Commonwealth v. Estabrook (and nine companion cases) (Lawyers Weekly No. 10-167-15)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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 SJC-11833 COMMONWEALTH vs. JASON ESTABROOK (and nine companion cases[1]). Middlesex. May 7, 2015. – September 28, 2015. Present: Gants, C.J., Spina, Cordy, Botsford, Duffly, Lenk, & Hines, JJ. Cellular Telephone. Constitutional Law, Search and seizure, Probable cause. Search and Seizure, Expectation of privacy, Probable cause, Warrant, Affidavit, Fruits of illegal search. Probable Cause. Evidence, Result of illegal search. Practice, Criminal, Warrant, Affidavit. Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court Department on December 6, 2012. Pretrial motions to suppress evidence were heard by Kathe M. Tuttman, J. Applications for leave to file interlocutory appeals were allowed by Lenk, J., in the Supreme Judicial Court for the county of Suffolk, and the appeals were reported by her. George E. Murphy, Jr., for Jason Estabrook. Daniel Beck (Susan M. Costa with him) for Adam Bradley. Jamie Michael Charles, Assistant District Attorney (David Marc Solet, Assistant District Attorney, with him) for the Commonwealth. Andrew Sellars, for American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts & another, amici curiae, submitted a brief. BOTSFORD, J. In this case, we consider again a search of historical cellular site location information (CSLI).[2] See Commonwealth v. Augustine, 467 Mass. 230 (2014), S.C., 470 Mass. 837 (2015). The defendants, Jason Estabrook and Adam Bradley, stand indicted for murder and related crimes arising out of a shooting that took place on July 7, 2012, in Billerica. They moved to suppress evidence of historical CSLI pertaining to Bradley’s cellular telephone that the police initially obtained in July, 2012, without a search warrant but in compliance with 18 U.S.C. § 2703 (2006), and then, in November, 2013, reobtained pursuant to a warrant. The defendants also sought suppression of statements they each made to police in 2012, following the receipt of Bradley’s CSLI. A judge of the Superior Court denied the motions after an evidentiary hearing; the defendants filed these interlocutory appeals. See Mass. R. Crim. P. 15 (a) (2), as appearing in 422 Mass. 1501 (1996). Returning to an issue briefly touched on in Augustine, 467 Mass. at 255 n.37, we conclude that a defendant’s reasonable expectation of privacy protected under art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights is not violated where the Commonwealth requests up to six hours of historical CSLI without obtaining a search warrant. In this case, however, […]