LaMar Cook was back in Hampden Superior Court on Wednesday, and the hearing produced exactly what we said it would: not a trial date, but a motion schedule. The case is now built entirely around two fights, and neither of them will be resolved this year.
Cook, Governor Healey’s former regional office director, has pleaded not guilty to all charges. He is accused of receiving eight kilograms of cocaine at the State Office Building on Dwight Street in Springfield in October 2025.
What happened Wednesday
Two things, and they run in opposite directions.
The prosecution served Rule 17 motions. Prosecutors told the court they recently served several Rule 17 motions on Cook’s attorney and asked for a hearing on them on October 2.
The defense announced it is moving to suppress and to dismiss. Defense attorney Kedar Ismail told the court he plans to file several motions, including motions to suppress evidence and a motion to dismiss the case. A scheduling conference on those motions was set for November 12.
WWLP also reported a detail that had not been prominent before: during the investigation, police searched Cook’s home and the UMass Hotel where he was formerly employed, and investigators said they found drugs and a pistol at his home that was not registered to him.
No trial date was set.
What a Rule 17 motion actually is
This is the part worth understanding, because “Rule 17 motions” sounds procedural and is not.
Mass. R. Crim. P. 17 governs summonses for witnesses. Subsection (a)(2) is the one that matters here: “A summons may also command the person to whom it is directed to produce the books, papers, documents, or other objects designated therein.”
That is how a party in a Massachusetts criminal case gets records from someone who is not a party. Not from each other, which is Rule 14 discovery, but from a bank, an employer, a phone carrier, a hotel, a hospital. In a case where the alleged conduct ran through a state office building and a university hotel, third-party records are not a side issue. They are a substantial part of the proof.
Rule 17 has a guardrail written into the same paragraph. “The court on motion may quash or modify the summons if compliance would be unreasonable or oppressive or if the summons is being used to subvert the provisions of rule 14.” A party cannot use a third-party summons to get around the limits on discovery from the other side.
The showing the Commonwealth has to make on October 2
A pretrial Rule 17(a)(2) summons is not issued for the asking. The Massachusetts Guide to Evidence sets out the protocol at § 1108, drawn from Commonwealth v. Lampron, 441 Mass. 265 (2004), and Commonwealth v. Dwyer, 448 Mass. 122 (2006).
The moving party files a motion naming the custodian and describing the records as precisely as possible, supported by an affidavit. At the hearing, the party must establish good cause by showing four things:
- that the documents are evidentiary and relevant;
- that they are not otherwise procurable reasonably in advance of trial by the exercise of due diligence;
- that the party cannot properly prepare for trial without production and inspection in advance, and that failing to obtain it may tend unreasonably to delay the trial; and
- that the application is made in good faith and is not intended as a general fishing expedition.
The record holder and, where there is one, the person who is the subject of the records are notified and may be heard on relevance and on statutory privilege. The judge then makes findings on whether the showing was met and whether the records are presumptively privileged.
Note the fourth factor. “Not intended as a general fishing expedition” is the language a defense lawyer uses against a prosecutor who serves several summonses at once, six weeks before a suppression fight.
Why the prosecution is the one doing this
The Lampron protocol was largely developed in cases about defense access to third-party records, often privileged ones. Seeing the Commonwealth as the moving party is less common and tells you something about the posture.
The likely explanation is ordinary. This case began with a federal package interception and a controlled delivery, moved through a state grand jury, and involves at least two institutional custodians, a state office building and a university hotel. Records that were gathered informally during the investigation often have to be re-obtained under a summons to be admissible at trial, with a custodian who can authenticate them. That is housekeeping, and it is what the October 2 date most likely is.
The less ordinary reading is that the Commonwealth is shoring up the record ahead of the suppression motion, by establishing an independent path to evidence that might otherwise be challenged as the fruit of a contested search. Which of those it is will be visible on October 2 from what the summonses actually seek.
The suppression motion is still the case
Nothing Wednesday changed that assessment.
Ismail argued at the March arraignment that evidence was obtained through searches that violated Cook’s constitutional rights. Wednesday he confirmed he is filing. The two search questions we set out remain the ones that decide this prosecution: the anticipatory warrant framework behind the controlled delivery, and the search of a cabinet in a government office, which is a distinctive Fourth Amendment setting.
The newly reported search of Cook’s home adds a third front, and the pistol found there is the basis for two of the five indicted counts. A suppression ruling on the home search reaches the firearm and ammunition charges directly.
And the count that governs everything is unchanged. Trafficking 200 grams or more of cocaine under G.L. c. 94C, § 32E(b)(4) carries 12 to 20 years with a mandatory minimum of 12 that a judge cannot go below. That number is why this case will be litigated rather than pleaded, unless something is suppressed.
The calendar now
- October 2: hearing on the Commonwealth’s Rule 17 motions.
- November 12: scheduling conference on the defense motions to suppress and to dismiss.
- After that: briefing, an evidentiary hearing on suppression, and only then a trial date.
A scheduling conference in mid-November means the suppression hearing itself realistically lands in 2027. Cook has been out on $25,000 cash bail since March, having spent more than four months in custody, so the delay does not cut the way it would for a detained defendant.
What happened at LaMar Cook’s September 23 hearing?
Prosecutors told the court they had served several Rule 17 motions and asked for a hearing October 2. Defense attorney Kedar Ismail said he will file motions to suppress evidence and to dismiss, and a scheduling conference on those was set for November 12. No trial date was set.
What is a Rule 17 motion?
Under Mass. R. Crim. P. 17(a)(2), a summons may command a person to produce books, papers, documents or other objects. It is how a party obtains records from someone who is not a party to the case.
What does the Commonwealth have to show?
Under the Lampron protocol set out in the Massachusetts Guide to Evidence § 1108, good cause requires showing the documents are evidentiary and relevant, not otherwise reasonably procurable, necessary for trial preparation, and that the request is in good faith and not a general fishing expedition.
Can a Rule 17 summons be challenged?
Yes. The court may quash or modify it if compliance would be unreasonable or oppressive, or if the summons is being used to subvert Rule 14 discovery.
Is LaMar Cook in custody?
No. He was released in March 2026 after a Superior Court judge set $25,000 cash bail on the indictment, following more than four months in custody.
How much time does he face?
The trafficking count under G.L. c. 94C, § 32E(b)(4) carries 12 to 20 years in state prison with a mandatory minimum of 12 years on a conviction. He has pleaded not guilty.
Account of the September 23, 2026 hearing, including the Rule 17 motions and the October 2 date, Kedar Ismail’s statement that he will file motions to suppress and to dismiss, the November 12 scheduling conference, and the reported searches of Cook’s home and the UMass Hotel, from WWLP-22News, September 23, 2026, as syndicated by AOL. Text of Mass. R. Crim. P. 17 and the Lampron-Dwyer protocol at Massachusetts Guide to Evidence § 1108 read at mass.gov. The Lampron and Dwyer citations are given as the Guide to Evidence gives them; we were unable to retrieve reliable copies of those opinions and do not quote from them. G.L. c. 94C, § 32E read at malegislature.gov. We have not reviewed the Hampden Superior Court docket or any of the motions. LaMar Cook has pleaded not guilty and is presumed innocent of every count. General information about Massachusetts law, not legal advice.