Commonwealth v. Torres (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-021-14)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, John Adams Courthouse, 1 Pemberton Square, Suite 2500, Boston, MA 02108-1750; (617) 557-1030; SJCReporter@sjc.state.ma.us 12‑P‑919 Appeals Court COMMONWEALTH vs. JUAN TORRES. No. 12‑P‑919. Bristol. January 7, 2014. ‑ March 5, 2014. Present: Katzmann, Fecteau, & Milkey, JJ. Firearms. Motor Vehicle, Firearms. Search and Seizure, Inventory. Constitutional Law, Search and seizure. Practice, Criminal, Motion to suppress. Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court Department on July 30, 2010. A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Richard T. Moses, J., and the cases were tried before Robert J. Kane, J. Susan E. Taylor for the defendant. Owen J. Murphy, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth. MILKEY, J. Following a jury trial in Superior Court, the defendant was convicted of carrying a firearm without a license, G. L. c. 269, § 10(a), and of unlawful possession of a large capacity feeding device, G. L. c. 269, § 10(m). These convictions were based on a gun that the police discovered during an inventory search of a car that the defendant had been driving. On appeal, the defendant argues that his motion to suppress the gun should have been allowed because of the failure by police to complete an inventory search form. We affirm. Background. The facts are not in dispute. On July 2, 2010, Swansea police officer Donald Dibiasio was monitoring traffic on Route 6 in Swansea, while parked at a mall adjacent to the highway. After observing the defendant’s car drive through a stop sign, Dibiasio pulled the car over to the side of route 6. At that point, the highway has two lanes in each direction and no breakdown lane. Thus, the defendant’s stopped vehicle was obstructing traffic in one of the two travel lanes in that direction. Through a routine check of the defendant’s license and registration, Dibiasio learned that the defendant’s license had been suspended. Because the defendant was alone in the car and the car was obstructing traffic, Dibiasio determined that the car would have to be towed from the scene (a decision that was approved by Dibiasio’s superior). Dibiasio informed the defendant that he would be summonsed for driving with a suspended license and that the vehicle was going to be towed. While the defendant was outside the vehicle but still present at the scene, and while awaiting the tow truck’s arrival, Dibiasio began to inventory the car’s contents in […]