Image courtesy of The Architectural Team
A Back Bay preschool director fighting an $80 million North End hotel project claims the development team has orchestrated a harassment campaign intended to silence her opposition.
Mary Beth Sweeney is seeking a protective order against the Cross Street Hotel developers, who are seeking to build a 5-story, 132-room hotel just a few feet from her Stillman Street condominium.
Board members of the John Winthrop School for Young Children, where Sweeney is the director, received anonymous emails on Friday painting Sweeney as the “befuddled front for a coalition of lawyers, secret real estate trusts, unions and more seeking to stop a proposed boutique hotel project.”
The anonymous email, send through the encrypted Proton service, contains links to transcripts of depositions which have not been made public in court records. Sweeney’s attorney, Kelly Frey of Mintz Levin, alleges that the email originated from the development team.
“Only the parties to this action could have provided it to the email’s author, which Ms. Sweeney most certainly did not do,” Frey wrote in a filing submitted Monday in Suffolk Superior Court.
The motion seeks to prohibit the defendants from disclosing discovery materials in the case, seeks attorneys’ fees for the motion and asks the court to schedule an evidentiary hearing to review potential sanctions.
The hotel project, led by 6M Development and William Caulder, was approved by Boston officials in 2022, including variances that Sweeney is seeking to overturn. The suit names the Boston Zoning Board of Appeal and project architect Michael Doherty as defendants.
Attorneys for the developers claim a rival developer that failed to acquire the hotel site, Andrew Collins, is behind the opposition and still hopes to obtain ownership of the development site at 42 Cross St.
A neighboring parcel at 52 Salem St. is owned by a corporate entity managed by attorney Steven Meyer of Boston-based Sassoon Cymrot Law. In a deposition last month, Sweeney said she received $150,000 toward the lawsuit from community activist Osmin Alberto Montero, who told her the money came from Meyer.
In an interview with Banker & Tradesman on Friday, Meyer denied that he was the source of the funds to Sweeney but said he represents North End residents opposed to the project.
