Commonwealth v. Martinez

• Decision Date: 19 January 2011
• Docket Number: SJC–10473.
• Citation: 458 Mass. 684,940 N.E.2d 422
• Parties: COMMONWEALTHv.Melvin MARTINEZ.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

458 Mass. 684

940 N.E.2d 422

COMMONWEALTH

v.Melvin MARTINEZ.

SJC–10473.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

Argued Sept. 14, 2010.Decided Jan. 19, 2011.

Richard J. Shea, Boston, for the defendant.Macy Lee, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth.Present: MARSHALL, C.J., IRELAND, SPINA, CORDY, BOTSFORD, & GANTS, JJ. ¹BOTSFORD, J.

In January of 2007, a Suffolk County jury found the defendant, Melvin Martinez, guilty of the aggravated rape of Monica Mejia and of her murder on a theory of felony-murder.² On appeal, the defendant claims error in the admission of his statement to the police and the repeated mention of his nickname, “Pinocchio,” at trial. He also argues that the credibility of a key prosecution witness who testified pursuant to a plea agreement was enhanced improperly by the prosecutor's references to the witness's obligation to testify truthfully, and that the jury were impermissibly biased by seeing, during a view, a memorial erected in the victim's memory. For the reasons we discuss, we reject the defendant's claims, and, after reviewing the entire record, conclude there is no basis on which to grant the defendant relief pursuant to G.L. c. 278, § 33E. Accordingly, we affirm the defendant's conviction of murder in the first degree.

1. Facts. We summarize the facts as the jury could have found them based on the evidence introduced at trial, reserving other facts for later discussion. On the evening of July 16, 2002, the victim attended a party at 115 Washington Avenue in Chelsea. The defendant, known to a number of the residents of the apartment only as “Pinocchio,” was also there. The victim and the defendant were both eighteen years old. The defendant and other guests at the party were drinking, and the victim became intoxicated and also distraught over her relationship with her boy friend. The defendant offered to take the victim to see her boy friend, and the two left together at approximately 11:30 p.m.

Adalberto Ingles,³ one of the men at the party, followed the victim and the defendant on a bicycle and joined them as they arrived at a park near the Chelsea Soldiers' Home. Sometime after the three entered the park, the victim walked down a hillside into a wooded area in order to urinate, and the defendant followed her. Hearing screams, Ingles also descended, and saw the defendant lying on top of the victim on the ground. At the defendant's direction, Ingles removed the victim's pants while the defendant held her, and Ingles held the struggling victim down as the defendant had vaginal intercourse with her. The defendant then stated that he and Ingles had to kill the victim. The defendant picked up a large rock, which he and Ingles separately used to hit the victim on the head. At that point the victim was bleeding from her head and not making any sound, but was still breathing faintly. The two men left the victim and returned to the rear porch of the earlier party site at 115 Washington Avenue. They borrowed a blanket or sheet from one of the apartment's residents, went back to where they had left the victim, threw the blanket over her, and set fire to it, burning the victim's body.⁴ The next morning, Marisol Cruzado, another resident of the apartment at 115 Washington Avenue, overheard the defendant state that he had had sex with the victim.

The victim died of blunt head trauma and thermal injuries. The medical examiner found no evidence of trauma that might be related to sexual assault. An anorectal swabbing from the victim, blood from a large rock found at the scene, and a cutting from the victim's jeans were all tested for deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and the victim was a match for all three. The defendant was excluded as a match for DNA from the first two items, while testing of a minor DNA profile in the jeans sample was inconclusive.

2. Admission of the defendant's statement. The defendant claims that the admission at trial of his second statement to the police was error on two grounds, each of which requires reversal of his conviction and a new trial. In particular, he argues that neither the waiver of his Miranda rights nor the second statement itself was voluntary, and therefore should have been suppressed; and that in any event the statement should have been suppressed under Commonwealth v. Rosario, 422 Mass. 48, 56–57, 661 N.E.2d 71 (1996) ( Rosario ), because he gave it more than six hours after his effective arrest and without waiving his right to prompt arraignment.

Before trial, the defendant moved to suppress the statement on the first ground now asserted, that is, the lack of voluntariness. An evidentiary hearing on the motion was held before a Superior Court judge who was not the trial judge (motion judge). The motion judge denied the motion in a written memorandum of decision and order on November 17, 2005.⁵ The motion to suppress did not raise any argument concerning a violation of Rosario. Nevertheless, the evidence presented at the motion hearing and the motion judge's findings, which constitute the factual basis for considering the defendant's arguments on voluntariness, also provide many of the record facts relevant to his Rosario claim. We begin with a summary of the motion judge's findings, supplemented by uncontroverted evidence presented at the motion hearing.⁶

a. Additional facts. Around 8 or 9 p.m. on the evening of July 23, 2002, approximately one week after the victim was killed, State Troopers Romere Antoine and John Sylva approached the defendant on Washington Avenue in Chelsea. The troopers had received information that a man known as “Pinocchio” knew the victim and was the last person seen with her. On spotting a man fitting the description they had been given, the officers got out of their unmarked cruiser and the defendant identified himself as Pinocchio. The troopers told the defendant that they wanted to speak with him regarding the homicide of Monica Mejia, and asked if he would mind accompanying them to the Chelsea police station to answer a few questions. The defendant, who is Spanish speaking, was able to comprehend the troopers' request although it was made in English and, speaking in broken English himself, agreed to go with them. The troopers and the defendant traveled the short distance to the police station in the unmarked cruiser. Both troopers rode in the front while the defendant rode in the back. The defendant was not handcuffed or under any restraint.

On arrival at the police station, the two troopers and the defendant entered through the front entrance and proceeded to a fourth-floor conference room. The room, also referred to as the library, contained a long conference table, chairs, bookcases, and a television. The entrance to the room was a glass doorway in a glass wall, which permitted viewing by people outside the room. The defendant sat unrestrained in the room. Trooper Sylva attempted to read the defendant his Miranda rights in English, but decided it would be better to obtain the assistance of a Spanish-speaking officer. Sergeant Peter Perez of the State police was called and arrived ten minutes later. On entering the library, Perez introduced himself and determined the defendant spoke Spanish.

Perez handed the defendant a preprinted Chelsea police department Miranda rights explanation and waiver form written in Spanish, and read the entire form to him. Perez asked if the defendant had any questions about the form, offering to explain, but the defendant had no questions. The defendant checked “Si” (yes) to two questions at the bottom of the form that asked, respectively, in Spanish, “Do you understand what I have said to you?” and, “Having these rights before you, do you wish to voluntarily, consciously, and intelligently give up your rights and respond to any question or make any declaration right now?” The defendant signed the form with the name “Melvin Omar Lionso” and Trooper Sylva also signed it. The form was dated July 23, 2002, at 9:15 p.m.⁷

After the defendant signed the Miranda form, his first interview by the police began. Present were Sylva, Sergeant Detective Edward Conley of the Chelsea police department, and other Chelsea police officers who were present intermittently. Perez initially interpreted but was soon replaced by a Spanish-speaking Chelsea police officer, Detective Rosalba Medina. During the interview, the defendant acknowledged that he knew the victim and had heard of her death. He initially stated that he had last seen the victim two days before she was killed. He also explained that the victim was a friend of his sister and had come to his birthday party, and stated that he had developed feelings for her. When the officers asked about his presence at 115 Washington Avenue, the defendant replied that he had been there about six months earlier. As for the night in question, the defendant stated that he was at a residence at 100 Washington Avenue drinking with a friend.

Trooper Sylva had noticed that the defendant was limping, and Conley asked the defendant to lift his pant legs.⁸ The defendant did so, revealing one bad laceration and several other scrapes, along with bruising and red marks over much of his legs. The defendant granted Conley's request to take a photograph of his legs. This occurred approximately forty-five minutes to one hour after the beginning of the interview, between 10 p.m. and 10:15 p.m. A police witness testified that as of about this time, in light of inconsistencies between the defendant's statements and information the police had gleaned from other interviews, the police would not have permitted the defendant to leave the police station.

The interview continued a little while longer, and the defendant at one point exclaimed that he had been in love with the victim. The statement struck the officers as odd, given the context of the interview, the “matter of fact” tone the defendant used, and the fact that the defendant had...