285 Mass. 41 | Mass. | 1933
The defendant was charged in two counts of an indictment with forcibly and secretly confining and imprisoning Margaret G. McMath, otherwise called Peggy G. McMath, with intent thereby to extort money from her father, Neil C. McMath. At the trial verdicts of guilty were returned on both counts of the indictment. The case is before this court upon certain exceptions saved by the defendant at the trial.
It is recited in the bill of exceptions that the defendant was arrested upon a complaint made to the Second District Court of Barnstable; that on May 8, 1933, he was arraigned upon a complaint issuing from that court which charged him with the offence of kidnapping; that the defendant
G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 12, § 27, provides that “District attorneys within their respective districts shall appear for the commonwealth in the superior court in all cases, criminal or civil, in which the commonwealth is a party or interested, and in the hearing, in the supreme judicial court, of all questions of law arising in the cases of which they respectively have charge . . .. ” It is a common practice for the grand jury to consider crimes, prosecution for which is pending in district courts. “It also has been the custom, in instances where an indictment has been found for the same or a graver offence, for the district court not to try the complaint pending before it.” Klous v. Judges of the Municipal Court, 251 Mass. 292, 295. A district court has power to order a complaint dismissed. Commonwealth v. Bressant, 126 Mass. 246. Although the statute (G. L. [Ter. Ed.] c. 12, § 27) expressly requires the attendance of the district attorney in the courts of superior jurisdiction, his appearance in district courts within his district is discretionary. It is a common practice for district attorneys to appear in district courts in cases where persons are charged with the commission of serious crimes. It is plain that the district attorney had power to appear for the Commonwealth in the District Court, and where as here the grand jury had returned an
Following his arrest the defendant made two statements to the officers who were engaged in the investigation of the crime. The first was made in the court house in Barn-stable, on May 6, and was offered at the trial as a confession of the defendant. The jury were excused upon objection of counsel for the defendant, and the testimony was offered through a witness as to the contents of a statement purported to be a confession of the defendant. At the conclusion of the preliminary hearing, the presiding judge ruled, in the absence of the jury, that statements made to the defendant by officer Barrett, who was present, destroyed the validity of the statement as a confession, and that the confession made after the words spoken to him by the officer was involuntary. The judge further ruled that he would admit all statements made by the defendant before the officer made the statements above referred to.
At a later time during the trial one Hall, the chief of police of Harwich, testified that he assisted in the investigation in company with State officers; that on May 9, 1933, he talked with Lawrence Buck, a brother of the defendant, as a result of which on the same day he afterwards talked with the defendant at the house of correction, in the presence of a brother and brother-in-law of the defendant. The Commonwealth then proposed to offer a statement made by the defendant to
It is the contention of counsel for the defendant that the statements of officer Barrett to the defendant when the
All confessions are prima facie voluntary, and it is for the party objecting to their admission as evidence to show that they were made under such pressure of hope or fear as to raise a doubt of their accuracy. Commonwealth v. Sego, 125 Mass. 210, 213. Commonwealth v. Dascalakis, 243 Mass. 519, 522. The confession was not inadmissible because the defendant was not warned that anything he might say might be used against him. Commonwealth v. Szczepanek, 235 Mass. 411, 414. Commonwealth v. Jokinen, 257 Mass. 429, 431. It is recited in the bill of exceptions that, as the case of the Commonwealth was about to close, counsel for the defendant stated to the judge that before the Commonwealth rested it should put in evidence the statements of officer Barrett to the defendant made on May 6 by virtue of which the judge excluded the statements of the defendant and what followed thereafter. The judge stated that he had no control over the introduction of evidence by the Commonwealth, but that he would allow the defendant to introduce that evidence; this the defendant failed to do. If that evidence was competent for any purpose, which we need not decide, the defendant was not harmed as he was permitted to introduce it if he so desired.
The defendant’s testimony before the jury so far as it
Gertrude Collins, a witness called by the Commonwealth, testified that she was assistant clerk of the Superior Court in Barnstable County, and on May 9, 1933, went to the jail to take a statement from the defendant, and that she took
As no error of law appears in the conduct of the trial, the entry must be
Exceptions overruled.