Justia Massachusetts Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff commenced an action alleging various constitutional violations with respect to the presidential ballot. Along with his complaint, Plaintiff filed an affidavit of indigence pursuant to Mass. Gen. Laws chapter 261, 27B requesting a waiver of normal court fees and litigation costs. In his affidavit, Plaintiff claimed indigence on the ground that he received public assistance in the form of veterans’ benefits. The judge concluded that Plaintiff was not indigent because he had the ability to pay the normal and extra fees and costs. At issue on appeal was whether Plaintiff, who received federal veterans’ benefits and a Massachusetts property tax abatement that were not dependent on his economic circumstances, was considered indigent under Mass. Gen. Laws chapter 261, 27A and therefore entitled to a waiver despite having ample financial resources to pay court fees and costs. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the judge’s decision denying Plaintiff’s request for a waiver of normal and extra court fees and litigation costs, holding that the statute was not intended to provide for a waiver under the circumstances of this case. View "Reade v. Sec’y of Commonwealth" on Justia Law

Defendant was sentenced to committed time on a conviction. Defendant successfully moved to vacate community parole supervision for life and was resentenced to a term of probation. Defendant moved to vacate the condition of probation requiring GPS monitoring. The motion was denied. The Appeals Court affirmed. The Supreme Judicial Court granted Defendant’s application for further appellate review to address the propriety of resentencing Defendant by imposing a term of probation to run from and after committed sentences that either had fully been served at the time of resentencing or will have fully been served before the probationary term was due to begin. The Court affirmed the order denying Defendant’s motion to vacate the GPS condition of probation, holding (1) where a defendant sentenced to committed time on a conviction is resentenced to a term of probation, the new sentence violates double jeopardy where the defendant had already completed the original sentence on that conviction before the resentencing; and (2) where the defendant has yet to complete the original sentence on a conviction, resentencing to a term of probation does not violate double jeopardy provided that the total length of incarceration imposed on the defendant for that conviction is not increased. View "Commonwealth v. Sallop" on Justia Law

The Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance (DCAM), the owner of a construction project, entered into a contract with a designer to prepare the project’s designs. DCAM contracted with Gilbane Building Company to be the construction manager at risk (CMAR). Gilbane subcontracted with Coghlin Electrical Contractors, Inc. to perform electrical work. Coghlin later filed a complaint against Gilbane alleging that Gilbane breached the subcontract by causing Coghlin to incur additional costs resulting from design errors. Gilbane filed a third-party complaint against DCAM, asserting that DCAM breached its contract with Gilbane by refusing to pay Gilbane the amounts claimed by Coghlin. The trial court allowed DCAM’s motion to dismiss the third-party complaint. The Supreme Judicial Court vacated the superior court’s judgment, holding (1) a public owner of a construction management at risk project gives an implied warranty regarding the designer’s plans and specifications, but the scope of liability arising from that implied warranty is limited; (2) the construction management at risk contract in this case did not disclaim the implied warranty; and (3) the contract's indemnification provision did not prohibit Gilbane from filing a third-party complaint against DCAM seeking reimbursement of additional costs under the implied warranty for damages claimed by Coghlin caused by an insufficient or defective design. Remanded View "Coghlin Elec. Contractors, Inc. v. Gilbane Bldg. Co." on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was found guilty of rape of a child by force and of assault with intent to rape a second child. The Appeals Court affirmed. Defendant appealed, arguing that the admission of evidence relating to a prior acquittal deprived him of his right to a fair trial and due process. The Supreme Judicial Court reversed Defendant’s convictions, holding (1) there was no error in the admission of the evidence on relevancy grounds; but (2) the collateral estoppel protections necessarily embraced by article 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights warranted the exclusion of the acquittal evidence under the circumstances of this case. View "Commonwealth v. Dorazio" on Justia Law

At issue in this appeal was an ordinance imposing restrictions on the right of sex offenders to reside in the City of Lynn. Plaintiffs, a class of sex offenders subject to the ordinance, challenged the ordinance's constitutionality. A superior court judge invalidated the ordinance under the Home Rule Amendment. Specifically, the judge determined that the ordinance was inconsistent with the Sex Offender Registry Law and the law providing for the care, treatment, and rehabilitation of sexually dangerous persons. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding that the ordinance was inconsistent with the comprehensive statutory scheme governing the oversight of convicted sex offenders and, therefore, was inconsistent and invalid under the home rule provisions. View "Doe v. City of Lynn" on Justia Law

In 2008, Defendant was indicted on a charge of first-degree murder but was found not competent to stand trial until 2013. Thereafter, the Commonwealth filed a nolle prosequi with respect to the portion of the indictment that charged first-degree murder. Defendant filed a motion for a required finding of not guilty, which was denied. Defendant was subsequently found not guilty by reason of mental illness and ordered hospitalized. Defendant filed an appeal under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 278, 28. The Commonwealth argued that Defendant may seek to pursue an appeal only by filing a petition for extraordinary relief under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 211, 3 and that Defendant’s appeal does not lie under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 278, 28 because a finding of not guilty by reason of mental illness is not a “judgment” and Defendant is not “aggrieved” since he has not been convicted. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding (1) a defendant who is found not guilty by reason of mental illness may appeal under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 278, 28; and (2) the evidence in this case was sufficient to support a conviction of murder in the second degree, and therefore, the judge did not err in denying Defendant’s motion for a required finding of not guilty. View "Commonwealth v. Bruneau" on Justia Law

Defendants were indicted on charges of unarmed robbery and assault and battery. Defendants both committed the offenses prior to their eighteenth birthdays. The Governor subsequently signed an “Act expanding juvenile jurisdiction” that extended the jurisdiction of the juvenile court to children who are seventeen years of age at the time of committing an offense. Defendants filed motions to dismiss, arguing that the Act should be applied retroactively to seventeen-year-old defendants who had criminal charges pending against them as of the Act’s effective date and that a failure to apply the Act retroactively as to such defendants would violate their equal protection rights. The Supreme Judicial Court held (1) the Act does not apply retroactively to a defendant who commits an offense prior to his eighteenth birthday for which a criminal proceeding commenced prior to the effective date of the Act; and (2) prospective application of the Act does not violate the equal protection guarantees provided by the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal Constitution and article 1 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, as amended by article 106 of the Amendments. View "Commonwealth v. Freeman" on Justia Law

John Doe was adjudicated a delinquent juvenile by reason of sex offenses and was committed to the Department of Youth Services. Defendant was later found to be a sexually dangerous person and was civilly committed for a period of from one day to life. Twenty years after Doe committed the offenses the Sex Offender Registry Board (SORB) classified him as a level three sex offender. Doe was later discharged from the treatment center based on the determination that he was no longer sexually dangerous. Doe brought this action contending, as relevant to this appeal, that the hearing examiner’s determination that he is a level three sex offender was unsupported by substantial evidence, in part because the evidence underlying the classification was stale where the hearing resulting in the final classification took place more than three years before Defendant’s discharge. The Supreme Judicial Court agreed with Doe and remanded the matter, holding that because Doe’s final classification was was not based on current evidence of the relevant risk factors, Doe was entitled to a new evidentiary hearing at which SORB will bear the burden of establishing Doe’s current risk of reoffense and dangerousness to the community. View "Doe, Sex Offender Registry Bd. No. 3839 v. Sex Offender Registry Bd." on Justia Law

John Doe, Sex Offender Registry Board No. 7083, was serving a criminal sentence and had been civilly committed as a sexually dangerous person when the Sex Offender Registry Board (SORB) notified him of its recommendation that he be classified as a level three sex offender. When a classification hearing took place in February 2012 Doe’s earliest parole eligibility date was ten months away and a trial on Doe’s petition for discharged was eighteen months away. Doe requested that the classification hearing be continued or left open. The hearing examiner denied the requests and classified Doe as a level three sex offender. The superior court and appeals court affirmed. Doe appealed, arguing that, by scheduling the classification hearing based on his earliest possible parole eligibility date, the information relied on by the hearing examiner in reaching a classification decision will have become stale by the time Doe is released from confinement. The Supreme Judicial Court vacated SORB’s decision and the superior court’s order affirming that determination, holding that, because the 2012 classification of Doe as a level three sex offender will not reflect an evaluation of his current level of risk at the time of his discharge from the treatment center, the decision classifying Doe as a level three offender is invalid. View "Doe, Sex Offender Registry Bd. No. 7083 v. Sex Offender Registry Bd." on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of several crimes based on three incidents that occurred in October 2010 when Defendant accosted three different teenage victims as they walked to school. On appeal, Defendant argued, among other things, that the motion judge erred in denying his motion to suppress statements that he made to police during a videotaped interview. The Supreme Judicial Court reversed, holding that the statements at issue were erroneously admitted at trial because the police engaged in impermissibly coercive tactics that rendered Defendant’s statements involuntary under the circumstances of the interrogation, and the error was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Remanded for a new trial. View "Commonwealth v. Monroe" on Justia Law