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Well, it’s nice to see the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office having a good time. Of course, Demetrius E., 27 of Dorchester (hereinafter, the “Defendant”) might not be laughing, though, should he read their recent press release celebrating his guilty plea in Boston’s Superior Court.

The Defendant pleaded guilty to various drug charges on November 17th. The drug of choice was crack, cocaine. The sentence was five-to-seven years in state prison. The funny part?

He is said to have stored his crack in a Chips Ahoy cookie box.

He had been arrested on Feb. 22, 2005. November 17, 2009, was to be his trial date. Instead, he pleaded guilty.
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Boston, along with the rest of the country, has been watching the events unfold in the Tiger Woods automobile accident matter. While the participants took turns not talking (law enforcement would not talk to the press and Tiger would not talk to anyone), I have been reminded of one of the most important lessons I learned many years ago as a young assistant district attorney.

The lesson?

When to keep your mouth shut.

For those of you not acquainted with the latest Tiger Woods adventure, let me recap with what we now know.

It was early Friday morning at 2:25 a.m. just outside Woods’s driveway in one of Orlando’s most exclusive suburbs. Woods was the driver as the vehicle had a collision . Woods was described as being briefly unconscious with blood on his lips and mouth. Neighbors called 911 and then rendered outside to render aid while awaiting an ambulance and police.
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Recovery from a long weekend, such as the Thanksgiving weekend we have just enjoyed, can mean different things to different people. For me, for example, it meant waking up yesterday not being able to get online and so not posting my blog (sorry about that, by the way). For Sonny T., 21, of Wareham (hereinafter referred to as the “Defendant”), it meant being in contact with his new criminal defense attorney and dealing with fallout from some alleged indiscretions over the holiday.

These indiscretions include criminal charges such as counterfeiting, armed robbery and assault.

According to the Commonwealth, the Defendant was not in the most thankful of moods last Thursday night when he met up with two people he knew at an oil change business.

Violently unthankful.
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James LaShoto, a 17-year-old football player for Arlington High School, has pleaded not guilty to a Massachusetts assault and battery charge for head-butting Daniel Curtin, an Abington High School player during a September 19 game. He entered his plea last week in Cambridge District Court before being released on personal recognizance.

Police say that the alleged incident occurred after Curtin’s helmet was knocked off. He was unable to play for 10 days following the head-butt, which was captured on video. Curtin says that LaShoto of pulling off the helmet before head-butting him.

Arlington Catholic suspended LaShoto for two days. The 17-year-old and his family have apologized for the incident and they acknowledge that his behavior was wrong. However, LaShoto’s defense attorney maintains that head-butting someone during a football game is not a crime and the matter should therefore not be pursued in criminal court.

LaShoto is scheduled to reappear in court next month.

Assault and Battery
For a jury to convict a defendant of Massachusetts assault and battery, the prosecution must either prove that the defendant committed reckless assault and battery or intentional assault and battery beyond a reasonable doubt. Intentional assault and battery involves an unjustified and offensive/harmful act of physical contact that caused injury to a victim. Reckless assault and battery involves reckless conduct by the accused that caused physical injury to the victim.

Maximum penalty upon conviction for Massachusetts assault and battery is 2.5 years.

Arlington Catholic High School football game headbutt gets assault charge, Boston Herald, November 28, 2009
High School Football Player Charged For Head Butt, WBZ, October 30, 2009

Related Web Resource:
Chapter 265 Crimes Against the Person, The General Laws of Massachusetts Continue reading

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Sometimes the memories of Thanksgivings past are ones you might prefer to forget. Take a particular North Adams police officer who was testifying at a criminal trial-his own, side by side with his criminal defense attorney.

The events at issue took place last Thanksgiving.

Officer Joshua M. (hereinafter, the “Defendant”) is on trial for two counts of assault and battery with a deadly weapon, one count of assault and battery, one count of witness intimidation, and one count of filing a false police report about the incident, which involved treatment of a Pittsfield prisoner. The defense is that because said prisoner was covered with his own excrement from the middle of his back down to the back of his knees, the Defendant felt he had fewer options in trying to restrain the drunk and combative man.

The Defendant testified that he didn’t pat down the Matthew T. (hereinafter, the “Prisoner”) at the North Church Street scene where the Prisoner had caused a disturbance by kicking doors and defecating on a welcome mat. He further explained that his training indicated that he should avoid touching bodily fluids to prevent exposure to potentially infectious diseases.
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Dr. John Mark Felton, a vice president of Acambis Inc., a Cambridge vaccine development company, is scheduled to be arraigned today. He is accused of traveling to Alaska to take part in a child sex ring.

Felton is accused of intending to have sex with a 6–year-old boy in a tryst that had been arranged by the minor’s father. Felton allegedly planned on dressing the boy in a Spider-Man costume. He also is accused of purchasing Hannah Montana toys for the 6-year-old’s 7-year-old sister and offering to babysit the children in between “sexual assaults.”

The Back Bay physician was arrested on November 16 in Anchorage at Ted Stevens International Airport. Felton is said to have informed police that he brought costumes for the boy.

Felton allegedly was supposed to meet “Bob” and his kids at the airport baggage carousel. Instead, he was greeted by ICE Senior Special Agent Kevin Laws.

The sexual crimes case against Felton is supposedly based on pages of online conversations that began in February 2008. On Wednesday, a federal grand charged the British national with attempted aggravated sex abuse. His arraignment was scheduled for this past Monday.

Arrest for any kind of sex crime is serious-especially if the alleged victim or intended one is under 14 years of age. Some sex crime convictions can lead to life in prison. Conviction for a Massachusetts sex crime also results in one’s name being placed on a list of registered sex offenders. This can seriously limit a person’s professional and personal opportunities even if he/she has already served time for a crime.

Massachusetts sexual crimes involving child victims include:
• Child sex abuse
• Forcible rape of a child • Indecent assault on a child under age 14 • Sexual assault • Assault with intent to rape a child • Child pornography-related charges • Solicitation of a minor using the Internet
• Statutory rape (the alleged victim is younger than 16)

Back Bay doc held in kid sex case, Boston Herald, November 23, 2009

elated Web Resource:
General Laws of Massachusetts
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There is a tragic scene taking place in north of Boston city of Lynn. It is playing out on the Victim side of the criminal justice equation. It will also likely mean bad news for a particular assailant when it is time for arrest and attorney- life without parole type of bad news.

The family of Vincent G., a 30-year-old man (hereinafter, the “Victim”), faced with determinations of his being brain dead since being shot in the head Sunday morning are planning to remove him from life support.

About the shooting-turned homicide we know only a part. Apparently, at approximately 1:00 a.m. on Sunday, the Victim was shot once in the head outside Soriano’s nightclub in Lynn. His fiancée who was at the scene is said to desperately tried to keep him alive at the scene, giving him CPR as he slowly slipped away in her arms.

The Victim was taken by ambulance to Salem Hospital and then air-lifted to Boston Medical Center.

Originally, the family had hope that the Victim would survive, clinging to promising signs of his occasional blinking or coughing.

“We thought he was going to make it, but he’s brain dead,” explains a family member. “The bullet is still there in his brain and they can’t get it out because his brain is so swollen. So his mom asked us to say our last prayers because she decided to pull the plug.”
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Bruce Springsteen wrote a song claiming that “Summer is here and the time is right for racing in the street”. Well, it is not summer and the time certainly isn’t right for street speeding. The lesson, however, is a little late in the learning for 17-year-old Michelle M. of Methuen (hereinafter, the “Defendant”). Accused of drag racing in Lowell by witnesses, the young lady will be facing charges alongside a criminal defense attorney.

According to the police, the Defendant will be charged with leaving the scene of an accident causing personal injury. The injured party was a 12-year-old boy who was struck by a car during what witnesses claim to be a drag race and thrown about 20 feet. Allegedly, because leaving the scene of an accident is a misdemeanor, the Defendant is going to be summoned to court at a later date and was not arrested. She has, however, lost her license.

According to witnesses, the racers had run a red light before one of the cars struck the boy. The boy is listed in fair condition with internal and head injuries at a Boston hospital.

According to the police, the Defendant, having left the lad for dead, fled the scene and went to a Lawrence hair salon, got her hair done and then reported to the police that her car had been vandalized.
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Chris W., a 22-year-old Hanson man (hereinafter referred to as the “Defendant”) spent some time in court this week and undoubtedly got to meet a nice new criminal defense attorney.

The visit was occasioned by some pretty serious felony charges.

You see, apparently the Defendant and a young lady (hereinafter, the “Complainant”) went to Boston Saturday night. They went back to Hanson later and that is where the trouble is said to have started.

Apparently, the Complainant and the Defendant had an argument in her Hanson home. The women told police that the Defendant then went into her basement bedroom and forced himself on her, putting his hand on her mouth to muffle any screams. He then grabbed a plastic bag and put it over her head and lifted her up. As she tried to flee, he then is said to have thrown her to the floor and, banging her head against a wall and dresser, said, “You’re lucky to be alive, and I should kill you.”
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Wanda Eileen Barzee, the woman charged with kidnapping teenager Elizabeth Smart in 2002, has pleaded guilty to federal charges of unlawful transportation of a minor and kidnapping. The 64-year-old says she will plead guilty to state charges of conspiracy to commit aggravated kidnapping.

At her court hearing on Tuesday, Barzee issued an apology to Smart for the role she played in the teenager’s abduction. As part of Barzee’s plea agreement, she will help prosecutors with their federal and state criminal cases against Brian David Mitchell, who is her husband.

Now that she has pleaded guilty, Barzee is expected to serve 15 years in federal prison. Her formal sentencing has not yet taken place. If Barzee had been convicted, she might have been sentenced to life in prison.

Mitchell and Barzee are accused of kidnapping Smart, then age 14, from her home. Barzee has admitted that she encouraged her husband to abduct the young girl and that they planned the kidnapping together.

In her plea agreement, Barzee says that she helped her husband control, confine, sexually assault, and transport Smart out of state and back. Smart was found with the couple nine months after her abduction.

Barzee, who was been staying at a Utah State Hospital, was recently declared competent to stand trial following years of being forced to take psychotropic drugs while at the mental hospital. Her husband’s competency hearing is scheduled to continue on November 30. His defense attorney says that he is incompetent and cannot defend himself during a criminal trial.

Kidnapper apologizes to Elizabeth Smart, will cooperate, CNN.com, November 18, 2009
Captor of Elizabeth Smart to serve 15 years, Los Angeles Times, November 18, 2009

Related Web Resources:
Read the Plea Agreement (PDF)

Timeline of Smart Case
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