Commonwealth v. Robinson

• Docket Number: SJC-09903
• Decision Date: 12 April 2024
• Citation: 230 N.E.3d 1016
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. Leon ROBINSON.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

230 N.E.3d 1016

COMMONWEALTH

v.Leon ROBINSON.

SJC-09903

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.

Argued January 5, 2024.

Decided April 12, 2024.

Homicide.Practice, Criminal, Motion to suppress, Warrant, Affidavit, Disclosure of evidence, Argument by prosecutor, Assistance of counsel, Instructions to jury, Discovery, Capital case.Search and Seizure, Probable cause, Warrant, Affidavit.Probable Cause.Constitutional Law, Right of defendant in criminal case to act pro se.Evidence, Disclosure of evidence, Argument by prosecutor, Expert opinion, Firearm.Firearms.

Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court Department on April 30, 2001.

A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Joseph M. Walker, III; the cases were tried before Elizabeth B. Donovan, J.; a motion for a new trial, filed on April 30, 2019, was heard by Debra A. Squires-Lee, J.; and a motion for postconviction discovery, filed on December 14, 2022, was considered by this court.

Elizabeth Caddick for the defendant.

Ian MacLean, Assistant District Attorney(Mark T. Lee, Assistant District Attorney, also present) for the Commonwealth.

Present: Budd, C.J., Gaziano, Kafker, & Wendlandt, JJ.

KAFKER, J.

DefendantLeon Robinson was convicted of murder in the first degree for the 2001 shooting death of Recardo Robinson¹(victim).On the afternoon of February 21, 2001, the defendant and the victim got into an argument at the victim's barbershop, which culminated in the defendant shooting the victim four times in front of several witnesses.The defendant was arrested that night, and in 2005 was convicted of murder in the first degree on a theory of deliberate premeditation and of unlawful possession of a firearm.

Appealing from his convictions and from the denial of his motion for a new trial, the defendant advances a number of arguments regarding errors committed before and during his trial.He argues that his motion to suppress evidence obtained from the search of his apartment was erroneously denied.He also asserts that his right to represent himself at trial was violated, and that the trial prosecutor acted improperly by delaying disclosure of a change in a witness's testimony and by ascribing a motive not supported by the evidence to the defendant during closing arguments.The defendant next contends that he was denied effective assistance of counsel because his trial counsel did not introduce in evidence a swatch of fabric with a spot of the victim's blood, and because his trial counsel did not retain an expert on eyewitness identification or blood spatter analysis to testify.Finally, he asserts that the trial judge abused her discretion in choosing not to give the jury instruction requested by defense counsel on the possibility of an honest but mistaken identification by witnesses.He further argues that the cumulative effect of all the alleged errors requires that we grant him a new trial.He also requests that we reduce his conviction of murder in the first degree to manslaughter as more consonant with justice.Separately, he also appeals from the denial of his motion for postconviction discovery, and from his conviction of unlawful possession of a firearm.

Having considered all the arguments advanced by the defendant and having reviewed the entirety of the record pursuant to our duty under G. L. c. 278, § 33E, we affirm the conviction of murder in the first degree.However, we vacate his conviction of unlawful possession of a firearm and remand for a new trial on that charge.

1.Factual and procedural background.We recite the facts as the jury reasonably could have found them, reserving certain facts for our discussion of the legal issues.

The victim was the owner of Hair Textures, a barbershop located in the Brighton section of Boston.On the afternoon of February 21, 2001, the shop saw many visitors, as the victim was closing down the shop before moving to North Carolina.Among the visitors that afternoon were Maurice McIntosh, a friend of the victim who had previously worked at Hair Textures, and James Rainey, who was a regular at the shop.The defendant, who was not a regular at the barbershop but was a family friend of the victim, was also present, having received a haircut at the shop earlier in the afternoon.By around 4:20 p.m., only four men remained in the barbershop: the defendant, the victim, McIntosh, and Rainey.

The victim began lecturing the defendant about how the defendant needed to "straighten up" and change the way he was living his life in order to take better care of his children.The lecture upset the defendant, and the defendant showed the men in the barbershop that he was carrying a black revolver.The victim looked at his cell phone, and the defendant asked the victim who he was calling.The victim told the defendanthe was not calling anyone, and again began lecturing the defendant on how to live his life.The entire conversation between the victim and the defendant lasted about five minutes, at the end of which the defendant pulled out his gun and shot the victim once in the chest.The victim fell, and the defendant shot the victim twice in the back and once in the back of the head.Rainey ran to the back of the barbershop and descended a staircase to the basement, where he hid until he was found by police.McIntosh fled out the front door and ran to a nearby pizza shop, where he called 911.

Dorinda Carter was parking her car on Commonwealth Avenue outside Hair Textures at the time of the shooting.She saw the defendant pull a gun from his waist area and shoot at the victim.The victim fell, and the defendant shot twice more.The defendant left the barbershop.Carter drove away, but returned to the area and spoke to police when they arrived at the scene.

Police arrived at the barbershop a few minutes after the shooting.They secured the scene, discovered Rainey during a protective sweep of the barbershop basement, and identified McIntosh, Rainey, and Carter as witnesses.Police brought the three witnesses to a police station in Brighton, where officers took statements from each of the witnesses regarding their recollection of what had happened.McIntosh described the shooter as a Black man with a dark complexion, about five feet, eight inches tall with a "low haircut" and goatee.He stated that the shooter had worn a black and white Polo brand shirt, a black leather jacket, and a silver chain with a cross.Rainey told police the shooter was a Black male, five feet, four inches tall, wearing blue jeans and a black leather jacket.He stated that the shooter was about thirty-nine years old, had short hair, and walked with a limp.Carter described the shooter as a darker skinned man of average height with a short, cropped haircut, wearing a brown leather jacket and dark pants.She described the gun as a black revolver.

Based on the witness descriptions of the shooter, police created a set of 106 images of possible suspects.Rainey and McIntosh separately viewed the photographs, and both identified the defendant as the shooter.The defendant's photograph was added to a photographic array with nine other photographs.This array was printed out, and paper versions were shown to Rainey, McIntosh, and Carter.Rainey and McIntosh both identified the defendant as the shooter.Carter circled two pictures to indicate the men who most closely resembled the shooter.One of the pictures Carter circled depicted the defendant.

On the night of the murder, the defendant was arrested at a convenience store near his apartment in the West Roxbury section of Boston.When he was arrested, the defendant was wearing a black leather jacket and dark pants.Later that night, police obtained a search warrant for the defendant's apartment, where they found a black and white Polo brand shirt and a silver chain necklace with a cross.

The defendant's jacket and other evidence was submitted to the Boston police crime laboratory (crime lab).There, criminalists discovered a small stain, roughly two millimeters in diameter, on the right sleeve of the defendant's jacket.The stained fabric was cut out of the jacket and submitted for testing.The swatch of fabric with the stain tested positive for the presence of blood, and subsequent deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) testing showed that the bloodstain matched the DNA of the victim.

At trial, the prosecution called McIntosh, Rainey, and Carter, all of whom testified regarding their recollection of the murder.McIntosh and Rainey both identified the defendant as the shooter.Two other witnesses who had been at the barbershop during the afternoon of the murder testified and stated they had seen the defendant there.Criminalists from the crime lab testified that the small stain found on the right sleeve of the defendant's jacket had tested positive for the presence of blood, and that the blood was a DNA match for the victim.

The defendant called Christopher Driscoll, another percipient witness to the murder, who testified that he believed the shooter had been a Black teenager wearing a blue jacket or sweatshirt.Driscoll acknowledged that he only saw the shooter through the window of the barbershop for four or five seconds, and he admitted that his recollection of the shooter's appearance was "pretty foggy."

The defendant also presented evidence that suggested his brother, Michael Robinson,² had a motive to kill the victim because of an altercation the night before the murder between the victim and Bobby Stevens, a cousin of the defendant and Michael.The defense suggested that the eyewitnesses had mistakenly identified the defendant as the shooter instead of Michael because the defendant had been in the barbershop the day of the murder.Michael testified that he saw the defendant during the afternoon of the murder, and that the two men could have shaken hands when they met.The defendant posited the theory that when Michael and the defendant shook hands, the victim's blood transferred...