say the mental health issues continuing. I think we're also going
to see a lot more of the cyber kinds of crimes. You know,
the AI, the deep fakes AI is going to be. Look, I
can tell AI in literally three seconds to build a city stample home and because
there's so many homes on the internet, it comes up with a like this,
So how hard it is going to be? Put me my face or
on a naked body or vice versa, or me talk like I'm you.
You talk like I'm me and I'm not you and you're not me, and
you're saying things that would be me and vice versa. I mean, I
don't know about I'll say again, there's always something good, but then we
find the bad in it. That's great, but then you gotta find the
you know, you have to bring the bad into it. So there's things
like we rely on surveillance, video and photos and things. Those can all
be altered by AI. Will come to Brookline. You're everybody's going to body.
We're protecting everybody there. It's crazy. But the other things that people
have to understand is that you've been doing this job for eleven years. How
many other have held that position for as long as you've told it? Many
or not, there's a few. So there's a reason why you hold a
position for eleven years. But how many women? How many women? That's
a good one. I like that one, Sammy. No other woman has
been da this long. I like that, Sammy. That's a fist pump.
I need a fifth pump right now. We're not going to throw you
out today. She just retrieved herself. Oh no, we're going to break.
I'm to be stupling. Listen to I Was Nails on WBZ News Radio
ten thirty. It will be right back, sponsored by new Brook Realty Group,
Boston Wood Smaller Insurance, World Auto Body and Tosca Drive Auto Body And
welcome back to Tapa's Nails on WBZ News Radio ten thirty. And I'm Sidney
Stumpo and I'm sitting here with the lovely maryon Ryan, the District Attorney of
Middlesex County. And she's tough. And who else, Samantha Smithy. That
was a great question. I gotta give you. I'm not gonna let anything
go that you did earlier. You just saved her. Now I can ask
for things now. Earlier. It wasn't earlier. I was getting disowned this
own. She's like, Mom, I make a strong living. Why are
you telling me that I should be spending that much money because you shouldn't because
you're safe for rain day? Did your parents tell you safe for rainy day?
Is that just stuck in our brains? We ever hear of that?
No, but it's the truth, right, Yeah, I'm not crazy?
Right, Well, I can't speak to that, but you're not. It's
crazy, but I'm not crazy about that, correct. I like that.
I'm crazy. I want to be those crazy just but not crazy about that.
So talk to me about domestic violence. Talk to me. I saw
a lot of that going on. Who COVID a lot of it with our
police because they hang out of my job nights and all of a sudden,
there's four and then they're gone, right, and I know where they're going.
I can get the calls coming through what's going on domestic So we've created
a lot of partnerships that really are a reflection of we all know the response
we had thirty years ago. You know, the police go out, we
kind of separate people. We hope it gets better. That wasn't very effective.
What has been effective is helping people to really find a way out of
that life. So for instance, and having people that aren't police to be
supportive of them. So we created a program brought it to Middlesex about eleven
years ago called the Cut It Out Program, where we train hairdressers, folks
who do personal services, people who do your nails, who do a facial,
even restaurant workers what the signs are of domestic violence, because there are
lots of injuries that are inflicted in domestic violence cases that don't happen in any
other case. So, for instance, there is no other crime where people
pull out a clump of hair, but that happens very often in a domestic
violence case. And I pull out a clump of hair in the back of
your head, it hurts unbelievably, but you can comb your hair down and
you can go to work, and no one else sees that you go to
the hair salon that your hairdresser sees those clumps. They see the little petiki,
the first blood vessels in your eye, they'll see the little marks on
your neck where somebody's grabbed you and choked you. So we've trained those providers
for what the signs are, to look for, and then how to approach.
I mean, you can't say gee, you know being abused at home.
No one's going to say g I am, but how to kind of
ask questions that are not threatening or to And when we do it, we
go with people from the local shelters and police officers. So it's not a
person and saying you know, I've heard there's a shelter you could go to.
They're saying there's a shelter down on Washington Street. The woman's name is
Samantha, whatever it is, and they can give people those kinds of connections.
So we've now trained several thousand people across Middlesex County to what to look
for, how to reach out for help, give me the delivery. So
the hairdresser sees a hole in a woman's head, see the hare has been
pulled out, Does she engage in a conversation? Does she call somewhere to
somebody come out and engage. No, that we train people to be able
to ask that question about starting out, you know, depending on what your
relationship obviously is. But you know, I notice you've lost some hair back
here. Okay. You know, somebody might say, well, it's my
medication, it's whatever, And now they've come back twice and you've now seen
different big clumps, so you might be asking and maybe even just the question
of are you safe. And when we do that training, what people tell
us who've been doing that work for a long time, they've all seen it
and they didn't know what to do with it. We give them something they
can be doing about it those questions. Maybe you just say, you know,
I know, you say you're fine, but let me just tell you.
There's this woman, you know, Alice, who works down the street.
Here's her number. You might want to talk to her. What we
know and what the studies bear out is that people often have to hear that
five or six times before they're ready to do something. It's not very likely
that someone's going to suddenly say, you're right, I'm in an abusive relationship.
I short of seen that, but maybe I worked. They think about
idiots, so I know they think about it, and then they feel safer
because now you've given them an actual person. They know you, and they
feel safer saying things you know. You know how it is with your hairdresser.
You know your hairdresser forever. They know all kinds of stuff, and
what's really important is they're usually kind of separated from the rest of your life,
so you can say things there that aren't going to get back to your
work, that aren't going to get back to your family. People sort of
trust that, and over time, many of them end up coming forward and
saying, you know, somebody cared about me. They asked if I was
okay. They're living often in a very frightening reality and for somebody to just
reach in and care about them is really important. So that program's been really
successful. Let's make this clear to the audience. Domestic violence happens in poor,
middle class, and rich and ultra ultra rich. It lives in every
kind. Doesn't matter. Yeah, it doesn't matter. That's why I like
my show. We can talk about whatever goes on between the foundation roof,
and Samuel'll tell you I'm a huge on domestic in conversations with this, We've
done so many conversations. But look, my experience is that sometimes we can
get the families, the women and the children out of the houses and put
them in they have their own apartment, especially the brook Few house in Roxbury
to bedroom. They get in there and sometimes they want to leave in five,
six, ten, twelve nights right because they only remember the good or
their promise this is not going to happen again, and come home and things
are going to be different. But leopards don't change their spots. They would
have to go through so much psychiatry to even change that. But again,
the woman is used to I've got my husband, I've got my roof over
my head, I'm not in some strange area, I'm not in a shelter,
and they start to justify that this is okay. I've seen it so
many times, and a lot of times obviously it's about children, you know,
you know, I don't want my children not to be with their father,
my children were. It's very hard for somebody, and as you said,
it's in all kinds of communities. Sometimes in a in a more affluent
situation, it's very hard to lead that because you don't want to be abused,
but you also don't want your kids to have given up all of their
friends. They're not going to their same school in the house. Yes,
let's call it what it is. Right. We tolerate, but we tolerate
because sometimes, well, I'm living a nice life. Sometimes I've heard that,
but Cindy, I live a nice life. No, you're not living
a nice life. Well, and you know until it life is that you're
when you go home. Everybody should go home and feel safe. Right you're
in the streets, you're hanging, you're doing whatever, you're working. I'm
on construction. I'll go home. I want to feel safe. Everybody should
feel safe when they go home. Everybody should have a partner that makes them
feel safe. But I tell you some of the stuff I'm watching next.
These women can throw down as good as the men can. Right now,
I wouldn't want to bang on some of these women either. They can throw
down. They really can. Well, that's another and that's another piece of
it. You know, people think about domestic islands in its very traditional way.
It is, you know, a traditional couple, usually a female who's
the victim. We're seeing a lot more. For instance, people don't think
about this. We see couples that have been married fifty or sixty years and
there's an abusive situation going on. Maybe they're both on well, maybe one
of them just reques. There's a lot of care people who maybe things were
sort of okay when they worked and they were away from each other a lot
of the time. Now they're home together, you know that retire Yeah,
that's not that's not what people expect, you know, we have. We
have victims in domestic violence cases who are eighty years old, and that it
poses a whole lot of different challenges. That person is not as portable or
able to go to a shelter. They got it, They need their medication,
they need to be in their home. There's just sort of a lot
of other issues. We also have a large number of adult children who,
because of mental health issues or substance issues, are back living with their parents.
That situation phrase very often. Somebody doesn't want to take their medication,
they won't go get a job, the fight starts. You know, you've
got an eighty year old mother and a forty year old son. You know,
we see a lot of that, and people don't think about that as
domestic violence, but it is. Yeah, any of you children put in
the head and whoever thought you'd see boys sixteen, seventeen fifty putting their hands
on their father's I mean, this is I'm seeing this. Yeah, whether
it's Newton, brook Line, Revere not sure. So I'm seeing it,
I'm hearing it. I'm seeing it. It's not normal. But what do
you do? You lock up these kids, You lock up the kids that
are hitting their parents. You lock up the husband that said his wife you
lock up, Well, I think we en have jails to go around right
now for everybody. But what about reopening mental hospitals Again, well, I
think we certainly right now. There's certainly even if there were situations where people
thought that was good, and clearly we people didn't have an opportunity to do
a lot of things they were able to do safely in communities. But the
biggest problem right now is we don't have enough mental health workers. We just
can't fill them. We're going to get them because they're not coming out of
school, they don't want this job. They're hard jobs, they're not the
best paying jobs, and you can spend a lot of money to get the
education to do that job. So we have to think of a different model
of how to provide that gear. And the insurance companies are terrible. Unless
you're very rich and you need help for your kids with drugs and any of
the unless you're going to write a check for eighty eighty five thousand a month,
you're not getting a kid help you there. Okay, Anyways, I'm
sending you stuff when you will send Tess Nails on WVZ News Radio ten thirty
and'll be right back please and welcome back to Toughness Nails on WBZ News Radio
ten thirty. And I had a lovely guest here tonight, which is Marion
Ryan, the District Attorney in Middlesex County. Glad you take it. We've
had a great opportunity to talk about some of the work that we're doing,
some of the programs that we have, particularly proud of our Unsolved Case Unit.
So please go to our website, Middlesex da'soffice dot com and look at
both the programs that are out there that are available, some of the tips
about keeping people safe, and also please look at the work we're doing around
uncharged and unsolved cases. And I'm Sidney Stumpo, and I got to get
right behind her because I've been backing her if I don't know how many years
now. I respect Maria and I appreciate it. I think she's great at
what she does. And I put my money where my mouth is. Everybody,
have a great safe weekend, and we'll see you next week. And
this is Sidney Stumpo Tough his Nails on ws Thank you Seemy, WBZ News
Radio ten thirty