Com. v. Cyr

• Decision Date: 27 May 1997
• Citation: 679 N.E.2d 550,425 Mass. 89
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. James R. CYR, Jr.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 550

679 N.E.2d 550

425 Mass. 89

COMMONWEALTH v. James R. CYR, Jr.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts,

Franklin.

Argued March 4, 1997.

Decided May 27, 1997.

David P. Hoose, Springfield (Judith Wideman, Amherst with him), for defendant.

Judith Ellen Pietras, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth.

Before WILKINS, C.J., and ABRAMS, LYNCH, FRIED and MARSHALL, JJ.

ABRAMS, Justice.

After trial by jury, James R. Cyr, Jr., was convicted of murder in the first degree by reason of deliberate premeditation and of arson. ¹ On appeal, the defendant argues that the judge's evidentiary rulings on the victim's state of mind were erroneous. The defendant asserts that the erroneously admitted evidence was unfairly prejudicial and undermined his defense. Therefore, the defendant concludes a new trial is required on his conviction of murder in the first degree. We agree. We reverse and remand for a new trial on the indictment charging murder.

Facts. We summarize the evidence viewed in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth. Commonwealth v. Salemme, 395 Mass. 594, 595, 481 N.E.2d 471 (1985). Tara Hartnett and the defendant met while attending college at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. In April, 1992, during her junior year, Hartnett gave birth to the defendant's daughter. During the pregnancy, Hartnett and the defendant had agreed that adoption was in the best interest of the child. They met with a nurse counsellor at Children's Aid and Family Services in Northampton, to plan for the adoption placement. The nurse counsellor met with Hartnett and the defendant several times during the course of the pregnancy and after the child's birth. She said that there was increasing tension and discord in the relationship between Hartnett and the defendant as to the child's future.

After the child was born, the defendant decided that he wanted to keep the child himself with some help from his parents. Hartnett still believed that adoption was in the child's best interest. Eventually, Hartnett and the defendant decided against adoption. They agreed to have the child live at the defendant's parents' home in Amherst. Hartnett could see the child every day and help raise her.

On February 13, 1993, Hartnett and the defendant had a violent altercation which precipitated a series of legal proceedings in the District Court. Each sought a protective order against the other. A hearing on the orders was held in the Northampton Division of the District Court Department. The court issued the orders requested by both parties. A friend of Hartnett was designated the go-between. The go-between's tasks included picking up the child at the defendant's house for visits with Hartnett. Hartnett filed a petition with the Hampshire County Division of the Probate and Family Court, seeking to gain custody of the child. She also filed a criminal complaint against the defendant.

On March 19, 1993, there was a Probate Court hearing. Pending further probate custody proceedings, the child continued to live with the defendant and his parents. On the evening of March 20, 1993, Sunderland police and fire personnel were summoned to a fire at Hartnett's house. These officials recovered Hartnett's body from the burnt house.

Hartnett's body had several stab wounds and extensive third degree burns. Forensic testing revealed that Hartnett had been stabbed eight times, but was alive at the time of the fire. ² The police discovered blood in almost every room of the house. They recovered a bloody knife. The police also observed a fresh trail of footprints and blood leading away from the house, and an identical set of footprints, absent the blood, leading toward the house. Next to the footprints leading toward the house, they found an impression in the snow, the dimensions of which matched that of a gasoline can found melted on the floor of the burned home. Hartnett's housemates said that they had never seen the knife in their home. ³

That same evening, the defendant sought medical treatment at the emergency room of Cooley Dickinson Hospital. His hands were cut and bloody, he smelled of smoke and had singed hair. The defendant told the hospital personnel, and later the police, that he had burned his head on the stove while making coffee and that someone had attacked him with a knife while he was in his car.

The defendant admitted that he and Hartnett often argued and screamed at each other, especially about parenting. The defendant also testified that, on February 13, he and Hartnett got into an escalating argument over the child. They "shoved each other." He then "pushed her away from" him into a closet. He grabbed the telephone out of her hands as she tried to call the police. He refused to let her take the child out because she was too upset. ⁴

The defendant said that, on the evening of March 20, he drove to Hartnett's house. To avoid detection and arrest for violation of the protective order, he parked his car on a nearby road and walked through the woods to Hartnett's house. The defendant said that, although Hartnett tried to close the door on him, he stuck his foot in the door and forced his way into her house. Hartnett ran away from him.

The defendant said that Hartnett grabbed a knife from the kitchen. She cut his hand. The defendant then hit her, knocked her down, grabbed the knife, and "attacked her with it." The knife slipped and he felt his fingers go numb. The defendant said that he realized that he had just partially severed his fingers and that "drove [him] on even more, more." He said that Hartnett tried to run from him, but he followed her from room to room. Hartnett eventually collapsed on the floor, and stopped moving. Thinking she was already dead, the defendant ran from the house.

The defendant said that he was bleeding heavily. As he was running away over snowbanks by the garage, he looked in the open door and saw a can of gasoline. ⁵ He decided to burn the house because he knew there was blood everywhere. He spilled the gasoline in various rooms and searched the house for matches. He found matches but he had difficulty striking them due to his injured hand. He finally ignited the gasoline. The back of his head was burned as he fled through the breezeway door. He admitted that the blood and footprints leading away from the house were his. However, he denied that the footprints (with the nearby impression matching the dimensions of the gas can) which led to the house were his. He went home and asked his father to bring him to the hospital. He admitted lying to the doctor and the police about how he was injured.

On rebuttal, two police officers testified that, when they arrived at Hartnett's house on the evening of March 20, the garage doors were closed. One officer also testified that he had examined the breezeway door and the snowbanks in front of the garage door, and that he had found no blood or footprints there.

A. Hearsay. The defendant asserts that the judge's evidentiary rulings on Hartnett's state of mind were erroneous and prejudicial. He claims that the judge admitted Hartnett's hearsay statements concerning her fear of the defendant and his prior misconduct. The defendant contends that that hearsay evidence undermined his defense of what he calls provocation or lack of malicious intent.

Generally, a deceased's expressions of fear of the defendant are not relevant to or probative of the defendant's motive. See Commonwealth v. DelValle, 351 Mass. 489, 493, 221 N.E.2d 922 (1966) (evidence of threats held immaterial as demonstrative "only [of] a state of fear on the part of the deceased," and therefore inadmissible hearsay); Commonwealth v. Williams, 30 Mass.App.Ct. 543, 548, 571 N.E.2d 29 (1991) (victim's statement that she feared the defendant was inadmissible hearsay); Commonwealth v. Bond, 17 Mass.App.Ct. 396, 399, 458 N.E.2d 1198 (1984) (victim's statements recounting threats by defendant and expressing fear of defendant inadmissible hearsay). The judge, despite this general rule, permitted witnesses to testify as to Hartnett's statements to show the relationship between the parties. ⁶

A friend of Hartnett said that Hartnett told her: "[S]he was afraid for [the child's] safety as well as her own because of [the defendant's] personality and his violence." Over defense counsel's objection, the judge ruled that this statement was admissible "to show the relationship that was existing between the parties and what was going on between them, the general tenor of their behavior, one to the other." ⁷ The nurse counsellor said that, during a telephone conversation, Hartnett had told her: "If [the defendant] would hit his mother and he would hit me, what will he do to [the child] in the future. So I don't want him to raise [the child]." ⁸ The nurse counsellor said that she told Hartnett that "she had a right to feel safe, and that she had a right to make sure her child was safe." The nurse counsellor also said that, during another telephone conversation, Hartnett told her: "I'm afraid of [the defendant] and I don't want him anywhere near me, and I wouldn't drop the [protective] order."

We conclude that the admission of the extrajudicial hearsay statements of Hartnett as to her fear of the defendant was erroneous and prejudicial. The hearsay statements undermined the defendant's defense. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Andrade, 422 Mass. 236, 239, 661 N.E.2d 1308 (1996). The hearsay testimony of Hartnett's statements invited the jurors to base their decision on the degree of the defendant's culpability (the only issue in the case) on inadmissible hearsay. ⁹ See DelValle, supra at 492-493, 221 N.E.2d 922; Bond, supra at 399, 458 N.E.2d 1198.

The Commonwealth argues that the extrajudicial statements were admissible because Hartnett's state of mind was known to the defendant and relevant to his motive for killing her. ¹⁰ See Commonwealth v. Lowe, 391 Mass. 97, 106, 461 N.E.2d 192, cert. denied, 469...