Com. v. Zimmermann

• Decision Date: 03 October 2007
• Docket Number: No. 06-P-1240.,06-P-1240.
• Citation: 873 N.E.2d 1215,70 Mass. App. Ct. 357
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. Michelle M. ZIMMERMANN.
• Court: Appeals Court of Massachusetts

873 N.E.2d 1215

70 Mass. App. Ct. 357

COMMONWEALTH v. Michelle M. ZIMMERMANN.

No. 06-P-1240.

Appeals Court of Massachusetts, Essex.

Argued May 10, 2007.

Decided October 3, 2007.

Robert N. Weiner, Salem, for the defendant.

Catherine L. Semel, Assistant District Attorney (William J. Melkonian, Assistant District Attorney, with her) for the Commonwealth.

Present: COWIN, DREBEN, & TRAINOR, JJ.

DREBEN, J.

Convicted of motor vehicle homicide by negligent operation in violation of G.L. c. 90, § 24G(b), the defendant claims the judge erred in denying her motion to suppress and her motion in limine. Both motions sought to exclude evidence taken from the vehicle's event data recorder (EDR). That evidence indicated that five seconds before the accident the defendant was traveling at a speed of fifty-eight miles per hour. She claimed that her speed was between twenty to thirty miles per hour. We affirm.

1. Motion to suppress. The defendant challenges two rulings of the motion judge: one, based on Commonwealth v. Mamacos, 409 Mass. 635, 568 N.E.2d 1139 (1991), that a warrant to search her vehicle was not necessary, and two, that the affidavit in support of the application for the warrant established probable cause. We need not reach the question whether a warrant was necessary because the affidavit established probable cause to obtain the EDR. We turn to the affidavit.

The affiant was Sergeant Stephen J. Walsh, a State police officer assigned to the collision analysis and reconstruction section. He described his experience and training and stated that he has investigated and reconstructed hundreds of motor vehicle collisions involving death or serious bodily injury. On January 4, 2003, at the request of the Ipswich police department, he went to the site of the accident. At the time of the incident, a mixture of rain and snow was falling, and roadway conditions were deteriorating. Safe driving required a reduction in speed and extra caution. From Walsh's preliminary investigation, he learned that the defendant had operated a 2002 GMC Yukon sport utility vehicle on Argilla Road in Ipswich. "For reasons not conclusively determined," the defendant lost control of the vehicle¹; it rotated counterclockwise as it slid off the edge of the road, and the passenger side of the vehicle struck a large tree "in a centric collision." The passenger sitting in the front seat died. During the course of his investigation, Walsh found out that the vehicle was equipped with an EDR² which, as he knew, could include records of airbag deployment and the speed of the vehicle. Based on his observations, information learned in the course of the investigation, and his training and experience, Walsh

"deem[ed] that there [was] probable cause to believe that [the defendant] was operating the GMC at a rate of speed that was greater than reasonable and prudent, pursuant to G.L. c. 90, § 17,[³] and that her negligent operation constituted criminal conduct pursuant to G.L. c. 90, § 24G: Motor vehicle homicide via negligent operation so as to endanger the lives & safety of the public."

He also stated that there was probable cause to believe that evidence of this crime would be found in the EDR as well as in other parts of the vehicle.

Although Sergeant Walsh did not explicitly explain why he found probable cause to believe that the defendant was going at "a rate of speed that was greater than reasonable and prudent," it is apparent that his observations as to road conditions, the need for caution and reduction of speed, and the rotation, sliding, and violent crash of the vehicle, as well as his observations of the severe trauma and death of the passenger, were significant to him and led to that finding. In view of Walsh's special experience as an investigator in accident reconstruction, see Commonwealth v. Taglieri, 378 Mass. 196, 199, 390 N.E.2d 727, cert. denied, 444 U.S. 937, 100 S.Ct. 288, 62 L.Ed.2d 197 (1979); 2 W.R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 3.2(c), at 40 (4th ed.2004), the magistrate was warranted in concluding that Walsh's inferences were reasonable and that there was probable cause that a crime had been committed. See Commonwealth v. Toledo, 66 Mass. App.Ct. 688, 691-692 & n. 8, 849 N.E.2d 1281 (2006).

2. Motion in limine. The defendant's motion to exclude evidence based on the EDR was based on her claim that the Commonwealth cannot establish the reliability and accuracy of the device. In Commonwealth v. Lanigan, 419 Mass. 15, 26, 641 N.E.2d 1342 (1994), the Supreme Judicial Court "accept[ed] the basic reasoning of [Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharms., Inc., 509 U.S. 579, 113 S.Ct. 2786, 125 L.Ed.2d 469 (1993),] because it is consistent with our test of demonstrated reliability." As formulated by our cases, a plaintiff seeking to introduce expert testimony based on scientific or technical knowledge, see Commonwealth v. Patterson 445 Mass. 626, 640 n. 11, 840 N.E.2d 12 (2005), "may lay a foundation by showing that the underlying scientific theory is generally accepted within the relevant scientific community, or by showing that the theory is reliable or valid through other means." Id. at 640-641, 840 N.E.2d 12, quoting from Commonwealth v. Sands, 424 Mass. 184, 185-186, 675 N.E.2d 370 (1997). See Commonwealth v. Lanigan, supra at 26, 641 N.E.2d 1342.

Here, the motion judge held an extensive hearing on the reliability of the data from the EDR. He concluded that the Commonwealth's expert, William Russell Haight, was qualified as an expert in EDRs and found the EDR to be an accurate device. The judge also determined that there was general acceptance in the scientific community of the validity of such data. In our review of his decision to allow the admission of the evidence, the standard is whether there was an abuse of discretion. See Commonwealth v. Patterson, supra at 639, 840 N.E.2d 12. There was no abuse of discretion.

Haight, accredited by the Accreditation Commission for Traffic Accident Reconstruction, an organization supported by approximately twenty professional societies, police stations, and universities, helped develop the crash tests that formed the basis for the accreditation examinations. Haight has taught courses in crash reconstruction both in the United States and abroad, has published in the field of motor vehicle crash reconstruction and motor vehicle data recorders, and has been involved in almost 1,000 crash tests. He was on the original committee created by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to develop training for data recording technology. He has testified in many States as an expert in collision reconstructions and as an expert on EDRs in motor vehicles.

Haight described the function and reliability of EDRs. Every vehicle with airbags has an airbag control module⁴ that monitors a developing crash and, based on the information received decides whether to deploy the airbags. In addition, the module runs a diagnostic examination to make sure that its system is operating properly. The module also has a function that records data and, after a crash, stores some of that data in the EDR, which is a component of the airbag control module.

In addition to recording such matters as the warning lamp status (which, when lighted indicates problems) and whether the driver's belt is buckled, an EDR captures information about the severity of a crash, known as the delta force or the change of speed, and the duration of the crash.⁵ Moreover, the EDR records and stores four matters for a five-second period before a crash event—the vehicle speed, the engine revolutions per minute (RPM),⁶ the brake switch status (whether the brake has been applied),⁷ and the throttle position.⁸ In this case, the EDR indicated a forward vehicle speed of fifty-eight miles per hour five seconds before the crash.

Haight testified that he has performed over 200 crash tests since 2000, "looking to the reliability of the accuracy" of EDRs. The majority of the crashes were performed with the same type of airbag control module as used in the defendant's vehicle. The tests have been of crashes of low severity to very high severity, angle crashes, and crashes involving side impacts, cars backing, and cars "flying off of ramps ..., hitting the ground, and then hitting another car." In performing these tests he does not rely solely on the data in the EDR, as then there would be no control. He compares the speed obtained from the EDRs with that obtained from other instrumentation including accelerometers infrared traps, sensitive radar, high speed video, and tape switches on the ground. Other persons and groups have also conducted tests and have published on the topic. He explained that the EDRs are designed to be accurate within "plus or minus" four percent, but in his tests he found them to be "a lot more accurate than that." A Canadian testing group also found the EDRs more accurate than four percent.

The EDR does not function until there is a crash. After the airbag control module performs its safety function, determining whether to deploy airbags,⁹ the EDR stores the "precrash parameters and [the] crash pulse information" that determined the deployment of the airbags. Storage is the function of the EDR; it "locks in" the data. The airbag control module performs its safety function every second, but the data is not stored in the EDR unless there is a crash.

In this case the crash severity was monitored for almost four-tenths of a second; thus, the contact with the tree lasted less than one-half second during which time the vehicle lost 21.34 miles per hour as measured in a front to rear direction.

Since the collision was a sideways one and the vehicle rotated, the front speed would not provide a side rate of speed at which the vehicle hit the tree. In making that calculation and determining the angle at which the vehicle hit the tree, Haight examined photographs of the damage to the vehicle, the marks in the slush leading up to...