Commonwealth v. Shea

• Decision Date: 07 November 1949
• Citation: 88 N.E.2d 645,324 Mass. 710
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH v. JOHN L. SHEA, SECOND (and a companion case against the same defendant).
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

324 Mass. 710

88 N.E.2d 645

COMMONWEALTH

v.

JOHN L. SHEA, SECOND (and a companion case against the same defendant).

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Middlesex.

November 7, 1949

October 3, 1949.

Present: QUA, C.

J., RONAN, WILKINS SPALDING, & COUNIHAN, JJ.

Evidence, Of identity. Motor Vehicle, Operation.

A finding beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant was the operator of an automobile at the time of a collision with another vehicle was not warranted by evidence merely that the automobile was registered in the name of the defendant's wife; that it had not stopped after the collision and was found abandoned about a mile and a half further on; that from the vicinity of the abandoned automobile the defendant telephoned for towage fifteen minutes after the collision, and an hour later procured a taxicab; and that about three hours before the collision he had been seen in a nearby town but that someone else had then been operating the automobile.

COMPLAINTS received and sworn to in the First District Court of Northern Middlesex on November 4, 1948.

On appeal to the Superior Court, the cases were tried before Murray, J.

W. F. A.

Graham, for the defendant.

G. E. Thompson District Attorney, & E.

V. Keville,

Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth, submitted a brief.

COUNIHAN, J. These two complaints were brought originally in the First District Court of Northern Middlesex and were there tried, and on appeal were tried together to a jury in the Superior Court.

The first complaint is for violation of G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 90, Section 24 (2) (a), as appearing in St. 1936, c. 434, Section 1, which provides that "whoever without stopping and making known his name, residence and the register number of his motor vehicle goes away after knowingly colliding with or otherwise causing injury to any other vehicle or property . . . shall be punished . . . ."

The second complaint is for violation of the same chapter, Section 24 (1) (a), which provides, "Whoever upon any way or in any place to which the public has a right of access operates a motor vehicle while under the influence of intoxicating liquor shall be punished . . .." At the close of the evidence the defendant duly moved for a directed verdict of not guilty on each complaint, for the reason that the Commonwealth had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was the operator of the motor vehicle referred to in the complaints. The motions were denied and the jury returned a verdict of guilty on each complaint. After the verdicts the judge with the consent of the defendant reported the cases to this court, in accordance with G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 278, Section 30, for determination of the question of the sufficiency of the evidence as to the operation of the motor vehicle by the defendant, upon the following stipulation: "If the cases should have been submitted to the jury then the cases are to be remanded to the Superior Court for sentence. If the cases should not have been submitted to the jury, the verdicts are to be set aside and the cases are to be remanded to the Superior Court for an entry of `not guilty by order of the court.'"

At the trial one Beebe testified that on November 3, 1948, at about 8:45 P.M while driving a motor vehicle on Ayer Road in Ayer, his vehicle was struck and damaged by a motor vehicle coming in the opposite direction. This other vehicle did not stop. It was found abandoned about a mile and three quarters west of the scene of the accident. It is undisputed that this vehicle was registered in the name of Mildred Shea, the wife of the defendant.

The evidence on the question of the identity of the operator of the Shea vehicle may be summarized as follows: Neither the operator of the vehicle which was struck nor his wife who was with him could tell who was the operator of the Shea vehicle or how many persons were in that vehicle; later an "autoist" saw the Shea vehicle off the road about a mile and a half west of the scene of the accident and, as he approached it the lights of it were turned off and he was unable to determine whether anyone was in the vehicle; the same witness and the police officers saw neither the defendant nor anyone else on Ayer Road or on Willow Road which joined it; the defendant telephoned to Everett Scott about 9 P.M. from the Henry house on a large chicken farm, located about three hundred yards beyond the point where the Shea vehicle was...