Commonwealth v. Lahey

• Citation: 80 Mass.App.Ct. 606,954 N.E.2d 1131
• Decision Date: 12 October 2011
• Docket Number: No. 10–P–568.,10–P–568.
• Parties: COMMONWEALTHv.Steven M. LAHEY.
• Court: Appeals Court of Massachusetts

80 Mass.App.Ct. 606

954 N.E.2d 1131

COMMONWEALTH

v.Steven M. LAHEY.

No. 10–P–568.

Appeals Court of Massachusetts, Bristol.

Argued April 1, 2011.Decided Oct. 12, 2011.

William T. Harrington, Boston, for the defendant.

Travis Carter (Rachel J. Eisenhaure, Assistant District Attorney, with him) for the Commonwealth.Present: GRASSO, KAFKER, & SIKORA, JJ.SIKORA, J.

At the conclusion of a bifurcated trial in Superior Court, the defendant was convicted of operating a motor vehicle under the influence of intoxicating liquor (OUI), seventh offense, G.L. c. 90, § 24(1)( a )(1); operating to endanger, G.L. c. 90, § 24(2)( a ); and operating after revocation of his license, G.L. c. 90, § 23.¹ On appeal he challenges the pretrial denial of his motion to suppress evidence resulting from the stop and detention of his automobile by a police officer of an adjacent town. He contends that the motion judge improperly applied the doctrine of inevitable discovery of incriminating evidence and that she later abused her discretion by denial of his request to renew the motion to suppress. For the following reasons, we affirm.

Facts. 1. Suppression findings. The evidence received at the two hearings upon the motion to suppress supported the following findings by the judge. ² On the evening of December 25, 2007, Norton police Officer Jeffrey Zaccardi escorted an ambulance to Sturdy Memorial Hospital in the neighboring town of Attleboro. After the arrival of the ambulance, Zaccardi drove his marked patrol car back toward Norton on Route 123, a two-lane east-to-west highway. As he traveled in the eastbound lane and still in Attleboro, he saw the defendant's car coming westward in the eastbound lane. It was moving at an excessive speed, and passing westbound vehicles in a no-passing zone.³ Zaccardi swerved off the roadway to avoid a head-on collision.

Zaccardi then reversed direction, turned on his patrol car's light bar and siren, and began pursuit of the defendant's car. Simultaneously he radioed his Norton police dispatcher and directed him to notify the Attleboro police dispatcher to send assistance to the pursuit.⁴ Zaccardi saw the defendant attempt unsuccessfully to pass vehicles; oncoming traffic blocked that maneuver. He overtook the defendant after one-half mile and forced him to the side of the road.

Zaccardi walked to the defendant's car, requested and received his keys and driver's license, and instructed him and a passenger to place their hands on the dashboard. At that time, he could hear the siren of an approaching Attleboro cruiser. It arrived within approximately twenty to thirty seconds of Zaccardi's receipt of the keys and license. Two Attleboro officers then conducted an investigation of the scene and collected evidence resulting in the eventual charges. Zaccardi briefed them about his observations and left within a few minutes. An Attleboro officer testified that their cruiser had reached the location of the stop in “[l]ess than one minute” after receipt of dispatch. Zaccardi testified, and the judge specifically found, that the purpose of his pursuit and detention of the defendant was the prevention of a fatal accident.

2. Suppression rulings. The defendant argued that Zaccardi, as a Norton police officer, lacked jurisdictional authority to stop the defendant in Attleboro; and that the substantial incriminating evidence resulting from the stop should be inadmissible because neither statutory nor common-law sources permitted an extraterritorial stop in these circumstances. In a detailed memorandum of decision, the judge agreed that neither statutory authorizations nor common-law doctrine appeared to validate the stop. She concluded, however, that the concept of inevitable discovery by lawful police action applied to the circumstances and provided a valid basis for admission of evidence yielded by the stop. She found that Officer Zaccardi had pursued the defendant in good faith for an urgent purpose of public safety and that his dispatch notices to the Attleboro police had assured their proper interception of the defendant.

3. Request to renew the motion to suppress; the turret tape. Approximately eight months after the judge's findings and rulings and five weeks before trial, the defendant moved to renew his motion to suppress upon the ground that an audio recording of Zaccardi's dispatch communications, or cruiser turret tape, would show that the Attleboro police had not arrived at the site until five minutes after the stop. The judge denied leave to renew the motion upon the grounds that defense counsel's ability to have known and to have presented any turret tape information at the suppression hearing ten months before amounted to waiver and that the time measurements of the tape would not offer new ground showing a need to review the earlier findings.

Analysis. The defendant argues generally that the concept of inevitable discovery should not apply to extraterritorial police stops and specifically that the evidence in this case does not establish the inevitability of his discovery by the Attleboro police. He challenges also the judge's denial of his request to renew his motion to suppress as an abuse of discretion.

1. Inevitable discovery. a. Standard of review. Most commonly, appeals from suppression decisions present constitutional questions of allegedly unreasonable search or seizure under the standards of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution or art. 14 of the Declaration of Rights of the Massachusetts Constitution. Scores of cases establish the standard of review. The appellate court accepts the motion judge's subsidiary findings of fact unless they are clearly erroneous. It conducts an independent review of her ultimate findings and conclusions of law. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Scott, 440 Mass. 642, 646, 801 N.E.2d 233 (2004); Commonwealth v. Colon, 449 Mass. 207, 214, 866 N.E.2d 412, cert. denied, 552 U.S. 1079, 128 S.Ct. 810, 169 L.Ed.2d 611 (2007). Under this standard, the credibility and weight of testimony remain the province of the motion judge directly observing the witnesses. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Gentile, 437 Mass. 569, 573, 773 N.E.2d 428 (2002); Commonwealth v. Clark, 65 Mass.App.Ct. 39, 43, 836 N.E.2d 512 (2005), and cases cited.

Our case concerns not the usual constitutional contentions, but rather a statutory and common-law right of an individual to freedom from seizure and search by a police officer outside his lawful jurisdiction. The identity of the interests in freedom and privacy and the evidentiary consequences of suppression or admission of the resulting evidence lead us logically to apply the same standard of review to the defendant's nonconstitutional argument against the action of the police.

b. Principle of jurisdictional limits. “A police officer lacks authority to act outside his or her jurisdiction, unless specifically authorized by statute or in the performance of a valid citizen's arrest at common law.” Commonwealth v. Twombly, 435 Mass. 440, 442, 758 N.E.2d 1051 (2001). It is a statutory violation for a police officer to engage in extraterritorial action without valid authority. See Commonwealth v. LeBlanc, 407 Mass. 70, 75, 551 N.E.2d 906 (1990); Commonwealth v. Hernandez, 456 Mass. 528, 532, 924 N.E.2d 709 (2010). The appropriate remedy for unauthorized extraterritorial action is suppression of the resulting evidence. See Commonwealth v. Grise, 398 Mass. 247, 253, 496 N.E.2d 162 (1986) (exclusion of evidence and dismissal of charges); Commonwealth v. LeBlanc, supra at 75, 551 N.E.2d 906 (police officer may not pursue motorist across his jurisdictional boundary for nonarrestable traffic violation; stop and arrest invalid; all resulting evidence of OUI suppressed); Commonwealth v. Savage, 430 Mass. 341, 347, 719 N.E.2d 473 (1999) (exclusion of evidence resulting from Vermont State trooper's arrest of intoxicated driver in Massachusetts); and Commonwealth v. Hernandez, supra at 532–533, 924 N.E.2d 709 (exclusion of evidence resulting from arrest of defendant by university campus police at place and for suspected conduct having no connection to university's property, facilities, or activities). Several statutory provisions authorize extraterritorial police action in well defined situations.⁵ The motion judge specifically excluded their application in this case. She excluded also the common-law exception for a permissible citizen's arrest ⁶ and the constitutional allowance for the police exercise of the community caretaker function in circumstances of a public safety emergency.⁷

c. Inevitable discovery. While an unauthorized extraterritorial stop is a statutory violation, Commonwealth v. LeBlanc, 407 Mass. at 75, 551 N.E.2d 906, and while inevitable discovery is a corollary of constitutional law, Commonwealth v. O'Connor, 406 Mass. 112, 113, 546 N.E.2d 336 (1989), no principled distinction bars their blended application to the same case. The remedy of exclusion has worked as a deterrent and sanction against official violation of statutory authority. See Commonwealth v. Upton, 394 Mass. 363, 367 n. 4, 476 N.E.2d 548 (1985), and cases cited; Commonwealth v. Hernandez, 456 Mass. at 532, 924 N.E.2d 709. In Commonwealth v. LeBlanc, supra, the court reasoned that the exclusionary rule, as a constitutional standard, applied to an unauthorized extraterritorial stop because “[t]he requirement that a police officer have lawful authority when he deprives individuals of their liberty is closely associated with the constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.” Accord Commonwealth v. Hernandez, supra. As a matter of rational and consistent doctrine, if the standard of lawful inevitability will excuse a constitutional violation of interests of freedom or privacy, then it will excuse also a statutory violation of those same interests.

In his original motion to suppress, the defendant invoked the protection of ...