Commonwealth v. Abrahams (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-034-14)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports.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 12‑P‑1744 Appeals Court COMMONWEALTH vs. ROBIN ABRAHAMS. No. 12‑P‑1744. Essex. October 8, 2013. ‑ April 2, 2014. Present: Rubin, Milkey, & Agnes, JJ. Deoxyribonucleic Acid. Search and Seizure, Blood sample, Incarceration. Evidence, Blood sample. Practice, Criminal, Motion to suppress, Harmless error. Constitutional Law, Harmless error. Error, Harmless. Rape. Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court Department on February 9, 2007. A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by David A. Lowy, J., and the cases were tried before him. David Hirsch for the defendant. Kenneth E. Steinfield, Assistant District Attorney, for the Commonwealth. RUBIN, J. This case primarily presents a question about the proper construction of a statute governing the submission of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) samples by certain convicted offenders, St. 2003, c. 107, § 2. 1. Background. The defendant, Robin Abrahams, appeals from his 2010 convictions for burglary with assault on an occupant, G. L. c. 266, § 14, and forcible rape of a child, G. L. c. 265, § 22A. In 1991, the fifteen-year-old victim was raped in her bedroom on the second floor of a two-story apartment building in Newburyport where she lived with her mother, stepfather, and eleven-year-old brother. The victim awoke in the early morning hours to see the rapist, who had broken into the apartment, “standing over” her. The victim did not scream or cry out because she was scared and feared the defendant would hurt her. She was afraid he would harm her mother as well. After the defendant raped the victim, he left through a window. The victim was taken to a hospital, where a sexual assault evidence collection kit was provided to the police. The police also took custody of the sheets that had been on the victim’s bed, among other things. As detailed below, more than fifteen years after the crimes, the defendant was identified as a suspect based on DNA evidence and, ultimately, convicted. In 1993, a chemist at the Massachusetts State police (MSP) crime laboratory identified seminal fluid in multiple areas of the victim’s bed sheets. In January, 2004, the laboratory sent a cutting from one of the sheets to Orchid Cellmark, a private company, for DNA analysis. On August 19, 2005, the defendant was brought to the Essex County correctional facility (correctional facility) from another State based […]