For once, an attempt by a Massachusetts state employee to pad a pension didn't work.
Retired probate court judge Edward Rockett of Marblehead will have to get by on his judicial pension of $81,000 a year.
That's a generous sum, but it seems Rockett couldn't help himself when, back in 2004, he learned that he might parlay three years spent as an unpaid member of the Marblehead School Committee into a second pension. That time, added to the nine years he'd spent as an assistant register of probate in Salem, would give him the 10 years' minimum service needed for a second pension to supplement the one he received after serving almost 25 years on the bench.
So Rockett tried to repay the money he'd previously withdrawn from the state employees' retirement fund and filed an application for benefits with the state retirement board.
There was only one problem: The law allowing individuals to count unpaid service towards a public pension had been passed in 1994 (a favor to someone, no doubt), well after Rockett's school board service.
His request was denied by the state board and affirmed by the state's second-highest court.
The decision represents a rare win for taxpayers who should now demand the legislators repeal the 1994 law and similar giveaways that have put the public pension system deep in the hole.
