Articles Posted in Criminal Law

Yesterday, we discussed whether an investigating officer’s failure to read a suspect in custody his or her Miranda Rights (hereinafter, the “Rights”), means that the case against said suspect must be dismissed.

The answer, in most cases, is no.

The remedy is to suppress the statement so that the Commonwealth may not use it against the suspect at trial. However, this is not as simple as one might imagine. The question becomes what is a “custodial interrogation”. Let’s look at three scenarios.

1) Duncan Drugdealer is at home when the police arrive with a search warrant. They tell him to sit down while they search the place. All of a sudden, as the officers are going upstairs, he yells out, “Hey, that coke in the bedroom ain’t mine!”

2) Virginia Victim stands in Boston’s Government Center, screaming that she her purse has just been stolen. The police see her and then see Alfred Assault running away from her, carrying a woman’s purse. The officers know Alfred and he very rarely carries a purse. So they chase him. As they catch up to him, he turns around and says, “It ain’t the old lady’s purse, man!”

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…And so students and their families alike are awakening to the passing of the season. Summer is exiting Massachusetts, and school is beginning. This time, though, things are a bit more serious. First of all, as discussed yesterday, the Boston area seems to be in the middle of a dramatic increase in murder cases. Violent alleged criminals aside, however, what once was not unusual juvenile school behavior will now be viewed under the type of criminal justice microscope that inevitably brings new arrests.

As you will recall, the Massachusetts legislature brought into being a new anti-bullying statute last year. It is now in effect and, because of its vagueness, has school districts scrambling to figure out how to adhere to it.

At the same time, there are attorneys who have adjusted their practices so that they may open the new specialty to capitalize on the new statute and attention on bullying behavior.

Meanwhile, I am a criminal defense attorney with many years of experience. I also am focusing on the new statute and the mess it is about to bring the system. Said mess began when a bunch of kids were indicted last year for bullying activities on which another student’s suicide was originally blamed.

The truth is that, for the most part, what was illegal to do remains illegal to do.

Let’s take some examples:
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The Boston Criminal Law Blog has had a fairly police-intensive week this week. We began with
A police chase in which an officer accidently struck and killed a pedestrian (which, if we had done it would probably be treated as a homicide) and then with of law enforcement investigations and actions in cases of murder, vandalism, armed robbery and, “worst of all”, the “scourge” of prostitution.

And yet, critical as I may be, I claim to have a great deal of respect for police officers. Well, most of them, anyway.

And I do. I am not “anti-cop”.

True, my work tends to place me at the other side of the aisle from them in a courtroom. And yet, often, they are not my client’s enemy. It is often someone else who has made a certain report to the police which led to my client’s arrest.

“But Sam, you are always telling us how they lie during police investigations to get the unwitting to make statements.”
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September is a-coming. It would appear that it will soon be time, once again in Massachusetts, for those school-time hijinks like bullying, assault and vandalism.

And police investigations.

Well, it looks like some people just can’t wait. No, not a high school or college campus crime this time. The event took place at Julia F. Callahan Elementary School in Lynn this past weekend. Vandals trashed the school, dumping paint, spraying fire extinguishers, shattering glass, overturning desks and copiers, and spewing classroom materials throughout the building, according to Deputy Superintendent Jaye Warry and Lieutenant William Sharp of the Lynn Police Department.

The police describe that the “school was entered and extensively vandalized,” Superintendent Warry, who has worked in the Lynn school system for 25 years, said this break in was “up there on the extent of damage.” She went on to say that the vandalism affected most of the two-story building and that the principal’s office was destroyed.
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