Case Title: Commonwealth v. Edwards

Citation: 

Docket Number: SJC-11989

State: massachusetts

Court: Massachusetts Supreme Court

Date: 2017-01-20T00:00:00Z

Document:
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SJC-11989 
 
COMMONWEALTH  vs.  JOSHUA EDWARDS. 
 
 
 
Suffolk.     September 6, 2016. - January 20, 2017. 
 
Present:  Gants, C.J., Botsford, Lenk, Hines, Gaziano, Lowy, & 
Budd, JJ. 
 
 
Constitutional Law, Search and seizure, Investigatory stop, 
Reasonable suspicion.  Search and Seizure, Motor vehicle, 
Threshold police inquiry, Reasonable suspicion.  Threshold 
Police Inquiry.  Firearms.  Alcoholic Liquors, Possession 
of opened bottle.  Beverage Containers. 
 
 
 
 
Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court 
Department on April 23, 2013. 
 
 
A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Kenneth 
W. Salinger, 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.  After review by the Appeals Court, 
the Supreme Judicial Court granted leave to obtain further 
appellate review. 
 
 
 
Greg L. Johnson for the defendant. 
 
Matthew T. Sears, Assistant District Attorney, for the 
Commonwealth. 
 
2 
 
 
 
BOTSFORD, J.  The defendant, Joshua Edwards, has been 
indicted for multiple offenses, including firearms offenses, 
with which he was initially charged following the seizure and 
search of a motor vehicle he had been driving.  Before trial, he 
moved to suppress evidence seized during the search of the 
vehicle, invoking the Fourth Amendment to the United States 
Constitution and art. 14 of the Massachusetts Declaration of 
Rights.  After an evidentiary hearing, a Superior Court judge 
allowed the defendant's motion.  A single justice of this court 
allowed the Commonwealth leave to pursue an interlocutory appeal 
and reported the case to the Appeals Court.  See Mass. R. Crim. 
P. 15 (a) (2), as appearing in 422 Mass. 1501 (1996).  The 
Appeals Court reversed in an unpublished memorandum and order 
issued pursuant to its rule 1:28.  Commonwealth v. Edwards, 87 
Mass. App. Ct. 1133 (2015).  We granted the defendant's 
application for further appellate review.  Recognizing that this 
is an exceedingly close case, we conclude that the stop was 
predicated on reasonable suspicion of criminal activity and 
therefore reverse the motion judge's order allowing the motion 
to suppress. 
 
Factual background.  One witness, Boston police Officer 
David Lanteigne, testified at the hearing on the motion to 
suppress.  In addition, a number of photographs, documents, and 
3 
 
police radio transmissions, as well as a recording of a 911 
call, were received in evidence.  In reviewing a judge's 
decision on a motion to suppress, we "accept the judge's 
subsidiary findings of fact absent clear error, but conduct an 
independent review of the judge's ultimate findings and 
conclusions of law."  Commonwealth v. Washington, 449 Mass. 476, 
480 (2007).  Without "detract[ing] from the judge's ultimate 
findings," Commonwealth v. Jessup, 471 Mass. 121, 127-128 
(2015), we supplement his factual findings with "evidence from 
the record that 'is uncontroverted and undisputed and where the 
judge explicitly or implicitly credited the witness's 
testimony'" (citation omitted).  Commonwealth v. Jones-Pannell, 
472 Mass. 429, 431 (2015).1 
                                                          
 
 
1 The judge's factual findings were prefaced with the 
statement that "[t]he [c]ourt finds that Officer Lanteigne was 
credible and credits his testimony to the extent it is 
consistent with and reflected in express findings stated in this 
memorandum.  The [c]ourt does not credit any testimony by 
Lanteigne that goes beyond or is inconsistent with the court's 
findings." 
2 We have listened to the recording of the 911 
call that was admitted in evidence and played during the 
suppression hearing.  Some portions of the recording are 
inaudible or unclear.  We discern no clear error in the 
subsidiary findings that the judge made with respect to the 
recording, and therefore accept them.  See Commonwealth v. 
Jewett, 471 Mass. 624, 628 (2015).  We make no additional 
findings with respect to the recording. 
4 
 
 
On March 17, 2013, at approximately 1:30 A.M., the Boston 
police received a 911 call.2  The caller identified himself by 
name, Jabari Wattley, and told the operator that he could see a 
man standing in the street holding a gun.  Wattley further 
stated that he had seen the man drive off in a black Infiniti 
motor vehicle, return and park on Armandine Street (in the 
Dorchester section of Boston), get out of the vehicle holding a 
gun in his hand, and then get back into the vehicle.3  He 
informed the operator that he knew the man, identified him as 
the defendant, Joshua Edwards, and said that Edwards was not 
threatening anyone. 
                                                          
 
 
2 We have listened to the recording of the 911 call that was 
admitted in evidence and played during the suppression hearing.  
Some portions of the recording are inaudible or unclear.  We 
discern no clear error in the subsidiary findings that the judge 
made with respect to the recording, and therefore accept them.  
See Commonwealth v. Jewett, 471 Mass. 624, 628 (2015).  We make 
no additional findings with respect to the recording. 
 
3 The dispatcher's broadcast added, "He's circling the area.  
He's been driving around."  The motion judge properly predicated 
his findings on the information provided by the 911 caller 
rather than the dispatcher's comments.  See Commonwealth v. 
Lopes, 455 Mass. 147, 155 (2009) (Commonwealth must "establish 
that the transmitted information bears adequate indicia of 
reliability").  The judge found that the defendant left and 
returned; he did not find that the caller reported circling 
activity, or that any such behavior had occurred.  The 
transcript from the suppression hearing indicates that, on 
cross-examination, the police officer agreed that "there's 
nothing on the 911 recording that was the basis for the 
information . . . regarding the vehicle circling the area." 
 
5 
 
 
The police dispatcher broadcast the information as a 
"Priority 1" call, requesting "any unit nearby" to respond to 
the address.  A call coded as "Priority 1" "means that it was of 
a serious nature and that response time and protecting officer 
safety were both high priorities."  A marked cruiser driven by 
Lanteigne arrived on Armandine Street shortly after the 
broadcast.4  The cruiser did not have its emergency lights 
activated.  Lanteigne stopped when a man (later identified as 
Wattley) ran off his porch toward the cruiser and began 
"yelling" to Lanteigne and pointing at a black Acura motor 
vehicle that was parked twenty to thirty feet in front of the 
cruiser, on the right hand side of the street.5 
 
The Acura was legally parked very close to the curb, and 
was completely dark; no interior or external lights were on.  
Another vehicle was parked in front of the Acura, but the space 
or spaces behind it were empty.  At that point, Lanteigne 
observed the Acura's brake lights illuminate, and Wattley yelled 
something to the effect of, "That's him.  That's the guy, he's 
                                                          
 
 
4 The motion judge found that Lanteigne knew Armandine 
Street was in a high crime area; he also knew that repeated 
incidents of shots fired, gun injuries, homicides and other 
violent crimes had occurred within a few blocks of the street, 
but had no information about shots fired or use of a firearm 
near Armandine Street that night. 
 
 
5 The distinction between the Infiniti mentioned by Jabari 
Wattley on the 911 call and the Acura that he pointed out to 
Lanteigne is discussed in note 8, infra. 
6 
 
about to drive away."  In response, Lanteigne activated the 
cruiser's blue lights, strobe lights, and other lights, and 
moved the cruiser alongside the driver's side of the Acura in 
order to block the vehicle from leaving.  Lanteigne believed 
"the Acura was about to drive away . . . [and] understood that 
the person Wattley had seen with a handgun was driving the 
Acura." 
 
Lanteigne got out of the cruiser and removed his firearm 
from its holster.  At the same time, the defendant got out of 
the Acura and closed the door.  He "appeared to take no notice 
of and pay no attention to" Lanteigne, and started to walk away.  
Lanteigne responded by running to the front of his cruiser and 
ordering the defendant to stop.  When the defendant turned and 
started walking away quickly, the officer holstered his own 
weapon, pushed the defendant against the rear of the Acura, 
forced him to the ground when he resisted being pushed, and 
handcuffed him. 
 
Another police officer who had responded to the scene stood 
immediately next to the closed driver's side door of the Acura, 
and leaned toward the window.  He observed a firearm lying on 
the floor by the driver's seat.6  If the defendant had been 
                                                          
 
 
6 A photograph taken through the closed window of the Acura, 
and showing the firearm on the driver's side floor, was received 
in evidence.  The judge made no finding as to whether the gun 
 
7 
 
seated in the vehicle, "his legs would have completely hidden 
the gun from view." 
 
The police determined that the defendant did not have a 
Massachusetts driver's license, and that he was not the 
registered owner of the Acura.  The police decided to tow the 
vehicle because a person having lawful control of the vehicle 
was not present, and because there had been vandalism in the 
area.  Prior to the tow, the vehicle was searched pursuant to an 
inventory policy.  In addition to the firearm, the police found 
an open bottle of beer, a cup containing what appeared to be an 
alcoholic beverage in the console next to the driver's seat, and 
a closed, full bottle of beer. 
 
Suppression ruling.  The motion judge allowed the motion to 
suppress because he concluded that, at the time Lanteigne 
stopped and seized the Acura vehicle -- identified by the judge 
as the moment when Lanteigne activated his cruiser's blue lights 
and blocked the Acura from leaving -- the police lacked a 
reasonable, articulable suspicion that criminal activity was 
afoot.7  See Commonwealth v. Alvarado, 423 Mass. 266, 268 & n.3 
(1996), citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968).  The judge 
                                                                                                                                                                                           
was secured with a safety device.  Nothing about the photograph 
suggests that such a device was present.  See G. L. c. 140, 
§ 131L (gun storage statute). 
 
7 The Commonwealth did not argue that there was probable 
cause for the stop. 
8 
 
emphasized that it is not unlawful to carry a gun in public; it 
is only illegal to do so without a license.  The judge concluded 
that a report of a man holding an unholstered gun on a public 
sidewalk, late at night in a high crime area, was not 
sufficiently suspicious to warrant an investigatory stop.  He 
therefore ordered that the evidence discovered in the vehicle be 
suppressed. 
 
Discussion.  We agree with the motion judge that the 
determinative issue in this case is whether the initial stop of 
the Acura was predicated on "reasonable suspicion, based on 
specific, articulable facts and reasonable inferences therefrom, 
that an occupant  of the . . . motor vehicle had committed, was 
committing, or was about to commit a crime."  Alvarado, 426 
Mass. at 268.  See Commonwealth v. Wilson, 441 Mass. 390, 394 
(2004).  See also Terry, 392 U.S. at 21-22. 
 
Breaking down the inquiry into its component parts, we 
consider when the stop and seizure occurred, whether the stop 
was supported by reasonable suspicion, and whether the scope of 
the ensuing search was proportional to the degree of suspicion 
that prompted it. 
 
1.  Moment of seizure.  Like the motion judge, we conclude 
that the defendant clearly was stopped and seized in the 
constitutional sense when Lanteigne activated his cruiser's blue 
lights and blocked the Acura's egress.  See Commonwealth v. 
9 
 
Thompson, 427 Mass. 729, 733, cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1008 
(1998).  Viewed objectively, at that moment, a reasonable person 
would not have believed that he was free to leave the scene.  
See Commonwealth v. Barros, 435 Mass. 171, 173-174 (2001); 
Commonwealth v. Smigliano, 427 Mass. 490, 491 (1998). 
 
2.  Reasonable suspicion to initiate stop.  Under the 
principles of Terry, 392 U.S. at 21-22, a police officer may 
stop a person to make a "threshold inquiry where suspicious 
conduct gives the officer reason to suspect that a person has 
committed, is committing, or is about to commit a crime."  
Commonwealth v. Silva, 366 Mass. 402, 405 (1974).  An officer's 
suspicion must be grounded in "'specific, articulable facts and 
reasonable inferences [drawn] therefrom' rather than on a 
'hunch'" (citation omitted).  Commonwealth v. Lyons, 409 Mass. 
16, 19 (1990).  In this case, the stop was predicated primarily 
on the information contained in the police broadcast.  That 
information was provided by a person who both identified himself 
and said he personally had seen the defendant with a gun at 1:30 
A.M. on a deserted, residential street.  He identified the 
defendant by name; explained that he knew the defendant; met the 
police officer, Lanteigne, at the address he had provided to the 
911 dispatcher; and pointed out the defendant's vehicle to 
10 
 
Lanteigne.8  In these circumstances, Wattley's basis of knowledge 
was established, and his report of seeing the defendant holding 
a firearm "could be regarded as reliable without any prior 
demonstration of his reliability."  Commonwealth v. Gouse, 461 
Mass. 787, 793 (2012), quoting Commonwealth v. Bowden, 379 Mass. 
472, 477 (1980) (distinguishing reports of anonymous informants 
from those of "bystanders, victims and participants"). 
 
Although Wattley did not describe the firearm to the 911 
dispatcher -- and, as the motion judge observed, there is 
nothing illegal about merely possessing an appropriately 
licensed gun -- there was more to the 911 call and Wattley's 
description of the defendant's behavior than mere possession of 
a gun.9  As Wattley reported, the defendant drove away and then 
came back to Armandine Street; he got out of the vehicle and 
stood outside while holding a gun -- apparently in his open 
hand, because Wattley reported seeing the weapon; the defendant 
                                                          
 
 
8 Although Wattley, who was calling from the second story of 
a building, reported to the 911 dispatcher that the vehicle was 
a black Infiniti, he specifically identified a black Acura to 
Lanteigne.  In the circumstances -- nighttime, Wattley's 
location inside his apartment at the time of the 911 call, his 
location outside and nearer to the vehicle at the time he 
pointed it out to Lanteigne, and the fact that on both occasions 
he described the vehicle as black -- the difference is 
immaterial. 
 
9 Contrast Commonwealth v. Couture, 407 Mass. 178, 179, 183 
cert. denied, 498 U.S. 951 (1990) (report that defendant had 
been seen inside convenience store with handgun protruding from 
rear pocket, by itself, was insufficient to support probable 
cause under Fourth Amendment). 
11 
 
returned the firearm to the vehicle before entering the vehicle 
himself; and he then sat alone in the vehicle with all of its 
lights off.  These facts, coupled with the time (approximately 
1:30 A.M.), the location (a deserted street in a residential 
area, "within a few blocks" of which there had been repeated 
crimes of violence, including gun violence and homicides), and 
the officer's belief that "trained, licensed owners of a handgun 
typically carry their firearm in a holster,"10 combine to create 
a scenario that an experienced police officer could reasonably 
believe is more consistent with likely criminal activity than it 
is with lawful possession of a firearm.  Although, unlike 
Commonwealth v. Haskell, 438 Mass. 790, 791, 794 (2003), the 
defendant was not observed loading the gun, the facts just 
described concerning the time of night, the location, and the 
defendant's conduct in driving away and returning and, more 
particularly, in his handling of the gun as he got out of and 
then reentered the Acura, were collectively significant. 
                                                          
 
 
10 We recognize, as did the motion judge, that a person 
licensed to carry a gun is not required to carry it holstered 
and concealed from view.  See Couture, 407 Mass. at 181, 183.  
However, the fact that in the officer's experience, licensed gun 
owners tend to carry their weapons in holsters, when combined 
with the other facts discussed in the text, added, albeit 
marginally, to the facts that collectively amounted to 
reasonable suspicion.  See Commonwealth v. Gomes, 453 Mass. 506, 
511 (2009), quoting Commonwealth v. Watson, 430 Mass. 725, 729 
(2000) ("Seemingly innocent activities taken together can give 
rise to reasonable suspicion justifying a threshold inquiry"). 
12 
 
 
When these facts are considered together and in light of 
Lanteigne's police experience, they are sufficient to establish, 
even if just barely, the requisite nexus to suspected criminal 
activity to warrant an investigatory stop, because the officer 
"could reasonably infer from the conjunction of these facts that 
criminal activity might be afoot."  Thompson, 427 Mass. at 734.  
See id. (vehicle double-parked in front of townhouse that was 
subject of narcotics investigation, late at night, with engine 
running, in high crime area); Commonwealth v. Almeida, 373 Mass. 
266, 271-272 (1977) (reasonable suspicion present where 
defendant was sitting alone in automobile in high crime area 
late at night, with its engine running and lights off).11  
Contrast Couture, 407 Mass. at 183 (in absence of other factors, 
"mere possession of a handgun was not sufficient to give rise to 
a reasonable suspicion that the defendant was illegally carrying 
that gun"). 
 
3.  Scope of search.  Not only was the decision to make an 
investigatory stop objectively reasonable, but the officer's 
actions were "reasonably related in scope to the circumstances 
which justified the interference in the first place."  
                                                          
 
 
11 "Although an individual's presence in a high crime area 
alone will not establish a reasonable suspicion, . . . it may 
nevertheless be a factor leading to a proper inference that the 
individual is engaged in criminal activity" (citations omitted). 
Commonwealth v. Thompson, 427 Mass. 729, 734, cert. denied, 525 
U.S. 1008 (1998). 
13 
 
Commonwealth v. Borges, 395 Mass. 788, 793 (1985), quoting 
Terry, 392 U.S. at 20.  See Commonwealth v. Moses, 408 Mass. 
136, 141 (1990) (once investigative circumstances for stop are 
established, "[t]he pertinent inquiry is whether the degree of 
intrusion is reasonable in the circumstances").  When Lanteigne 
saw the Acura's brake lights illuminate, he "feared that the 
Acura was about to drive away."  Activating the cruiser's 
emergency lights and blocking the Acura's egress were reasonably 
prudent protective measures that were proportional to the degree 
of suspicion that prompted the stop.  See Moses, supra ("common 
knowledge that a person who wants to avoid police questioning, 
very often will recklessly drive away, resulting in serious 
injury to the police and bystanders"). 
 
The defendant's actions following the initial seizure of 
the Acura increased the degree of reasonable suspicion, and the 
police response properly escalated in proportion to it.  See 
Commonwealth v. Sinforoso, 434 Mass. 320, 323 (2001) ("conduct 
of the officers was proportional to the escalating suspicion 
that emerged over the course of the stop").  See also Haskell, 
438 Mass. at 794.  At the time of the stop, Lanteigne was alone, 
very late at night, on a deserted street in an area that he knew 
from his police experience had been the site of repeated 
incidents involving the use of guns as well as homicides and 
other violent crimes.  He was aware of Wattley's report that the 
14 
 
defendant was armed, that he had left the scene and then 
returned, and that he had held the weapon openly on the 
residential street before concealing its presence by returning 
it to the vehicle.  Those facts properly were "considered as 
part of the aggregate circumstances that provide reasonable 
suspicion to justify a protective frisk."  Commonwealth v. 
Gomes, 453 Mass. 506, 512 (2009).  See Wilson, 441 Mass. at 394-
395.  See also Sinforoso, supra at 325.  If the defendant had 
remained seated in the vehicle, the officer would have been 
warranted in ordering him from the vehicle to conduct that 
patfrisk.  See Commonwealth v. Robbins, 407 Mass. 147, 151 
(1990) (protective measures may include protective frisk and 
minimal search of interior of vehicle). 
 
The defendant did not, however, remain in the vehicle.  
Instead, after the cruiser's blue lights and strobe lights had 
been activated and the cruiser had pulled along the driver's 
side of the Acura, the defendant get out of the vehicle and 
"appeared to take no notice of and pay no attention to Lanteigne 
and started to walk away”; he disregarded the officer's order to 
stop, and turned and began to walk quickly in a different 
direction.  Because the defendant resisted the officer's 
attempts to stop him, the officer was warranted in physically 
restraining him to further the investigation.  See Commonwealth 
v. Williams, 422 Mass. 111, 119 (1996) ("restraint, . . . 
15 
 
limited in duration and necessary to complete the 
[investigatory] inquiry, does not turn a valid investigatory 
stop into an unlawful arrest").  See also Commonwealth v. 
Torres, 424 Mass. 153, 162 (1997) (limited restraint for 
purposes of threshold inquiry permissible where commensurate 
with purpose of stop). 
 
While Lanteigne was occupied with the defendant, another 
officer, who had arrived on the scene and was standing outside 
the defendant's vehicle, observed a gun on the floor of the 
Acura near the driver's seat.  For essentially the same reason 
that Lanteigne was justified in frisking the defendant, and in 
light of the defendant's actions after the initial stop, the 
police were entitled to determine "whether the object was, in 
fact, a weapon which could be used against them.  The [officers] 
were not required to gamble with their personal safety."  
Robbins, 407 Mass. at 152.  See Sinforoso, 434 Mass. at 324 
(actions of police officers in entering automobile to retrieve 
discovered weapons was reasonable for officer safety); Silva, 
366 Mass. at 408 ("a Terry type of search may extend into the 
interior of an automobile so long as it is limited in scope to a 
protective end").  Although the defendant was not in the vehicle 
at the time the gun was observed, "like the defendant in Silva, 
[supra,] he was not under arrest at the time of the 'pat-down' 
search of his person, and there was no assurance that he would 
16 
 
not be returning promptly to his seat behind the wheel of the 
automobile."  Almeida, 373 Mass. at 272.  In the circumstances, 
the police intrusion into the vehicle was reasonably justified 
in scope. 
 
Once the police lawfully had access to the vehicle, under 
the plain view doctrine, additional items could be seized, 
provided the incriminating character was apparent.  See, e.g., 
Commonwealth v. Santana, 420 Mass. 205, 211 (1995).  In this 
case, two open containers of what appeared to be alcoholic 
beverages were seized from the center console.  The 
incriminating character of these open containers was apparent.  
See Commonwealth v. Johnson, 461 Mass. 44, 50 n.7 (2011) 
("possession of an open container of alcohol in a motor vehicle 
is a misdemeanor"); G. L. c. 90, § 24I (open container law).12  
We conclude that seizure of the items contained in the vehicle 
was constitutionally permissible.13 
                                                          
 
 
12 The Commonwealth did not argue that there was probable 
cause to search the motor vehicle based on the officer's plain 
view that the firearm inside the vehicle was neither locked nor 
secured, in violation of G. L. c. 140, § 131L (gun storage 
statute).  As a result, the judge made no findings with respect 
to whether the gun was within the defendant's control or, if 
not, whether there was cause to believe it was not secured with 
a safety device.  We do not, therefore, reach the question 
whether violation of the gun storage statute would support 
warrantless entry into the vehicle. 
 
 
13 Because we conclude that the firearm and the open 
containers of alcohol were properly seized, we do not consider 
 
17 
 
 
Conclusion.  Considered collectively, the articulable facts 
in this case combine to establish a reasonable suspicion of 
criminal activity before the defendant was stopped and seized, 
albeit with the very narrowest of margins.  Objectively, the 
police officer could consider the behavior reported, the weapon 
identified, the time of night, and the characteristics of the 
location, and reasonably suspect that the sum of these 
activities equated to criminality.  The order allowing the 
motion to suppress is vacated, and a new order is to be entered 
denying the motion.  The case is remanded to the Superior Court 
for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
So ordered. 
                                                                                                                                                                                           
whether the officers lawfully impounded the vehicle and 
conducted an inventory search, or whether the search was lawful 
as a search incident to arrest.