COMMONWEALTH vs. ANGEL PANIAQUA.
Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts
December 15, 1992
413 Mass. 796
Suffolk. March 3, 1992. - December 15, 1992. Present: LIACOS, C.J., WILKINS, ABRAMS, NOLAN, LYNCH, O‘CONNOR, & GREANEY, JJ.
Police officers who responded promptly to a radio call reporting a probable firing of gunshots at a certain apartment building had probable cause and exigent circumstances to justify their warrantless entry of a third-floor apartment, to which they were directed by a bystander, and their seizure of items in рlain view therein. [797-799]
Where the judge at a criminal trial, on the defendant‘s objection, disallowed a peremptory challenge by the Commonwealth of a prospective juror, and the Commonwealth immediately sought review of the judge‘s action by means of a proceeding in this court under
Evidence at a criminal trial was sufficient to warrant the jury in finding the defendant guilty of unlawfully carrying a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition, and unlawful possession of cocaine. [801-803]
O‘CONNOR, J., with whom NOLAN, J., joined, dissenting in part.
INDICTMENTS found and returned in the Superior Court Department on May 11, 1987.
A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Herbert Abrams, J., and the cases were tried before Guy Volterra, J.
The Supreme Judicial Court on its own initiative transfеrred the case from the Appeals Court.
James A. Couture for the defendant.
ABRAMS, J. Convicted of unlawfully carrying a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition, and unlawful possession of cocaine, the defendant, Angel Paniaqua, appeals.1 On appeal, the defendant claims error in (1) the denial of his motion to suppress; (2) the Commonwealth‘s exercise of a peremptory challenge; and (3) the denial of his motions for required finding because the evidence was insufficient to support the convictions. We affirm.
1. The motion to suppress.2 At issue is whether exigent circumstances justified the police officers’ warrantless entry into an apartment where the defendant was arrested and the seizure of items in plain view. There was testimony from which the judge could find that Boston police Officer William E. Doogan, while patrolling in a police vehicle, received a radio report that gunshots had been fired in a hallway at 166 Seaver Street in the Roxbury section of Boston. Doogan arrived аt that location in about one minute. Within another minute or two, several other officers arrived, and all of the
A police radio call alerted the police to a probable firing of shots at 166 Seaver Street. The police reasonably believed the circumstances to be life-threatening. The rapid response by five officers within three minutes of the radio report meant that there was a strong possibility that the person who fired the shots still was at 166 Seaver Street. The woman in the second-floor hallway identified the third-floor apartment occupied by the defendant as the location of the person who fired the shots. The opening and closing of the rear door to that apartment further identified that apartment as a possible location of a suspect. The facts here clearly warranted the officers to conclude that there was a danger to the public and that at least one suspect and one weapon would be located at 166 Seaver Street. Speed would be essential if the person who fired shots were to be apprehended. The judge correctly concluded that the Commonwealth had sustained its burden of proving that exigent circumstances and probable cause justifying the police officers’ entry into the apartment existed. See Commonwealth v. Franklin, 376 Mass. 885, 899-900 (1978).
2. The Commonwealth‘s use of a peremptory challenge. The defendant asserts that he is entitled to a new trial because the judge erred in requiring the defendant to choose between a stay of the trial pending an appeal or to proceed to trial without a juror who was peremptorily challenged by the Commonwealth. In the course of jury empanelment, the prosecutor challenged one juror. Defense counsel objected, stating, “He‘s obviously Hispanic. The Defendant is Hispanic.” The judge disallowed the challenge. The prоsecutor responded that, “under Commonwealth v. Soares, 377 Mass. 461, cert. denied, 444 U.S. 881 (1979)] there has to be a pattern.” The judge then asked the prosecutor why she was challenging the juror. She answered, “I‘m challenging him, first of all, because I don‘t like his looks. Secondly, he lives in Hawthorne Place. He‘s young; he‘s single. And he‘s watching me in a strange manner.” The judge again rejected the challenge, suggesting that she could seek relief from a single justice of this court.
On the following Monday, the prosecutor moved for reconsideration of the disallowance of the perеmptory challenge on the ground that there had been no showing of a pattern of excluding Hispanic jurors. The judge denied the motion. The Commonwealth then sought relief from a single justice of this court. The single justice conducted a hearing on the “Commonwealth‘s Application Pursuant to
The proceedings then resumed in the trial court. The judge said that since there were “only two individuals of Hispanic origin in the . . . group of potential jurors . . . out of fifty, the Defendant‘s objection to the peremptory challenge exercised by the Commonwealth was deemed by [the judge] to be mer-
Defense counsel objected, stating that, if the trial were to be stayed until the juror issue was resolved in the Supreme Judicial Court, the trial would not take place for another six months, during which time the defendant would be requirеd to remain in jail. Thus, said counsel, “We would be prepared to work out whatever accommodation, including impanelling a new jury tomorrow. . . .” The judge replied that, rather than empanelling a new jury, a juror could be seated to replace the challenged juror. Defense counsel said, “Whatever the accommodation is, we are not able to withstand a six month delay. And we are prepared to go ahead.” Counsel also announced that he was not giving up his right to appeal the question whеther the defendant was entitled to have the challenged juror on his jury, but, if his only choice was to wait six months for the juror issue to be resolved by the Supreme Judicial Court or to go ahead with the trial, he would go ahead with the trial.
The defendant now argues that his choice to proceed with the trial, without the challenged Hispanic juror, rather than delay the trial for a six-month period during which the defendant would remain in jail, cannot fairly be deemed to be a voluntary relinquishment of his right to argue on appeal that the challenged juror was excused erroneously. We recognize that the defendant may have been put to a difficult choice; however, we are not persuaded that it is unfair to hold the defendant to his choice to proceed without the juror, knowing all the circumstances. The defendant made his choice and cannot now claim error by the judge.
Possession is the intentional exercise of control over an item. Commonwealth v. Brzezinski, 405 Mass. 401, 409 (1989). There was ample evidence at the trial that the defendant possessed a gun сontaining ammunition. He threw the loaded gun into a trash can. At issue is the conviction for unlawful possession of cocaine.3
The evidence concerning the foil ball, in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth, may be summarized as follows. The defendant threw a foil ball into the trash can. The contents of the foil ball were described as “a white rock-like and powdery substance [which the officer] believed . . . to be cocaine.” The certificate issued by the Commonwealth pursuant to
“Absent objection, the hearsay evidence was properly admitted, and the jurors were entitled to give it such probative effect as they deemed appropriate.” Abraham v. Woburn, 383 Mass. 724, 726 n.1 (1981). See Commonwealth v. Keevan, 400 Mass. 557, 562 (1987). Accord People v. Bailey, 1 Cal. App. 4th 459 (1991). Additionally, there was evidence that (in addition to running away frоm the police and throwing the foil bag into the trash can) the defendant gave a false name and changed his appearance by the time of trial. There was, therefore, extensive evidence of the defendant‘s consciousness of guilt. See Commonwealth v. Doucette, 408 Mass. 454, 461 (1990) (“Actions . . . that indicate a defendant‘s consciousness of guilt together with other evidence are sufficient to prove . . . guilt“).7
Judgment affirmed.
O‘CONNOR, J. (dissenting in part, with whom Nolan, J., joins). I, too, would affirm the defendant‘s conviction of unlawfully carrying a firearm, and I agree that the guilty verdict with respect to the indictment charging unlawful posses-
The trial took place in March, 1989, approximately two years after the events that the trial addressed. The evidence most favorable to the Commonwealth showed that on April 7, 1987, the defendant threw a tinfоil ball into a trash barrel in a kitchen at 166 Seaver Street in the Roxbury section of Boston, and Officer William E. Doogan retrieved it. The police also retrieved from the kitchen at 166 Seaver Street two other tinfoil packages. There was no evidence that the defendant had ever been in possession of either of those two packages. The contents of the tinfoil ball and the other two tinfoil packages were commingled and then they were analyzed by the Department of Public Health. The Cоmmonwealth introduced in evidence a certificate, pursuant to
The evidence also included the following. Officer Doogan testified that, immediately after he picked the tinfoil ball out of the trash barrel on April 7, 1987, he opened the ball and “saw a white rock-like and powdery substance that [he] believed at the time [when he picked it up] to be cocaine.” Doogan did not testify about why he believed at that time that the substance was cocaine and, most importantly, he did not testify to any opinion that he may have held at the time of the trial as to what the substance was. Doogan did not testify as an expert, and indeed there was no evidence that would have qualified him as such. Surely, his testimony “in response to a question by the defense, that this was not the first arrest he had made where drugs were found,” referred to by the court, ante at 802, would not qualify him as an expert in drug recognition and identification.
Officer Frеderick Stevens testified that “Officer Doogan went to the trash barrel and retrieved . . . a large aluminum
So, it may well be that “[t]he jurors could credit the officers’ beliefs that the white powdery substance was cocaine,” as the court states, ante at 802, if all that is meant by that is that the jury could have found that in April, 1987, two years before the trial, two police officers without drug expertise “believed” for unstated reasons that the tinfoil ball attributable to the defendant contained cocaine. If the court means, however, that the police officers’ testimony warranted the jury in finding that the tinfoil ball in fact contained cocaine, the court is clearly wrong. Thе officers’ beliefs in 1987, at a time as to which the record contains no evidence of their training and experience in drug recognition and identification, are completely without probative value. See Commonwealth v. Santaliz, ante 238, 241-242 (1992); Commonwealth v. Dawson, 399 Mass. 465, 466-467 (1987). As the Chief Justice states in P.J. Liacos, Massachusetts Evidence 409 (5th ed. 1981), “[t]he concept of relevancy, or inherent probative worth, is as much practical as legal. To determine the inherent probative worth of evidence of a fact (B) offered to establish another fact (A), it must be shown thаt from the viewpoint of logic, experience, or common sense that proof of
But, says the court, “[t]he defendant did not challenge the expertise of the offiсers at trial,” ante at 802, and “‘[a]bsent objection, the hearsay evidence was properly admitted, and the jurors were entitled to give it such probative effect as they deemed appropriate.‘” Ante at 803, quoting Abraham v. Woburn, 383 Mass. 724, 726 n.1 (1981). Of course, it is not difficult to understand why the defendant did not challenge the officers’ expertise at trial. The officers did not purport to testify as experts. They did not offer opinions at trial that the substance in question was cocaine. In any event, neither Abraham v. Woburn, supra, nor Commonwealth v. Keevan, 400 Mass. 557, 562 (1987), cited by the court, both of which involve probative, but unobjеcted-to, hearsay evidence, stands for the proposition that a jury are free to give unobjected-to nonprobative (irrelevant) evidence whatever effect the jury may deem appropriate. Indeed, the court said in Keevan, supra, quoting Mahoney v. Harley Private Hosp., Inc., 279 Mass. 96, 100 (1932), “Hearsay, once admitted, may be weighed with the other evidence, and given any evidentiary value which it may possess” (emphasis added). The testimony concerning the police officers’ beliefs, uninformed by training or experience, was without probative effect when it was offered, and it did not acquire probative effect by having been admitted without objection.1 See Agricultural Nat‘l Bank v. Schwartz, 325 Mass. 443, 448 (1950) (“Even if some of this evidence may have been admitted without objec-
In affirming the trial judge‘s denial of the defendant‘s motion for a required finding of not guilty on the cocaine indictment, the court appears to rely not only on the nonprobative evidence of the officers’ beliefs two years before the trial, but also on the cеrtificate introduced by the Commonwealth pursuant to
Brief comment on the “extensive evidence of the defendant‘s consciousness of guilt,” ante at 803, is appropriate. The court recognizes that “[e]vidence of consciousness of guilt alone cannot support a conviction. . . .” Ante 803 at n.7. Here, with respect to the charge of unlawful possession of cocaine, the evidence of consciousness of guilt (of some crime, at least) stands alone. Therefore, it cannot support a conviction.
“[T]o sustain the denial of a directed verdiсt, it is not enough for the appellate court to find that there was some record evidence, however slight, to support each essential element of the offense; it must find that there was enough evidence that could have satisfied a rational trier of fact of each such element beyond a reasonable doubt.” Commonwealth v. Latimore, 378 Mass. 671, 677-678 (1979). There was not