Speaker DeLeo’s conflicting comments

FOX UNDERCOVER - House Speaker Robert DeLeo stopped by FOX 25's Beacon Hill studio Tuesday morning to talk about State House business, including a bill that was filed following a FOX Undercover investigation.

That bill would provide benefits to the widow of Boston police officer Kenneth Shaw who died from hepatitis C in 1998, but it remains stuck in a legislative committee.

Shaw worked in the police department's identification unit, processing bloody crime scenes.

Doctors believe he contracted the disease on the job.  But the state would not give his widow Maura Shaw accidental death benefits because she could not pinpoint the person who gave her husband hepatitis C.

After FOX Undercover's story aired in December, a bill was filed to give her the benefits.

But lawmakers were not allowed to vote on the bill during the formal session which ended last week, but it could still pass during the informal session that ends December 31.

During an interview on the FOX 25 Morning News, Speaker DeLeo said he's concerned about how the public perceives elected officials on Beacon Hill.

But his answers to questions about this bill only seem to feed into the perception that lawmakers talk out of both sides of their mouths.

The speaker first tells FOX 25's Shannon Mulaire the bill is alive, then says it's unlikely to pass, and finally claims he doesn't know why.

The Shaw family is frustrated because they believe the speaker is not giving them straight answers.

If he's against the bill, they'd like him to explain why instead of blaming the lack of action on the committee where the bill is stuck.

State House insiders tell FOX Undercover DeLeo could get the bill moved out of the committee if he supported it.
          
The bill's sponsor, Rep. Marty Walsh, says he's frustrated, but working on other avenues to get the bill passed.

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