Commonwealth v. Copeland
| Decision Date | 18 January 2019 |
| Docket Number | SJC-10992 |
| Citation | 481 Mass. 255,114 N.E.3d 569 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. David COPELAND. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Stephen Paul Maidman, Springfield, for the defendant.
Julianne Campbell, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth.
Present: Gants, C.J., Lowy, Budd, & Cypher, JJ.
On July 29, 2008, John Marshall (victim) was stabbed to death in a parking lot in the Roxbury section of Boston. A grand jury returned indictments charging the defendant, David Copeland, with murder in the first degree and armed robbery. At trial, the defendant conceded that he stabbed the victim, but argued that he suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at the time of the killing, that the killing was a spontaneous event, and that he did not rob the victim. A Superior Court jury convicted the defendant of felony-murder in the first degree and armed robbery. On appeal from his convictions, the defendant challenges (1) the Commonwealth's opening statement; (2) the sufficiency of the evidence on the offenses of felony-murder and deliberately premeditated murder; (3) the judge's refusal to instruct the jury on felony-murder in the second degree; (4) the Commonwealth's closing argument; and (5) defense counsel's ineffective performance. He also requests that we exercise our power under G. L. c. 278, § 33E, to order a new trial or reduce the verdict to voluntary manslaughter. Because we find neither reversible error nor a reason to exercise our authority under § 33E, we affirm the judgments.
Background. We recite the evidence presented during the Commonwealth's case-in-chief, in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth. Commonwealth v. Veiovis, 477 Mass. 472, 474, 78 N.E.3d 757 (2017). See Commonwealth v. Latimore, 378 Mass. 671, 676-677, 393 N.E.2d 370 (1979). On July 28 and 29, 2008, the defendant and two women were smoking "crack" cocaine at an apartment on Regent Street. They ran out of cocaine multiple times, and on each occasion someone left the apartment and got more. But eventually, on the second day, both the cocaine and the money ran out. The defendant then asked one of the women if he could use her cellular telephone, saying that he was going to meet somebody. The defendant left the apartment wearing a white T-shirt.
That same day, a witness telephoned the police after she saw two men fighting in the parking lot next to her apartment building on Dale Street. She saw a man in a white shirt apparently punching the victim, who was wearing a black shirt. The victim was "[j]ust standing there" leaning against his vehicle. The man in the white shirt eventually walked out of the parking lot toward Regent Street, leaving the victim lying on the ground. The witness then saw blood on the ground of the parking lot.
At that time, a police officer who was in the area saw the defendant walking away from Dale Street on Regent Street. The defendant was sweating, bleeding, and shirtless; he was holding a white T-shirt in his hands. The officer asked the defendant if he needed help, and the defendant "shrugged [the officer] off and kept walking." After receiving a radio call about a stabbing in a Dale Street parking lot, the officer put out a description of the defendant and said the defendant might be in a nearby building. Officers began to canvass the area.
The defendant returned to the Regent Street apartment sweaty and with blood on him. He first told one of the women at the apartment that he had fallen, but then said that "he got someone" and that he "took care of business." The women told the defendant that police were gathering outside. After hearing this, the defendant handed one of the women cocaine, marijuana, and money, all of which had blood on them. He also told the other woman that she did not need to open the door. He went into the kitchen, saying that he was trying to get to the back door, but he was still inside when a police officer entered the apartment.
After the defendant's arrest, police found blood containing the victim's deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) on the defendant's ear. The defendant initially told a detective that he had not left the Regent Street apartment building on the day of the killing. But when the detective told the defendant that he had evidence to the contrary, the defendant acknowledged that he had left once to buy alcohol.
Meanwhile, police and paramedics found the victim lying on his back between two parked vehicles in the Dale Street parking lot, covered in blood. He was wearing a dark shirt, either navy blue or black. The victim was a crack cocaine dealer, and he also used marijuana. According to his girlfriend, who had previously seen drugs in the victim's vehicle, he had been selling drugs on July 29.
The victim died at the hospital from an eight inch stab wound to the heart. He had other wounds on his body, including wounds on his hands consistent with attempts to block a knife. There were components of marijuana in his blood.
Inside the victim's vehicle, which was at the crime scene, police found crack cocaine and a hat with the defendant's DNA on it. When police searched the Regent Street apartment, they found a knife wrapped in a white T-shirt. The medical examiner testified that the knife could have caused the injury that killed the victim. Blood on the knife matched the victim's DNA. Police officers also examined video footage captured on July 29 by surveillance cameras next to the Dale Street parking lot. The defendant appeared on that footage at around the time of the killing.
The defendant moved at the close of the Commonwealth's case for a required finding of not guilty on the armed robbery charge. The judge denied the motion. The defendant then presented multiple witnesses, including a psychiatrist who had interviewed the defendant, to testify about an alleged sexual assault against the defendant that occurred in February 2008. The psychiatrist testified that the assault resulted in PTSD that affected the defendant's mental state on the day of the killing.
The defendant also testified. He asserted that he planned to give the victim marijuana in exchange for crack cocaine on July 29, and he claimed to have exchanged drugs with the victim before. He also stated that he took with him a knife from the kitchen of the apartment when he went to meet the victim. After seeing the amount of cocaine that the victim wanted to exchange for the marijuana, the defendant tried to back out of the deal. He testified that a fight ensued inside the vehicle, resulting in the defendant stabbing the victim. He stated that the cocaine that the victim had offered him was not the same cocaine that the police found in the victim's vehicle.
On cross examination, the defendant admitted that his entire postarrest statement to police was a lie. He also insisted that he had not handed over any cocaine on his return to the apartment, but had no answer for where the cocaine that the victim had offered him went.
After the defense rested, the defendant moved for a required finding of not guilty on the offenses of murder in the first degree, murder in the second degree, and armed robbery. After brief oral argument, during which the defendant emphasized the lack of evidence with respect to felony-murder, the judge denied the motion "as to the armed robbery, felony murder and other theories of first degree murder." The jury were instructed on murder in the first degree based on the theory of premeditation; murder in the first degree based on the theory of felony-murder, with armed robbery as the predicate felony; murder in the second degree based on malice; manslaughter; and armed robbery. The judge declined to instruct the jury on murder in the second degree based on larceny from a person. After the jury returned their verdict, the defendant filed motions under Mass. R. Crim. P. 25 (b) (2), as amended, 420 Mass. 1502 (1995), regarding the felony-murder offense and the armed robbery offense. The judge denied both motions.1
Discussion. 1. Sufficiency of the evidence for felony-murder. The defendant contends that the evidence did not support a conviction of felony-murder because there was insufficient evidence of armed robbery, the predicate felony.2 According to the defendant, the judge erred by failing to enter sua sponte a required finding of not guilty on the felony-murder charge at the close of the Commonwealth's case, and erred again by denying the defendant's motion for a required finding at the close of all the evidence.3
"In reviewing the denial of a motion for a required finding, we must determine whether the evidence offered by the Commonwealth, together with reasonable inferences therefrom, when viewed in its light most favorable to the Commonwealth, was sufficient to persuade a rational jury beyond a reasonable doubt of the existence of every element of the crime charged" (quotation and citation omitted). Commonwealth v. Whitaker, 460 Mass. 409, 416, 951 N.E.2d 873 (2011). "[A] conviction may rest upon circumstantial evidence alone, and the inferences a jury may draw from the relevant evidence need only be reasonable and possible," not "necessary or inescapable" (citation omitted).
Commonwealth v. Martin, 467 Mass. 291, 312, 4 N.E.3d 1236 (2014). "[W]e do not weigh supporting evidence against conflicting evidence when considering whether the jury could have found each element of the crime charged." Id.
When reviewing a motion for a required finding that was filed at the close of the Commonwealth's case and was renewed at the close of all the evidence, (alteration omitted). Commonwealth v. Semedo, 456 Mass. 1, 8, 921...
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