SJC denies bail for North Andover officer shot by colleague

Local News

Kelsey Fitzsimmons pointed a gun at a fellow officer as colleagues were attempting to serve her a restraining order in June, prosecutors say.

The state’s highest court decided Monday to uphold a lower court order denying bail for Kelsey Fitzsimmons, the North Andover police officer who was shot by a colleague earlier this year. 

Fitzsimmons was indicted on one count of assault by means of a dangerous weapon after the incident. She was briefly released from custody in September on a number of conditions, including that she submit to regular alcohol testing using a device that requires breathing into it. But using the device proved to be “physically impossible” due to Fitzsimmons’s injuries, as it caused severe pain and dizziness, her lawyers wrote in court documents. A judge determined that regular usage of the device was necessary to ensure public safety and ordered that she be detained again because she could not comply with the conditions of her release. 

In October, Fitzsimmons petitioned a single justice of the Supreme Judicial Court, asking them to vacate the previous ruling and allow her to be released on conditions that she use a different means of alcohol testing. The single justice denied the petition, and Fitzsimmons then appealed to the entire SJC. 

The SJC issued a 10-page ruling Monday, upholding the single justice’s decision and ensuring Fitzsimmons’s continued detainment. Her trial in Essex Superior Court is set to begin on Feb. 9, according to court records. 

Fitzsimmons and her former fiancé had a child in early 2025, and she has said that postpartum depression set in soon afterward. She was involuntarily committed for treatment of postpartum depression in March, according to court records. 

By late June she had been released but was allegedly exhibiting troubling behavior that caused her former fiancé to apply for a restraining order. In an affidavit, he described how Fitzsimmons’s behavior both during and after her pregnancy was causing him to fear that she could be a danger to herself, to him, and to the baby.

He alleged that Fitzsimmons became intoxicated and violent at a party on June 28, striking him multiple times and making suicidal statements. He allegedly warned police that when they served the order, she “would attempt to kill the baby, any officers involved, and then herself,” according to court documents. 

On June 30, three North Andover officers arrived at a home on Phillips Brook Road to serve Fitzsimmons the restraining order. There are two contradictory versions of events that occurred in the home before the shooting. The North Andover Police Department does not use body cameras.

At one point, as Fitzsimmons was gathering books and clothing for her child, she was alone with one other NAPD officer. According to a police report, she suddenly pulled a firearm from an area behind an open door and pointed it directly at the officer. She allegedly pulled the trigger, but the gun did not fire. As she started to load another round, the officer told her to drop the weapon. Fearing for his life, he fired two rounds, one of which hit Fitzsimmons. The responding officers then administered aid. 

Fitzsimmons, who released a statement herself over the summer, describes the incident as a “halfhearted attempt” to take her own life. Believing that her son would be taken away and that her career as a police officer was over, she grew distraught and attempted to shoot herself, she said. 

Fitzsimmons is adamant that she never pointed her weapon at another officer. She describes the officer who shot her as a friend and said that the two grew close after responding to a murder-suicide involving a mother and her infant child last year. Working this scene was a “catalyst” for her mental health issues, Fitzsimmons said, as she was 20 weeks pregnant at the time. 

Fitzsimmons and her lawyers have also said that she is being smeared in order to distract from the “botched response” by the NAPD. 

The most recent SJC ruling can be read in full below:

Fitzsimmons SJC December 22 2025 by Ross Cristantiello