Commonwealth v. Eagles
| Decision Date | 24 January 2023 |
| Docket Number | SJC-13215 |
| Citation | 491 Mass. 210,200 N.E.3d 993 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. Michael J. EAGLES. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Dennis Shedd, Lexington, for the defendant.
Arne Hantson, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth.
M. Chris Fabricant & Meghan Gilligan Palermo, of New York, Laura Carey, Daniel V. McCaughey, Abigail Kittredge, Boston & Christopher J. Walsh, for The Innocence Project, Inc., & another, amici curiae, submitted a brief.
Present: Budd, C.J., Lowy, Cypher, Kafker, Wendlandt, & Georges, JJ.
Following a jury trial, the defendant, Michael J. Eagles, was convicted of murder in the first degree by means of extreme atrocity or cruelty and on a theory of felony-murder, arising from the death of the victim, Lewis Jennings.1 During the course of the defendant's trial, the Commonwealth presented expert testimony comparing hair samples collected at the crime scene from the victim's hand with hair taken from the defendant. The expert testimony included a statistical probability to support the expert's opinion that the hair collected at the crime scene belonged to the defendant. Since the defendant's convictions, however, such statistical probabilities to support hair comparisons have been found to be unreliable. In light of this recent development, the defendant filed a motion for a new trial, arguing that the admission of the expert testimony improperly influenced the jury in their verdicts. The motion was denied without an evidentiary hearing. The defendant filed both a notice of appeal and a gatekeeper petition for leave to appeal pursuant to G. L. c. 278, § 33E. A single justice of this court allowed the defendant's gatekeeper petition and submitted this appeal to the full court.
This case now presents the issue whether the admission of expert testimony on statistical support for hair comparison evidence, which since has been proved to be unreliable, was a real factor in the jury's deliberations. Where we conclude that it was not, we affirm the denial of the defendant's motion for a new trial.2
Background. The facts surrounding the murder are set forth in detail in Commonwealth v. Eagles, 419 Mass. 825, 826-830, 648 N.E.2d 410 (1995). "We summarize those facts here and supplement them with other relevant facts from the trial record and the facts found by the motion judge to be significant with respect to the defendant's motion for a new trial, all of which are supported by the record." Commonwealth v. Sullivan, 469 Mass. 340, 341, 14 N.E.3d 205 (2014).
On the evening of July 29, 1986, the defendant returned home from work, drank beer, and walked into town to purchase more liquor. While returning from the liquor store, the defendant met with Jeffrey Roberio. The defendant and Roberio returned to the defendant's residence, where they both drank more alcohol, and the defendant ingested cocaine and hallucinogenic "acid." At approximately 8 P.M. , Roberio's cousin, Paul DeMoranville, drove Roberio and the defendant to a local drive-in movie theater. While at the theater, Roberio told DeMoranville that he planned to break into a nearby trailer home and asked the defendant to be his lookout. Roberio assured the defendant that nobody would be home at the time of the break-in. Roberio then asked DeMoranville to return to the theater to pick them up in one and one-half hours. DeMoranville left the theater, and both Roberio and the defendant walked from the theater to the victim's back yard.
The victim was a seventy-nine year old man who lived alone in a trailer. He stored cash in various hiding places throughout the trailer, kept change in a beer stein, and stored his insurance papers and old coins in a strong box in the kitchen. The victim also kept a shotgun underneath his bed. See Eagles, 419 Mass. at 826, 648 N.E.2d 410.
When Roberio and the defendant arrived at the victim's trailer, they noticed that a light was on and that a car was parked in the driveway. The two men "proceeded to cut off any chance of help being called by severing the telephone line."3 Eagles, 419 Mass. at 829, 648 N.E.2d 410. According to the Commonwealth's theory of the case, the two men entered the trailer and confronted the victim, who resisted with force. Id. at 829-830, 648 N.E.2d 410. Both Roberio and the defendant beat the victim mercilessly, tied a pillowcase around the victim's neck, and brought him from room to room in an attempt to force the victim to tell the two men where the money was hidden. Id. at 827, 830, 648 N.E.2d 410. After robbing the victim, the two men left him either dead, or nearly dead, in his trailer. Id. at 830, 648 N.E.2d 410.
The defendant's version of the events, however, differed drastically. Eagles, 419 Mass. at 828, 648 N.E.2d 410. The defendant testified at trial in his own defense, and he entirely contradicted the recorded statement he previously had given to police shortly after the murder. Id. In his previous statement to police, the defendant had denied any involvement in the crime. Id. At trial, however, the defendant testified that he did not take part in the robbery and murder but did go to the victim's trailer for the sole purpose of acting as Roberio's lookout while Roberio entered the trailer, which he believed to be unoccupied at the time, and took the victim's money. Id.
The defendant was adamant that he served only as a lookout and remained outside when Roberio entered the trailer. He testified that only when he heard noises coming from within the trailer did he enter. According to the defendant, he saw the victim lying on the floor with a ligature around his neck and bleeding from his face. The defendant also saw Roberio holding the victim's shotgun. Although the victim was unconscious, he still was breathing. Roberio instructed the defendant to look for money, which he tried to do, but he claimed he was unsuccessful. Roberio dumped change from the victim's beer stein into the defendant's hand and grabbed the strong box as the two men fled from the trailer.4
Shortly after the murder, DeMoranville and DeMoranville's brother returned to the theater, where they picked up the two men, and dropped off the defendant at his residence. The defendant had been living at this place of residence with a roommate and the roommate's wife for about one and one-half months, but never paid any rent. See Eagles, 419 Mass. at 830, 832, 648 N.E.2d 410. Following the murder, the defendant was seen taking handfuls of change from his pocket and offering the change to his roommate as payment for food and rent. See id. at 827, 832, 648 N.E.2d 410. The defendant also was seen with a roll of paper currency.
The victim was found the next day on the floor of the living room of his trailer. Eagles, 419 Mass. at 826-827, 648 N.E.2d 410. According to the medical examiner, the victim was alive when his injuries were inflicted, but he ultimately died from a combination of the multiple blunt force injuries and the strangulation by ligature.5 See id. at 827, 648 N.E.2d 410.
As police searched the victim's trailer, which was in disarray on their arrival, there were pools of blood and blood stains throughout it, but none of the victim's money could be found. See Eagles, 419 Mass. at 827, 648 N.E.2d 410. Much of the blood in the trailer was type O, the victim's blood type. Id. The police investigation also revealed Roberio's fingerprint on the empty beer stein, as well as a bloody footprint on a pillowcase on the floor of the living room. Id. Police eventually were able to obtain the defendant's sneakers and match the bloody footprint to the print from the defendant's left sneaker. In addition to the bloody footprint, police found type O blood on the defendant's pants, occult blood
on the defendant's hands, and blood on one shirt and the sneakers of the defendant.6 See id.
Most importantly for the purpose of this appeal, hairs were found in the victim's left hand, which was found tucked underneath his body at the crime scene. See Eagles, 419 Mass. at 827, 648 N.E.2d 410. At trial, Jay Godleski, a chemist at the State police crime laboratory, testified that he tested hair samples from the victim, Roberio, and the defendant. He then compared those hairs to the ones found in the victim's hand. Godleski testified that "two of [the five] hairs [that were recovered from the victim's hand] were consistent with [the defendant's] standard head hair."7 He further testified: "[F]or one hair to be consistent with a head hair that's been submitted, there's a one in 4,500 chance that that hair came from that individual."8
Following trial, the defendant was found guilty of murder in the first degree by means of extreme atrocity or cruelty, and on the theory of felony-murder, for which the defendant's conviction of armed robbery served as the predicate offense. Eagles, 419 Mass. at 826, 648 N.E.2d 410. This court upheld the defendant's convictions on direct appellate review. See id. at 840, 648 N.E.2d 410.9
In 2009, years after the defendant's convictions were affirmed on appeal, the National Academy of Sciences issued a report rejecting the ability of a forensic hair analyst to opine on the statistical significance of a person's hair being consistent with hair found at a crime scene. See National Research Council, Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward (2009). Specifically, the report stated that the very probability that Godleski testified about, i.e., that there was a one in 4,500 chance that the hair collected from a crime scene would be consistent with the hair sample submitted by the defendant, was a probability that was shown to be unreliable. Id. at 158-161.
came to an agreement on "what the science of microscopic hair examinations supports." United States Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation,...
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