Commonwealth v. Maguire (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-106-15)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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 14-P-752 Appeals Court COMMONWEALTH vs. LAWRENCE F. MAGUIRE. No. 14-P-752. Suffolk. February 27, 2015. – August 11, 2015. Present: Vuono, Milkey, & Blake, JJ. Open and Gross Lewdness and Lascivious Behavior. Resisting Arrest. Practice, Criminal, Required finding. Complaint received and sworn to in the Roxbury Division of the Boston Municipal Court Department on October 15, 2010. The case was tried before David B. Poole, J. Bradford R. Stanton for the defendant. Anthony Riley (Matthew T. Sears, Assistant District Attorney, with him) for the Commonwealth. VUONO, J. Following a jury trial in the Boston Municipal Court, the defendant, Lawrence F. Maguire, was convicted of open and gross lewdness and lascivious behavior in violation of G. L. c. 272, § 16, and resisting arrest in violation of G. L. c. 268, § 32B.[1] On appeal, the defendant claims that the evidence was insufficient to support the convictions.[2] We affirm. Background. As is required in considering a question of the sufficiency of the evidence, “we must look at the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth to determine whether any rational jury could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Commonwealth v. Ruci, 409 Mass. 94, 96 (1991), citing Commonwealth v. Latimore, 378 Mass. 671, 677 (1979). A reasonable jury could have found the following facts. On the afternoon of October 14, 2010, Detective Sean Conway of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) and the defendant were on a train headed for the Park Street station. Once the train arrived at the station, the defendant transferred to another train and sat down across from a college-aged woman. Unbeknownst to the defendant, Detective Conway had followed him and was standing about eight to ten feet away when he saw the defendant rub his penis with his hand over his pants for thirty seconds to a minute.[3] The defendant alighted from the train at the Hynes Convention Center station, and Detective Conway continued to follow him. Upon arriving on the station platform, Detective Conway saw the defendant lean against a pillar with his hands in front of him. There were about twenty to twenty-five people on the platform and two or three women sitting on a bench five to six feet away from the defendant. The defendant faced the women and jerked his […]