Commonwealth v. Moore (Lawyers Weekly No. 10-006-16)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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 SJC-11857 COMMONWEALTH vs. LAWRENCE MOORE. Bristol. October 6, 2015. – January 11, 2016. Present (Sitting at New Bedford): Gants, C.J., Spina, Cordy, Botsford, Duffly, Lenk, & Hines, JJ. Constitutional Law, Parole, Search and seizure, Burden of proof, Reasonable suspicion. Search and Seizure, Expectation of privacy, Presumptions and burden of proof, Reasonable suspicion. Practice, Criminal, Parole, Motion to suppress. Controlled Substances. Indictment found and returned in the Superior Court Department on April 25, 2013. A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Thomas F. McGuire, Jr., J. An application for leave to prosecute an interlocutory appeal was allowed by Botsford, J., in the Supreme Judicial Court for the county of Suffolk, and the appeal was reported by her to the Appeals Court. The Supreme Judicial Court granted an application for direct appellate review. Rachel W. van Deuren, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth. Nancy A. Dolberg, Committee for Public Counsel Services, for the defendant. CORDY, J. In October, 2011, the New Hampshire parole board issued a certificate of parole to the defendant, Lawrence Moore, who was serving a sentence of from two and one-half to ten years for assault with a firearm. The defendant’s parole was transferred to the Commonwealth in May, 2012. On November 16, 2012, the defendant’s parole officer and others searched the defendant’s apartment without a warrant and seized seventeen “twists” of “crack” cocaine in the defendant’s bedroom drawer, as well as a digital scale and a gun lock. The defendant was indicted for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, in violation of G. L. c. 94C, § 32A (c).[1] He filed a motion to suppress the evidence seized from his home, arguing that the search was unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.[2] After a hearing, the motion judge issued a written order allowing the defendant’s motion to suppress, holding that, while the search did not violate the Fourth Amendment, it was barred under art. 14. The motion judge concluded that art. 14 offers the same protections for parolees as it does for probationers, and, therefore, searches of a parolee’s residence must be supported by both reasonable suspicion and either a search warrant or a traditional exception to the search warrant […]