Suspect in Southie double murder briefly worked at doctors' apartment building

BOSTON — The man accused of murdering two prominent local doctors worked briefly at their apartment complex, according to the company that employed him.

Boston 25 News has learned Bampumim Teixeira worked in South Boston’s Macallen building for 3 weeks. His background and reference checks came back clean when the company hired him just over a year ago.

A source told Boston 25 he lives in the United States legally on a green card and despite 2 previous convictions for bank robbery, was allowed to stay in the country.

“Hopefully he'll be dealt with swiftly and get the justice he deserves,” Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said.

In 2016, a judge sentenced Teixeira to 364 days in jail with nine months to serve. The rest was suspended for a 3-year probationary term.

MORE: Investigators reveal chilling information about gruesome killing of 2 Boston doctors

Defense attorney Brad Bailey, who doesn’t represent Teixeira says the shorter sentence may have allowed him to escape deportation.

“If that's been committed within 5 years of someone's admission in the country, and you get more than a year in prison, you are going to lose your green card and lose your status,” he said. “That sounds like it could be a factor in this situation given that it was a bank robbery and given how low the sentence was here.”

Due to citizen privacy laws, the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Office could not comment on Teixeira's immigration status, but gave Boston 25 News the following statement:

“ICE has no legal position with regard to this individual at this time, although we will continue to monitor the matter in case his criminal charges change his legal disposition."

Bailey says if Teixeira is convicted on one or both murder charges, deportation becomes a non-issue as he would spend the rest of his life in prison in the United States.

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The Suffolk County District attorney specifically addressed deportation concerns in a statement Tuesday afternoon.

It's been suggested that Teixeira would have been automatically deported had he received a different sentence: This suggestion is simply inaccurate.  No plea in any criminal case automatically results in a person being deported.  It is a far more complicated and variable process than that.  In fact, Federal immigration law is so complex and variable that state prosecutors strive to focus our work on accountability in Massachusetts courts, where, for this defendant, they obtained a nine-month committed sentence followed by three years of court supervision on a case that involved no weapon, no actual use of force, and no injuries, with a defendant with no criminal record.  One of the two cases at issue was only solved when the defendant volunteered his involvement to detectives investigating the other.  The sentence imposed on this defendant was no more lenient than what would have been imposed on any similarly-situated person given the same facts, circumstances, and lack of criminal record.

This sort of speculation only serves to detract responsibility for two murders from the only individual responsible for them -- Bampumim Teixeira.

Cox Media Group