Commonwealth v. Jones (Lawyers Weekly No. 10-156-17)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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-12255 COMMONWEALTH vs. RICHARD JONES. Essex. May 4, 2017. – October 4, 2017. Present: Gants, C.J., Lenk, Hines, Gaziano, Lowy, Budd, & Cypher, JJ.[1] Child Abuse. Rape. Indecent Assault and Battery. Evidence, Medical record, Production on demand, Privileged record, Cross-examination, Prior misconduct. Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court Department on March 27, 2009. Motions for summonses for the production of records were heard by Timothy Q. Feeley, J., and the cases were tried before him. The Supreme Judicial Court granted an application for direct appellate review. Nancy A. Dolberg, Committee for Public Counsel Services, for the defendant. David F. O’Sullivan, Assistant District Attorney (Kimberly Faitella, Assistant District Attorney, also present) for the Commonwealth. Meagen K. Monahan, Anthony D. Mirenda, Madeleine K. Rodriguez, Jeremy W. Meisinger, Stacy A. Malone, & Lindy L. Aldrich, for Victim Rights Center & others, amici curiae, submitted a brief. LOWY, J. The defendant appeals from his convictions stemming from his sexual abuse of his two daughters. He argues that (1) a Superior Court judge abused his discretion by refusing to issue summonses pursuant to Mass. R. Crim. P. 17 (a) (2), 378 Mass. 885 (1979), regarding the release of the mental health and counselling records of the younger of the daughters, Diane;[2] and (2) the judge’s restriction of the defendant’s cross-examination of Diane was an abuse of discretion. We affirm the convictions.[3] Background. In 2005 or 2006, when Diane was in the seventh grade and eleven or twelve years old, she stayed home from school one day. She was sitting on a couch watching television and her father was at a nearby computer when a commercial with sexual themes came on the air. After a discussion regarding sex sparked by the commercial, the defendant sat down next to Diane and she wound up in his lap. The defendant then slid his hand under Diane’s pants and underwear and touched her vagina. Diane pushed her father’s hand away and ran upstairs to her room. In the fall of 2008, when Diane was a fourteen year old freshman in high school, she started acting out in school. Due to her behavior she was referred to a psychiatrist and also met with a therapist at a counselling center. At around the same time, […]