Title: Commonwealth v. Thomas

State: massachusetts

Issuer: Massachusetts Supreme Court

Document:

NOTICE:  All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal 
revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound 
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error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of 
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SJC-10826 
 
COMMONWEALTH  vs.  CHITEARA M. THOMAS. 
 
 
 
Plymouth.     February 7, 2014. - September 2, 2014. 
 
Present:  Ireland, C.J., Spina, Botsford, Gants, Duffly, & Lenk, 
JJ.1 
 
 
Homicide.  Burning a Dwelling House.  Attempt.  Constitutional 
Law, Assistance of counsel, Admissions and confessions, 
Voluntariness of statement, Harmless error, Self-
incrimination.  Due Process of Law, Assistance of counsel.  
Evidence, Admissions and confessions, Voluntariness of 
statement.  Error, Harmless.  Practice, Criminal, Capital 
case, Motion to suppress, Assistance of counsel, Admissions 
and confessions, Voluntariness of statement, Harmless 
error. 
 
 
 
 
Indictments found and returned in the Superior Court 
Department on September 22, 2006. 
 
 
A pretrial motion to suppress evidence was heard by Charles 
J. Hely, J., and the cases were tried before Thomas A. Connors, 
J. 
 
 
William S. Smith for the defendant. 
 
Mary E. Lee, Assistant District Attorney, for the 
Commonwealth. 
 
                                                          
 
 
1 Chief Justice Ireland participated in the deliberation on 
this case prior to his retirement. 
2 
 
 
 
 
GANTS, J.  In the early morning of July 6, 2006, the 
defendant, Chiteara M. Thomas, used a cigarette lighter to set 
fire to a curtain in the first-floor apartment of a three-story 
house in Brockton (house).  The fire quickly spread from the 
first floor to the upstairs apartments.  Olinda Calderon, a 
resident in the third-floor apartment, died in the fire, and 
several residents and guests in the second- and third-floor 
apartments were injured.  A Superior Court jury convicted the 
defendant of murder in the first degree on the theory of 
deliberate premeditation, arson of a dwelling house, and the 
attempted murder of thirteen persons. 
 
On appeal, the defendant contends that the judge erred in 
denying, except in small part, her motion to suppress the 
statements she made to police on July 6 and 7, 2006,2 and that a 
substantial likelihood of a miscarriage of justice arose from 
the admission in evidence of the defendant's invocation of her 
right to counsel at the commencement of her July 6 interview.  
We conclude that the judge erred in denying the motion to 
                                                          
 
2 The judge allowed the motion to suppress only with respect 
to a four-minute segment of the interrogation on July 7, 2006, 
and denied the motion with respect to the remainder of the 
interrogation, which continued for over three hours over two 
days.  Because the defendant contended that it strengthened her 
claim that her subsequent confession on July 7 was not made 
voluntarily, the trial judge allowed the defendant's request 
that the jury hear the suppressed four-minute segment. 
3 
 
 
suppress the July 6 interview and that part of the July 7 
interview that preceded the defendant's booking, but correctly 
denied the motion with respect to the defendant's postbooking 
confession.  We also conclude that the error was not harmless 
beyond a reasonable doubt with respect to the convictions of 
murder in the first degree and attempted murder, but was 
harmless beyond a reasonable doubt with respect to the 
conviction of arson of a dwelling house.  We therefore vacate 
the attempted murder convictions, affirm the conviction of arson 
of a dwelling house, and, with respect to the conviction of 
murder in the first degree, give the Commonwealth the option of 
either accepting a reduction of the verdict to felony-murder in 
the second degree or having the conviction vacated and 
proceeding with a new trial on the murder indictment. 
 
Background.  Because the sufficiency of the evidence is not 
at issue, we summarize briefly the evidence at trial.  At the 
time of the fire, the defendant was a twenty-two year old 
homeless woman.  Michelle Johnson rented and resided in the 
first-floor apartment of the house, which was a "place to buy 
['crack' cocaine]" and a known "drug house."  The defendant's 
boy friend, Cornelius Brown, and the defendant were among the 
persons allowed to stay in the apartment with Johnson, but 
before the fire, Johnson told the defendant to move out of the 
apartment.  The defendant was angry with Johnson for preventing 
4 
 
 
her from living with Brown, and repeatedly threatened to kill 
Johnson and burn the house down.  The defendant returned to the 
house on multiple occasions and broke the windows of the first-
floor apartment by throwing rocks and bricks at the house. 
 
On June 27, 2006, a police officer saw the defendant 
walking on the porch of the house while holding a small paring 
knife.  The police officer directed her to leave, but she 
continued to return.  On July 3, police officers again saw her 
outside the house, where she had been arguing with Brown.  A 
neighbor who lived across the street and witnessed the argument 
observed the defendant break one of the windows of the house and 
heard her yell, "I'll be back to torch the place," and, "If I'm 
not going to have a home, you're not going to have one."  That 
day, Johnson threw a bottle at the defendant upon finding her 
sitting on the porch of the house, an act that enraged the 
defendant, especially when Brown failed to come to her defense.  
After that incident, the police warned the defendant not to 
return to the house, but she returned later that evening, and 
was arrested for trespassing.  She was required to appear in 
court on July 5 to be arraigned on this charge, but defaulted, 
and a warrant issued for her arrest. 
 
On the evening of July 5, the defendant visited the home of 
her friend, Veronica Copeland.  The defendant was upset and high 
from smoking crack cocaine, drinking alcohol, and taking 
5 
 
 
Klonopin medication.  At or around midnight, the defendant drove 
Copeland's vehicle to the house without her permission, but 
Copeland followed her there and drove her back to Copeland's 
home.  At 12:30 A.M. on July 6, the defendant telephoned Johnson 
and told her that she hated her, that she thought Johnson was 
engaging in a sexual relationship with Brown, and that she was 
going to "mess [her] up."3  The defendant later took a bicycle 
from Copeland's home and rode back to the house. 
 
Later that morning, the neighbor who lived across the 
street from the house was awakened by a traffic accident that 
occurred outside the house at approximately 4:50 A.M.  At 
daybreak, the neighbor saw the defendant approach the house on 
foot and reach her hand into the second window on the first 
floor of the left side of the house.  The neighbor then saw a 
reddish-orange glow from the first-floor windows, went outside, 
and saw the defendant running away from the house.4 
 
The fire spread quickly through the three apartments.  All 
who were on the first floor escaped without injury, but the 
family on the second floor and their two guests were trapped by 
                                                          
 
3 Michelle Johnson had earlier taunted the defendant by 
suggesting that Cornelius Brown was engaging in a sexual 
relationship with Johnson's friend. 
 
4 The police officer who responded to the traffic accident 
outside the house left the area between 5:20 A.M. and 5:30 A.M.  
The first report of the fire occurred at approximately 5:41 A.M. 
6 
 
 
the flames.  The adults threw the children out of a window into 
the waiting arms of a good Samaritan who stopped to provide 
assistance, and later jumped out of the window themselves, 
sustaining serious injuries when they hit the ground.  The four 
residents of the third-floor apartment also were trapped.  Three 
people, including a one month old baby girl, were rescued by 
fire fighters and survived; the fourth, Calderon, the mother of 
the baby, was pulled by a fire fighter from the bathroom where 
she had sought refuge but died at the hospital from smoke 
inhalation. 
 
The police questioned the defendant on July 6 and 7, 2006, 
and arrested her during the interrogation on July 7.  The video 
recordings of these interviews were admitted in evidence and 
played in their entirety at trial.  On July 6 and initially on 
July 7, the defendant denied setting the fire, but after she was 
arrested and booked on the charges of murder and arson of a 
dwelling house, she admitted that she had "set the fire" with 
"just a lighter" by placing the flame on the curtain in "the 
second window."  The defendant said that she did not know why 
she did it, but that her "intentions were never to hurt 
anybody."  Her description of her conduct was consistent with 
the observations of the neighbor who had seen her reach her hand 
into a window of the house, and with the fire investigation, 
which determined that the cause of the fire was incendiary, that 
7 
 
 
the origin of the fire was the rear bedroom of the house, and 
that no accelerant had been used. 
 
Discussion.  1.  Motion to suppress.  The defendant moved 
to suppress the statements she made on July 6 and 7, claiming 
violation of her right against self-incrimination and her right 
to counsel under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the 
United States Constitution and art. 12 of the Massachusetts 
Declaration of Rights.  A judge in the Superior Court, who was 
not the trial judge, conducted an evidentiary hearing on the 
motion, and made the following relevant findings of fact, which 
we supplement where necessary with evidence in the record that 
is uncontroverted and that was implicitly credited by the motion 
judge, see Commonwealth v. Isaiah I., 448 Mass. 334, 337 (2007), 
S.C., 450 Mass. 818 (2008), and with the video recordings of the 
interviews of the defendant, which were admitted in evidence at 
the motion hearing.5 
 
On the morning of July 6, the Brockton police department 
and the State police began investigating the fire as a possible 
arson.  They soon learned that the defendant had been in a feud 
with a resident of the house.  Brockton police Detective Michael 
                                                          
 
5 Where a defendant's interview is video recorded, we are in 
the same position as the motion judge to determine what occurred 
during the interview and therefore independently make that 
determination.  See Commonwealth v. Hoyt, 461 Mass. 143, 148-149 
(2011). 
8 
 
 
Schaaf, who was assigned that day to "warrant apprehension," was 
asked to locate her.  Detective Schaaf knew the defendant, and 
had arrested her for outstanding warrants on seven prior 
occasions. 
 
The defendant knew she had an outstanding default warrant 
arising from her arrest for trespassing at the house on July 3, 
because she had failed to appear for her arraignment on July 5.  
She also believed that the police were looking for her as a 
suspect in connection with the fire that morning.  Accompanied 
by Copeland, she went to the Brockton District Court to clear up 
her warrant and obtain an attorney.  At approximately 12:50 P.M. 
on July 6, she was in the court house lobby near the Department 
of Probation office when Detective Schaaf approached her and 
told her that detectives wanted to speak with her at the police 
station about the fire.  The defendant told him that she had an 
arrest warrant she was trying to clear up, and the detective 
replied that the police would "take care of" the warrant for 
her.  The defendant agreed to go to the station with him.  He 
did not place the defendant under arrest, handcuff her, or frisk 
her for weapons. 
 
a.  July 6 interview.  The defendant was taken to an 
interview room at the police station, where she was met by State 
Trooper John Sylva and Brockton police Detective Dominic 
Persampieri at 1:53 P.M.  The defendant agreed to have her 
9 
 
 
interview recorded, and a video recording was made of the 
interview.  Trooper Sylva read the Miranda warnings form to the 
defendant and showed her the printed warnings as he read them.  
After asking her if she understood these rights, the defendant 
replied, "I don't understand . . . .  If I said anything, 'okay, 
don't want to talk to you guys,' 'cause that wouldn't happen, 
right?"  Trooper Sylva replied, "Well, that's your right.  If 
you want to contact a lawyer, you can always have a lawyer 
present when you talk to us."  The defendant then asked, "And 
I'd have to sit here and wait for a lawyer, and probably be held 
and all that, right?"  Trooper Sylva said, "Well, I don't know.  
You do have . . . an outstanding warrant."  The defendant said, 
"That's what I mean."  Trooper Sylva replied, "[T]hat's a 
separate matter.  You were arrested because you had a warrant."  
The defendant told him that she had not been arrested, stating, 
"I didn't come here in cuffs."  She said, "Schaaf came to get 
me." 
 
The following conversation then ensued: 
Trooper Sylva:  "[B]efore we proceed any further, I just 
want you to decide whether you want to speak with us 
regarding an incident." 
 
Defendant:  "I'd rather have a lawyer, because . . . I'm 
accused [of] starting a fire . . . [a] major fire." 
 
Trooper Sylva:  "[W]e didn't bring anything up to you." 
 
10 
 
 
Defendant:  "No, I'm bringing it up, 'cause I know what I'm 
here for. . . .  And I know what I done, but . . . I'm not 
a fire-starter.  I did not do that, man." 
 
Trooper Sylva:  "So what you're saying to me is that you do 
not want to . . . talk to us, is that correct?" 
 
Defendant:  "I want to talk, but I don't wanna talk unless 
I got somebody present who . . . ." 
 
Detective Persampieri:  "Do you want an attorney?  Yes or 
no?" 
 
Defendant:  "Yes." 
 
Detective Persampieri:  "Okay.  End . . . of conversation." 
 
After this invocation of her right to an attorney, Detective 
Persampieri left the room, leaving the door open, and the 
defendant asked, "Am I being held, or do I have bail?"  Trooper 
Sylva replied that that would be decided by the courts because 
the warrant had to be addressed. 
 
Detective Persampieri then reentered the room.  He stood at 
the table where the defendant was seated and, facing the camera, 
asked, "Is that off?"6  He then looked down at the defendant and 
told her, "[U]nderstand one thing.  Once you leave here, . . . 
[w]e're gonna do our investigation, and it's gonna get a lot 
hotter. . . .  [W]hat we're trying to tell you, we're gonna give 
you the opportunity to tell us your side of the story.  Okay?"  
The defendant said, "[T]hat's why I wanted to stay here," but, 
                                                          
 
6 The video recording was not off and recorded all that 
transpired thereafter. 
11 
 
 
before leaving the room again, the detective interrupted her and 
said, "Sorry.  You already lawyered up." 
 
The defendant remained seated at the table and stated, "I'm 
real confused here."  Brockton police Detective Jackie Congdon, 
who was nearby but off camera, asked her why she was confused.  
The defendant became visibly upset and said that she had never 
been in this position before, where she was being accused of 
starting a fire.  The detective asked, "If you're not an 
arsonist, then you'd have no problem with us taking that shirt 
from you?"  The defendant became visibly upset and said that she 
had no problem with giving her shirt to the police, adding, "You 
can have anything.  You can touch anything on me."  Detective 
Congdon then said, "You had your chance, you just lawyered up."  
The conversation continued as follows: 
Defendant:  "But I didn't . . . well, but I don't . . . I, 
I mean that if I could go back so there's no way I can say 
no at all?  There's no way I can say, 'Yeah, I'm gonna give 
my story?' '[C]ause I'm confused." 
 
Detective Congdon:  "Is that what you want to do?" 
 
Defendant:  "I want to tell my story, but I'm not sure, do 
you understand what I'm trying to say . . . .  I've never 
been in this position." 
 
Detective Congdon:  "Well, we can't talk." 
 
Defendant:  "So I don't know if I need lawyer help or not.  
And now that he . . . what did he, he just said now, I have 
my chance to tell my story.  I, I would rather do it like 
that." 
 
12 
 
 
Detective Congdon:  "That's what we're asking. . . So you 
want to give up your right to have a lawyer?" 
 
Defendant:  Yes.  'Cause I don't know what . . . .  All 
this confusion . . . .  I'm confused." 
 
 
Detective Congdon asked if the defendant would rather have 
her (Detective Congdon) in the interview, and the defendant said 
she would.  Off camera, Detective Congdon then told Trooper 
Sylva and Detective Persampieri that the defendant wanted to 
talk with her.  Detective Persampieri asked, "She just wants 
you?" referring to Detective Congdon.  The defendant stated, "I 
just said I would feel comfortable with her being around," and 
added, "When you said I had my chance, though, when you said 
that I had my . . . ."  Detective Persampieri interrupted her 
and asked, "Do you want to talk with us?"  She answered, "Yes." 
 
Trooper Sylva and Detective Persampieri then returned to 
the room, and Detective Congdon told the defendant that she 
would be outside the room if the defendant needed anything.  
Trooper Sylva again read her the Miranda rights, and the 
defendant signed the waiver form.  In the ensuing conversation, 
the defendant denied setting the fire, but made many 
incriminating admissions regarding her whereabouts in the hours 
before and immediately after the fire, the details of her feud 
with Johnson (including her admission that she smashed the 
windows of the house), the intensity of her animosity toward 
Johnson, her tumultuous romantic relationship with Brown and her 
13 
 
 
jealousy regarding his purported sexual infidelity, and her 
disappointment that he had not sided with her in the feud with 
Johnson. 
 
The interview continued until 4:40 P.M.  When the interview 
ended, Trooper Sylva stated, "We gotta put you through the 
system."  The defendant asked, "I should be able to go right 
back to the court house right now, right?"  Trooper Sylva told 
her the court house was closing, and he did not know if there 
was time to get her back there.  The defendant was held in 
custody at the police station overnight on the default warrant 
for the July 3 trespass charge, and was not brought to court 
until the next morning, at which time she was released on 
personal recognizance. 
 
We review de novo any findings of the motion judge that 
were based entirely on the documentary evidence, i.e., the 
recorded interviews of the defendant.  See note 5, supra.  We 
accept other findings that were based on testimony at the 
evidentiary hearing and do not disturb them where they are not 
clearly erroneous.  See Commonwealth v. Tremblay, 460 Mass. 199, 
205 (2011).  However, we "make an independent determination as 
to the correctness of the judge's application of constitutional 
principles to the facts as found."  Id. 
 
The defendant clearly and unequivocally invoked her right 
to counsel at the beginning of the interview, when she declared 
14 
 
 
that she did not want to answer questions without an attorney 
present.  The United States Supreme Court explained in Edwards 
v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 481-482 (1981): 
"In Miranda v. Arizona, the Court determined that the Fifth 
and Fourteenth Amendments' prohibition against compelled 
self-incrimination required that custodial interrogation be 
preceded by advice to the putative defendant that he has 
the right to remain silent and also the right to the 
presence of an attorney.  [384 U.S. 436, 479 (1966)].  The 
Court also indicated the procedures to be followed 
subsequent to the warnings.  If the accused indicates that 
he wishes to remain silent, 'the interrogation must cease.'  
If he requests counsel, 'the interrogation must cease until 
an attorney is present.'  Id. at 474." 
 
The Court held that "when an accused has invoked his right to 
have counsel present during custodial interrogation, a valid 
waiver of that right cannot be established by showing only that 
he responded to further police-initiated custodial interrogation 
even if he has been advised of his rights."  Edwards, supra at 
484.  "[A]n accused, . . . having expressed his desire to deal 
with the police only through counsel, is not subject to further 
interrogation by the authorities until counsel has been made 
available to him, unless the accused himself initiates further 
communication, exchanges, or conversations with the police."  
Id. at 484-485. 
 
The motion judge concluded that the prohibition in Edwards 
did not apply because the defendant was not in custody when she 
15 
 
 
invoked her right to counsel.7  We disagree.  "In assessing 
whether a defendant was in 'custody' for purposes of the Miranda 
requirements, '[t]he crucial question is whether, considering 
all the circumstances, a reasonable person in the defendant's 
position would have believed that he was in custody. . . .  
Thus, if the defendant reasonably believed that he was not free 
to leave, the interrogation occurred while the defendant was in 
custody, and Miranda warnings were required.'"  Commonwealth v. 
Hilton, 443 Mass. 597, 609 (2005), S.C., 450 Mass. 173 (2007), 
quoting Commonwealth v. Damiano, 422 Mass. 10, 13 (1996).  See 
Commonwealth v. Kirwan, 448 Mass. 304, 309 (2007) ("The test is 
an objective one:  would a reasonable person in the 
circumstances of the defendant's interrogation have perceived 
the environment as coercive?"). 
 
When the defendant was taken from the court house to the 
police station for questioning, the defendant knew that a 
default warrant had issued for her arrest because she had failed 
to appear at her arraignment.  She informed Detective Schaaf 
that she was trying to address the outstanding warrant.  A 
                                                          
 
7  The motion judge found that custody commenced after State 
police Trooper John Sylva and Brockton police Detective Dominic 
Persampieri resumed their interrogation following the 
defendant's conversation with Brockton police Detective Congdon.8 
Although Brockton police Detective Michael Schaaf had told the 
defendant that the police would "take care of" the warrant for 
her, there was no evidence that the police had taken any action 
regarding the warrant, or had told the defendant that they had. 
16 
 
 
reasonable person in that position would recognize that, when 
there is an outstanding warrant for a person's arrest, and when 
the person named in the warrant is at a police station in the 
company of detectives who know there is such a warrant, that 
person is not free to leave until she is brought before a 
judicial officer and released on bail or personal recognizance.  
The motion judge found that the defendant was not in custody 
until Trooper Sylva told her after she invoked her right to 
counsel that her warrant had to be addressed.  But we conclude 
that a reasonable person in that position would have known that 
the warrant had to be addressed without being told so by a 
police officer, and would also have known that she could not be 
released until it had.   Although the determination of custody 
rests on what a reasonable person in that position would 
believe, rather than on the subjective understanding of the 
interrogating police officer or the person being questioned, see 
Kirwan, 448 Mass. at 309, it is noteworthy that the police 
officers who were questioning the defendant and the defendant 
herself understood that she was not free to leave until the 
warrant had been addressed.8 
                                                          
 
8 Although Brockton police Detective Michael Schaaf had told 
the defendant that the police would "take care of" the warrant 
for her, there was no evidence that the police had taken any 
action regarding the warrant, or had told the defendant that 
they had. 
17 
 
 
 
The motion judge appears to have rested his finding that 
the defendant was not in custody in large part on her insistence 
that she had not been arrested by Detective Schaaf and her 
statement, "I didn't come here in cuffs."  However, this does 
not suggest that she believed (or, more importantly, that a 
reasonable person in her position would believe) that she was 
free to leave or that the police would not arrest her if she 
attempted to leave.  Nor does it suggest that she went to the 
police station voluntarily.  In fact, when Trooper Sylva asked 
her, "You came voluntarily?" she replied, "No, Schaaf came to 
get me."9 
 
The motion judge also found that, "[e]ven if the defendant 
was in custody at the time she asked to speak with a lawyer, the 
Edwards rule was not violated," because "[t]he defendant 
initiated her conversation with Detective Congdon after the 
other detectives had terminated the interview and left the 
                                                          
 
9 The motion judge correctly rejected the Commonwealth's 
argument that, even if the defendant was in custody because of 
the outstanding arrest warrant, she was not in custody because 
of the arson investigation and therefore was not in custody for 
purposes of applying the rule of Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 
477, 484-485 (1981).  The judge noted that the "exception to the 
usual Miranda custody principles is limited to the questioning 
of a prisoner who is already in the 'confines of ordinary prison 
life,'" quoting Commonwealth v. Larkin, 429 Mass. 426, 434-435 
(1999).  See id. at 435, quoting People v. Margolies, 125 Misc. 
2d 1033, 1041 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1984) ("The precise question is 
thus 'whether the prisoner would reasonably believe himself to 
be in custody beyond that imposed by the confines of ordinary 
prison life'"). 
18 
 
 
room."  While it is true that the defendant initiated a 
conversation with Detective Congdon by saying, "I'm real 
confused here," it is also true that the defendant stated her 
confusion only after Detective Persampieri told her, "Once you 
leave here, . . . [w]e're gonna do our investigation, and it's 
gonna get a lot hotter. . . .  [W]e're 'gonna give you the 
opportunity to tell us your side of the story," but, "Sorry.  
You . . . lawyered up." 
 
Detective Persampieri's statements were improper for two 
reasons.10  First, they were an attempt to persuade her to change 
her mind about her decision to invoke her right to counsel 
seconds after she had made that invocation.  The invocation of 
the right to counsel, like the invocation of the right to 
silence, is part of the "right to cut off questioning" that must 
be "scrupulously honored" by law enforcement.  Michigan v. 
Mosley, 423 U.S. 96, 103-104 (1975), quoting Miranda, 384 U.S. 
at 474, 479.  The police may not fail to honor the right of a 
person in custody to cut off questioning "by persisting in 
repeated efforts to wear down his resistance and make him change 
his mind."  Mosley, supra at 102, 105-106.  See Commonwealth v. 
Brum, 438 Mass. 103, 112 (2002).  Cf. Commonwealth v. Clarke, 
                                                          
 
10 Detective Persampieri's query whether the video recording 
was "off" suggests that he recognized the impropriety of what he 
was about to say. 
19 
 
 
461 Mass. 336, 352 (2012), quoting Connecticut v. Barrett, 479 
U.S. 523, 534 n.5 (1987) (Brennan, J., concurring in the 
judgment) ("where the initial request to invoke the right to 
remain silent is clear . . . , 'the police may not create 
ambiguity in a defendant's desire by continuing to question him 
or her about it'"). 
 
Second, Detective Persampieri's failure scrupulously to 
honor the defendant's invocation of her right to counsel was 
aggravated by his statements suggesting that, by invoking her 
right to counsel and thereby ending the interview, she was 
losing her opportunity to tell her side of the story.  In 
Commonwealth v. Novo, 442 Mass. 262, 267 (2004), we criticized 
an interrogation technique in which the police told the 
defendant that this would be his "only opportunity" to offer an 
explanation as to why he hit the victim.  In Novo, the police 
persisted in "this now-or-never theme," and went on to tell the 
defendant that, if he did not give them a reason for his 
conduct, "a jury [were] never going to hear a reason."  Id. at 
267, 268.  We concluded that this misrepresentation of the 
defendant's right to testify at trial was an "egregious 
intrusion on rights that art. 12 declares to be fundamental."  
Id. at 268-269.  See Commonwealth v. Ortiz, 84 Mass. App. Ct. 
258, 268 (2013) ("detectives' message that this was the 
defendant's 'last chance' to tell his story was a plain 
20 
 
 
misstatement of the defendant's rights to present a defense").  
Here, the detective did not expressly tell the defendant that, 
by having "lawyered up," she was losing her chance to tell her 
story to the jury.  But we conclude that the message he 
implicitly communicated to her was unfair and misleading even if 
she understood him to mean that she was losing her chance to 
tell her story to law enforcement officers.  We recognize that 
we stated in Novo, supra at 269 n.5, that the "officers in 
[that] case might have properly (and truthfully) told [the 
defendant], 'This is your only chance to talk to us,' or, 'This 
is your only opportunity to tell your story to us so that we can 
help you.'"  On further reflection, we declare now that these 
statements, too, are neither proper nor truthful, especially 
where a suspect has invoked her right to counsel.  There is 
nothing that would bar a suspect, after consulting with counsel, 
from deciding to speak with the police, and there is no sound 
reason why the police would refuse such a request. 
 
Detective Congdon's conversation with the defendant added 
to the defendant's confusion that Detective Persampieri's words 
had elicited.  After the defendant told her she did not start 
fires and agreed to the detective's request to hand over her 
shirt, Detective Congdon said, "You had your chance, you just 
lawyered up," reiterating Detective Persampieri's warning that 
she had lost her "chance" to explain what happened by invoking 
21 
 
 
her right to counsel.  The potency of Detective Persampieri's 
improper persuasion was apparent from the words the defendant 
spoke as she decided whether to revisit her invocation of 
counsel:  "I want to tell my story," but "I don't know if I need 
lawyer help or not," and "he just said now, "I have my chance to 
tell my story," so "I would rather do it like that."  In other 
words, she reasoned that she knew she wanted to tell her story 
but she was not sure whether she needed the assistance of a 
lawyer, so she decided to tell her story without counsel lest 
she lose her opportunity to do so.  Contrast Commonwealth v. 
Chipman, 418 Mass. 262, 273 (1994) (police did not engage in 
"any type of prodding designed to elicit inculpatory 
statements"). 
 
"When a defendant invokes his right to counsel, all 
subsequent statements are inadmissible unless counsel is 
provided or the Commonwealth can prove beyond a reasonable doubt 
that the defendant "initiate[d] further communication, 
exchanges, or conversations with the police. . . and thereby 
waived his right to counsel."  Commonwealth v. Hoyt, 461 Mass. 
143, 151 (2011), quoting Edwards, 451 U.S. at 485.  Where, as 
here, the defendant's initiation of conversation with a 
detective was triggered by another detective's attempt to 
persuade her that she was making a mistake by "lawyer[ing] up," 
and that, by doing so, she was losing her chance to tell her 
22 
 
 
version of what happened, the Commonwealth cannot meet its 
burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant 
waived her right to counsel.  Because the police officers here 
did not scrupulously honor the defendant's right to cut off 
questioning until she had the benefit of counsel, and instead 
sought to persuade her to change her mind by suggesting that 
"lawyering up" was costing her the opportunity to tell her side 
of the story, we conclude that the continuation of the 
questioning on July 6 violated the Edwards rule and that the 
statements the defendant made that day in response to that 
questioning should have been suppressed.  See Hoyt, supra. 
 
b.  July 7 interviews.  The motion judge found that, at the 
arraignment on the trespass charge on the morning of July 7, 
counsel was appointed for the defendant on that charge and she 
was released on personal recognizance.11  That day, the police 
learned that Calderon had died from her injuries in the fire and 
that a neighbor had identified the defendant as the person the 
neighbor saw putting a hand into a broken window at the house.  
Detective Schaaf was again directed to find the defendant, and 
he located her in Brockton at approximately 3 P.M.  He told the 
defendant that the police wanted to speak with her again at the 
station.  The defendant was "a little upset" and "annoyed" about 
                                                          
 
11 The record is silent as to whether she conferred with 
appointed counsel. 
23 
 
 
returning to the station, but she was "compliant" and allowed 
Detective Schaaf to drive her there.  The defendant waited 
nearly three hours at the station with officers by her side 
before she was interviewed again by Trooper Sylva and Detective 
Persampieri at approximately 6 P.M.  There, she was again given 
the Miranda warnings and again waived her rights.   
 
Trooper Sylva told the defendant that "[s]omebody died in 
that fire" and that they had "eyewitness accounts of what 
happened."  He told her about "mitigating circumstances," and 
urged her to present her side of the story.  When Detective 
Persampieri asked her to tell them what happened, she said she 
had already told them what happened, and stated, "I'm not 
changing nothing."  When asked by Trooper Sylva, "You're going 
stick with the same story you told us yesterday . . . ?" she 
answered, "Yeah."  In the approximately thirty minutes before 
she was arrested and booked on the charges of murder and arson 
of a dwelling house, she did not change her story and continued 
to deny setting the fire.12 
                                                          
 
12   Shortly after the defendant was told she was under arrest 
for murder and arson of a dwelling house, the defendant got onto 
the floor and began praying, temporarily stopping the 
interrogation.  The motion judge suppressed this four-minute 
segment, finding that the defendant's statements during this 
highly emotional period were not made voluntarily.  The 
defendant later regained her composure, and the interrogation 
continued for a few minutes before she was escorted out of the 
room for booking. 
24 
 
 
 
State police Trooper Scott McGrath was present with the 
defendant during part of the booking procedure.  While the 
defendant was being booked, she turned to the trooper and told 
him, "I'm not a bad person."  The judge found that this was a 
spontaneous statement by the defendant.  The trooper replied 
that he did not think she was a bad person, and told her that, 
if she wanted to return upstairs and speak with Trooper Sylva 
and Detective Persampieri, she could.  He asked her if she 
wanted to explain to them what happened, and the defendant said, 
"I do want to speak with them again." 
 
At 6:49 P.M., the defendant returned to the interview room 
and met again with Trooper Sylva and Detective Persampieri.  
After she again was read her Miranda rights and waived them, 
Trooper Sylva asked, "Let's hear the real story.  What 
happened?"  The defendant then admitted that she set the fire at 
the house.  She explained that she set fire to a curtain in the 
window on the left side of the house, using "[j]ust a lighter" 
and then went to a friend's house to tell her the house was 
burning.  She said she had no "intentions of it getting that 
big," and that she never meant to hurt anybody. 
 
The motion judge found that the entirety of the July 7 
interview was custodial, and that the defendant made a knowing, 
intelligent, and voluntary waiver of her Miranda rights.  He 
also found that, apart from the four-minute segment of the 
25 
 
 
interview during which she was praying, her statements were 
voluntary beyond a reasonable doubt.  The motion judge also 
found that, even if there had been an Edwards violation in the 
July 6 interview, there was no such violation in the July 7 
interview.  To reach this conclusion, the motion judge 
determined, first, that the Edwards rule did not bar the police 
from initiating the July 7 interview, and, second, that any 
Edwards violation on July 6 did not taint any part of the July 7 
interview.  We review each of these determinations and, for 
reasons we shall articulate, conclude that, because the 
defendant had been appointed counsel during her arraignment on 
the trespass charge on the morning of July 7 and had had the 
opportunity to confer with counsel, the police were not barred 
from subsequently initiating another interview of her after her 
release from custody, but only her July 7 postbooking confession 
was free from taint arising from the Edwards violation on July 
6. 
 
As to the first determination, the judge noted that, after 
a defendant invokes her right to counsel, the Edwards rule 
requires suppression of a subsequent, police-initiated statement 
only where the defendant was in continuous custody from the time 
of the invocation to the time of the police initiation of 
interrogation.  See Commonwealth v. Galford, 413 Mass. 364, 370-
371 (1992), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 1065 (1993) (under Federal 
26 
 
 
law, "where there is a break in custody, Edwards does not 
require that a subsequent statement be excluded," because 
"[w]hen a defendant is released from custody, the coercive 
effect of custody disappears").  The motion judge determined 
that the Edwards rule did not apply because there was a break in 
the defendant's custody between her release by the District 
Court on the morning of July 7 and her return to the police 
station with Detective Schaaf later that day at approximately 3 
P.M.  We agree with the motion judge that, because of the break 
in custody, the defendant's invocation of her right to counsel 
did not bar the police under Federal law from initiating 
questioning of her after her release on July 7.  See Galford, 
supra. 
 
In Galford, however, we noted that the defendant's 
arguments were based on his rights pursuant to the Fifth and 
Fourteenth Amendments, and we therefore did not address whether, 
under State constitutional law, the police may initiate 
questioning of a suspect once the suspect is released from 
custody where that suspect earlier had invoked her right to 
counsel.  Id. at 369 n.7.  We address that issue here.13  We need 
                                                          
 
13 In this case, the defendant claimed a violation of her 
right to counsel under art. 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration 
of Rights, but even if she had not, we properly consider the 
question under our State constitutional law because in an appeal 
from a conviction of murder in the first degree, pursuant to our 
 
27 
 
 
not decide here whether to adopt under our State constitutional 
law the Federal rule regarding break in custody; we need only 
decide whether to adopt it in the rather unusual circumstances 
presented in this case, especially where this issue was not 
briefed by the parties. 
 
Here, the defendant went to court on July 6, not only to 
clear up her warrant, but to have an attorney appointed at the 
arraignment to represent her.  We infer that she wished to have 
the advice of counsel because she recognized that she was 
suspected of having set the fire at the house earlier that 
morning.  Her invocation of the right to counsel at the 
beginning of her interview on July 6 supports that inference.  
On the morning of July 7, the defendant appeared in court and 
had counsel appointed to represent her in a case alleging 
trespass of the same house that she was suspected of having 
burned.  Although the record does not shed light on whether she 
actually conferred with appointed counsel, she had the 
opportunity to do so that morning.  In these circumstances, 
where the defendant invoked her right to counsel, counsel was 
appointed to represent her in a related case the next day, and 
interrogation resumed several hours thereafter, following her 
                                                                                                                                                                                           
statutory duty under G. L. c. 278, § 33E, we review all 
potential claims to determine whether there was a substantial 
likelihood of a miscarriage of justice.  See Commonwealth v. 
Randolph, 438 Mass. 290, 294 (2002). 
28 
 
 
release from custody, we conclude that the reinitiation of 
custodial interrogation, standing alone, did not violate art. 
12.  We leave for another day whether police reinitiation of 
questioning following a defendant's release from custody might 
violate art. 12 where the defendant had earlier invoked her 
right to counsel and had not had the opportunity to confer with 
counsel appointed for her in a related case. 
 
The second determination, as the judge correctly noted, 
addresses whether any Edwards violation on July 6 tainted the 
statements made on July 7.  An Edwards violation is also a 
Miranda violation.  See Edwards, 451 U.S. at 482 ("Miranda . . . 
declared that an accused has a Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment 
right to have counsel present during custodial interrogation").  
In contrast with Federal constitutional law, under our State 
constitutional law, we "presume that a statement made following 
the violation of a suspect's Miranda rights is tainted," and 
require the prosecution to "show more than the belated 
administration of Miranda warnings in order to dispel that 
taint."  Commonwealth v. Smith, 412 Mass. 823, 836 (1992).  A 
statement obtained in violation of Edwards, and thus also in 
violation of Miranda, is "by definition 'coerced.'"  Smith, 
supra, quoting State v. Lavaris, 99 Wash. 2d 851, 857 (1983).  
The presumption of taint under our State constitutional law 
arises from the recognition that, where the police procure a 
29 
 
 
statement from a suspect in violation of Miranda, a subsequent 
statement may be the product of the initial coercion even where 
the suspect knowingly and voluntarily waives her right to 
silence and to counsel, if the custodial interrogation was 
essentially continuous or if the suspect believes that it would 
be futile to invoke her rights because she incriminated herself 
in the first statement.  See Hoyt, 461 Mass. at 153; 
Commonwealth v. Prater, 420 Mass. 569, 581, 583-584 (1995).  
"This presumption may be overcome by showing that either:  (1) 
after the illegally obtained statement, there was a break in the 
stream of events that sufficiently insulated the post-Miranda 
statement from the tainted one; or (2) the illegally obtained 
statement did not incriminate the defendant, or, as it is more 
colloquially put, the cat was not out of the bag."  Prater, 
supra at 580, quoting Commonwealth v. Osachuk, 418 Mass. 229, 
235 (1994).  "[W]hether one or both lines of analysis is 
required before a confession is admitted turns on the facts of 
the case."  Commonwealth v. Torres, 424 Mass. 792, 799-800 
(1997), quoting Prater, supra at 580 n.10. 
 
The motion judge found that, where over twenty-two hours 
had elapsed between the end of the interview on July 6 and the 
beginning of the interview the next day, and where the defendant 
had been released from custody during that time period, there 
was a "significant break in the stream of events" between the 
30 
 
 
July 6 and July 7 statements that "weigh[ed] in favor of the 
voluntariness of the defendant's Miranda waivers and statements 
on July 7."  The motion judge also found that the incriminating 
July 6 admissions "did not cause the defendant to feel a sense 
of futility that would pressure her into making admissions on 
July 7." 
 
We agree with the judge's finding of a material break in 
time, but we conclude that, in the circumstances of this case, 
the taint from the Edwards violation was not dispelled in the 
interrogation that occurred on July 7 before the defendant's 
booking, where she essentially related the same story she told 
on July 6.  As to this part of the interrogation, the invocation 
of rights would have appeared futile to the defendant because 
she intended to tell the officers only what she had told them 
the previous day, and that proverbial cat was already out of the 
bag.  See Commonwealth v. Mahnke, 368 Mass. 662, 686 (1975), 
cert. denied, 425 U.S. 959 (1976) ("The cat-out-of-the-bag line 
of analysis requires the exclusion of a statement if, in giving 
the statement, the defendant was motivated by the belief that, 
after a prior coerced statement, his effort to withhold further 
information would be futile and he had nothing to lose by 
repetition or amplification of the earlier statements.  Such a 
statement would be inadmissible as the direct product of the 
earlier coerced statement").  However, the cat was not out of 
31 
 
 
the bag when she returned to the interview room after her 
booking with the intent to reveal that she had set the fire.  
See Commonwealth v. Watkins, 375 Mass. 472, 478, 482 (1978) (cat 
was not out of bag where defendant only admitted in initial 
suppressed statement that he had been in Boston with another 
suspect but, after being allowed to use telephone to call 
attorney, admitted in subsequent statement to his involvement in 
murder).  Concerning this part of the interrogation, we credit 
the motion judge's finding that the defendant's Miranda waiver 
was voluntary and was not tainted by the July 6 violations of 
Miranda and Edwards.  Therefore, we conclude that the statements 
made by the defendant during the prebooking interview of July 7 
should have been suppressed, but that the statements she made 
during the postbooking interview were properly admitted in 
evidence. 
 
2.  Harmless error analysis.  Having determined that all 
but the postbooking interview should have been suppressed, we 
turn to whether the erroneous admission of these statements was 
harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.  See Commonwealth v. Santos, 
463 Mass. 273, 287 (2012).  In making this determination, "we 
consider 'the importance of the evidence in the prosecution's 
case; the relationship between the evidence and the premise of 
the defense; who introduced the issue at trial; the frequency of 
the reference; whether the erroneously admitted evidence was 
32 
 
 
merely cumulative of properly admitted evidence; the 
availability or effect of curative instructions; and the weight 
or quantum of evidence of guilt.'"  Id., quoting Commonwealth v. 
Dagraca, 447 Mass. 546, 553 (2006). 
 
Essential to the jury's verdict was determining whether  
(1) the defendant intentionally set the fire; (2) the setting of 
the fire caused the death of Calderon; and (3) the defendant 
intended by setting the fire to kill Johnson.14  The jury, 
through their guilty verdicts, necessarily concluded beyond a 
reasonable doubt that the defendant intentionally set the fire 
and that the fire caused Calderon's death.  In view of the 
evidence at trial, especially the defendant's confession to 
setting the fire during the postbooking interview, which was 
consistent with the neighbor's observations of the defendant 
moments before the house went up in flames and the fire 
investigator's opinion regarding the cause and origin of the 
fire, the erroneous admission of the defendant's July 6 and July 
7 prebooking statements could not reasonably have affected these 
two conclusions.  These findings alone (along with the 
undisputed fact that the house was a dwelling) were sufficient 
to support a guilty verdict of arson of a dwelling house and, 
                                                          
 
14 We do not suggest that the jury were asked these three 
questions, only that they effectively had to answer them to 
reach their verdicts. 
33 
 
 
with respect to the indictment charging murder, of the lesser 
crime of felony-murder in the second degree, with arson of a 
dwelling house as the predicate felony.15,16  The erroneous 
admission of the statements, therefore, was harmless as to these 
convictions. 
 
We are not persuaded, however, that the erroneous admission 
of the statements was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt as to 
the third question:  whether the defendant intended to kill 
                                                          
 
15  The elements of felony-murder in the second degree are as 
follows: 
"1. The defendant committed or attempted to commit a 
felony with a maximum sentence of less than imprisonment 
for life. 
"2. The death occurred during the commission or 
attempted commission of the underlying felony. 
"3. The underlying felony was inherently dangerous 
(or) the defendant acted with a conscious disregard for the 
risk to human life." 
Model Instructions on Homicide 60 (2013).  As the judge here 
explained to the jury, arson of a dwelling house is an 
inherently dangerous felony.  Commonwealth v. Bell, 460 Mass. 
294, 308 (2011). 
 
16 Because the jury found the defendant guilty of murder in 
the first degree on a theory of deliberate premeditation, the 
jury, in accordance with the judge's instructions, did not reach 
a verdict as to felony-murder, which would have been murder in 
the second degree because the predicate felony, arson of a 
dwelling house, in violation of G. L. c. 266, § 1, is not a life 
felony.  However, there can be no doubt that the jury found the 
defendant guilty of this offense because they found her guilty 
on the indictment charging arson of a dwelling house and 
necessarily found that the death arose from the commission of 
the arson. 
34 
 
 
Johnson.  The jury's finding that the defendant intended to kill 
Johnson was necessary to its guilty finding of murder on the 
theory of deliberate premeditation17 and its guilty findings on 
the thirteen indictments charging attempted murder, all of which 
rested on a finding of a transferred intent to kill.  There was 
sufficient evidence, apart from the erroneously admitted 
statements of the defendant, to permit a reasonable jury to make 
this finding, based largely on the defendant's earlier threats 
to kill Johnson and the persistent feud between them.  But the 
evidence supporting a finding of an intent to kill was not 
overwhelming, and the defendant's manner of setting the fire 
(using a cigarette lighter to set fire to the curtain in one 
window of the house, without adding any accelerant and without 
making any apparent effort to block egress from the first-floor 
apartment) was not reasonably likely to result in Johnson's 
death.  In these circumstances, we cannot conclude with the 
required confidence that admission of the defendant's 
statements, made over the course of more than three hours of 
interrogation, where she spoke of her hatred of Johnson, her 
breaking of the windows in the house, her anger at Johnson for 
taunting her with Brown's supposed sexual infidelity, and her 
                                                          
 
17 The judge instructed the jury on the elements of murder 
in the first degree on the theory of extreme atrocity or 
cruelty, but the jury did not find the defendant guilty on this 
theory. 
35 
 
 
failure to use her cellular telephone to call 911 for assistance 
even after she heard the screams of those trapped by the fire, 
was harmless to the jury's finding that the defendant intended 
to kill Johnson, and therefore harmless to their guilty verdicts 
on the indictments charging murder and attempted murder.  
Contrast Commonwealth v. Contos, 435 Mass. 19, 27-32 (2001). 
 
Conclusion.  The convictions of murder in the first degree 
and of attempted murder cannot stand for the reasons we have 
explained.  We vacate the attempted murder convictions and 
remand them for a new trial.  We affirm the verdict of arson of 
a dwelling house.  Because the jury necessarily found the 
required elements of felony-murder in the second degree, based 
on their verdicts of murder and of arson of a dwelling house, 
and because the erroneous admission of the defendant's 
statements was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt as to these 
required elements, the Commonwealth shall have the option of 
either having the conviction of murder in the first degree 
vacated and proceeding with a new trial on the murder 
indictment, or accepting a reduction of the verdict to felony-
murder in the second degree.18  Within fourteen days of the 
                                                          
 
18 We have considered and rejected the defendant's argument 
that the admission of that part of the July 6 recording where 
the police officers chastised the defendant for having "lawyered 
up," and the prosecutor's reference to this characterization in 
closing argument, created a substantial likelihood of a 
 
36 
 
 
issuance of this opinion, the Commonwealth shall inform this 
court whether it will move to have the defendant sentenced on 
the lesser offense of felony-murder in the second degree or 
whether it will retry the defendant for murder in the first 
degree.  See Commonwealth v. Rutkowski, 459 Mass. 794, 800 
(2011), and cases cited.  We will issue an appropriate rescript 
to the Superior Court after the Commonwealth informs us of its 
decision.  If the Commonwealth opts to move for sentencing on 
the lesser offense of felony-murder in the second degree, the 
conviction of arson of a dwelling house would of course have to 
be dismissed as duplicative.  See Commonwealth v. Gunter, 427 
Mass. 259, 275-276 (1998), S.C., 459 Mass. 480, cert. denied, 
132 S. Ct. 218 (2011). 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
So ordered. 
 
                                                                                                                                                                                           
miscarriage of justice.  The defendant chose to admit the 
entirety of the video recordings in the hope of persuading the 
jury that her statements were not made voluntarily, and 
therefore should not have been considered by them.  This 
strategy may have been unwise in retrospect, but it was not 
"manifestly unreasonable when made."  Commonwealth v. Housen, 
458 Mass. 702, 711 (2011).  Nor was it an error "likely to have 
influenced the jury's conclusion."  Commonwealth v. Wright, 411 
Mass. 678, 682 & n.1 (1992).  Viewing the references to the 
defendant having "lawyered up" in the context of the totality of 
the evidence, we conclude that it did not create a substantial 
likelihood of a miscarriage of justice as to any of the verdicts 
that we affirm in this opinion.