When the federal government charges a case in Massachusetts, it lands in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts — most often at the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse on Boston’s Fan Pier, the same building where the First Circuit will hear the appeal if one follows. This is one of the country’s most consequential districts for white-collar prosecution: fraud, money-laundering, and tax cases all run far above their national share of the docket here. Defending a case in this court means understanding not just federal law but the institution applying it.
This guide covers the court’s three divisions and the bench that staffs them, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and what it actually prosecutes, and how we represent clients here. Elizabeth Franklin-Best has been admitted pro hac vice in the District of Massachusetts — this is a court our firm has practiced in, not merely one we could reach. She is named in Best Lawyers in America 2026 for Appellate Practice and holds a Chambers USA 2026 ranking in Litigation: White-Collar Crime & Government Investigations — a fitting pairing for a district whose docket runs unusually heavy in white-collar prosecutions. This page is part of our federal courts directory.
A federal investigation or charge in Boston, Worcester, or Springfield should not be faced without counsel who know this court. We offer a paid, one-hour initial consultation to assess where the case stands and map what can be done.
Table of Contents
Quick Answer: District of Massachusetts
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| What court handles federal cases in Massachusetts? | The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts — one statewide district in three divisions, sitting at the Moakley Courthouse in Boston, the Donohue Federal Building in Worcester, and the U.S. Courthouse in Springfield. |
| Who prosecutes federal cases there? | The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts — one of the busiest in the nation, with more than 200 attorneys and staff, led as of mid-2026 by U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley. |
| Which circuit hears appeals? | The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit — headquartered in the same Moakley Courthouse where most of the district’s criminal cases are tried. |
| Where are post-conviction motions filed? | In this district itself — Section 2255 and compassionate-release motions attacking a Massachusetts federal judgment are filed and decided in the District of Massachusetts. |
| Has the firm appeared in this court? | Yes — and we already have. Elizabeth Franklin-Best has been admitted pro hac vice in this district, as part of a nationwide federal trial, appellate, and post-conviction practice. |
Key Takeaways
- The District of Massachusetts hears federal cases for the whole Commonwealth through three divisions — Eastern (Boston), Central (Worcester), and Western (Springfield).
- As of mid-2026, Chief Judge Denise J. Casper leads a bench of thirteen authorized district judgeships, with judges resident in all three divisions and a deep roster of senior judges still hearing cases.
- The district sentenced 531 people in fiscal year 2024 — the largest criminal docket in New England — per U.S. Sentencing Commission data.
- White-collar prosecutions are a signature of this district: fraud, theft, and embezzlement (16.2%), money laundering (9.0% — more than four times the national share), and tax (4.7%) together rival the drug docket.
- Massachusetts juries decided 33 federal criminal trials in FY2024 — more than any other district in the First Circuit.
- The U.S. Attorney’s Office, one of the busiest in the country, prosecuted the nationally watched college-admissions cases; the First Circuit’s United States v. Abdelaziz decision unwound key fraud theories from that prosecution.
- Appeals stay in the building: the First Circuit sits in the same Moakley Courthouse, and the notice of appeal is generally due within 14 days of judgment.
- Section 2255 and compassionate-release motions challenging a Massachusetts judgment are filed in this district — the First Circuit’s leading compassionate-release case, Ruvalcaba, began as a D. Mass. motion.
- Elizabeth Franklin-Best has been admitted pro hac vice in the District of Massachusetts — demonstrated experience in this specific court.
The District of Massachusetts at a Glance
The United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts is the federal trial court for the entire Commonwealth, organized into three divisional offices: the Eastern Division at the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse on Boston’s waterfront, the Central Division at the Harold D. Donohue Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in Worcester, and the Western Division at the U.S. Courthouse on State Street in Springfield. Where a case is heard generally follows the county where the alleged offense occurred, so a Berkshire County investigation and a Suffolk County indictment can put defendants in very different courtrooms.
The district anchors the First Circuit, whose judges sit several floors away in the same Moakley Courthouse — a geographic fact with practical meaning, because the trial record made in this building is reviewed in this building. Its in-circuit neighbors, the District of Rhode Island and the District of Maine, run far smaller dockets; Massachusetts is the circuit’s center of gravity for white-collar work.
Local practice has its own architecture here. Under the court’s rules for magistrate judges, every felony case is automatically assigned to a magistrate judge upon the return of an indictment, so the early life of a criminal case — arraignment, detention, scheduling, discovery disputes — typically unfolds before a magistrate judge rather than the district judge who will try it. Counsel who understand how that handoff works, and how the district’s local rules layer onto the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, start the case with an advantage.
The Bench: A Large Court Across Three Divisions
Massachusetts carries thirteen authorized district judgeships under 28 U.S.C. § 133 — by far the largest bench in the First Circuit. As of mid-2026, Chief Judge Denise J. Casper leads the court, with active district judges resident in all three divisions, including in Worcester and Springfield, so Central and Western Division cases are tried by judges who sit there, not by visitors from Boston.
The court’s senior bench is unusually deep and unusually active — it includes former chief judges and a former chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, and senior judges here continue to preside over significant criminal trials and sentencings. A Massachusetts federal defendant may draw a judge appointed in the 1980s or one appointed in the 2020s, and the difference in courtroom practice can be real even though the law is the same.
A corps of magistrate judges, led as of mid-2026 by Chief Magistrate Judge Paul G. Levenson, handles the front end of every felony case — initial appearances, detention hearings, and pretrial management — in all three divisions. Detention contests in this district are frequently won or lost at that magistrate-judge stage, which is one more reason the first week of a Massachusetts federal case matters so much.
Federal Criminal Cases in the District
Everything the federal criminal code reaches gets prosecuted in this district — but its docket tilts unmistakably toward white-collar crime and fraud, large drug-trafficking conspiracies, and money-laundering cases, with firearms prosecutions playing a smaller role than they do nationally. Whatever the charge, the procedural arc is the same.
Most cases begin with an investigation by a federal agency, sometimes signaled by a target letter or a grand jury subpoena. Formal charges follow, typically by indictment. After an initial appearance and arraignment, the case proceeds through pretrial litigation and discovery, and is then resolved either by a negotiated plea agreement or by trial. A conviction is followed by sentencing under the federal framework. Our federal criminal process hub walks through each stage in detail.
In a white-collar-heavy district, much of the defense happens before any charge exists: responding to grand jury subpoenas, managing parallel civil and criminal exposure, and making presentations to prosecutors about why a case should not be brought. Once a case is charged, we litigate it — motions, expert challenges to loss and laundering theories, and trial where trial is the right answer, in a district whose juries decided 33 federal criminal trials in fiscal year 2024 alone.
Applied Insight: Massachusetts federal investigations are often long, document-driven, and quiet — a healthcare-fraud or securities matter can be years old before the first subpoena arrives, and agencies like HHS-OIG, the FBI, and IRS Criminal Investigation usually work alongside the U.S. Attorney’s Office from the start. By the time you know you are a subject, the government has a theory. The window to shape that theory — or talk the office out of charging — closes fast, and it is the most valuable window in the whole case.
What Federal Prosecutors Pursue in Massachusetts
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts — led as of mid-2026 by U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley, with more than 200 attorneys and staff across Boston, Worcester, and Springfield — describes itself accurately as one of the busiest offices in the country. Its stated portfolio runs from national security and public corruption through white-collar crime, cybercrime, narcotics, money laundering, and gang violence, and its history includes some of the most prominent federal prosecutions in modern memory.
The U.S. Sentencing Commission’s fiscal year 2024 figures show what that means in volume: 531 people sentenced, the most of any New England district. Drug trafficking led at 38.0%, well above the 29.5% national share. But the district’s signature is its white-collar cluster — fraud, theft, and embezzlement at 16.2%, money laundering at 9.0% (more than four times the 2.1% national share), tax at 4.7%, and bribery and corruption above the national rate as well. Add them together and the financial-crime docket nearly rivals the drug docket.
No recent matter illustrates the district’s reach — or its limits — better than the college-admissions prosecution the office branded Operation Varsity Blues. Dozens of parents, coaches, and consultants were charged in Boston. But in United States v. Abdelaziz, 68 F.4th 1 (1st Cir. 2023), the First Circuit reversed the fraud convictions of two parents, rejecting the government’s theory that university admissions slots were the schools’ “property” for federal fraud purposes and finding the honest-services theory could not stand on that trial record. Read with the Supreme Court’s Ciminelli and Percoco decisions the same month, Abdelaziz is a standing reminder that aggressive fraud theories from this district can and do come apart on appeal — when the record was built to challenge them.
Healthcare enforcement is the other constant. The office’s civil and criminal units pursue kickback and billing-fraud cases against device makers, executives, and clinicians — in one recent example, the former chief financial officer of a Boston-area spinal-device company pleaded guilty in May 2026 in connection with a kickback scheme — and pandemic-relief and benefits-fraud prosecutions continue to move through both the Boston and Worcester courthouses.
Appeals and Post-Conviction Matters
In this district, the appeal does not even require leaving the building: the First Circuit sits in the Moakley Courthouse too, and convictions and sentences from the District of Massachusetts go there on a notice of appeal generally due within fourteen days of the entry of judgment. Abdelaziz shows what that review can accomplish when trial counsel preserved the right issues.
After the direct appeal, post-conviction litigation returns to the district of conviction: a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 attacking a Massachusetts federal judgment is filed in the District of Massachusetts, ordinarily before the original sentencing judge. This is the heart of our practice — record-driven work that depends on federal law and thorough investigation rather than geography.
This district also wrote the First Circuit’s compassionate-release law. United States v. Ruvalcaba, 26 F.4th 14 (1st Cir. 2022) — an appeal from a District of Massachusetts compassionate-release motion — established that district judges could weigh nonretroactive changes in sentencing law in the “extraordinary and compelling” calculus. The Supreme Court’s Rutherford v. United States decision (May 28, 2026) has now closed that door nationwide, so motions filed here must rest on medical, age-based, family, or comparable grounds. The forum remains comparatively receptive: First Circuit courts granted 25.0% of compassionate-release motions decided in fiscal year 2025, against a 14.1% national rate.
How the Firm Practices in This Court
Elizabeth Franklin-Best has been admitted pro hac vice in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts — not a hypothetical capability, but admission this court has already granted. For an out-of-district practitioner, that prior admission matters twice over: it reflects the court’s acceptance, and it means the learning curve on this district’s practices has already been climbed.
The work itself is national. The fraud statutes the government stretches in Boston are the same ones the Supreme Court has been trimming in Ciminelli, Percoco, and Kousisis; the Guidelines loss tables that drive white-collar sentences here are the same tables we litigate everywhere. What a Massachusetts case adds is local texture — the magistrate-judge assignment system, the divisional geography, the rhythms of a big, busy U.S. Attorney’s Office — and that texture is exactly what prior in-district experience supplies.
Because the First Circuit shares the courthouse, we treat every District of Massachusetts representation as an appellate case in development. Elizabeth Franklin-Best is admitted to the First Circuit, the U.S. Supreme Court, and every one of the twelve federal circuits, and the depth behind that admission is concrete: she has appeared in more than 330 federal proceedings, over 100 of them appeals, with cert-stage matters reaching the U.S. Supreme Court and a post-conviction practice that travels nationwide by pro hac vice admission. Her book Reversing Your Criminal Conviction grew out of exactly this kind of work — trial-level defense, direct appeal, and post-conviction litigation handled as one continuous strategy rather than three separate engagements.
Frequently Asked Questions
What court handles federal criminal cases in Massachusetts?
All federal criminal cases in the Commonwealth are heard in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, which operates through three divisions: Eastern in Boston at the Moakley Courthouse, Central in Worcester at the Donohue Federal Building, and Western in Springfield on State Street.
Who prosecutes federal crimes in the District of Massachusetts?
The United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Massachusetts, one of the busiest in the nation, with more than 200 attorneys and staff in Boston, Worcester, and Springfield. As of mid-2026 it is led by U.S. Attorney Leah B. Foley, and its priorities include white-collar crime, public corruption, narcotics, money laundering, and gang violence.
Which appeals court covers the District of Massachusetts?
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, which sits in the same John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse in Boston where most of the district court’s criminal cases are tried. A notice of appeal in a criminal case is generally due within 14 days of the entry of judgment.
How does a federal criminal case proceed in the District of Massachusetts?
Most cases here start with a long, quiet investigation, then an indictment. Under the district’s magistrate-judge rules, every felony case is automatically assigned to a magistrate judge at indictment for arraignment, detention, and pretrial management, before the district judge takes over for trial and sentencing. In fiscal year 2024, 93.8% of sentenced cases in this district ended in guilty pleas and 33 were resolved at trial.
Has the firm appeared in the District of Massachusetts?
Yes. Elizabeth Franklin-Best has been admitted pro hac vice in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts — admission this specific court has already granted. Pro hac vice practice by experienced out-of-district federal counsel is routine here, as it is in every federal district.
Does the firm handle federal cases in the District of Massachusetts?
Yes. We handle trial-level defense, First Circuit appeals, and post-conviction litigation arising from this district, including Section 2255 and compassionate-release motions, which are filed here when the judgment came from this court. Each engagement begins with a paid, one-hour initial consultation.
What kinds of federal cases are most common in the District of Massachusetts?
Drug trafficking led the fiscal year 2024 docket at 38.0% of the 531 people sentenced. But the district’s signature is financial crime: fraud, theft, and embezzlement (16.2%), money laundering (9.0% — more than four times the national share), and tax offenses (4.7%) together form a white-collar cluster that nearly rivals the drug docket.
What was Operation Varsity Blues and why does it still matter?
It was the college-admissions prosecution brought in this district, charging parents, coaches, and consultants. In United States v. Abdelaziz (2023), the First Circuit reversed two parents’ fraud convictions, rejecting the theory that admissions slots were the universities’ property. It remains a leading example of how aggressive fraud theories from this district can be unwound on appeal.
Will my case be in Boston, Worcester, or Springfield?
Assignment generally follows the county where the alleged offense occurred: Eastern Division cases are heard in Boston, Central Division cases in Worcester, and Western Division cases in Springfield. District judges and magistrate judges are resident in all three divisions, so a Springfield case is tried by Springfield-based judges.
Talk With a Federal Criminal Defense Lawyer
A grand jury subpoena from the Moakley Courthouse, a healthcare-fraud target letter, an indictment in Worcester or Springfield, an appeal worth taking, a Section 2255 motion worth investigating — each starts in the same place: a candid, structured review of the case. Our paid, one-hour initial consultation is built for that, and it is where every Massachusetts engagement begins.