Case Title: Commonwealth v. Tejeda

Citation: 

Docket Number: SJC-12187

State: massachusetts

Court: Massachusetts Supreme Court

Date: 2017-04-20T00:00:00Z

Document:
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SJC-12187 
 
COMMONWEALTH  vs.  JOSEFA TEJEDA. 
 
 
 
Suffolk.     December 8, 2016. - April 20, 2017. 
 
Present:  Gants, C.J., Lenk, Hines, Gaziano, Lowy, & Budd, JJ. 
 
 
Misleading a Police Officer. 
 
 
 
 
Complaint received and sworn to in the Roxbury Division of 
the Boston Municipal Court Department on October 8, 2014. 
 
 
A motion to dismiss was heard by David Weingarten, J., and 
a motion for reconsideration was considered by him. 
 
 
After review by the Appeals Court, the Supreme Judicial 
Court granted leave to obtain further appellate review. 
 
 
 
Jason Shaffer (Robert E. Proctor & Colin Doyle also 
present) for the defendant. 
 
Zachary Hillman, Assistant District Attorney (Alexandra I. 
Halprin also present) for the Commonwealth. 
 
 
 
BUDD, J.  This case presents an opportunity to further 
clarify the meaning of "misleads" in the context of G. L. 
c. 268, § 13B, specifically as it relates to nonverbal conduct.  
Here, a complaint issued charging the defendant, Josefa Tejeda, 
2 
 
 
with misleading a police officer after she picked up a small bag 
of what was believed to be heroin and swallowed it as the 
officer watched.1  A Boston Municipal Court judge dismissed the 
count.  The defendant sought further appellate review after the 
Appeals Court vacated the dismissal.  See Commonwealth v. 
Tejeda, 89 Mass. App. Ct. 625 (2016).  We affirm the order of 
the trial court judge, concluding that the defendant's actions 
were not misleading within the meaning of the statute. 
 
Background.  We summarize the facts included in the 
application in support of the complaint against the defendant.  
A police officer approached the defendant and a male whom the 
officer had observed earlier trying to purchase heroin with food 
stamps.  The two made eye contact with the officer and began to 
walk away.  A third person, a known heroin user, was squatting 
behind an automobile where the other two had been standing.  
Concerned that the man behind the vehicle was concealing a 
needle in his hand, the officer ordered him to reveal what he 
was holding.  When the man refused, the officer grabbed his arm, 
causing a small plastic bag of a light brown powdery substance 
to fall from his hand to the ground.  As the officer began to 
take the man into custody, he simultaneously observed the 
                     
 
1 The defendant was also charged with possession of heroin 
pursuant to G. L. c. 94C, § 34. 
3 
 
 
defendant return to the scene, pick up the plastic bag and place 
it in her mouth.  The bag and its contents were not recovered. 
 
Discussion.  To sustain the complaint against the 
defendant, the Commonwealth must provide sufficient evidence to 
establish probable cause, that is, "reasonably trustworthy 
information sufficient to warrant a reasonable or prudent person 
in believing that the defendant has committed the offense."  
Commonwealth v. Humberto H., 466 Mass. 562, 565 (2013), quoting 
Commonwealth v. Roman, 414 Mass. 642, 643 (1993).  General Laws 
c. 268, § 13B (1) (c), provides in pertinent part:  "Whoever, 
directly or indirectly, willfully . . . misleads . . . [a] 
police officer . . . with the intent to impede, obstruct, delay, 
harm, punish or otherwise interfere thereby . . . with [a 
criminal investigation] shall be punished." 
 
Although § 13B does not define "misleads," in interpreting 
the statute we have come to rely on the definition of 
"misleading conduct" contained in the Federal witness tampering 
statute: 
"(A) knowingly making a false statement; (B) intentionally 
omitting information from a statement and thereby causing a 
portion of such statement to be misleading, or 
intentionally concealing a material fact, and thereby 
creating a false impression by such statement; (C) with 
intent to mislead, knowingly submitting or inviting 
reliance on a writing or recording that is false, forged, 
altered, or otherwise lacking in authenticity; (D) with 
intent to mislead, knowingly submitting or inviting 
reliance on a sample, specimen, map, photograph, boundary 
mark, or other object that is misleading in a material 
4 
 
 
respect; or (E) knowingly using a trick, scheme, or device 
with intent to mislead." 
 
18 U.S.C. § 1515(a)(3) (2012).  See Commonwealth v. Figueroa, 
464 Mass. 365, 372 (2013).  This definition of "misleading 
conduct" has its limitations:  apart from subsection (A), 
"knowingly making a false statement," each of the other 
subsections includes the term "mislead" or "misleading," making 
the definition circular.  Commonwealth v. Paquette, 475 Mass. 
793, 799-800 (2016). 
 
In Paquette, we recently clarified the meaning of 
"misleads" in the context of false statements.  We noted that 
"each aspect of the working definition of 'misleads' suggests 'a 
knowing or intentional act calculated to lead another person 
astray.'"  Id. at 801-802, quoting Commonwealth v. Morse, 468 
Mass. 360, 372 (2014).  It follows that for any conduct to be 
considered misleading under § 13B, the conduct must be 
calculated to create in another a false impression or a belief 
that is untrue.  We also observed that the ordinary meaning of 
the term "mislead" is "[t]o lead in the wrong direction," The 
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language 1124 (4th 
ed. 2006), or "to lead or guide wrongly; lead astray," Webster's 
New Universal Unabridged Dictionary 1230 (2003).  Paquette, 475 
Mass. at 800.  We reasoned that "[t]hese definitions indicate 
that to 'mislead[]' principally entails sending a person on a 
5 
 
 
proverbial 'wild goose chase,' by inducing the person to go 
somewhere materially different from where he or she otherwise 
would have gone."  Id. 
 
Thus, we concluded that to find the defendant guilty of 
misleading a police officer with a lie, the jury would need to 
find not only that the statement was false, but that it 
reasonably could have led law enforcement officers to pursue a 
materially different course in their investigation from one they 
otherwise would have pursued because it sent them in the wrong 
direction, i.e., a "wild goose chase."  Id. at 800-801.  
Although Paquette dealt with false statements, its reasoning 
applies equally to physical conduct.2 
 
Here, to determine whether the nonverbal conduct in which 
the defendant engaged was misleading within the meaning of 
§ 13B,  we must determine whether it was intended to create a 
false impression in the mind of another and, if so, whether such 
conduct was reasonably likely to lead the investigation in a 
materially different, or wrong, direction.  Neither is true of 
the defendant's conduct in this case. 
                     
 
2 The Commonwealth suggests that the defendant's conduct 
fits within subsection (E) of the definition in 18 U.S.C. 
§ 1515(a)(3), that is, conduct which is "a trick, scheme, or 
device with intent to mislead," and therefore her actions were 
"misleading" in the context of § 13B.  We do not believe that 
the conduct here was actionable under that somewhat circular 
subsection, as it requires not just a "trick" but one that 
misleads.  The conduct here was neither such an artifice nor 
misleading as we understand that term. 
6 
 
 
 
First, although the defendant's swallowing of the plastic 
bag in full view of a police officer may have been an attempt to 
keep potential evidence away from the officer, it was not an 
attempt to create a false impression within that officer.  This 
is so because she did not attempt to, nor did she, deceive the 
officer as to where the bag went.  Second, the defendant's 
conduct did not lead officers astray or send them on a "wild 
goose chase."  Paquette, 475 Mass. at 800.  The officers knew 
exactly where to find the plastic bag if they were so inclined. 
 
This interpretation of "misleads" within § 13B is in 
keeping with the plain language of the statute, elements of 
which include both an intent to mislead and an intent to impede, 
obstruct, delay, harm, punish, or otherwise interfere with a 
criminal investigation.  See id. at 797 (elements of § 13B are 
"[1] wilfully misleading, directly or indirectly, [2] a police 
officer [3] with the intent to impede, obstruct, delay, harm, 
punish, or otherwise interfere thereby with [4] a criminal 
investigation" [footnote omitted]).  The interpretation the 
Commonwealth would have us adopt equates impeding conduct with 
misleading conduct.  This construction reads the word "misleads" 
out of the statute, and "[w]e decline to adopt an interpretation 
that ignores words and phrases of the statute."  Commonwealth v. 
Disler, 451 Mass. 216, 227 (2008).  It also overlooks our prior 
7 
 
 
case law.  See Morse, 468 Mass. at 372 (§ 13B requires 
prohibited act to both mislead and impede). 
 
We conclude that misleading conduct within the meaning of 
§ 13B is conduct that is intended to create a false impression 
such that it was reasonably likely to send investigators astray 
or in the wrong direction.  Here, although there may have been 
probable cause to believe that the defendant intended to 
"impede, obstruct . . . or otherwise interfere" with a criminal 
investigation, there was insufficient evidence that the 
defendant's conduct was "willfully mislead[ing]" under § 13B.3 
 
Conclusion.  The trial court judge correctly allowed the 
motion to dismiss. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Judgment affirmed. 
                     
 
3 "There is no general obstruction of justice statute in 
Massachusetts . . . .  Instead, a patchwork of statutes 
establishes various [crimes,] some of which involve uttering 
false statements or interfering with governmental operations in 
different capacities."  Commonwealth v. Morse, 468 Mass. 360, 
366 (2014).  Here, the defendant's conduct may have been 
prohibited by G. L. c. 268, § 13E, which criminalizes, among 
other things, the destruction of objects with the intent of 
interfering with criminal proceedings.