Justia Massachusetts Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed Defendant's convictions and sentences for assault and battery on a family or household member and assault by means of a dangerous weapon, holding that that a trial judge may order a defendant to pay restitution to a third party in certain circumstances.On appeal, Defendant argued that her right to a fair trial was violated and that the trial judge erred in ordering her to pay restitution to the victim's mother, who was a third party and non victim. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding (1) Defendant received a fair trial; and (2) a trial judge may order a defendant to pay restitution to a third party, and the order in the instant case satisfied the causation requirement. View "Commonwealth v. McGann" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the order of the trial judge granting Defendant's motion to suppress certain GPS location data and its fruits, holding that the initial imposition of a GPS device as a condition of pretrial release violated article 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.In 2015, Defendant was charged with possession of a class B substance with the intent to distribute, as a subsequent offense, and motor vehicle violations. Defendant was ordered to wear a GPS monitoring device as a condition of release. Defendant was later arrested and indicted on charges of armed robbery while masked. Defendant moved to suppress the GPS location data used to identify him as being present at the scene of the crime. After finding that Defendant had consented to the use of GPS location data only for the purposes of enforcing conditions of release and not for general law enforcement purposes the judge concluded that the search was not supported by probable cause and granted the motion to suppress. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed on different grounds, holding that the search was impermissible because the GPS monitoring did not further any legitimate governmental interests. View "Commonwealth v. Norman" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the decision of a superior court judge declaring that booking photographs of police officers arrested for alleged crimes and police incident reports involving public officials were not exempt from disclosure under the public records law, holding that the superior court did not err.Boston Globe Media Partners, LLC (Globe) made public records requests to the State police seeking booking photographs and police incident reports related to the arrests of law enforcement officers. The State police refused to comply with the requests, stating that the records were "criminal offender record information" (CORI) and were therefore not "public records" as defined in Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 4, 7. The Globe also made a public records request to the Boston police department for the names of officers charged with driving under the influence and the related booking photographs and incident reports. The Boston police withheld the records on the same grounds used by the State police. The Globe brought suit. The superior court granted summary judgment for the Globe. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding that requested booking photographs and incident reports were not absolutely exempt from disclosure as public records under exemption (a) or exemption (c) of the CORI Act, Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 6, 167-178B. View "Boston Globe Media Partners, LLC v. Department of Criminal Justice Information Services" on Justia Law

The Supreme Court affirmed in part the superior court's grant of summary judgment for the Attorney General and entering a judgment declaring that Boston Globe Media Partners, LLC's (Globe) request for data tables containing certain information for each criminal case tracked by the Commonwealth's eleven district attorneys sought public records that must be disclosed, holding that the district attorneys must disclose to the Globe twenty-two of the twenty-three categories of information requested, excising from the disclosure the docket number for each case requested.Specifically, the Court held (1) the data sought by the Globe would be "specifically or by necessary implication exempted from disclosure" under the Criminal Offender Record Information Act, Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 6, 167-178B if the individuals whose cases were tracked by the data could be directly or indirectly identified; (2) if the docket number for each case were redacted from the remaining categories of information, those individuals could not be directly or indirectly identified from this data; and (3) the request in this case, which required the traction of categories of information from an existing database, does not impose a burden on public record holders that exceed what is required under the public records law. View "Attorney General v. District Attorney for Plymouth District" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the judgment of a single justice denying Petitioner's petition for relief pursuant to Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 211, 3 seeking review of a superior court judge's decision denying Petitioner's motion to dismiss two armed assault with intent to murder indictments and two sentencing enhancement charges on the basis of double jeopardy, holding that the single justice did not err.On appeal from the denial of his petition, Petitioner argued, among other things, that the armed career criminal statutes defines an "offense," for double jeopardy purposes, rather than a sentencing enhancement. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the judgment of the single justice rejecting Defendant's arguments, holding that none of Defendant's arguments that his double jeopardy rights were violated was persuasive. View "Rivera v. Commonwealth" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the ruling of a single justice dismissing Appellant's postconviction petitions, holding that Appellant should seek his requested relief in the superior court.Appellant was convicted of murder in the first degree on a theory of joint venture. Appellant later filed in the county court a "Petition to Supreme Judicial Court Requesting Relief in the Form of an Order to the Trial Court to Correct the Record" and a "Motion Requesting Leave to Enter Petition on the Docket of the Supreme Judicial Court" purportedly pursuant to Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 278, 33E. A single justice dismissed the petitions because Appellant had not first sought relief in the superior court and that, therefore, there was no superior court decision from which Appellant sought to appeal. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding that the single justice correctly denied relief. View "Commonwealth v. Birks" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the order of the motion judge allowing Defendant's motion to suppress evidence derived from the warrantless seizure and search of his cell phone, holding that the seizure of the cell phone was proper but the search of the cell phone was not proper.The trial court granted the motion to suppress on grounds that the seized cell phone was not properly handled pursuant to a valid written inventory policy and that the police had conducted an investigatory search of the seized cell phone. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding (1) it was permissible to seize the cell phone as part of a search incident to custodial arrest; and (2) the search exceeded the scope of, and was inconsistent with, the purposes underlying the search exception to the warrant requirement. View "Commonwealth v. Barillas" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court reversed the judgment of the trial court and set aside Defendant's conviction as a joint venturer of murder in the first degree on the theory of extreme atrocity or cruelty, holding that the evidence presented to the jury was insufficient to establish Defendant's knowing participation in the murder with the required intent beyond a reasonable doubt.At the close of all evidence, Defendant moved for a required finding of not guilty. The motion was denied. After Defendant was convicted, he appealed, arguing that the trial judge erred in denying his motion for a required finding of not guilty. The Supreme Judicial Court agreed, holding (1) the Commonwealth's evidence was insufficient to demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt Defendant's presence when the victim was stabbed, and therefore, the conviction cannot stand; and (2) retrial of Defendant was barred by the principles of double jeopardy. View "Commonwealth v. Lopez" on Justia Law

In this case involving a consequence of the evidence tampering by Sonja Farak, a chemist at the State Laboratory Institute at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the Supreme Judicial Court held that a defendant who qualified for an enhanced sentence due to a subsequently vacated predicate offense that had been tainted by Farak's misconduct may challenge the guilty plea without being exposed to a harsher sentence than that which he received in exchange for his plea.Defendant was indicted on two counts alleging aggravated statutory rape and as a habitual criminal, with two drug offenses on his prior record as the predicate convictions. Defendant pleaded guilty to lesser charges without the habitual offender enhancements. Defendant was later identified as a "Farak defendant," and one of his prior drug convictions was vacated. Before seeking to withdraw his guilty plea, Defendant requested a ruling that if he succeeded in withdrawing his plea he would not be subject to a harsher punishment as the result of a reprosecution of the rape charges. The superior court judge asked whether protections from harsher punishment established for "Dookhan defendants" apply to "Farak defendants" challenging Farak-related predicate offenses that resulted in enhanced sentences on subsequent convictions. The Supreme Judicial Court answered the question in the positive. View "Commonwealth v. Claudio" on Justia Law

The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the judgment of a single justice of the court denying Petitioner's petition pursuant to Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 211, 3, holding that Petitioner's claim could adequately be resolved by the appeals court.Petitioner pleaded guilty to an indictment alleging sex offenses. Petitioner's probation was later revoked, and the Commonwealth filed a petition to commit Petitioner as a sexually dangerous person (SDP). Petitioner moved to dismiss the SDP petition on the ground that, at the time it was filed, he was not a "prisoner" as defined by Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 123A, 12(b) because the release date had been revised. The motion was denied. Petitioner then filed this petition under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 211, 3, alleging that the Commonwealth cannot demonstrate that he was a prisoner at the time his discharge petition was filed. A single justice denied relief. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding that the single justice correctly concluded that the ordinary appellate process provided an adequate remedy. View "Brace v. Commonwealth" on Justia Law