Edwards v. Murphy
| Decision Date | 24 April 2000 |
| Docket Number | No. Civ. 98-12000-REK.,No. 99-10012-EFH.,Civ. 98-12000-REK.,99-10012-EFH. |
| Citation | 96 F.Supp.2d 31 |
| Parties | Marcus EDWARDS, Petitioner, v. Paul MURPHY, Superintendent, Old Colony Correctional Center, Defendant. Michael Payne, Petitioner, v. Paul Murphy, Superintendent, Old Colony Correctional Center, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Massachusetts |
Page Kelley, Committee for Public Counsel Service, Cambridge, MA, for Marcus Edwards, plaintiff.
Cathryn A. Neaves, Attorney General's Office, Boston, MA, L. Scott Harshbarger, Attorney General's Office, Torts Division, Boston, MA, for Paul Murphy, defendant.
David P. Hoose, Katz, Sasson & Hoose, Springfield, MA, for Michael Payne, respondent.
In this consolidated action, Marcus Edwards ("Edwards") and Michael Payne ("Payne") petition this court for habeas corpus relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. For the following reasons, their petitions are dismissed.
In April, 1993, a Suffolk County grand jury returned indictments against both petitioners alleging two counts of murder, two counts of armed robbery, and one count of illegal possession of a firearm.
In May, 1994, Judge Stephen Neel heard petitioners' motions to suppress eyewitness identifications. The court denied those motions on June 3, 1994.
On June 6, 1994, both petitioners were tried before a Suffolk County jury with Judge Moriarity presiding. On June 14, 1994, the jury returned guilty verdicts of murder in the first degree against both Edwards and Payne. Edwards and Payne were each found guilty also of one count of armed robbery and one count of the possession of a firearm. Each was acquitted on the other count of armed robbery.
On June 21, 1994, Edwards and Payne were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder convictions, and lesser concurrent sentences for the other convictions.
Both Edwards and Payne appealed their convictions to the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC). On February 17, 1998, in a published opinion, Commonwealth v. Michael Payne, 426 Mass. 692, 690 N.E.2d 443 (1998), the SJC affirmed petitioners' convictions.
Edwards filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus with this court on September 21, 1998. See Edwards v. Murphy, Civil Action No. 98-12000-REK. Payne filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus with this court on December 22, 1998. See Payne v. Murphy, Civil Action No. 99-10012-EFH.
On April 21, 1999, respondent Murphy filed a Motion to Consolidate Habeas Corpus Proceedings Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 42(a). See Civil Action No. 99-10012-EFH, Docket No. 6 and Civil Action No. 98-12000-REK, Docket No. 18. On June 18, 1999, respondent's motion was allowed and petitioners' cases were consolidated, the lead case being Edwards v. Murphy, 98-12000-REK. See Docket No. 20 in Civil Action 98-12000-REK.
Both petitioners argue that the trial judge's instructions on reasonable doubt, which contained "moral certainty" language, violated their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment because, they argue, the instructions "permitted the jury to find guilty under a standard less than beyond a reasonable doubt." Docket No. 23 at 9.
Payne, alone, also argues that both the motion judge and the SJC failed to protect his due process rights when ruling that the pre-trial photographic identifications of him by several witnesses were not suggestive and were reliable despite the fact that the identifying witnesses were exposed to media images of him while he was in police custody for the crimes for which he was eventually convicted. See Docket No. 14 at 12.
The SJC provided the following recitation of the facts "in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, reserving certain details for discussion in conjunction with certain issues raised." Com. v. Payne, 426 Mass. at 693, 690 N.E.2d. at 446.
On March 28, 1993, at approximately 4 a.m., the defendants and the two victims, Kevin Christopher and Lloyd Industrious, were among a group of people gathered on Lindsay Street in the Dorchester section of Boston. A party at a Lindsay Street residence had just broken up, and the victims were sitting in a motor vehicle. According to several eyewitnesses, the defendants suddenly fired several shots at the victims, killing them. At least one of the defendants then approached, grabbed jewelry from one or both of the victims, and fled on foot. Christopher suffered eleven gunshot wounds and Industrious seven.
The motion judge, Judge Neel, in denying petitioners' motions to suppress identifications, made the following findings of fact.
Based on the credible evidence presented at the suppression hearing, I make the following findings.
On Saturday, March 27, 1993, at approximately 10:30 p.m., Charae Chretien and three friends (Carol Rich, Anna Bodden and Stacy Williams) arrived at a party at 28 Lindsay Street in Boston. Charae was just turning nineteen. Anna and Carol were then sixteen. Charae brought the other three in her car. With them were Bree Peterson and Adrienne Castillo, both then seventeen. After dropping Stacy off, and attempting unsuccessfully to enter another party on Commonwealth Avenue, Charae, Carol, Anna, Bree and Adrienne returned to the Lindsay Street party at or soon after midnight.
Anna testified that she had two beers at the party on Commonwealth Avenue, with the same group of young women with whom she had been at Lindsay Street. I do not credit that testimony, in view of the testimony of Charae that the group was not admitted to that party, and in view of Anna's own prior inconsistent statement on police. (Exhibit 5 at 4). At the hearing, Anna was clearly terrified and in tears, and said that she was in fear for her life should her testimony help convict the defendants. In my judgment, she chose not to remember certain facts as a result of these fears, and manufactured other facts designed to reduce the utility of her testimony.
After the group returned to the party at Lindsay Street, they remained there until sometime after 4:00 a.m. on Sunday, March 28. During that time, neither Charae, Carol, Adrienne or Bree had any alcoholic beverages or drugs. Anna testified that she had "a lot" to drink, from "wine and stuff" set out in plastic cups on a table; she estimated that she had five drinks, stated that she ate food as well, and testified that she "felt drunk" and had trouble walking when she left the party.
Only Carol testified that she saw Anna drinking; Carole is Anna's cousin. Bree, Adrienne and Charae testified that they did not see Anna having any drinks. I find that Anna did have some alcoholic beverages after returning to the party; that she had fewer than five cups of wine; and that, in view of the four-hour period over which she consumed those drinks, her eating of food during that period, and her average height and weight, she was at most mildly inebriated by the time she left the party. Her faculties and powers of observation and recall were not significantly impaired.
Anna, Charae, Adrienne, Carol and Bree left the party as it was breaking up sometime after 4:00 a.m., and walked up the street toward Charae's car. With them was "Jamie." When they arrived at the car, Charae sat in the driver's seat' Adrienne sat in the middle next to her; Anna sat in the right front passenger seat; Carol sat behind Charae; Jamie sat behind Adrienne; and Bree sat behind Anna.
As she sat in the car after the party, Anna saw "Pookie" come over to the driver's side and heard him converse with Charae. Anna had seen "Mark, Pookie, Chris and Lonnie" at the party. Anna heard Pookie ask Charae if she would call him, and he had her repeat his telephone number. As and just after Pookie left the driver's side of the car, and while he was standing near the car, Anna heard shots, looked in front of the car in which she sat, and saw people shooting. She watched the shooting for about five seconds. The lighting was sufficient to see the persons doing the shooting. After the shooting stopped, Anna saw someone take a chain from one of the victims. At the suppression hearing Anna stated that she did not recall, and could not describe, the two or three persons doing the shooting, or the person who took the chain.
Anna saw one victim on the right side of her car being shot, and then saw the shooter run back toward her. She and the other occupants of the car, in shock and hysterical, then drove off.
At about 7:00 p.m. on March 28, 1993, Boston police officers Det. Sgt. Charles M. Horsley and Det. Trailer visited Anna at her aunt's house. They interviewed her, but showed her no photographs at that time. She told them that Marcus Edwards had been at the party on Lindsay Street.
On March 29, 1993, Det. Sgt. Horsley and Det. Trailer, accompanied by Det. Halsted, again visited Anna at her aunt's house. This time they showed her a book containing front and side photographs of eighty-eight young black males. The photographs were arranged so that four subjects were pictured on each page; when the book was opened after the first page, Anna saw eight different subjects. None of the photographs bore names or similar written identification.
The officers sat Anna at a table, put the books before her, and asked her to go through each page and to tell them when she saw someone she recognized or knew as having been at the party or involved in the shooting. Anna looked through the book and, pointing at their photographs, identified Marcus Edwards (page 8, photograph number 30) as the boy she saw take a chain from one victim as he lay on the ground; Lonnie Watkins (page 11, photograph number 42) as one of the boys on the porch at the party, and one who...
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