Commonwealth v. Edwards

• Decision Date: 20 January 2017
• Docket Number: SJC–11989
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. Joshua EDWARDS.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

476 Mass. 341

67 N.E.3d 1224

COMMONWEALTH

v.Joshua EDWARDS.

SJC–11989

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk..

Argued September 6, 2016.

Decided January 20, 2017.

Greg L. Johnson, Boston, for the defendant.

Matthew T. Sears, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth.

Present: Gants, C.J., Botsford, Lenk, Hines, Gaziano, Lowy, & Budd, JJ.

BOTSFORD, J.

The defendant, Joshua Edwards, has been indicted for multiple offenses, including firearms offenses, with which he was initially charged following the seizure and search of a motor vehicle he had been driving. Before trial, he moved to suppress evidence seized during the search of the vehicle, invoking the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. After an evidentiary hearing, a Superior Court judge allowed the defendant's motion. A single justice of this court allowed the Commonwealth leave to pursue an interlocutory appeal and reported the case to the Appeals Court. See Mass. R. Crim. P. 15 (a) (2), as appearing in 422 Mass. 1501 (1996). The Appeals Court reversed in an unpublished memorandum and order issued pursuant to its rule 1:28. Commonwealth v. Edwards, 87 Mass.App.Ct. 1133, 2015 WL 3935709 (2015). We granted the defendant's application for further appellate review. Recognizing that this is an exceedingly close case, we conclude that the stop was predicated on reasonable suspicion of criminal activity and therefore reverse the motion judge's order allowing the motion to suppress.

Factual background. One witness, Boston police Officer David Lanteigne, testified at the hearing on the motion to suppress. In addition, a number of photographs, documents, and police radio transmissions, as well as a recording of a 911 call, were received in evidence. In reviewing a judge's decision on a motion to suppress, we "accept the judge's subsidiary findings of fact absent clear error, but conduct an independent review of the judge's ultimate findings and conclusions of law." Commonwealth v. Washington, 449 Mass. 476, 480, 869 N.E.2d 605 (2007). Without "detract[ing] from the judge's ultimate findings," Commonwealth v. Jessup, 471 Mass. 121, 127–128, 27 N.E.3d 1232 (2015), we supplement his factual findings with "evidence from the record that ‘is uncontroverted and undisputed and where the judge explicitly or implicitly credited the witness's testimony’ " (citation omitted). Commonwealth v. Jones–Pannell, 472 Mass. 429, 431, 35 N.E.3d 357 (2015).¹

On March 17, 2013, at approximately 1:30 A.M. , the Boston police received a 911 call.² The caller identified himself by name, Jabari Wattley, and told the operator that he could see a man standing in the street holding a gun. Wattley further stated that he had seen the man drive off in a black Infiniti motor vehicle, return and park on Armandine Street (in the Dorchester section of Boston), get out of the vehicle holding a gun in his hand, and then get back into the vehicle.³ He informed the operator that he knew the man, identified him as the defendant, Joshua Edwards, and said that Edwards was not threatening anyone.

The police dispatcher broadcast the information as a "Priority 1" call, requesting "any unit nearby" to respond to the address. A call coded as "Priority 1" "means that it was of a serious nature and that response time and protecting officer safety were both high priorities." A marked cruiser driven by Lanteigne arrived on Armandine Street shortly after the broadcast.⁴ The cruiser did not have its emergency lights activated. Lanteigne stopped when a man (later identified as Wattley) ran off his porch toward the cruiser and began "yelling" to Lanteigne and pointing at a black Acura motor vehicle that was parked twenty to thirty feet in front of the cruiser, on the right hand side of the street.⁵

The Acura was legally parked very close to the curb, and was completely dark; no interior or external lights were on. Another vehicle was parked in front of the Acura, but the space or spaces behind it were empty. At that point, Lanteigne observed the Acura's brake lights illuminate, and Wattley yelled something to the effect of, "That's him. That's the guy, he's about to drive away." In response, Lanteigne activated the cruiser's blue lights, strobe lights, and other lights, and moved the cruiser alongside the driver's side of the Acura in order to block the vehicle from leaving. Lanteigne believed "the Acura was about to drive away ... [and] understood that the person Wattley had seen with a handgun was driving the Acura."

Lanteigne got out of the cruiser and removed his firearm from its holster. At the same time, the defendant got out of the Acura and closed the door. He "appeared to take no notice of and pay no attention to" Lanteigne, and started to walk away. Lanteigne responded by running to the front of his cruiser and ordering the defendant to stop. When the defendant turned and started walking away quickly, the officer holstered his own weapon, pushed the defendant against the rear of the Acura, forced him to the ground when he resisted being pushed, and handcuffed him.

Another police officer who had responded to the scene stood immediately next to the closed driver's side door of the Acura, and leaned toward the window. He observed a firearm lying on the floor by the driver's seat.⁶ If the defendant had been seated in the vehicle, "his legs would have completely hidden the gun from view."

The police determined that the defendant did not have a Massachusetts driver's license, and that he was not the registered owner of the Acura. The police decided to tow the vehicle because a person having lawful control of the vehicle was not present, and because there had been vandalism in the area. Prior to the tow, the vehicle was searched pursuant to an inventory policy. In addition to the firearm, the police found an open bottle of beer, a cup containing what appeared to be an alcoholic beverage in the console next to the driver's seat, and a closed, full bottle of beer.

Suppression ruling. The motion judge allowed the motion to suppress because he concluded that, at the time Lanteigne stopped and seized the Acura vehicle—identified by the judge as the moment when Lanteigne activated his cruiser's blue lights and blocked the Acura from leaving—the police lacked a reasonable, articulable suspicion that criminal activity was afoot.⁷ See Commonwealth v. Alvarado, 423 Mass. 266, 268 & n.3, 667 N.E.2d 856 (1996), citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). The judge emphasized that it is not unlawful to carry a gun in public; it is only illegal to do so without a license. The judge concluded that a report of a man holding an unholstered gun on a public sidewalk, late at night in a high crime area, was not sufficiently suspicious to warrant an investigatory stop. He therefore ordered that the evidence discovered in the vehicle be suppressed.

Discussion. We agree with the motion judge that the determinative issue in this case is whether the initial stop of the Acura was predicated on "reasonable suspicion, based on specific, articulable facts and reasonable inferences therefrom, that an occupant of the ... motor vehicle had committed, was committing, or was about to commit a crime." Alvarado, 423 Mass. at 268, 667 N.E.2d 856. See Commonwealth v. Wilson, 441 Mass. 390, 394, 805 N.E.2d 968 (2004). See also Terry, 392 U.S. at 21–22, 88 S.Ct. 1868.

Breaking down the inquiry into its component parts, we consider when the stop and seizure occurred, whether the stop was supported by reasonable suspicion, and whether the scope of the ensuing search was proportional to the degree of suspicion that prompted it.

1. Moment of seizure. Like the motion judge, we conclude that the defendant clearly was stopped and seized in the constitutional sense when Lanteigne activated his cruiser's blue lights and blocked the Acura's egress. See Commonwealth v. Thompson, 427 Mass. 729, 733, 696 N.E.2d 105, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1008, 119 S.Ct. 524, 142 L.Ed.2d 435 (1998). Viewed objectively, at that moment, a reasonable person would not have believed that he was free to leave the scene. See Commonwealth v. Barros, 435 Mass. 171, 173–174, 755 N.E.2d 740 (2001) ; Commonwealth v. Smigliano, 427 Mass. 490, 491, 694 N.E.2d 341 (1998).

2. Reasonable suspicion to initiate stop. Under the principles of Terry, 392 U.S. at 21–22, 88 S.Ct. 1868, a police officer may stop a person to make a "threshold inquiry where suspicious conduct gives the officer reason to suspect that a person has committed, is committing, or is about to commit a crime." Commonwealth v. Silva, 366 Mass. 402, 405, 318 N.E.2d 895 (1974). An officer's suspicion must be grounded in " ‘specific, articulable facts and reasonable inferences [drawn] therefrom’ rather than on a ‘hunch’ " (citation omitted). Commonwealth v. Lyons, 409 Mass. 16, 19, 564 N.E.2d 390 (1990). In this case, the stop was predicated primarily on the information contained in the police broadcast. That information was provided by a person who both identified himself and said he personally had seen the defendant with a gun at 1:30 A.M. on a deserted, residential street. He identified the defendant by name; explained that he knew the defendant; met the police officer, Lanteigne, at the address he had provided to the 911 dispatcher; and pointed out the defendant's vehicle to Lanteigne.⁸ In these circumstances, Wattley's basis of knowledge was established, and his report of seeing the defendant holding a firearm "could be regarded as reliable without any prior demonstration of his reliability." Commonwealth v. Gouse, 461 Mass. 787, 793, 965 N.E.2d 774 (2012), quoting Commonwealth v. Bowden, 379 Mass. 472, 477, 399 N.E.2d 482 (1980) (distinguishing reports of anonymous informants from those of "bystanders, victims and participants").

Although Wattley did not describe the firearm to the 911 dispatcher—and, as the motion judge...