Justia Massachusetts Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Based on a tip, surveillance, and controlled drug purchases, Brockton police obtained a warrant to search defendant's apartment. Officers found cocaine, cash, and a digital scale in the apartment. In the locked basement of the building, they found heroin, handguns, and ammunition. Defendant was convicted of trafficking in heroin, G.L. c. 94C, 32E (c); possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, G.L. c. 94C, 32A (c ); school zone violations, G.L. c. 94C, 32J; unlawful possession of a firearm, G.L. c. 269, 10 (h ); and unlawful possession of ammunition without an FID card, G.L. c. 269, 10 (h ). The Appeals Court found sufficient nexus between the suspected drug dealing and the defendant's apartment and that defendant had no objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in the basement. The court nonetheless reversed all except the ammunition conviction. Admission of certificates of drug and ballistics analysis without testimony of analysts who had performed the tests violated the defendant's Sixth Amendment confrontation right. The Massachusetts Supreme Court held that defendant is entitled to a new trial on the confrontation clause issue. The search warrant application established probable cause to believe that evidence of defendant's drug dealing would be found in his apartment, and the basement was within the curtilage of the defendant's apartment. View "Commonwealth v. Escalera" on Justia Law

A taxicab driver was robbed at knifepoint by a passenger wearing a hat that covered most of his face; the driver fired his pistol at the fleeing robber, wounding him in the back. Police located defendant near the scene of the robbery suffering from an apparent gunshot wound to his back, but no witness was able to identify him as the robber. Defendant claimed to have been shot in an unrelated incident by unknown assailants. Convicted of armed robbery, G.L. c. 265, 17, defendant appealed, arguing that certain statements allegedly made by the fleeing robber were hearsay and should not have been admitted; that a statement attributed to defendant contained in his medical records ("he was in a taxicab when he got shot") was inadmissible as hearsay; and that, even if not hearsay, the admission of the medical records violated his right to confrontation under the Sixth Amendment. The supreme court affirmed, finding error but no prejudice. The trial judge erred in admitting defendant's medical records under the statutory exception for business records, G.L. c. 233, 78, and the disputed portion of the records was not shown to be admissible under the hospital records statute, G.L. c. 233, 79. View "Commonwealth v. Irene" on Justia Law

This case involved the proper interpretation of a Massachusetts election law that governed the filing of a vacancy, where a candidate nominated for state, city or town office withdraws, dies, or otherwise becomes ineligible prior to an election, G.L.c. 53, section 14(14), and its application to the presidential and vice-presidential candidates of a minor political party. The court concluded that this matter was properly before the court where plaintiffs have established an actual controversy; section 14 applied to presidential electors and assumed by extension to the presidential and vice-presidential candidates the electors have pledged to support; although section 14, as written, was not a model of clarity and its meaning not without uncertainty, the court interpreted it in a manner largely consistent with the interpretation proffered by the Secretary; and finally, aligning the court's analysis under art. 9 with that of the equal protection clause, the court perceived no constitutional deficiency in the election law scheme. View "Libertarian Assoc. of Massachusetts & another v. Secretary of the Commonwealth" on Justia Law

Defendant was found guilty of manslaughter for "inflicting fatal injuries on a viable and near full term fetus during the birthing process" in violation of her "legal duty...to refrain from wanton or reckless acts committed against her own viable fetus." At issue was whether a woman in the midst of an unassisted childbirth could be held criminally responsible for the unintentional death of her viable fetus. The court concluded that the evidence was insufficient to convict defendant on the theory that she was wanton or reckless in her acts of commission because the Commonwealth failed to prove that, once she decided to give birth unassisted, defendant had any alternative safe course of action. Additionally, the court concluded that, in light of the judge's findings that the Commonwealth had not proved that the baby was born alive, or that summoning medical assistance would have saved the baby's life, there was insufficient evidence that defendant's act of omission was the legal or proximate cause of the baby's death. The court also declined to recognize a duty of a woman, in these circumstances, to summon medical assistance, breach of which could give rise to criminal liability or involuntary manslaughter. View "Commonwealth v. Pugh" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs brought suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983 alleging, inter alia, that the city council's vote to remove Charles Turner, an elected Boston city councillor convicted of attempted extortion and other Federal crimes, was void, and sought declaratory and injunctive relief as well as damages. At issue were two certified questions: (1) Did the Charter of the City of Boston, or any other provision of the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, authorize the Boston City Council to promulgate Rule 40A of the Rules of the Boston City Council and employ it to remove an incumbent Councillor from office before he was sentenced and removed automatically by operation of M.G.L.c. 279, section 30? and (2) If so, is Rule 40A a civil or a criminal provision of law? The court answered that the city council was authorized to promulgate Rule 40A but did not have the authority to employ the rule to remove Turner from office. In light of this answer, the court need not provide an answer to the second question. View "Turner & others v. City of Boston & others" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed from his convictions of murder in the second degree and related firearms charges. Defendant was convicted on retrial; the jury at his trial was unable to agree on a unanimous verdict. On appeal, defendant contended, among other things, that State and Federal double jeopardy protections precluded the judge at the second trial from instructing the jury on accessory liability where no such instruction was provided to the first jury. The court concluded that the instruction given at the second trial was appropriate, because it would have been supported by the evidence introduced at the first trial, and, in the circumstances of this case, did not invite the jury to convict on a theory of the crime abandoned or foreclosed by the Commonwealth at the first trial. The court discerned no other error that would warrant relief and affirmed. View "Commonwealth v. Phim" on Justia Law

Defendant was indicted pursuant to the parental kidnapping statute, G.L.c. 265, section 26A, after his five-year-old nonmarital son, G.G., disappeared while in defendant's care. Relying on Commonwealth v. McCarthy, defendant filed a motion to dismiss the indictment (McCarthy motion) where defendant argued that the Commonwealth could not prove, as it must under the parental kidnapping statute, that he acted "without lawful authority" in allegedly taking G.G. To the extent the Commonwealth relied on G.L.c. 209C, section 10(b), to satisfy this element of the crime, defendant argued that the operation of that statute in these circumstances gave rise to an unconstitutional violation of his right to equal protection because it discriminated against him on the basis of gender. Because the indictment could properly rest on the application of another, gender-neutral statute, G.L.c. 209C, section 10(c), and because, in these circumstances, defendant could not raise an as-applied constitutional challenge to G.L.c. 209C, section 10(b), in a McCarthy motion, the court reversed the order allowing the motion to dismiss the indictment. View "Commonwealth v. Gonzalez" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree on a theory of deliberate premeditation, murder in the second degree, armed assault with intent to murder, and unlawful possession of a firearm. On appeal, defendant argued that the evidence was insufficient to convict him of deliberately premeditated murder and of armed assault with intent to murder. Defendant also challenged two jury instructions and claimed improper direct examination and closing argument by the trial prosecutor. The court affirmed defendant's conviction of murder in the first degree and declined to exercise its power to grant relief under G.L.c. 278, section 33E. The court affirmed the conviction of murder in the second degree. Because the court concluded that the omission of a jury instruction regarding defendant's knowledge that a codefendant was armed created a substantial risk of a miscarriage of justice, the court reversed defendant's conviction of armed assault with intent to murder. Finally, the court affirmed defendant's conviction of unlawful possession of a firearm. View "Commonwealth v. Bolling" on Justia Law

A grand jury returned six indictments charging defendant with rape of a child under the age of sixteen by force. At defendant's first trial, the trial judge entered a required finding of not guilty on one of the indictments. The jury returned guilty verdicts on the remaining indictments. However, almost a year later, the judge allowed defendant's motion for a new trial. The case proceeded to a new trial on the remaining five indictments and defendant was subsequently convicted of all charges. On appeal, defendant argued that he was convicted of crimes for which he was not indicted; error in the admission of first complaint testimony; error by the judge's restriction of cross-examination of one of the victims and refusal to grant a mistrial; and error in the admission of bad act evidence. The court transferred the case on its own motion and subsequently affirmed the convictions. View "Commonwealth v. Roby" on Justia Law

Defendant was charged with committing an assault and battery on a child under fourteen years of age causing substantial bodily injury and wantonly and recklessly permitting an assault and battery on a child that caused substantial bodily injury. At defense counsel's request and with the Commonwealth's agreement, the judge instructed the jury that they could consider whether defendant recklessly endangered her child. The jury acquitted defendant of the offenses charged in the indictments but found her guilty of the lesser included offense of reckless endangerment. Defendant filed a motion to vacate the conviction, claiming that the crime of reckless endangerment of a child was not a lesser included offense and the jury instruction to the contrary that her counsel had requested should not have been given. The court concluded that, although erroneously charged, the lesser included offense instruction created no substantial risk of a miscarriage of justice. The court also held that the judge did not abuse his discretion by allowing admission of the expert testimony at issue. View "Commonwealth v. Roderiques" on Justia Law