A state senator is demanding that the court records be made public in the case of an illegal immigrant evicted from a Revere shelter program following his arrest on charges including possession of an AR-15 rifle and roughly $1 million in fentanyl.

“If there’s anything I can do to effectuate change it’s demanding that the documents in this case be made public,” Sen. Ryan Fattman, a Sutton Republican, told the Herald Friday. “The public has a right to know what they’re funding.”

Revere Police arrested Leonardo Andujar Sanchez, 28, on Dec. 27. The Dominican resident of a Quality Inn used by the state to shelter migrants was charged in Chelsea District Court with 11 counts: 10 related to firearm possession — including “alien” in possession of a firearm, leaving no doubt to his documentation status — and one charging him with possession of nearly five kilograms of fentanyl.

Sanchez was arraigned on Dec. 30 and was ordered jailed until the end of April after being found dangerous during a subsequent hearing on Thursday. But the only court record the public can access is a listing of his charges.

There is no criminal complaint or police report available, either through the courts or through the Revere Police Department, which informed the Herald it had 10 days to comply with the request for the police report. Judge Jane Prince ordered the court documents impounded.

Private attorney

Sanchez has obtained a private attorney, John Benzan, to represent him. Private counsel is a luxury not expected of a resident of the Massachusetts emergency assistance shelter program, from which the state confirms Sanchez was evicted following his arrest.

“We took immediate action to terminate this individual from the EA system, and we confirmed with federal immigration officials that they have lodged a detainer,” Noah Bombard, a spokesman for the Executive Office of Housing & Livable Communities, wrote in a statement shared with the Herald Thursday night.

The Herald has requested additional information from that office as to Sanchez’s residency in that program, the amenities provided by the state and other issues and is awaiting a response.

In the meantime, Sen. Fattman, the Sutton Republican, suspects that Sanchez may have been able to afford private counsel thanks to his share of the $6 million in welfare apportioned by the state for illegal immigrants in Massachusetts.

The $6 million was state-funded to provide SNAP benefits — the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, a federal program — to any resident of the state “who meet the benefits criteria with the exception of immigration status, thereby ensuring that these benefits are made available to migrants within the Commonwealth,” according to a letter Fattman wrote in November to the commissioner of the state Department of Transitional Assistance.

While Fattman said he’s sure the majority of people used the money for legitimate means, that’s still “$6 million to people who are not our residents to pull out cash from an ATM for anything. Ranging from drugs and guns to legal counsel.”

All that money went quickly, within months, Fattman told the Herald. He said there’s “no way” he would vote for refunding it.

“Criminals are typically not stupid people. Their status doesn’t matter and therefore they will take advantage of a government program for malintent,” Fattman told the Herald. “If that’s what happened here, that is sickening, outrageous and yet self-inflicted.”

State policy

The state has spent roughly $2.5 billion on the emergency shelter program since the program itself became an emergency, Fattman said.

The Herald has reported that the state spends about $75 million each month — or about $10,000 per family — on the program.

“And that’s what we know about — that’s the money that is purported to be spent,” he added.

He recalled that when legislators were sworn in on Wednesday no major legislative leader spoke about this issue.

“To me, this calls for the voters to change this by way of ballot petition,” Fattman said, “to say ‘Enough is enough,’ that Massachusetts residents must come first.”

Leadership should be thinking about major issues — and such expensive or public safety-related problems, especially — now that the voters in November expressed skepticism about how public money is being handled.

More than 70% — 2.3 million, or 71.6% — voted in favor of ballot Question 1, according to state records, which specifies “that the State Auditor has the authority to audit the Legislature.”

It means people are seeking transparency and accountability on Beacon Hill, Fattman says, and that could very well start with this emergency assistance shelter program that has time and again been the setting for all kinds of headline crime.

That includes a kitchen fire at a shelter in Fattman’s own district and child rape cases in multiple other jurisdictions — a situation that the senator said “gets me really fired up.”

“The free-for-all that is right to shelter has to be reformed,” Fattman said.

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Revere Police photo of the drugs and weapon seized as part of the arrest at the Quality Inn. (Revere Police & Suffolk Sheriffs)